Tuesday, 25 May 2010
Monday, 24 May 2010
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Saturday, 3 April 2010
Psycho: An Intro Analysis
Psycho is a 1960 American thriller/horror film directed by Alfred Hitchcock. The film is based on the screenplay by Joseph Stefano, who adapted it from the 1959 novel of the same name by Robert Bloch. The novel was based on the crimes of Wisconsin serial killer Ed Gein. The film depicts the encounter between a secretary, Marion Crane (Janet Leigh), who is in hiding at a motel after embezzling from her employer, and the motel's owner, Norman Bates (Anthony Perkins), and the aftermath of their encounter.
From the beginning of the intro credits we hear loud and moody music that sends us the viewer into a sense of fear as the director seems to be communicating through the music that the film isn't going to be happy from the very start. We are then introduced to the first part of the film, we are presented with an aerial view of Wisconsin which slowly zooms into a window . This shot tells us the audience of our location and the pan into a random apartment is in my opinion is really smart and well edited because it gives the sense that the rest of the film is about a real person and a real situation, the music in this segment is also a complete juxtaposition as it uses string instruments to almost calm the viewer from the boom of the previous music and say that the city is calm, normal and safe.
Friday, 2 April 2010
Dawn of the Dead: An Analysis of its intro scenes
Dawn of the Dead is a 2004 American horror remake of George A. Romero's 1978 film of the same name. The remake and original both depict a handful of human survivors living in a shopping mall surrounded by swarms of zombies, but the details differ significantly. Directed by Zack Snyder and his directorial debut, the film was produced by Strike Entertainment and was released by Universal Pictures and stars Ving Rhames, Sarah Polley and Jake Weber with cameos from original cast members Ken Foree, Scott.
The introduction scene is about 5 minutes long and uses lots of methods to quickly tell the audience who the main character is, what the situation is and from this create a near instant conflict which grabs the viewer’s interest immediately. In the first few second of the film we see a skull that is glowing a bright gold, this then fades discretely into an x-ray image being held by a doctor in an over the shoulder shot. This then changes to a long shot of the doctor and the main character (Ana) who is tentatively listening to the doctor who is talking to a friend on the phone about a social outing. Already within just over a minute of footage we know that something about the x-ray may be foreshadowing later events (he enquires as to why the patient has been x-rayed when he came into hospital about a bite), that at the moment everything is normal as the doctor is talking to his friend as if nothing in the world is bad.
Ana then walks out of the hospital to notice a pair of legs sticking out of an ambulance. In this segment the camera has been tilted to make her look as if she is still in a state of power. The use of costume really helps to add this mise-en-scene of her being still powerful and safe. She then approaches the legs to reveal that it’s just an ambulance driver sleeping in the job, this is then followed by an aerial view of her driving home with the song "Have a Nice Day”. These two parts of the scene are very clever. The reason for this is that when Ana investigate the ambulance non diagetic music starts to play which makes us the viewer feel as if something is wrong with the legs sticking out of the ambulance, but as previously stated its all fine. I think the Director was once again referencing the zombie scenes in which a survivor finds a recently deceased person only for them to reanimate into a zombie. The next clip is a complete juxtaposition as the music is calmed and relaxed, we have an aerial camera view that I believe references how she's in a built up area and most probably safe and even the fact that the music is diagetic shows the clear contrasts in clips. I think this exists in the film to communicate to the audience that something bad is going to happen but for now we know that every things fine and dandy.
Later on we meet Ana husband lying on their bed, he says how someone they know has gone missing (zombie foreshadowing) and they then proceed to have a shower together. In this segment we as an audience form a form a bond with the husband and so when he dies and is reanimated the director successfully scares us psychologically. Also the use of focus changing conveys to the audience that the couple (Ana and her husband) are unaware of the Emergency broadcast playing in the foreground on the television. This change in focus also helps us the viewer to realise this so that we know something is important to plot is soon to happen. The last minute or so consists of the husband waking up to find a zombie girl in their room, assuming she's just and injured girl he wakes Ana up and picks the child up only to be bitten. He then turns into a zombie and then proceeds to chase Ana who flees into her car, the intro ends after she crashes into some trees. The use of on-scene-effects like the husbands bleeding neck, explosion from the car crashes and decomposing zombies create a repulsive and shocking mise-en-scene that creates panic in the viewers mind, also the fact that there is such a large amount of blood within such a short amount of time also adds to the shock value. Finally the last segment in which Ana is driving away uses a camera or dolly that is attached to the car which creates the effect that we the audience are in her situation, also from these clips it changes to an aerial view of the chaos in the area which helps to create a juxtaposition from the first aerial view we saw.
So in conclusion The director frequently foreshadows his zombie pandemic to create suspense before it begins, he does this with the camera, actors and even the music. By using blood, on-scene-effects and fast pace he also creates a sense of fear in the audience. The director also uses camera angles to communicate certain things like basic plot line to the audience.
Thursday, 1 April 2010
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