Monday 21 September 2015

Film Language

In today's lesson, I learnt about Textual Analysis in films. I studied camera angles, editing and sound effects. I also studied the Mise En Scene and applied this knowledge to analyse films.


Cape Fear


In the opening scene of Cape Fear, the lightning is natural. the actor featured is male and in his 40's. He has a tattoo of a cross on his back which have scales hanging from the sides, one of the scales say 'justice' and the other says 'truth', the one that says truth has 'The Bible' balanced there. He also has greasy hair and is quite muscular. The cross on his back symbolizes his religion, he also has Bibles as props and serious books throughout the opening. The setting is in a prison with cells then when they leave the prison it seems sun then you see the grey skies, everything is exaggerated as being worse than it is. The sound is the music in the background which is a dramatic instrumental that is parallel to the filming. The camera is an continual tracking shot from the prison and when he leaves the prison.


Boyz n the hood



In the opening sequence of 'Boyz n the hood' the background is in a classroom of children with them all talking, in the background sound you can hear mysterious sounds such as squeak, as though there is trouble in the area where they are. Also there is a ridiculous large amount of swearing that the children say highlights that there is clearly trouble in the area they are in. The word 'nigga' is repeated many times, this word shows that black people are poorly treated in the film at that point of time, and that no one has respect for different races. There are also statistics on the screen that highlight the negative treatment that is directed towards the black people. All of this builds tension at the very start of the section. The shots used are mostly medium long shots, mid shots and long shots of the children featured in the film, it is used so that we can get the detail of the characters in the first scene.












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