Today in class we watched a scene from The Godfather and briefly discussed some of the techniques the director, Francis Ford Coppola, used to heighten the tension and suspense in the scene. Review a suspenseful scene from a movie you've previously seen. Then, comment on some of the film techniques used by the director to help achieve the desired effect in the scene. (Please include the title and director of the film you choose to address.)
10 comments:
I have recently viewed the film "The Air I Breathe" directed by Jieho Lee. In this movie, a gangster named Pleasure extracts money from those people who "owe" his boss, Fingers. Pleasure has the rare ability to see the future. When Fingers commands Pleasure to snatch a wealthy popstar, Trista, he does not fully obey. Pleasure falls for Trista and hides her in his apartment away from the greedy Fingers...
While Pleasure is out at work, the phone in his apartment rings. Trista sleepily picks it up. Fingers is surprised to hear a female voice, and Trista identifies herself. A look of horror overcomes her face as she realizes the secret relationship she has exposed. The phone slams, breaking the silence of the quiet evening to which she has awoken. No music plays, which makes the scene eery. Lee's use of dramatic facial expressions, abrupt movements and sounds, and his absence of traditional suspenseful music contrast with the tranquility of sleep and set the stage for the terror of the next scene.
Pleasure enters a dark house after work, a classic sign that something mysterious looms. The thunder outside signifies that his world will come crashing down, the rain representing the tears of both he and Trista. The lights switch on, and violent punches and kicks crowd the screen. Lee confuses me with this chaos. I am eager to know who is hurt. The camera flashes to Trista, tied to a chair, and then to Pleasure, lying on the ground. The quick movements maintain my attention. The volume of Fingers' verbal abuse mirrors the track of a roller-coaster. At times I lean in to hear his barely audible whispers, but jump back in response to his angry screams. I believe that Pleasure will foresee the outcome, but he foresees nothing. Lee has tricked me. As the filmmaker switches from individual shots of Fingers to individual shots of Pleasure, who is reaching for a knife, the distance between the men is unclear. Is Pleasure close enough to Fingers to attack him? The lack of focus on the spatial relationship of the characters blinds me to what happens next. Fingers whips around to put an end to Pleasure. Lee's inclusion of darkness, stormy weather conditions, violence, varying volumes of speech, and clever camera shots characterize this scene as highly suspenseful.
WARNING!!! THIS IS A BIT OF A SPOILER!
A movie that is mostly built on suspense is "I Am Legend" directed by Francis Lawerence staring Will Smith. The reason I chose this film is because without suspense, this movie would've failed. Will is pretty much the only human in the whole movie, except for the very end of it. F.Y.I. this is a movie where a science experiment goes wrong, and people are affected. Most people become monsters, however some have an immunity to this air disease, but finding the cure is the real problem that Will is troubled with.
One thing the director does is that when Will goes to sleep in the movie, you can hear all the monsters in the background coming out. You can see him start to sweat and get nervous while this creatures are going on their rampages.
The director also uses Will's watch to add suspense. Will has to live by the hour, meaning that at a certain time he has to go out, at a certain time he has to be home, and at a certain time he has to board up his house. This beeping alarm is a reminder of the mistake he made, no matter how hard he tries to live a "normal" life, this alarm keeps him from that.
Will has dreams throughout this movie. From beginning to end, he dreams of the incident when the chemicals are released to when his family dies. The thing about these dreams are that Will usually wakes up at the climax of each dream. This builds the suspense because you really have to be patient to find out while he is so troubled.
The director has diverse camera angles during the movie. He does not have the camera always in 1st person or 3rd person mode, if you know wat I mean. Will is usually at the center of this movie, but there are times when the director pans the city and shows how empty it is. This builds both the suspense and the drama in the film. It raises the bar for fear, and it is quite suspensful to be isolated for so long from society, all he has is his dog.
Refering to society, Will's character watches the news every morning. The thing is these are all recorded. This adds on to the suspense because it shows just how alone he really is.
But to emphsasize one particular scene, it has to be the very end when Will's character is locked in his lab with the cure and a mother and child. The thing is, there are tons of creatures/monsters on the other side trying to get in. The head monster wants his daughter back you could say. Will took it to find a cure. As Will is trying to figure out what to do, the monsters are rushing at the plexyglass window, trying to break through. When the glass is practically cracked, Will tells the woman and child to go through this escape route, and take the vile with the cure in it. The best part of the scene is when the head monster takes one final run at the window to break through, meanwhile Will runs to the window with a gernade in hand. It is the most suspensful scene in the movie. The fact that it looks like a school yard fight about to go down is very dramatic. The suspense just builds as the camera angles shift from Will to the woman to the "daughter" to the head monster to the monsters. It is truly a suspenseful scene and this is truly a very suspenseful movie.
A movie that I have seen with a lot of tension is The Guardian. The director is Andrew Davis. The movie is about Jake Fischer the Cost Guard because he couldn’t save his friend’s lives. At first Jake Fischer is out to prove how good he is, but it leaves some awkward moments when he is trying to knock out Ben Randall, his instructor’s records. At the end of the movie, after the two become friends and colleagues, it is not possible that the two of them can both survive on the helicopter. Andrew Davis sets the scene to take place on a dark, stormy night. It pulls at the heartstrings because they made a rescue, but it cannot be called a success. The music gets softer and softer, the roaring winds and the wooshing wind dies into the background. The two talk about what is to come, and Ben Randall decides that he needs to let Jake Fischer survive and continue the legacy. Jake Fischer, wanting to start the legacy at that moment keeps hold of the Ben Randall’s hand, and Davis shows the grasp slipping. Then there is a dramatic burst in music as Ben Randall purposely lets his hand go to allow Jake Fischer to live and go on saving others.
A movie that I have seen and love is The Gladiator. This entire movie is filled with suspense with its battle scenes and the tension between the two main characters just continues to build. For one specific scene, the battle for germania is played out perfectly by the director. It begins all dark with suddle music playing in the background which gives you a sense that something is about to happen. When the two meet it is initiated by throwing a severed head. Right then you are not sure what is going to happen. One side reamains still while the other shouts and screams. As the men prepare for battle, Russel Crow's character just remains calm yet the intensity builds as they are all yelling and getting into place and the music begins the increase. The fire is released from one side and the music is now blaring and that is the initiation of the battle as all chaos is realeased. The fighting in that scene is very suspenseful as well because you watch the characters fight for their lives and see who will survive.
The movie JAWS is, in my opinion, one of the most classic suspense movies directed by Steven Speilberg. The story of a killer shark terrorizing a small island is scary, but what makes it a classic suspense film is the mood set by the director. The first thing you hear when the film begins are those creepy piano notes which today are synonymous with shark attacks. Also, nearly every time we see the shark, its presence is only hinted at. For example, for much of the shark hunt, its location is represented by the yellow barrels. This idea of concealing the shark largely adds to the suspense of these particular scenes
"The Shining" written by Stephen King, directed by Stanley Kubrick. Oh, I love that movie SO much. The whole thing is a giant suspenseful scene, but my favorite part is when Wendy (played by Shelly Duvall) finds her husband Jack(played by Jack Nickelson)'s "story".
OK, here's the backround: Jack decides to be the caretaker of the giant Overlook Hotel in the Colorado mountains during winter, and figures he'll bring Wendy and his son too. Jack is a writer so plans on writing his novel during his stay. He begins acting a little crazy (cabin fever), so when Wendy goes to ty to find him in the massive lobby, she brings a baseball bat. She shuffles her way down the stairs, calling Jack's name, and ends up finding Jack's typewriter and a stack of papers(still in the typwriter). She sees that one of the pages has the phrase "All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy" wriiten on it continuously. Creeped out, she begins looking through the dozens of pages to find that all have the same phrase written on them over and over in different configurations.
This is the good part: the camera is pointed up at Wendy's face, which becomes more and more horrified and on the verge of tears as she flips through the dozens of pages her husband has typed. The music meanwhile grows from some dull pricks on a string instrument to the sound of roaring violins being played by cheese-graters! It sounds amazing and terrifing (the music in this movie is fantastic). Then the camera switches to behind her to the far right, and gradually begins to glide to the left. Then the camera view passes mere inches in back of a dark pillar, blocking Wendy from view (and making it appear as though someone is walking with the camera). When the camera view finally passes from the pillar, it is almost directly behind her and only a few feet away, at which point the audience sees a man step into view (unknown to Wendy). Then all the music stops, giving the entire scene a tremendously unsettling feel. "How do you like it?" Jack suddenly asks, making Wendy shriek (which echoes in the silent lobby) and whip around. That is one of the greatest scenes ever; if anyone hasn't seen "The Shining"(1980), then watch it. It's not scary as in gore and violence, its just creepy and gorgeous. It is suspenseful. IT IS ART.
I'm surprised that no one has talked about this movie yet, but I'm going to have to choose The Dark Knight directed by Christopher Nolan. While it isn't a favorite of mine, it does have a few key suspense tactics that have made it such a popular movie.
The movie begins by showing the headway Lt. Gordon and District Att. Dent have made in fighting against the crime that has plagued Gotham. Just when it seems like things are looking up, the joker steps in and disrupts any progress the progress made. Gotham plunges into chaos as he begins to kill off innocent people in order to force Batman into revealing his identity. So as the movie continues, suspense builds up as more and more people die, and joker's tactics at killing them, intensify. One of the most suspenseful scenes is where people are loaded onto two boats that are leaving the city in order to escape the chaos. Convicted felons board one boat, sourrounded by crowds of citizens. Nolan makes the tension clear by sourrounding the boarding prisoners with angry people, shouting and waving their fists. The second boat is filled with the innocent inhabitants of Gotham.
As both boats are heading away from the city, the lights flicker on and off, and electrical control of the boat is lost. The question "what now?" immediately comes to the viewer's mind. The director moves in quickly, setting up the situation in only a few minutes. There's the sound of whispering, hushes, and people looking around in confusion as a guard on each boat heads to the engine room and discovers the oil barrels all rigged with bombs. Nolan has the camera settle on the image for a few seconds, accompanied by pure silence. Immediately after, pakages are brought up to the decks where the joker comes in and announces his "social experiment" to all the people onboard both boats. As the joker speaks, Nolan chooses small, yet significant moments to add suspense. The camera focuses on a mother with two children huddled in her arms, and then on another women making the sign of the cross against her chest. Both boats are given a time limit to choose wether or not to blow up the other boat. The camera consistently switches views from one boat, to the other boat, to the city where Batman hastily speeds to the Joker's location.
Nolans strategy in this part of the movie is to identify the problem incredibly quick in order to leave no time to think. The rush of information establishes the suspesnful scene. But the following time, where the viewer has to wait and watch, is where the suspense comes in. Nolan drags out the remainder of the scene, in order to let the viewer anticipate the ending. He adds the growing frustration and anger of the passengers of each boat to emphasize the decision they're faced with making. As the scene goes on, action in all three camera "views" becomes increasingly complicated. And still, no decision is being made on either boat. Nolan does an excellent job in this scene of devloping the suspense, and I could go on and on about his film techniques.
I have recently watched the film version of the musical Phantom of the Opera Directed by Joel Schumacher. on of the suspenseful scenes in the movie is when Christine first meets the Phantom. she is in her dressing room with her boyfriend. once the boyfriend leaves the room, the all the candles dim and start to flicker (a common suspense techneique), and then a strange wind starts to blow even though there are no windows in the room. Christine starts to hear her angel of music sing to her and it tells her to look at herself in the mirror. when she does she understands that the Phantom is actually inside her mirror in a secret passageway. when she is walking toward the mirror, the entire scene slows and the only thing that is moving in actual time is the music and the phantoms voice. this makes the action of her walking towards the mirror so much more intense. finally once she is through the mirror her boyfriend is banging on the door trying to find her, and all you see is the rose christine dropped on the ground outside the mirror. the scene is very suspenseful and there are many other scenes like it in the film
I just saw "Wanted" (with James McAvoy (Wesley) and Angelina Jolie (Fox)). In the last scene (I think), the characters are faced with the decision of either to kill themselves (and follow their "code") or kill the main character, Welsey. They are all surrounding Welsey with guns pointing towards him. They are in a large circular room with complete silence. The director chooses a bird's eye view as he zooms in on each of the people one by one. One of the guys (who is pointing the gun) all of of sudden basically says to hell with the code and starts pulling the trigger. Fox (Jolie) who is one of them is suddenly shown pulling the trigger and ends up killing everyone but Wesley (in honor of the "code").
On Thanksgiving I went to see Australia, directed Baz Luhrmann.
The film wouldn't neccessarily be classified as a suspenseful drama or anything, but it deffinately had its moments.
One thing that I picked up on early in the film was that all the characters, except the aborginals had blue eyes. The only white person that didn't was the Drover, Hugh Jackman. The clarity of the surroundings and contrast of the colors of the enviornment intensified and brought attention to the blue eyes of the white characters. The aboriginals, on the other hand, all had extremely dark skin and the contrast between their eyes and skin color was really defined. The director made it a point to create a magical/mystical quality for the native Australians. The picture's increased contrast and often abstract shots of the people made them eerily enigmatic.
There were several close up shots of characters, further drawing attention to the differences and similarities between their eyes. The young boy, who is half aboriginal and half white, doesn't know who exactly his white father is, and the constant focus on the different characters faces and the definition of their eyes against their skin are a huge hint to the audience.
The other thing that creates a lot of tension is when Australia gets bombed (its set during WWII), the bomb strikes Nicole Kidman's workplace and the camera cuts out just as you'd get to see the flailing bodies. It can be assumed, due to the slow somber music and dark dust clouded sky that the destruction ended her life.
The best part is when the whole town is collapsing and fires are springing up everywhere, Hugh Jackman attempts to enter the white guys bar with his black friend. The bartender stares at him and simply says his usual line about not allowing colored people in. At that moment the camera does one of its close ups on Jackman and he starts to cry. Without a crescendo in the music or any real fighting, the scene is incredibly intense. You're not sure at first whether he's going to fight the bartender or just walk out. The silence is screaming.
Post a Comment