Student Production Analysis - Cast in Shadows
Ufello films’ logo appears on a black screen in a hand written, white font, which contrasts with the black background. This is characteristic is a classic thriller convention which Levi Strauss introduced called binary opposition. In addition to the font and background, there are also two blue lines that appear to have been smudged. The colour blue often connotes coldness, and within the thriller genre, enigma-another common feature. A crescendo occurs at the end of the logo which adds tension to the following scenes.
The production logo then fades out and reveals the word ‘presents’ which is out of focus, possibly to further suggest mystery, just as the colour blue also does. A long establishing shot of a bus stop next to a main road is shown showing the area in which the events of the film opening are going to take place. This fades to the logo for Touchstone Films which gradually zooms in and then fades into opening scene.
A long shot of a girl walking past the camera and coming towards the bus stop at a fast pace with a worried look on her face, denoting distress and that something may have gone wrong, is seen. A straight cut to her walking into the shelter follows, whilst the camera slowly zooms into it. A mid shot of the girl shows her taking her phone out of her bag and then an over the shoulder shot of her entering a phone number is seen. A parallel edit shows a mid-shot and due to his non-verbal codes- what appears to be her boyfriend on a sofa giving, suggesting that he is the one she is ringing. A further straight cut shows her holding her phone up against her ear waiting for him to answer. The use of parallel editing then shows him pulling his own phone out. His room contrasts as it uses chiaroscuro lighting; low key and high contrast, whereas the bus stop is high key and low contrast, while being unusual for a thriller, it shows a great degree of realism whilst emphasising this is an everyday situation. A shot reverse shot then shows their phone conversation. She seems rather worried and anxious as she talks to him and insists that he comes to see her straight away fast paced editing and a prolific use of close ups of the girl’s face shows her emotions, creating tension.
Both characters wear very casual clothes showing realism and going to the bus stop is seemingly everyday situation, as well as them being just ordinary people thrown into a very strange set of events. This is a common convention that thrillers use to connect the audience with the actors, with the strange events taking place being the main source of entertainment.
Her apparent boyfriend gets up and the walks to the bus stop with a long shot showing him walking away as if he is walking into danger and away from his safe home. He walks to the bus stop with his hands in his pockets indicating that he is rather relaxed. He then begins to seem quite agitated and nervous when the girl isn’t there waiting for him. A point of view shot shows him surveying his surroundings, looking for her or any sign that she has been near. At the end of the POV shot, a non-diegetic percussion instrument can be heard, creating enigma and mystery. He sits down and scratches his head, which has connotations of confusion. He takes his phone out of his pocket and begins to dial her phone number, indicating that he is concerned about her and wants to establish her location.
He proceeds to phone his friend, and this is seen through an over the shoulder shot, in which he says “hey babe where are you?” The word ‘babe’ indicates they are close and further suggests that he is her boyfriend. This means that her disappearance may have more of an effect on the viewer than if they hadn’t, through the Kulshov Effect. While he is talking on the phone, the camera zooms in so we can focus on his non-verbal codes, which adds to the sense of terror. We hear a diegetic sound from the phone-the name - “James”- that is enigmatic, as it clearly isn’t his girlfriend, from the voice heard. He then looks confused in his non-verbal codes, with his scratching his head etc. Alien-like music emphasises the mystery of the proceeding shots and the ring he finds forms another enigma as to where his friend is. These enigmas are a common convention of the thriller genre, as well as serving the purpose of adding mysteries to the overall plot.
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| Whip pan |
He then walks out of the shelter to see if anything is behind him and then we see a POV shot from the antagonist and possible abductor’s perspective, which zooms out, making the actor appear isolated and helpless. He then shouts “Sasha” and then the same style of POV shot used earlier, along with a whip pan, again connotes that he is helpless and there is no one within his surroundings to help him.
POV shot
The editing noticeably speeds up as he hears “James” again. Alternating between the POV shot from his point of view and the POV shot from the antagonist’s point of view, and the camera tracking to show the antagonist’s movement out of the bushes, steadily builds tension. He then looks away from the protagonist, and the protagonist’s POV is shown once again this time as the antagonist gets closer, a non- diegetic sound of a metallic echo is heard, again, heightening the tension.
A hooded figure is then seen from a long shot. His dress code hides his identity, creating enigma, which is another convention of the thriller genre; the antagonist’s identity is often not revealed until the end of the film. He runs around the bus shelter and both he and the protagonist disappear as a car drives past on the main. The title of the opening “Cast in Shadows” is then shown, and again it uses a convention of the thriller genre- binary oppositions- which is between the black of the background, and the white of the text connoting, a struggle between good and evil, from what has been seen in the opening itself.
Regarding Tzvetan Todorov’s theory of narrative, at the start there is equilibrium where it is just an everyday occurrence of a girl walking to a bus stop, suddenly there is a disruption where she is nowhere to be seen after her boyfriend comes looking for her. The recognition of disorder occurring comes when the boyfriend calls the girl on his phone, but it only says “James”. Finally, he attempts to repair the damage of the disruption by calling her name, however, it could be said there is no equilibrium as he is taken by the antagonist and nowhere to be seen. Or, it could be said that a new equilibrium has been established in that the opening finishes with them disappearing.
Propp’s theory of characters that appear in a narrative is also adhered to. The hero is the boyfriend, as he seeks his girlfriend. The villain meanwhile is the hooded figure who actively blocks the hero’s quest to find his girlfriend by taking her and him. The dispatcher is the girlfriend, who calls the hero by phone and dispatches the hero on his quest to save her. The girl could also be said to be the Princess, as she acts as the reward for the hero and the object of the villain’s plots.
Whilst analysing this student productions we notices things in which we would like to put into our film and other stuff which we would leave out. They use enigmas well within the film such as 'where has the woman gone?, who is that guy? and how does he know James name?' which would keep the audience watching to reveal these answers.
They also used sound effects well and made it fit into the mood of the film which helps build up the atmosphere with the strange noises. We also noticed that they zoomed into the locations as the character entered and it was done how they did it, so we will probably replicate that shot in our film.
Although, we noticed there were a lot of shakey camera movements as if it was done by hand when it shouldn't of been, or as if the camera has been nudged, which isn't very professional. The story itself isn't very gripping which makes it hard to keep interest when watching the opening which can detirmine for some people if they will enjoy the film or not.
