Insidious: Chapter 2 opening deconstruction

Insidious opening deconstruction 

Mise - en - scene

Mise en scene is an important aspect in films, particularly this scene of Indicious. The background is extremely dark and therefore the audience are unable define some objects in the clip. The scene starts off with a little boy in bed wearing pajamas, this item of clothing includes innocent animated images which give us the impression that the boy is:

• Young 
• Pure 
• This contrasts greatly with the actual movie as it is classified as a psychological horror movie. 

Additionally, the location is also important as it sets the scene and gives the audience an idea of what type of character the little boy is. The bookcases in the background demonstrate how knowledgeable and educated the boy may be, which again allows us to get an understanding of what the character is like. 

A small lamp on the bedside table could suggest the little boys' insecurity during night time, this reinforces the idea of the character being quite young and therefore "scared" of the dark. 
The whole bedroom has a sense of comfort and security as it is predominantly made from wood, this includes the bed, walls and bedside tables, this contrasts greatly with the initial genre of the movie which is horror.

Lighting

The lighting varies throughout the clip, for example natural lighting is used which mainly shines through the curtains. The natural light is extremely limited as the scene is set in the night, this therefore reinforces the theme of 'horror' as night time is most commonly used within the horror genre.
Furthermore, artificial light is also included through the use of night lamps and glow in the dark items, lighting such as lava lamps. Soft light is also used to emphasise the child's face whilst he is sleeping, this suggests that he is the main character in the scene. 

Sound 

In this particular scene, there is little sound used because it is trying to portray a scene in the night, where the majority of people are asleep.

• Diegetic sound is used in some parts of the scene, this refers to the sounds that the characters can hear for example, the slight noises of insects such as cricket can be heard from the window outside. This sound technique therefore sets the atmosphere and mood of the scene. 
• As the clip progresses the volume of the sound increases rapidly, this creates a lot of tension in the scene and already makes the audience scared in the opening seconds. 
• Volume of sound corresponds well with what is shown on screen, for example a close up of a candle wick when the volume is at its highest point. 

Camera angles/movement
From the short clip, we can already see a variety of camera angles and movements, for example the use of panning which gives the audience an impression of what the surroundings look like and get a feel of where they are in the scene.

• Birds eye view shot - which again gives us an idea of the setting 
• Close up shot of the items which are placed around the house
• Medium shot - giving us a view of what the room look like, including a shadow lurking in the background
  

Typography 

The titles used for Insidious are mainly in the colour red or black, both of these colours have strong connotations of:

• Death
• Blood
• Devil 
• Evilness 
• Horror, ghosts and supernatural people

The sound corresponds well when the title 'Insidious' pops up, this is shown in bright red with almost 'devil horns' on each of the letters, this therefore works extremely well with the actual genre of the movie (psychological horror)

Deconstruction of 'Endless Love'

This clip is the opening scene to a film called 'Endless Love'. The genre of this film is Romantic Drama. I studied this clip as research into my horror film opening. My group decided to look at different genre's to get inspiration as to what to do for our coursework.  

CONVENTIONS 
While watching this clip and many others similar to this, I identified some features which I think are very conventional in the Romantic Drama genre. For example. 

• The main protagonist(s) are mostly always a male and female.
• There is always a best friend or someone to confide in that the protagonist can turn too. 
• The couple fall in love but there is something that stops them being together. 
• They couple overcome the obstacle or the complication stopping them and become happy together. 
• The opening scene is usually just introducing the characters and finding out their personalities and what they do in their day to day lives. They are not always familiar with each other and have very different styles of life causing them to fall in love as it is something new. 

CAMERA ANGLES

• The film starts off with close up on the main female protagonist Jade, this is to tell the audience that she is a main character, we can also clearly see her facial expression and the audience can connect with her from the minute the movie starts
• There is also a high angle shot which shows Jade taking a picture of her other classmates. This is effective as is puts the audience in a higher position than the characters which makes Jade look very small and inferior which is probably how she feels as she was excluded from the photo. 
• We are introduced the the male protagonist David, with a close up shot as well while we hear his thoughts about Jade. 

SOUND

• The diegetic sound helps us as the audience connect with him character and warm to him as they know exactly what he is thinking.

LIGHTING

• The natural light is used to show the realism in the film. As it is a bright and sunny day, it could portray that something good will happen later in the film and that there is a good atmosphere in this scene. 
• There is also a lot of soft light which could portray the delicateness of the protagonist.

MISE-EN-SCENE 

• The first scene is set at a school which shows that the characters are probably teenagers. 
• Jade is carrying books and walking with her parents portraying the typical good girl who follows her parents orders and doesn't get into trouble. The fact she was carrying books shows she is academic and takes school seriously. This idea is reinforced when she says 'I spent 4 years of high school getting ready to to get into the 4 years in college'
• The baby blue she is wearing connotes also connotes her innocence and purity and maybe the sadness she has experienced in her life since her brother died. Another connotation is the new life her and her peers are beginning since their graduating and leaving school. 

Action Film Deconstruction

Action Film Deconstruction: The Raid: Redemption

Lighting
The use of low key lighting helps to portray the importance of the character we find out to be the main character this coupled with the use of hard light shows the details of his body structure highlighting that is only by his hard work that will help him over come his challenges.
When his wife is shown laying on the bed the light changes to soft key (chiaroscuro)  which suggests how important his wife is to him, and how her life as a mother and a wife is contrasted to his life as police man. This is typical of action films as the main character finds themselves fighting and surviving because of the family they are trying to raise.



Sound

All of the sounds in this scene are diegetic, as it is an action film they are all over emphasised but they are only the sound of his heavy breathing and the impact of his hands on what he is doing. However the absence of sound when his mouth is moving connotes that his voice has less importance than his fists, although not many realise it but many action films lack explicit conversational dialogue, and many action film veterans cannot act very well in anything else but action films.
There is no use of non-diegetic sound, like music, whilst music is said to create an ambience by not using it there is a sort of empty ambience created





Camera Movement

When Rama is using the punching bag to train the use of handheld camera movement helps to emphasise how fast he is punching because it makes his hands hard to follow, as an action film this is a useful technique as it is used to make the protagonist look extremely powerful and skilled . It also suggests that as a police man this type of training is an everyday occurrence as handheld camera movement can also connote a sense of reality in a scene.


Although most action movies begin with an establishing shot, either an aerial shot dolly shots or a crane shot  of the general area the film is taking place. For a film like this it works to have eye level shots so that we are able to identify with the life of our main character and those he is trying to protect.

Mise en scene



Slasher film opening

Slasher Film Deconstruction

Instant death opening:

The viewer is immediately engrossed into the film.

The viewer will want to know why the victim has been targeted.

The viewer will want to know how they were killed, (sometimes, even thought the death is shown in the opening, it is not clear how it happens or why, it is left to be figured out by other characters in the rest of the film)

The viewer is made to feel very uneasy from the beginning.

By having action straight away keeps the viewer interested in the film.

The immediate death scene can be made to look original by combining the idea with a great location and good casting of actors.

The girl in the opening on Scream is evidently the first girl to get murdered. We can see this film will follow the conventions of a slasher because 'The Final girl theory' states that the first girl who dies will be sexual promiscuous, blonde, have a boyfriend, isn't a virgin etc. Therefore Drew Barrymore's character follows these conventions. the opening scene mainly consists of just this character. The first camera angle we see here is an eye level shot. This is so the audience can observe the scene in a human way. This makes the scene appear normal as the girl is going about her every day routine. After the girl puts down the phone to continue her evening, it rings again and the camera angle changes to oblique/canted. 

The camera angle has changed to a canted/ oblique angle here as the phone rings again for the second time. This shows to the audience that the character is going through a sense of fear which could lead to disorientation. As the scene continues onwards the audience starts to feel more scared and unnerved due to the camera angles and the expression on the characters face. The camera angle goes back to an eye level shot after this scene.

The phone rings for the third time and the camera goes back to eye level. This is almost tricking the audience into thinking everything is okay as the character is making popcorn and talking in a flirty tone. The character is wearing a yellow jumper and blue shorts which are both signs of purity and thus subverts the characters personality. Blue and yellow are both pastel colours that can appear as cute and immature which suggest that the character is also flirty and playful. Finally the hairstyle for the girl is a short, blonde bob which represents the time the film was filmed in, also the short hair frames her small face and accentuates her features. Drew Barrymore's character also has a fringe which is normal for the time period. This girl cannot hide behind her hair and the shortness also shows her shoulders and if she was to wear a tank top it would accentuate them. The mise en scene of the room is very normal, the girl is placed in her house and everything appears normal which subverts what's actually happening in the scene.

Sound
The opening also starts with a non-diegetic scream which gives the audience a sense of foreboding into what might happen in the end of the movie. The phone rings before this occurs which portrays that the phone call is going to have major significance to the scene. The non-diegetic music appears again when the person on the phone says 'I want to know who I'm looking at', this therefore scares the young girl who's on the receiving end of the call and the music adds to the rising tension. The orchestral strings music is a low, ominous sound. After a diegetic sound appears which is a dog barking. When dogs bark that suggests something/ someone has disrupted it and it's barking to alert people. The teenage girl starts to panic here and continues to lock all the doors and turn the lights on.

Camera Movement 
Throughout the opening there are lots of pans which follows the character around the scene which suggests the normality of the scene and also puts the audience into the characters shoes. When the teenage girl starts to run to lock the doors surrounding her home the camera shifts to a slight tilt as she turns the corners. This reflects to the audience that soon something bad will happen as the camera movement reflects the distress in the character's mind. The camera movement is very basic in the opening scene to reflect the normality of the characters situation.

From this deconstruction I can infer that camera angles, diegetic and non-diegetic sound are the key aspects which create the slasher films tension and fright which are inflicted upon the audience watching the movie. The camera angles change as the scenes start to become more frightening. The diegetic sound of the killer over the phone the entire scene made the character scared and isolated. Therefore making the audience unnerved and frightened by what may happen.