This is our opening sequence of our horror film ' Left out the box'.
Here is our analysis of the mis en scene, editing, lighting, sound and camera angles included in the opening.
Sound:
Throughout most of the opening sequence, in the background,
there is a piece of non-diegetic dark eerie music, which builds up the tension
and creates a soundscape. We have also found a piece of music called ‘Evening
of chaos’ which plays whenever the doll is visible in shot. By playing this
piece whenever the doll is on camera, it informs the audience of the dolls presence,
giving off a feel that the doll is almost lurking around and watching over
Heather, the protagonist. The non-diegetic piece is effective and works well in
the opening sequence because it is a contrapuntal sound due to the sweetness of
the children’s doll juxtaposed against the music which is mysterious and moody.
In the middle of the opening, there is a small amount of dialogue between the
main protagonist Heather and her friend. The girls have fairly high pitch
voices and speak in a quiet manner due to it being late in the evening. In our
opening there are several sounds like loud bangs, children’s giggles, screams
and heartbeats, which were important as they were what, made our opening
sequence and portrayed verisimilitude. Due to our cameras sound being a little
faulty we had to cut out these sound we made when filming and replace them with
sounds from sound garage and YouTube. The two series of loud bangs which are
made by the doll when Heather is sleeping is a diegetic sound, which sounds
extremely aggressive, leaving the audience wondering how the doll is able to
make such a dominating sound. The two diegetic sounds, the children’s giggle
and the female scream, which we use at the very end of the opening sequence,
are interesting because they are such opposite sounds. The juxtaposition
between them is effective, and leave the audience confused as one of the sounds
symbolises pain and the other happiness which leaves the viewers with a mix of
emotions.
Editing:
We have used a variety of cuts in our opening sequence to
allow the smooth flow between each of the shots. We have used a number of
straight cuts between the shots which are in time with the tension building
music, keeping a fast paced feel to the opening sequence. Cross dissolve shots
are used when switching between the antagonist (doll) and protagonist (Heather,
young and old) to allow smooth flow of scene, and emphasises that when she does
not have the doll , or are not in the room, the doll is always there, so the
audience are well aware of the dolls presence. Fade to black is used when the
shot goes from present into a black and white effect, of a flashback of Heather
when she was little, have included a black and white effect, as the colour
change signifies that this shot is a flashback of the girls when they were
younger, ensuring that viewers can follow the storyline and not get confused. In
the flashback shots of the young girls at the beginning, we slowed down the
speed of the shot which worked really well, as it made the speech sound
blurred, slow motion like and distorted which almost mimics the distortion of
time.
Camera:
Birds eye
view shot-The bird’s eye views is of the two young girls playing
with their doll. This is an effective shot as it lets us view the exterior of
the stereotypical young children’s room with colourful items and dolls and toys
in clear view. It is also effective as it could be perceived as CCTV in the
children’s room as we changed it into black and white for effectiveness. This
also ties in with a shot later on which shows us the bird’s eye view of the
dolls eye view.
Close up- The close up on the dolls face after we see the two
young girls playing with the doll makes us wonder what is going to happen and
also why we are being shown this close up of the doll. This is therefore an
enigma code for the audience. This is effective as it adds effects to the scene
and close ups are used a lot in horror films to get the audience connected to
the objects and also the people involved too.
Mid shot-As heather is getting ready to go to bed, we used a
mid-shot to show the exterior of the room. The room which heather is in is a
very stereotypical girl’s room with pink items and also cushions and pastel
colours. This I effective as it gives us a clear insight into what heather is
like.
Montage-During
the montage we get to see a number of things, at the start we get to see the
dolls face covered it blood which instantly makes the audience worry about
Heathers safety, we then get to see a quick shot of the university in which
heather is going to be going to. This reminds the audience on what is happening
and where heather has gone. The shots after these all match, as we get to see
the dolls eye and then heathers eye also, after this we get to see the dolls
mouth and then heathers mouth and then a close up onto both of their faces. The
end of the scene is a quick shot of heathers hand being dragged across the
floor. All of these shots are all very fast and it makes the audience wonder
what is happening and keeps them watching till the very end of our opening
sequence.
Mis en scene
The establishing shot is an exterior shot of the street
where older Heather lives. The street is normal and this shows the equilibrium
of the scene at this point. Her house is shown as ordinary but as soon as the
close up of the window occurs we start to see dark shadows appearing on the
walls, therefore giving us an indication that something might be wrong in this
world of normality. The doll is seen wearing normal every day clothing such as
jeans and a hello kitty top. These are stereotypical girls’ clothing and her hair
is also blonde. She the ideal doll for little girls yet she has a darker
supernatural side to her that the younger Heather is unaware of but becomes
prone to it later on in her life. The girls’ bedroom is also stereotypical as
it is filled with dolls, the walls are pink and the room is bright. The girls’
dresses however, are black Indicating that something darker is going to happen
to these girls in their life. The girls are also smiling throughout the flash
back scene. This facial expression is normally related to happiness so by
having the horror music in the back ground and the black and white colouring,
as an audience it I unsettling to see two young girls smiling when we know
something is going to happen. The older Heather is seen wearing pyjamas indicating
that the particular scene is set at night time. The doll is always above
Heather and is still wearing the same clothes, highlighting the doll have never
changed its love and protection for Heather but Heather has grown out of the
doll. When the blood drips down the dolls face at the end scene it is clear to
the audience the pure horror the doll holds and the evil that is inside it. The last shots show Heather at university
still being haunted by the doll.
Lighting
The establishing shot of our film uses ambient lighting as
the shots are of the exterior of the house. The window shot however has a
shadow of the trees and branches on the house which straight away gives the
audience an enigma code that this film is a horror film. We used an effect of
black and white for the flash back scene so that it clearly shows that the
little girls in the shot are now grown up in the duration of the film. Artificial lighting and low key lighting is
used for the evening time to show the time change and the night time scene we
were trying to portray. Very low lighting was used to create shadows when the
doll is shown for close ups and extreme close ups to mirror the supernatural, horror
feeling the doll has over Heather. Black and white colour change is used again
for the flashback when young Heather is hugging the doll. This is to show the
clear distinction between present day and a flash back. To make the audience feel uncomfortable even
more we made the bedroom scene pitch black when heather turns the little lamp
off to create even more horror atmosphere. Adding lighting just to Heathers
face made the audience explicitly know what emotion to feel at this point and
we saw Heathers initial reaction and nothing else. Once the biggest knock had
happened we then saw the main light for the bedroom being switched on. This
gave us a clear sighting of the doll on her bed and the horror that such a
normal girls room was being took over by a haunted doll.
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