Genre Research - Vertigo

Vertigo, made in 1958, was directed by Alfred Hitchcock, considered to be one of the greatest thriller directors of all time. The movie itself is also considered to be a classic of the thriller genre. It stars James Stewart and Kim Novak. James Stewart plays a retired detective who has ‘acrophobia’, a fear of heights, who is hired by a wealthy shipbuilder to follow his wife, played by Kim Novak. Her husband fears she is going insane as she believes she is possessed by a dead ancestor. Although unsure at first, James Stewart eventually agrees to follow the beautiful woman for personal reasons.

The audience will assume that the man hanging from the building is the protagonist, as he is given the most screen time. The shot reverse shot of the protagonist, to the police officer back to the protagonist connotes our reliance on the police when we are in danger.

 

The picture then becomes clear and we’re shown a man climbing up a ladder in a hurry. The unclear image connotes the ambiguity in most thrillers – how at first, the narrative may not be clear but as the story unfolds it become apparent what is happening.

The ambient music running over the credits help to build tension and suspense. The soundtrack plays a large role in Vertigo, and in most thriller movies, as it adds impact to certain events. For example, as the policeman falls to his death the music rises in tempo. This connotes the escalation in tensions.

The credits are viewed running over the face of a petrified woman. It is obvious that she is terrified by the way her huge eyes are constantly darting from left to right. A regular theme in thriller movies is to use black and white colouring, this again helps to build tension and is a device used by Alfred Hitchcock quite a lot.

The black and white colouring then changes to a red filter. The colour red connotes many things – blood, danger, death etc – all of which are usual ingredients in thriller movies. The red filter also helps the white font to stand out, in particular the “Directed by Alfred Hitchcock” credit.

The audience are shown a close up of a man who looks afraid, then the camera pans out and we see the man is climbing up a building, being chased by policemen – the policeman could suggest that this is a crime thriller.

As the credits go up, the camera focuses largely on an extreme close up of a woman’s face. The camera zooms into her lips, gradually panning up to her eyes then zooming in on them so we can see the extreme fear in them – automatically the audience knows this movie is either a thriller or a horror due to the element of fear.

Codes And Conventions Of Movie Openings In General.

The first things you will see in the opening of a movie are the various production and distribution logos that have helped make the movie. Sometimes the logos might be changed and edited so that they relate to part of the storyline. For example in the 2010 documentary “Catfish”, which references to the internet and the social networking website ‘Facebook’ various times, the logos appear via a mouse clicking on the screen and bringing them up, so that they appear to be website pages.

The opening shot of a movie will generally be a blank screen with titles going across, or an establishing shot to set the scene. The title screens can help the audience to identify the genre, for example if the movie is a horror, the titles may be an eerie font of the colour red, with the sounds of screams etc running over them. The ways the titles are generated also help with this, for example if the titles come on in a misty fashion, it could suggest the movie is of a supernatural nature.

If the movie has big actors in it, they will be given a lot more attention and screen time as opposed to the less well known actors. Sometimes, the big stars do not actually play that big a role in the film, and do not even appear in the opening. However, they may be one of the more prominent characters shown in posters etc – this is because the producers recognise that certain stars attract a larger audience. Other movies are sold purely on stars though, and audiences go to see the film expecting to see that actor straight away. For example, if a romance features Hugh Grant or Julia Roberts, its most likely that they will be in the opening shot so as to please viewers.

Some movies, generally those aimed at teenagers, will start off by pointing out all of the different steretypes. For example, the “geek”, “busty blonde”, “virginal female”, “arrogant jock”. This helps the audience to identify the “heroes” and the “villains” straight away.

Many movies begin with voiceover, more so in contemporary movies than older ones. This is a clever device which allows the audience some insight into the protagonists mind. Voiceover is always helpful if the movie is a sequel to another film, it is an easy way of recapping the former movies, without having to include self-explanatory, unrealistic dialogue.

The same codes and conventions do not apply to ALL movies – different genre, different opening typicality’s. For example, majority of horror movies will open with a murder of some sort, obviously a romance movie will not do this. Thus, there are not really a certain set of “rules” that every opening scene of a movie must follow.

Genre Research - Memento

For one of my genre research case studies, I've decided to analyse the opening scene of contemporary thriller Memento. Memento, directed by Christopher Nolan, is a contemporary thriller made in 2000. The movie was written by Jonathon Nolan and Christopher Nolan, and stars Guy Pearce as its protagonist. It also co-stars Carrie-Anne Moss and Joe Pantoliano. ‘Memento’ centres around a man with short term memory loss, and how he uses notes and tattoos to help him in his search for the man he believes killed his wife. The movie creates suspense and tension through editing, sound, mise-en-scene and cinematography to make it fit in to the ‘thriller’ genre.

The editing in ‘Memento’ is very fast, the cuts are very quick which creates a choppy effect and tense atmosphere. Fast editing is quite regularly used in contemporary thrillers so as to capture the audience. As the genre has progressed, thrillers now need to be fast paced and full of tension – this differs to older thrillers in the sense that they would usually be quite slow.

For the first 90 seconds, we have no dialogue, but instead atmospheric music. The music compliments the happenings on screen and is very effective in creating a tense mood for the movie. We hear a bullet and a man scream as he is shot, then we then cut to a male lying on a bed. The audience are presented with non diegetic voiceover, he is obviously our protagonist since he is the only character who we have clearly seen thus far.

Around about one minute and forty five seconds into the clip, the movie changes from colour to black and white. The shift in colour suggests that what was once clear is now blurred and ambiguous. Our protagonist's face is also half shadowed when the colour becomes black and white, further reinforcing the so far unclear storyline.

Once the colour changes to black and white, we are shown a close up of our protagonists facial expression. He appears to be very confused, and we have a pan around the hotel room from his POV to further suggest this is an unknown location to him.

The black and white colours, though they do connote his uncertainty, could also be a homage to the older thrillers. For example, Alfred Hitchcock, who regularly used black and white to colour his movies. This creates a sense of suspense and unordinary events.

The first minute of the movie appears to be one long shot of a man shaking a Polaroid picture, as he shakes it the content of the Polaroid disappears – contrary to what usually happens when you shake a Polaroid photo.

Eventually, the audience are made very aware that the scene is taking place in reverse. The medium close up of the hand holding the Polaroid photo placing it back inside the camera, then taking a picture and placing the camera in his coat pocket makes it obvious that the scene is going backwards. The director has done this to create a sense of wonderment from the viewers, most thriller movies aim to do this.

The POV pan around the room from the protagonist’s perspective creates a sense of speculation among the audience, especially as he says it is an “anonymous room.”

The high angle canted shot in black of white on the male on the bed suggests someone may be watching him.  This is a regular theme in thriller movies; however the shot could also connote a sense of disorientation.

Preliminary Task