1. Christian Owens
10/10/2013
How Do We Analyze a Film?
There are many ways that a film can be analyzed but the main way that a film can be looked
into in the greatest detail is analyzing the Codes and Conventions. Codes and Conventions
are the rules that govern how a piece of media is shot or written. Techniques such as
Iconography, Mise-en-Scene and Narrative are used that go into the making of a piece but
you probably don’t think about this when you watch a movie.
Looking into these certain techniques breaks the movie down into its key aspects and allows
the person watching to see that across a lot of films that the same techniques and conventions
are used but certain directors like to challenge the typical conventions.
A conventional narrative that is used in a film starts with a Beginning, middle and end. This
can also be known as a Conventional Linear Narrative (Straight forward Story). In a
conventional film for example James Bond you know that Bond is the hero and as the story
progresses you then already that he will get the girl and ride off into the sunset. This is
typical for an action/thriller such as this to have a set story because it is seen as a corporated
project with alots of money being thrown into it. So the movie must be made to have specific
features so that the audience know what will be coming.
Directors who contest the conventional codes and
conventions are commonly known as Auteurs this is
French for author. “Any filmmaker who has
unconventional ideas or challenges towards the
accepted genre conventions and tries to break away
from them.”
Leon is a great example that breaks conformity to the
action thriller genre. You can clearly see this in the way
the characters are formed throughout the movie. Leon is
the male protagonist in this film but is seen as the
unconventional hero, as he hides behind his glasses and
hats and does not look like your typical hero being very
tall and skinny. This is compared to your conventional
hero James Bond, who always wears a suit, never hides
his face and he has a sense of aura that makes him seem
powerful. The director chooses to use these techniques
and go against the conventional methods because it
creates an interesting film when the audience

2. Christian Owens
10/10/2013
cannotpredict the way the main protagonists thinks and what his next moves will be.
The biggest difference between these two films that go for and against the codes and
conventions is the way that women are portrayed in their role through the entirety of the film.
In James Bonds ‘Quantum of Solace’ women are sexually objectified to the audience as they
end up with the hero (Bond) at the end of the film every time. Whereas the female
representation in the film Leon as seen much differently to the typical codes and
conventions.
Although there is still some sexually objectification towards some of the older women who
are seen as quite weak and helpless.Whereas the character Mathilda shows characteristics of
an older strong women, who fights to be at Leon’s side. Sort of like the love interest of the
movie. This is unconventional because Mathilda is a 12 year old girl, whereas Leon is around
age 30. The director Luke Besson went against the conventions to see how the audience
would react to this weird relationship and if they would have the
same emotion towards the main characters compared to the
typical relationship like James Bond.
Conventional and Unconventional techniques can fit into every
type of genre such as Action, Comedy and War. A conventional
War film that sticks to these conventions is the Green Berets
which was produced in 1968 by director Ray Kellogg and John
Wayne. Which are about two highly trained Green Beret teams
that are sent in for a mission in South Vietnam to fight against
the war towards America to save innocent people. This is a
conventional film as it’s about American hero’s saving lives and
showing that they are the good guys that always win and only
fight people who oppose them. This is
shown in the Mise-en-Scene by how
the guns are held and how much gore
is shown to the audience.
An auteur film like Apocalypse Now is a good example for
unconventional techniques. Francis Ford Coppola the director of
the film shows this in the editing as he uses cross cut to show the
helicopters flying in ready to attack using music to scare the
enemy and say that they are coming. This would be raw footage of
what the American Soldiers actually did in the war. That they
actually killed women and children. This is compared to the clean

3. Christian Owens
10/10/2013
look of the green berets. The Mise-en-Scene plays a big part of this with the many helicopter
roaming over the villages and The way that the Americans are setting up their gear preparing
for war knowing what they need to do and what they are heading for.
Pulp Fiction is a crime/thriller film made
in 1994 by Director Quentin Tarantino.
Till this day Pulp Fiction is still the most
invigorating film experience a filmgoer
can ever hope for. The reason this movie
was so success over the years is the way
that it breaks conformity and
conventions of a typical Crime/Thriller
film. The way that the Quentin does this
by using character development of
secondary characters that you would not
likely see in a typical crime film.
The characters Vincent Vega (John
Travolta) and Jules Winnfield (Samuel Jackson) are hired hitmen. In films such as James
Bond you would only see the bad guy for certain periods of time usually as they commit the
crime and the time they get captured or killed. In this film they take the bad guy and give
them a background and allowing the audience to get to know them better.
Vladimir Propp defined that there were several types of character sets such as: The Hero,
The Helper, and The Princess/Damsel in distress. If Pulp Fiction followed typical
conventions then the hitmen would be seen as anti-hero that looked like they wanted to help
but ended betraying the hero in the end because the film breaks conventions and characters
are developed we see them as the protagonists of the movie as we are laughing at their jokes
and rooting for them to come out on top.
The main reason that Quentin Tarantino is seen as an auteur director because of the way he
lays out the narrative. This is known as a non-linear narrativewhere there isn’t a defined
start, middle and end. In Pulp Fiction they use the scene of the movie at the start of the film
and then return to that exact scene at the end but at a different perspective. Also the change
in narrative can be seen as they tell the same story from different perspectives. So if a
character dies in one scene of the movie, they may return in the next scene as it might be
someone else’s perspective. The audience would not be able to piece the film together till the
end.

4. Christian Owens
10/10/2013