1. Halloween opening scene – 2007 version.
Halloween is a 2007 Americanhorror film written, directed, and produced by Rob
Zombie. In the opening sequence of Halloween, a close up of all the family members
is used, which could imply each character had their own individual psychological
problem, or suggesting there is something wrong within the family. Starting from
the beginning; we see the young boy named Michael who is masked by a clown, in
most horrors, masks are used to hide the true identity and make someone look
different and in this he’s not just wearing it because he likes clowns, it’s to
intimidate and maybe masquerade his actions. We then see a close up of the female
in the kitchen which appears to be the older sister or even a young mum of Michael;
I think this is used to show she knows more than what she tells people, it’s as if what
she knows will harm people so she is keeping it inside. Later we see a medium close
up of the male character which appears for mise en scene to look rather dirty and
not well nurtured; he also doesn’t seem to be bothered about his appearance. He
seems to be clueless about every situation and most likely unaware of the
psychological damage to Michael, he just thinks it’s a faze. Just a few seconds later a
close up of a baby is shown and the baby is screaming because of the arguing and
shouting going on around her. She is completely oblivious to what is happening, all
she knows is that she doesn’t like the volume of conversation, this doesn’t really give
good reviews of the family as they continue to shout long after they hear her crying.
The dialogue used throughout the whole kitchen scene is full of expletives, “fucking”
is repetitively used in it to portray violence and aggression and on a whole just
generally no manners or consideration for others. What looks to be the teenage
daughter comes into the kitchen and for mise en scene wearing stereotypical
confident teenage clothing, she appears to have on a short skirt a crop top and a
small cardigan hanging off her shoulders, this to me shows she isn’t very
interested what others think and is more than happy to show her body off and
not care about the consequences. The non-diegetic sound of the radio in the
background helps create a sense of normality however along with all the
arguing and shouting it just adds to the effectiveness of the enormity of what is
going on. A sound bridge is also used as at the beginning; Michael is listening to
a band either on the radio or on a cd etc. and when we change the scene to the
kitchen the same music is playing, this could be trying to emphasize equality or
just how loud Michael is playing it that it can be heard from a different room on a
different floor. A cut shot is shown from when Michael is in the bathroom then
quickly cuts to the kitchen, this makes it more flowing and saves time, the fact it
keeps cutting from the bathroom to the kitchen could show that so many things
are happening at once and make the audience feel a bit hesitant, it could also
could just be to change the setting and build and create an image or idea. When
the mother and her boyfriend are aggressively speaking in the kitchen a shot
reverse shot was used. This could be to help us see who is speaking at the time
and indicate that it is a two way spontaneous conversation. The teenage girls
makeup is what you would expect for a teenager, quite heavily done and a bit
much but this is just to support her ago and young youth. The setting is just a
stereotypical kitchen full of equipment like pots and pans and food etc. to create a
sense of realism. A jump cut is used when Michael is in the bathroom washing the
blood off his hands; the scene suddenly jumps to his sister knocking on the door.
This is used to dramatically introduce a disruption and interference.