In my continuing goal to become a better teacher, I am putting up more exam answers to help students to see how to structure an argument and refer in detail to a text.
This is an example of an answer for Section A of the A2 Film Studies exam. Section A covers world cinema and there is a focus on urban stories and how they deal with issues of power, poverty and conflict. The films looked at are City of God, La Haine and Tsotsi.
Check out my answer on social and political context here.
This answer is on visual features of the films studied.
This is an example of an answer for Section A of the A2 Film Studies exam. Section A covers world cinema and there is a focus on urban stories and how they deal with issues of power, poverty and conflict. The films looked at are City of God, La Haine and Tsotsi.
Check out my answer on social and political context here.
This answer is on visual features of the films studied.
What are the distinctive visual
features of the world cinema films you have studied?
World
cinema films are often positioned as art house films and therefore their visual
styles can be very different from their Hollywood
counterparts. However in the case of some
world cinema films such as City of God,
there are elements of the visual style that could be aimed at a much wider
audience. The three films studied, City of God,
La Haine and Tsotsi all have very different visual styles but they are also all
devised in ways that emphasise the realism of the representations on screen.
City of God and La Haine have very different visual
styles. Both use the mise-en-scene of
real locations to add to the realism of the films. In City of God, the filmmakers chose to shoot in the
real Brazilian favelas that are depicted in the film. This adds to the realism and the choice to
use many non-professional actors also aids this. The film looks in many ways like a
documentary with its real locations, lack of recognisable star faces and also
the cinematography that captures the scenes.
The favelas are very unfamiliar to global audiences and the striking
poverty including endless grey concrete and shanty style huts, skinny animals
wandering around and the electricity wires that hang precariously in many shots
all increase the sense of hardship that the inhabitants face. The characters’ clothes are similarly torn
and raggedy and Benny’s desire to get new clothes after earning more money
through drug dealing reflects his desire to break free of the poverty of the
slums.
Similarly
the locations used in La Haine emphasise the realistic nature of the
content. Les banlieues on the outskirts
of Paris are
filled with more grey concrete. High
rise flats are hemmed in together so that the sounds of the estate ricochet
around. Though not in as desperate
poverty as the slums of both City of God
and Tsotsi, the locations used in La Haine are still grim, depressing and
hopeless. The youths in La Haine sit
around in simple playgrounds, one flicking a discarded syringe with his feet
and hanging out in the cramped apartments that are very different to the open
plan luxury of the Parisian apartment they later visit.
All
three films contrast their poverty stricken locations with opposite locations
to emphasise the poor conditions. In
City of God, we see the journalists large open plan offices and one journalists
house (that Rocket notes has hot running water), in La Haine the youths end up
in the centre of Paris in a lush art gallery where the attendees are offered
free champagne and called ‘sir’ and in Tsotsi the audience sees the contrast of
the townships where Tsotsi lives with the gated mansion of the rich people he
steals from. These contrasts help to
emphasise inequality in society and help the audience to empathise more with
the youths in the films who struggle with crime, drugs and violence.
Another
contrast between the films is that whereas La Haine and Tsotsi are set over
short periods of time, City of God
is set over decades and the mise-en-scene effectively shows this time
span. Les banlieues and the townships
stay the same but the favelas in City of God
noticeably change from sun drenched, open and almost optimistic looking places
to grey, concrete lined alleyways that hem in the characters and give a sense
of claustrophobia.
None
of the films use a star which helps to create more realism as the faces of the
characters are far more believable and their performances and occasionally
improvised dialogue in the case of City of God adds to the sense that the viewer is
watching real people’s lives.
However
all the films are stylised in some ways.
La Haine uses black and white cinematography to enhance this realism by
linking it with the real footage from news reports shown in the opening
credits. This real footage gives the
viewer real social and political context at the start of the film as we can see
that riots and confrontation with the police are genuine occurrences in the
French banlieues. Similarly City of God also uses real
footage but places this at the end of the film in the closing credits. Unlike La Haine which uses black and white to
give a sense of grey, boring reality to the scenes, City of God begins with
bright colour (in the sixties and seventies) but as the narrative progresses,
the colours become duller as the concrete trappings of urban development take
over. The use of colour reflects the
more innocent crimes of the early characters before plunging the audience into
the darkness and despair of the later scenes.
Tsotsi uses naturalistic lighting but also emphasises the beauty of the
townships through the golden sunset tinged establishing shots.
Handheld
camera is used throughout City of God
enhancing the documentary feel, whereas La
Haine features more steadicam movement with long flowing shots following
characters through their environment.
City of God
is hectic in both its cinematography and editing. The opening chase scene is a great example of
how the films subject (a chicken running for its life) and the film form used
reflect each other. The point of view
shots from the chicken, the close ups on the chicken’s face and the low angle
shots of Lil Ze are rapidly cut together to give the impression that the viewer
is watching something as it happens and gives a sense of the hectic,
danger-filled environment of the favelas.
There are many close ups that can disorient the viewer by not allowing
them the conventional establishing shot that sets the scene. On the other hand the close ups give a great
level of detail about the favelas helping to create a realistic and atmospheric
representation. The close ups of the chicken’s face in the opening scene
accompanied by close ups of blood, knives, instruments sets up a party
atmosphere but also a tension and fear for the chicken’s life (and by extension
protagonist Rocket’s life). The use of point-of-view shots also helps the
viewer to identify with Rocket and we often see events from the view of him or
his camera.
The
use of strobe lighting in Benny’s death scene and the parallel editing between
Blacky entering the dance hall and the rest of the people partying creates
unbearable levels of suspense and is a standout scene where editing,
cinematography and mise-en-scene are used to create meaning for the
viewer. The fast cuts, quick zooms and
unsteady camera all emphasise the hectic nature of the scene.
La
Haine uses much slower paced shots with a very deep depth of field in its
cinematography. This conveys a sense that life is much slower in les banlieues
with the boredom of the main characters being emphasised. The three youths look
like they belong in their environment as they are constantly in focus and the
camera often tracks them through the streets of their estates. There is one
shot where the camera floats over the streets and flies high above the
buildings as a DJ plays a tune from his window.
This one shot alludes to the sense of freedom provided by music. One
scene in City of God
is similar to La Haine with its use of depth of field as the story of the
apartment is relayed to the viewer. This
scene is all one shot and fades between different moments in the story of the
apartment as characters come and go. La Haine uses this same technique when
Hubert is smoking in his room. The camera stays in the same position but the
image jumps or fades to Hubert in different positions. Both these scenes draw attention to the
editing while using static shots of a single location. The cinematography of La
Haine also changes when the youths arrive in Paris.
The depth of field becomes shallower and the youths suddenly stand out
from their environment, reflecting the way they feel and their exclusion from
the environment they find themselves in.
The
editing also adds to the restlessness of the camera in City of God with lots of quick cutting and speeding
up of footage. La Haine, on the other
hand, favours shots with a longer duration and the editing is less choppy than
in City of God. This emphasises the idea that life is fast in
the favelas, whereas life is boring in les banlieues. However tension is created by using a number
of ‘explosive’ cuts at the beginning of La Haine. The image cuts, for
example, on Vinz pretending to shoot a gun at his mirror image and hitting a
boxing bag. The sound of a gunshot is
used on each of these cuts. This means
the combination of lengthy shots punctuated by sharp, loud cuts keeps the
viewer on edge and builds expectations of something abrupt happening after the
youths spend so long sitting around being bored.
Overall
the most noticeable visual features of the films are in the mise-en-scene. The
striking realism of the locations is very powerful and gives audience a
powerful sense that what they are watching is real. City of God’s flashy
editing and handheld camera aesthetics work to both give the film a documentary
feel but also to draw attention to the style of the film, perhaps taking away
some of the realism. Tsotsi is the most traditionally shot of the films and
again it is the mise-en-scene that is most powerful. However the editing and cinematography of
both La Haine and City of God
add to the meanings created in the films and is rewarding on repeat viewings.
Most of all they have several scenes that stand out in the memory for their
effective and experimental visual features.
What do you think? Do I get an A? Any feedback always welcome.
A* excellent answer, well done.
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