Film Clips -Elizabeth Roy

Film Techniques Used to Evoke Emotions

1. Bunny
My distaste and discomfort was caused primarily by the strange, dim lighting, which invoked a feeling of dirtiness and disuse. The feeling of annoyance was emphasized by the constant uncontrollable movements – those of the lamp, moth, ingredient shaker, cupboards, etc. Also, the bizarre viewpoints emphasized the straggly fur of the rabbit, which I found distasteful. The bright flashes of light from the oven were a color of an entirely different spectrum from the rest of the house, which is what made it feel particularly weird and creepy.

2. Northfork
The snowy white image combined with the wide shot makes it feel desolate, the combination of the bison and the snow gives a hint of strangeness or otherworldliness. The juxtaposition of the bison’s stillness made the boy’s movement seem more intense. The wide shot showing the mountains and fields would normally be a ‘nature’ shot, but the car intrudes. The car –perhaps representing humanity in general – seems out of place, unwanted, and insignificant.

3. Paris, Texas
The music invokes loneliness, as does picture of one person and hawk. The first shot is beautiful, with multiple colors and a lovely landscape, but when the man enters it seems dirty because you can see the dust all over his suit. The man and hawk are compared and contrasted – they are both alone in the desert, but the hawk is content and is master of the desert, while the man is strangely driven and is slave to the desert. The mountain behind Walt is ‘normal’ – shaped nicely, green, and fertile, rather like what one would expect. The one behind Travis is rocky, not as pretty but far more interesting, mysterious, and uncertain. The setting where Walt is seems cluttered, hectic, and rather ugly. The setting where we see Travis is wide, open, free, and beautiful. There were many straight lines (such as the road, power lines, and train tracks) that connect people, and Travis is following the communication route of the power lines. The line of shoes is representative also of transportation, as is the highway that Travis is watching. The huge freeway represents how huge of an expanse there can be between two people when they try to communicate. It takes Travis a long time to traverse the freeway, and he encounters something unexpected on the way that could have blocked his path (the crazy man). Travis and his son, Hunter, communicate and connect in the midst of highways and cars. In the scene where Travis has found his wife, she is in a setting of warm colors and bright light, whereas he is in a place with harsh colors and darkness. When his wife finally realizes who he is, she must turn the light off – come down to his level of darkness – in order to see him. The whole aspect of the mirror plays with the idea of whether or not the two people are truly present. Travis hasn’t really been there the past several years (perhaps more than that) and Jane says it was easier for her to talk to him when he wasn’t actually there. The view of the insulation also plays with the idea of incompleteness and illusion.

4. The Wall
The colors of the animation – black, brown, and red – convey a feeling of horror and despair. The dull colors of the scenes where the children are in school make you feel horror and despair also, but in a more hopeless sort of way. The stark lines, distasteful order, and factory setting heighten this feeling. The factory is taking normal children and churning out mindless, identical pieces of meat. At first it is not apparent that the children have melted, horrific faces, but it eventually becomes more clear – just like the effects of the real-life school system. When the children finally revolt, the colors of passion appear in the fire and in the machetes. The flower animation uses vaguely humanoid melting figures to invoke disgust and revulsion. All of the ‘human’ figures in the film, are, in fact, very misshapen and horrific. The symbolism of the judgment scene shows the protagonist as a helpless, limp doll, the judge as an anus, and the schoolteacher as an evil marionette.

5. Cabeza de Vaca
The chaos, disorder, and fear of the attack scene is caused by the jumble of confused images and blurry colors. During this scene, the silver cross that Alvar wears is focused on - because of its size, clarity, and central placement in the shots where Alvar is captured, it is clear that the cross is powerful and important. In the scene where Alvar is trying to escape, his movements are compared to that of the tied lizard in the shaman's ritual - just as the lizard cannot escape its circle, Alvar cannot escape his captors, and when the shaman spits on the lizard, Alvar trips in the water. During this, the fast-tempo music heightens the anxiety and suspense. When Alvar is coming into his power by healing the man with the damaged eye, the audience sees two kinds of camera angle: the wide angles showing the hut and spectators is from Alvar's eyes, and we see how confused and dazed he is at the moment. The closer angles where we see Alvar's face and the Shaman's expression helps us realize the import of the event as the Shaman watches Alvar's actions closely.