Camera Angles in 'The Thing' (1982)

One of the most haunting films in the 1982 horror film "The Thing" is the scene that can only be described as the defibrillator scene. A truly disturbing experience for a first viewing, and makes you very cautious and paranoid about peoples stomachs. The camera angles used in this film do not hide the horror, they seek it and force you to watch it, and this scene is no exception with its use of practical effects that are chilling. The first shot is a mid shot which shows the characters over the man's body who needs medical attention. The shot then changes to close up on the man's stomach and the doctor's hands, holding defibrillators. The "dead man"'s stomach then opens up, and he has teeth in his stomach, which swallows the doctor's arms, tearing them off and swallowing the defibrillators. The way the shot stays focused on the abyss inside his stomach, and the horrific mouth with sharp teeth that bite off the doctor's hands is truly horrifying, and it does not care to show the reactions of the other characters. It wants the viewers to be disgusted and truly horrified, like they were there just as the other characters were, but you get closer, seeing his arms ripped through the socket and the bones tear off with blood flooding out. It also uses examples of panning, from where it shows the true monster's neck, waggling, and pans up to show its horrific face and arachnid like arms, with many close ups of the monster to truly scare the audience.

Friday the Thirteenth (2009) Camera Angles

Friday the 13th Camera Angles

The reboot of Friday the 13th in 2009 is set in present day, but the opening scene and it's camera angles show the origin story, leaving no mystery to the story that will take place in the present. The filter used is black and white, and this is to clearly show that it is the past. It also establishes this by telling us the location and date of the scene, which is June 13th 1980. The first shot shows the wooden sign 'Crystal Lake Camp', showing us where the location is. It is a closeup, and we can see the black letters written on the torn wooden sign. This is a good establishing shot, as it shows the eeriness of this camp site, and tells us just where it is located, in the middle of the woods. the perfect place for a hunter to stalk his prey. In the shots there is rain and lightning, a storm is a conform in a horror, as the it traps the characters in an environment that they cannot control, So the heavy rain, thunder and lightning adds more drama to the scene. All sounds are cut when a name appears on the screen, as if to give the audience some quick time to prepare themselves for what will happen next. The most common shot used in the opening is a mid shot, as the girl who is limping holds her stomach and you cannot see her legs. 

There is a long shot, where it is hard to see because of the black and white, but we get the sense that she is running because she is being chased and hunted through the forest like environment, with the trees, mud and lake all in her path. 

The lack of diegetic sound in this scene makes it rather boring, so if our group was to ever do a flashback scene, we would use diegetic music to make the scene more interesting, because this flashback is not engaging, and the filter on the black and white is too much and you can barely see what is happening. There is an over the shoulder shot, as the camera pans towards the innocent girl. 

There is then a close up of the crazy woman's head on the floor, where it was hacked clean off, and another high angle shot on the girl running away. This is how the confrontation ends. The decapitated mothers somehow talks to  her son, who was supposed to be dead. A gentle keyboard plays as he picks up her objects, and she narrates what he must do. The opening credits continuing every few seconds. There is closeups of the objects he takes, but the quick pace and the annoying lightning makes it hard to see what is actually happening, 

These camera angles make it easier to know what we would want in our production, because if there was to be a flashback scene we wouldn't want to have lightning effects too bright for the audience to see what is happening, and we would make it known that it was a flashback another way by showing a blur in the corners of the screen instead of a black and white filter, as it makes some things in the shot unknown, 

Camera angles deconstruction - student-made scene

I am deconstructing a student-made scene because it enables us to see how effective others are at making the film look professional using camera angles, and to see how filming will be for us (if we can incorporate any effective camera angles that we see).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1RtH0oiBerk

This scene opens with an establishing shot of the area to show where the scene will take place. The shot fades out into the titles, then back into a pan mid-shot of two characters as they walk together. This again fades into a screen with the two actors' names, building suspense as it cuts away from the scene. It follows them to a bench where the camera then tilts downwards as they sit down to keep level with them. There are a few shots of the couple together before it fades again, adding possibly more actors' names.
 

Paralleled with a sinister non-diegetic soundtrack, there is a point of view shot from the killer as he looks through trees at the couple from behind. This cuts to a shot of the couple laughing, adding a sense of danger and tension because this contrasts to what may happen to them. There is a mid shot of the two standing up and walking away from the bench / log they were on, and then another killer POV shot as they start to walk through the woods.
 

The killer's POV shots are handheld to make the shot look more natural like it is what someone is seeing exactly, and the shakiness makes the killer seem more unstable mentally. There is then a long shot of the killer in the woods, and we're unable to see him because of it being so far away and the branches of trees covering him up. This boosts the suspense momentarily as we see the killer.
 

Another still, long shot of the couple walking hand in hand, showing the setting again. The setting is calm and peaceful and the snow makes it look very clear, however it's surrounded by many trees making it look more isolated. There is a side-on shot of the couple as they look out over the lake which is full of ducks and birds.
 

Immediate suspense and dread is felt as there is another killer POV shot and he is right behind the couple, walking up to them slowly. It again fades to another credits screen like it has throughout, making us anticipate the next scene because it has cut away at the most suspenseful part. There's another side-on shot of the couple and the girl steps forward and out of the shot, then a very quick mid-shot of the boy and the killer right behind him about to kill him (which made me jump). This cuts away to the title of the film.
 

Camera angles are very important in this film opening as they allow the scene to establish so we understand what is happening and what may happen next. This shows us that they're very powerful to the scene so we will have to think about the specific ones we will use in our scene to make it as effective as possible.

Deconstruction of Camera Angles in an Opening Scene

Camera Angles in Halloween

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ELF1DCf1ChA

Halloween is a slasher film from 1978, directed by John Carpenter and starring Donald Pleasence and Jamie Lee Curtis. It is the first instalment from the Halloween franchise.

The film is set in the fictional town of Haddonfield, Illinois and the opening scene is Halloween 1963. In the film, Michael Myers escapes form a psychiatric hospital 15 years after killing his sister and stalks a girl called Laurie Strode and her friends. His psychiatrist then suspects what Michael is doing and follows him to Haddonfield to stop him form killing anyone.

• An establishing shot at the start of the opening scene shows that a house is the location for the opening scene.
• The opening scene is done in one take with a handheld camera, first it pans across the side of a house showing pumpkins which explicitly show that it is Halloween. 
• it is all done in a point of view shot from the killer's perspective, which we could use for some of the shots in our own opening scene. The use of a point of view shot with no editing makes it seem more realistic and also more dramatic for the viewers. Also, the ambiguity of not knowing who the person is creates tension and mystery in the scene.
• The pan stops at a window which shows a medium long shot of two teenagers kissing on a sofa, then when they run upstairs there is  a quick pan from left to right which reinforces the idea that the shot is a point of view shot.
• Next, the point of view shot pans across back to the front of the house where the killer looks up at the window, where it can be presumed that it is where the two teenagers are.
• The handheld camera then moves across to an open door where the killer walks into a dark kitchen, turns the light on and gets a large knife out of a drawer, hinting to the audience that there is going to be a murder
• The handheld camera moves slowly through the house so that viewers can see the inside of the house. A medium shot reveals a rocking chair in the corner of a room which is often shown in horror films to create a sense of fear in the viewers.
• A high angle shot shows the teenage boy coming down the stairs, making the teenager seem more important than the killer. This could be a hint to the fact that the killer is a young boy.
• The lighting changes from completely dark to dim lighting as the killer goes upstairs which is to allow the viewers to see what is about to happen
• There is a close up of a clown mask on the floor, which the killer then puts on his face. When he puts it on the shot is darkened around where the clown mask would affect his eyesight. We could use this in our opening scene when we do point of view shots from our killer when she has the sack on.
• The killer walks into the room and shows a medium shot of the teenage girl brushing her hair and the camera slowly gets closer to her until it becomes a close up shot and the girl turns around and sees the killer. There are then more close ups as the killer gets closer to the girl while stabbing her, then there is a conventional shot of the knife being stabbed into the woman but only showing his hand and not her body. We could use this as inspiration for the murder at the end of our opening scene.
• A medium shot reveals the girl lying naked on the floor, showing her to be powerless and vulnerable and also conforming to the conventions that the 'slut' dies first in horror films.
• The killer then quickly leaves the house, while still wearing the clown mask. WHen he gets out, the camera changes from a handheld point of view shot to a medium shot which zooms out, showing the mask being taken off the boy, revealing that he is young, which subverts the common conventions of killers in horror films.

Watching this and analysing the different camera angles made me realise how many camera angles we're going to need in our opening scene. This deconstruction has definitely helped me to understand how camera angles can affect the effectiveness of the scene.