Scene Deconstruction

Scene from the movie "Inception": http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0HM5YBXkE9s

            The scene I chose is from the 2010 movie “Inception”. The protagonist has entered the dream of the antagonist. In this scene, the antagonists realize that the protagonist is in their dream. The theme is that the subconscious is still conscious and nothing is truly ever subconscious. It is always influenced by conscious thoughts or actions. The theme is exemplified in the scene because once the characters wake up from the dream, they are still conscious of what was going on. The theme is definitely didactic because you infer that the conscious and subconscious are related, they don’t tell you.

            The space and movement of the scene both help to reinforce the theme of the subconscious being part of consciousness. First let’s talk about the space. The scene starts off in a very small room and the characters are given a flat and limited space. Later, as the scene becomes more intense, they move to a much larger room. This deep space represents how deep into our minds that dreams can go. The affinity of the rooms look helps to show that they are both part of the dream, while the contrast between the sizes of the rooms shows that the dream can go much deeper. The affinity of the space of the small room inside the dream and the small room outside of the dream helps to reinforce the idea of the conscious and subconscious being connected.

            The movement also reinforces the theme. The scene is active in telling the audience that the man is going to wake up the protagonist and we see that his actions have an effect on the protagonist in the dream. His movements of shaking, slapping, and dunking the protagonist underwater provides another link between the conscious and subconscious. The characters also actively tell you that the dream has become unstable and is collapsing, which is reinforced by the movement of the rooms inside the dream that literally begin to collapse. Didactically the audience infers that when a character dies they are woken up from the dream and brought back into reality. This is how shape and movement reinforce the theme of this scene and how contrast, affinity, and active and didactic storytelling play a part in conveying the theme to the audience.

Animation Deconstruction

First image: The Simpsons, Episode: "The Trouble with Trillions" (1998)

Second image: The Simpsons, The Simpsons Movie (2007)

            I chose to compare and contrast two images from the animated sitcom, “The Simpsons”. The first image is from an episode from the ninth season called “The Trouble with Trillions”, made in 1998. The second image is from The Simpsons Movie, made in 2007.

            New technology and animation techniques developed in the ten years between the two images have greatly enhanced the graphics. First, let’s compare and contrast color. The second image is much brighter than the first image. The characters from each image are still the same hue, but because of updated graphics the second image is brighter. The background of the first image is mostly dark gray and brown, which are cooler colors. This causes it to recede while the lighter colors of the characters cause them to advance in the image.  The background of the second image is pink, a warmer color that advances the background to bring it in line with the characters. The second image is made up of almost entirely warm colors, which gives the image a more comforting feel. This is reinforced by the fact that it is inside the Simpson’s house and so it feels “homely”. The first image has many cooler colors. This makes the area in the image seem less inviting, which fits Mr. Burns’ character. Also, the red in the first image contrasts with the all other colors. Both images are very colorful and feature a variety of hues.

            Now let’s discuss the lighting of each image. The first image has a constant lighting throughout and does not use any element of shadow. The second image uses lighting to create shadows in the image. Shadows can be seen on the walls and on the characters body. Based on where the shadows are placed you can determine where the source of light is coming from, even though it is not in the image. Going back to the color aspect, the areas covered in shadow are obviously darker in tone. The lighting in both images does not add to or create a certain mood and you are left to determine mood and emotion through the characters’ faces. However, the lighting also helps to establish depth and space within the image, because the characters and other objects are blocking the source of light which must be coming from somewhere other than on screen.

Storyboard Imitation

Movie clip from "The Thing": http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NtgFKdWcKXY&feature=fvwrel

This scene is from the movie “The Thing”, directed by John Carpenter. The scene actually starts thirty-two seconds into the clip.

The director follows the 180-degree rule during this scene. Between the first shots of the scene, the director moves the camera completely 180 degrees to go from looking at one end of the hallway to the opposite end. This works because he doesn’t cross the line and is focusing on the two groups of characters looking at each other. The next three shots are still on the correct side of the established 180-degree line. The camera is on the same side and follows the characters as they move along the hallway and look at the camera towards an unknown object.

The director does a good job of following the Rule of Thirds. During the first shot of the scene the two characters are in the middle of the shot. Then during the next shot the characters are in the top right area of thirds. From here the director moves the characters from the top left and right positions according to the Rule of Thirds. While these first five shots don’t show him using the bottom two portions of the thirds, he is placing the characters in the correct positions so people will look in the right spots.

Lastly, the director follows the 30 Rule. As I said before, the first shot moves 180 degrees to the second shot. From there he moves at least 45 degrees into the third shot while using a dolly to follow the character. From the ending position of the camera he moves about 45 degrees back to focus on the other characters. Finally, another 45-degree move of the camera focuses back on the other character.

The director, John Cameron, effectively follows each of the three rules: 180-degree Rule, Rule of Thirds and the 30 Rule. I think he directed this scene very well and it flows perfectly without any jump cuts or distractions.