MasterShots Vol 2

by Christopher Kenworthy

  Munich. Directed by Steven Spielberg. DreamWorks SKG, 2005. All rights reserved.

  2.3

  EXAGGERATED HEIGHT

  When you want to show one character frightening another, the most obvious techniques can be effective. Placing the more powerful character up high and having him look down at the victim works well.

  A brief establishing shot shows that he is trying to get her to raise her hands so he can inspect them. The director then cuts to two shots of their faces.

  The shot of him is taken from halfway down her body, so that the viewer looks up at an extremely exaggerated angle. The director also shows her reaction to him, even though it is side-on and out of focus. If the camera was further back, or at her head height, the sense of his domination would be diminished.

  The shot from his point of view is made from shoulder height. It focuses on her face and her reaction, rather than his. The viewer identifies with her because the shots reveal her perception of the situation more than his.

  In this scene, they both repeatedly look at her hands and then at each other. This adds some interest, movement, and variety to the setup, which otherwise might seem stationary.

  Shots like this should not be over-used, because they can quickly become ridiculous. They must be justified by the plot or the needs of the scene.

  Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me. Directed by David Lynch. New Line Cinema, 1992. All rights reserved.

  2.4

  DRAMATIC SWING

  When tension is increasing it can be made all the more unbearable when one character remains calm. This is seen quite often, especially when worried civilians are being interviewed by near-bored cops, as in The Lovely Bones. In scenes like this, cutting between the two characters in the standard way could break the tension.

  To preserve the tension, keep the focus on one character before turning around to show the other. This shot opens with the cop framed on the left, and only the back of her head in shot. The audience is aware that she’s in the scene, but they don’t get to see her face, and the camera moves away from her. Both voices are audible as the camera pushes forward, and as it passes his shoulder, it finally turns around to look at her. The viewer then sees her stress, because the discomforting sensation has been established.

  This move works well when you’re trying to show miscommunication, or one character not listening to another. The trick is to focus on a secondary or incidental character at the start of the shot, with the main character’s face out of shot. This makes the audience uncomfortable, because they want to see the main character, they want to know how she is coping with the situation. They expect a quick cut to her reaction, but when the camera pushes forward, closer to him, it captures some of the tension she is feeling.

  It’s worth noting that there’s another cop in the background, while behind her there is only an image of the home. This small attention to detail adds to the feeling that there is a strange world on one side, intruding on the home.

  The Lovely Bones. Directed by Peter Jackson. DreamWorks SKG, 2009. All rights reserved.

  2.5

  CLANDESTINE

  When your characters need to have a secret conversation, without it looking like they’re talking at all, you can achieve the best effect with motionless cameras and limited views of the actors.

  The scene shown here has one camera set up to establish the geography of the scene. It shows the wide, open space of the gallery, and the actors move into the space without looking at each other.

  They talk to each other without making eye contact. The most they do is angle their heads slightly toward each other. This is primarily so that the cameras set up behind them can see their faces. If they looked directly ahead throughout the whole scene, the viewer wouldn’t get to see their faces at all.

  To get this setup to work, you do need to show the actors’ faces, but be wary of an actor who tries to angle his face toward the camera more than you want. Most actors will respect the needs of the scene, but one may find it difficult to act with his back to the camera, and will continually turn his head so that it’s in shot. Remind your actor that the purpose of the scene is for him to remain covert as the talk continues.

  The establishing shot can be done with quite a wide lens, but the other shots should use a long lens. This throws the foreground (the other actor’s shoulder) and the background out of focus, which isolates each character within the scene. You may need to set up your camera well away from the actors, or you will get an unintentional close-up, with an actor’s head filling the frame.

  Although there isn’t much movement in a scene like this, you want to leave some space around the actors’ heads to keep some awareness of the space they are sitting in. If your viewer forgets about their location the need for secrecy is lost, so get far enough back to show their surroundings, even when using a long lens.

  The International. Directed by Tom Tykwer. Columbia Pictures, 2009. All rights reserved.

  2.6

  FRAME SHARE

  In the standard dialogue setup, you cut from one character on the left of the frame to a character on the right of the frame. You can add tension to a scene by setting it up so that both characters are on the same side of the frame.

  These shots from The Majestic show how both characters are looking at each other, but both are on the left-hand side of the frame. This is unusual, and makes the audience feel uneasy.

  In this scene, one character is seated and the camera remains at his head height throughout because he is the main character. This could work just as well if both were seated, or if both were standing.

  The danger here is that, because your audience expects to see one character frame-left and the other frame-right, breaking the rule can disorient them. This is, of course, what you want to some degree, but you don’t want them to be confused about where people are, or who’s looking at whom.

  The trick is to start with a reasonably wide shot, as shown here, which makes it clear where the main character is sitting in the room, and what direction he’s looking in. Ideally, you should make the first cut when he’s looking directly at the other character.

  The second character can then be shown in a medium shot, and it will be clear where everybody is, even though they are sharing the same part of the frame. You can move in closer on the main character, as the director does here by filming Jim Carrey in a medium-close shot, while the other character remains more distant. The uncomfortable feeling is created without confusion.

  The Majestic. Directed by Frank Darabont. Warner Bros., 2001. All rights reserved.

  2.7

  FOCUS ON ONE

  When a conversation turns from gentle argument to something more intense, moving in on one character can be a way of indicating the rising pressure.

  In this single-shot from Magnolia, the camera slowly pushes in on the two characters as they talk, and as it gets closer it slowly moves over to the main character until it is looking up at him.

  This works because they are both sitting at the bar and are thus facing the camera. It could work just as well if they were sitting on a park bench, but you need to find a plausible reason to have people sit next to each other as the conversation progresses.

  At times, you can direct the actors to look at each other, but these only need to be glances. They can spend most of their time, as real people do, looking forward. This keeps them facing toward the camera, so your audience can take in their expressions.

  You need to start a shot such as this from quite a distance away, but the characters will be too small in the frame unless you use a reasonably long lens. The challenge with a longer lens is that it’s more difficult to stay in focus as you push in, so you’ll need the dolly move to be slow and smooth.

  When you come to rest on the main character, the conversation can continue, and the words of the off-screen character remain audible for a while. Don’t keep this going for too long, though. You need to end the scene, or cut to a different angle.

&nb
sp; Magnolia. Directed by Paul Thomas Anderson. New Line Cinema, 1999. All rights reserved.

  2.8

  LEVEL CHANGE

  Camera height is one of the most neglected tools in a filmmaker’s arsenal. Positioning actors at different heights, and putting your camera at different levels, can have profound effects on the scene. One of the most interesting ways to increase tension in a scene is to put the more frightening character low down, while putting a nervous hero high up.

  You can see the tension and fear created by this technique in Inglourious Basterds, where the director puts the female character above the man she’s frightened of. They continue a relatively mundane conversation, but it is their positioning in relation to each other, and the fact that they shake hands while on these different levels, that makes it transfixing.

  Although he is seated, the camera is at his level at all times when filming him or when turned on her. This is his first scene in the film, and she is well established as a main character, so by tying the camera to his level the director gives him a strong sense of power. He’s taking us away from our viewpoint character. The audience would prefer to be at her eye level, looking down on him, but by being dragged to his level, the viewer feels her fear.

  Finally, she is made to sit near him, and is brought down to his level. This gives the audience the sensation of her being pulled into his world against her will.

  The final shot, where she takes her seat, is also unnerving, because she is further to the left of frame than normal (for a character who is looking to screen left). This leaves a space on the right of the screen, which unbalances the audience even further.

  Inglourious Basterds. Directed by Quentin Tarantino. Universal Pictures, 2009. All rights reserved.

  2.9

  CLAUSTROPHOBIC SPACE

  When dramatic or tragic news is revealed to a character, it helps to get close to him to show every nuance of the actor’s performance. This can be enhanced by using a long lens, and the actor’s position in the frame, to box him in. This creates a sense of claustrophobia that is often experienced by those hearing unbearable news.

  To take this even further, the director may slightly disorient the audience by cutting to an unusual angle. In the frames shown here, Naomi Watts is filmed with a long lens. It’s an over-the-shoulder shot, but the lens is so long that the foreground character is extremely blurred and the background almost non-existent, so the audience is watching her expression alone. The camera is positioned so that the audience looks almost straight into her eyes and identifies with her.

  When the second doctor starts talking, she looks to frame right (her left), but at first the audience doesn’t see him. After a while, the director cuts to a shot showing the doctor. Unusually, this is shot from her left-hand side, breaking the standard rules of where the camera should go. The first shot was taken from her right-hand side, so cutting to a shot from her left crosses the line of action (an imaginary line between the two characters who are talking). If used carelessly this cut will confuse the audience, but because she has turned her head and moved her eyes to the left, the director makes it very clear where everybody is.

  To maintain the sense of claustrophobia, the director sets this doctor quite close to camera (although not as close as her), and tightly frames him with Watts on one side and another character on the left. They push into the frame much more than usual, which makes this shot feel extremely crowded.

  You will create the best effect if you use people to build this sense of claustrophobia, as shown here. If you use other foreground objects, rather than people, the crowding of the frame doesn’t have as strong an effect.

  21 Grams. Directed by Alejandro Gonzãlez Iñárritu. Focus Features, 2003. All rights reserved.

  2.10

  TRACK CHARACTER

  As tensions reach boiling point, characters often blurt out their fears. When filmed well, these scenes are compelling, but you need to capture the energy and confusion of the main character.

  You can see that as Natalie Portman moves toward the camera, the camera moves continually to the left, panning to the right to keep her in shot as she walks straight forward.

  When she turns to her right (moving to screen left), the camera continues to move, keeping her in shot. The camera’s actual move to the left is quite small, but because she moves straight forward and then turns, this creates a lot of confusing movement. This is made even more dramatic because the scene is shot from behind an obstruction. It’s not clear whether these are pillars, bedposts, or something else, but they serve the purpose of making her seem imprisoned in a confusing world.

  The shot of the two listeners is filmed with a stationary camera to reflect the fact that they are dealing with the situation more calmly. The problem here is that cutting from the moving shot to the still shot is quite jarring. One solution is to shoot a close-up of the main character’s face, so you can jump cut to it as a transition between shots. Alternatively, you could stay on her (without showing the other characters), until she is facing them.

  This technique can be applied in many ways, and you don’t necessarily need the foreground obstructions to get it to work. The most important thing is to have the main character move roughly toward camera, as it moves away from her, while panning to keep her in shot, and then have her track across to catch up with the camera. A long lens makes her movement forward seem nightmarishly slow, but then makes her move to the left seem swift, adding to the confused, dreamlike feeling of the scene.

  The Other Boleyn Girl. Directed by Justin Chadwick. Columbia Pictures/Focus Features, 2008. All rights reserved.

  CHAPTER THREE

  POWER STRUGGLES

  3.1

  DISORIENTED

  During any power struggle, there is often a moment of change, where one character gains the upper hand. Far from being a moment of relief, this is often a new challenge for the character and one that leaves him feeling disoriented. A camera move can be used to bring up this feeling of being overwhelmed.

  At the moment that Chris Pine takes the captain’s chair in Star Trek, the director wants to show the magnitude of this moment for him, no matter what he actually says, or what is said to him. To achieve this, the director positions the camera so that the chair is central in the frame. Then, as the camera moves forward it moves to the side and rolls over. This gives the scene a slightly drunken feeling, and leaves a space in the frame for Zoe Saldana to enter the left of the frame. Even though the viewer hasn’t seen her approach, he feels as if she’s been drawn in by the camera move. Her dialogue at this moment may further disturb Pine’s sense of self, or ground him back in reality, depending on the type of scene being shot.

  Shots like this, where the camera is given a “Dutch angle,” work best when they are used rarely. If you use lots of Dutch angles, they won’t have much effect. They also work well when they come during a camera move, rather than with a straight cut.

  Although you can run dialogue through the entire scene, you will probably find it best to wait until the end, when the second character moves into the frame. By doing this, you give the moment of change all the weight it requires, before you move back to dialogue.

  Star Trek. Directed by J. J. Abrams. Paramount Pictures, 2009. All rights reserved.

  3.2

  DOORWAY ANGLES

  Doorways are interesting places to hold conversations, and they are often the scene of power struggles, because one person wants something and the other resists. In this scene from Ghost World, Steve Buscemi is doing his best to get information out of Scarlett Johansson, but she isn’t interested. Attention to lens choice and camera placement are essential in portraying this power struggle effectively.

  Although he is not a hostile character, Buscemi’s arrival is meant to feel like an intrusion. This is shown partly by the way she holds the door, as though ready to slam it in his face.

  The shot of her is quite close, with a long lens. This has the effect of making him seem closer to her, a
nd closer to the threshold of her home, than he actually is. It also cuts out the doorway itself, which makes it seem as though he’s already in the home. This is a subtle psychological trick.

  In the reverse angle, the director has shot with a wider lens, from further back. This means that we can see the door and both characters. The door itself appears ready to move, something the audience notices.

  When shooting a power struggle in a doorway, you may shoot a lot of coverage, using different lenses and distances on each actor. But when you cut, restricting yourself to two angles and lenses (as shown here) can be all you need to show the power imbalance between them.

  Ghost World. Directed by Terry Zwigoff. United Artists, 2001. All rights reserved.

  3.3

  ANGLE EXCHANGE

  At first glance, this may look like the standard angle/reverse angle setup, but there’s more to it than that. At a key moment, when the power finally shifts between these two characters, he walks away. By the time he’s come to rest, the camera places him on the right of frame, where she was. This shows that a power shift has just taken place.

  Without the move, this crucial scene would be just a series of angle/reverse angle shots, and its impact would be lost. By putting in the move, the change is made both overtly and on a subconscious level. This makes it a powerful move, even though it’s fairly easy to set up.

  The first setup is a classic angle/reverse angle, so that she’s on the right of the frame, and he’s on the left. At the moment that he walks away from her, the camera cuts to a wider shot. He walks to his left (the right of frame). At the same time, she crosses the screen behind him to the left of frame. Without this movement — where they both cross the screen — the geography of the scene would confuse the viewer. This wider shot is also essential because it actually shows them swapping sides of the frame, illustrating the power shift.