From on-foot to motorcycle to car, chase scenes constitute an essential part in action movies. Not only do chase scene reinforce a sense of danger and thrills in movies, but they also allow audiences to enjoy in moments of speed and actions as they identify with the protagonist. In this paper, I will examine chase scenes of action movies from five different cultures: Hong Kong, Thailand, France, U.S. and Canada, and compare the differences with regards to cinematography between these movies and discuss the significance for such differences.
In the famous bicycle chase scene from Jackie Chan’s Project A (Hong Kong), the scene employs a full body shot of the protagonist to showcase his actions. Throughout the whole scene, the bicycle chase occurs at a narrow alley in which the camera applies deep focus. The extended depth of field gives the scenes a 3-dimensional quality, showing multiple planes of action at once. It also allows the producer to demonstrate the tension
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between the protagonist and the antagonist that accumulates as they travel in the narrow alley together. Instead of having a wheeled platform for the camera, the camera is in a static position and pans through the characters as the chase scene takes place. The pans also incorporate zooms to denote specific actions. For example, the camera zooms in to show the shocked face of an antagonist when the protagonist uses a stick to hit him. Another example is that the camera zooms out when the characters are traveling far in the alley to demonstrate the narrowness of the setting and amplifies the tension between the characters. Unlike Project A, Tony Jaas’ Ong-Bak (Thailand) demonstrates the lack of panning in the chasing scene that also happens in an alley.
In this scene, the camera does not follow the protagonist’s action as he runs in and out of the frame to demonstrate a sense of urgency, followed by the chasing of the antagonists. Moreover, instead of showing the facial expressions of actors, the camera zooms in whenever the protagonist needs to go over a physical obstacle and zooms out to show the action he takes to overcome the obstacle. Another this movie is different from other films is that it shoots the same action sequence in multiple angles. One part of the scene illustrates the agility of the protagonist by showing a front shot of him passing through a loop, followed by a side shot of the same action. Also, whenever the protagonist is performing a stunt, the editing slows the action down for the viewers to be amazed at the difficulty of the stunt. Hence, the speed of this scene could be inconsistent at
times. Compare to the Asian films introduced above, Taken 3 (France) takes a different approach to chase scene. The scene consists of extremely fast edits to represent the urgency the protagonist is experiencing to get away from the cops. The scene never films the protagonist in a full body shot; the actions are presented in either a zoom in of the protagonist’s feet or his upper body. The individual close-ups of the protagonist and the cops not only do they allow immunity from continuity problem, but also they add intensity of the power dynamics between the protagonist and the cops. Furthermore, as the scene runs at a high speed, audiences may not fully understand what is going on with the scene, just as the protagonist may not fully know why is he being accused of murdering his ex-wife. Unlike the other films, the chasing scene of this film is shoot at uneven levels so it can be deduced that a steadicam is employed to even out the movement. Moving onto North American movies, a combination of Asian and France movie elements can be seen in Brick Mansions (Canada). In order to build tension, the camera shoots from the perspective of the protagonist and the antagonist. These shots intertwine to add intensity of the chase scene that is about to happen. Along with the fast edits to demonstrate the protagonist’s parkour skills to run away from the antagonists, instead of panning to follow the protagonist’s movements, the camera stays in the same position in which the protagonist runs in and out of the frame, just like Ong-Bak. Similar to Project A, the film also employs deep focus to exhibit the action of the antagonists while the protagonist in running down the hallway. One major difference between this film and the others is that the edit slows down when the antagonist gets hit, rather than demonstrate the complexity of the protagonist’s movement. Lastly, in Casino Royale (U.S.), the protagonist, rather than being chased, is the one who chases after the antagonist. Unlike other films, this film, through long shots and frequent panning, emphasizes on the complexity of the environment the characters are in, so that audience will understand how difficult it is for the protagonist to successfully chase down the antagonist. Panning is mostly used to show the fluidity of the actions and the intricacy of the movements. However, the use of panning in this film predicts the route that the characters will take, instead of following where the characters go. Tilting is used to show the height of the construction site that the chasing scene takes place, which sets an obstacle for the protagonist to overcome in order to chase down the antagonist. Moreover, deep depth of field is again employed to demonstrate the action and reaction of both the protagonist and the antagonist. In order to track the movement of the actors, unlike other films, this film utilizes drones to film the scene at such a high height. Furthermore, the camera zooms in when the characters decide to commit an action and zooms out to demonstrate the consequence of the action such as looking at the ground from high up and jumping down. In conclusion, even though different cultures have different approaches in filming chasing scenes, the different techniques used in the aforementioned films not only do they not serve to highlight technological advancement in different countries, but they allow audiences to appreciate the variance of chasing scenes and never view chasing scenes as mundane.
2. According to Sobchack, contemporary screen violence greatly differs than portrayals of violence in years past. Today, violent scenes are careless and lack significance because we as audiences have become calloused and desensitized to any acts of violence. She states that there is “no grace or benediction attached to violence. Indeed, its very intensity seems diminished” (Sobchack 432). Senseless violence, gruesome acts, and profound amounts of gore are prevalent in movies today, and because even this is not enough, it must be accompanied by loud blasts and noise, constantly moving scenes to keep audiences stimulated and large quantities of violence for viewers to enjoy what they are watching. Decades ago, it was the story that was engaging to audiences and filmmaking was an art.
...ot where the camera follows a subject within a frame and motion of the subject or its surroundings is involved. In this movie Lee uses the double dolly shot which includes the camera dolly and the actor mounted on a second dolly so the actor is moving along with the camera. The double dolly shot signature move is one of Lee’s favorites and also plays into his technical competence for the movie. This shot stars Detective Keith Frazier and happens just seconds after a hostage is “allegedly” killed by the bank robbers. In this scene the camera tends to shake and Denzel facial expressions display feelings of sadness and anger. In addition, a small cameo of Sal’s Pizzeria pizza boxes are seen when the head bank robbers makes a deal with the officers to get food for the hostages. Lee has lots of these connections within his movies relating back to Do The Right Thing.
When one observes the plot of the story, it becomes blatantly obvious that places in the script where story development should be, is replaced instead by shootouts, car chases, and fighting scenes in general. While it is not just understandable, it is crucial to have more action scenes in action movies than other genres, what makes the classic action films great, is that they found a stable order of development of plot and action
The Great Train Robbery in 1903 through to the hugely popular James Bond exploits in the 60’s onwards, to the more modern films such as the classic Die Hard or Speed even. It was mainly during the 80’s and 90’s however that action films really exploded into a genre of their own. With the growth of special effects and heightened demand by audiences for faster plots containing increased violence and stimulation, some of the best classic action films of our time were created. Successful action films have breath taking impact, nonstop energy, an abundance of physical stunts, neck braking chase scenes, explosive battles and fight scenes, destructive disasters, non-stop motion, spectacular rhythm, nail biting suspense , a heroic hero, damsel in distress and evil villain - all designed and premeditated for pure audience thrill. It isn’t hard to realize why Speed is classified as being as being a classica... ...
When I watching this movie, I notice that I felt less separation from the movie. Initially I could not find a reason for that but, soon after I realize that the camera is not static but it wobbling slightly. In most movie, camera does not move and it creates the frame. In the other hand, this movie’s handheld camera type of camera works imitate the human eyesight feeling and make people feels like to experience the event in a movie as a one of the character. In this perspective, do not explain too much about the detail is emphasizing this experience. Consider these things, I really excited and enjoyed couple of scene which are the running through battle field and engaging to the baby. In the every day world, both scene is pretty rare to experience. For the battle field scene, majority of the people have avoiding to be in there so that is rare. The engaging to the baby experience is quite normal event for most people and of course it is grate experience but, in this movie setting, baby is extremely rare and seeing baby is truly miracle event. To emphasize and provide this miracle event, this camera work is perfect to apply.
The police and car owner follow close behind him, trying to get the husband to pull over. The use of the single frame displays the husband’s dark silhouette as the camera focuses on the rearview mirror where the police can be seen gaining on him. It allows the viewer to take in both storylines simultaneously. The husband is still racing home to help his wife, but the police in the mirror also show the duality of his worries as they literally and figuratively hang over his shoulder. Meanwhile, in the mirror, the police are seen trying to grasp the husband in order to get him to stop. The two spaces for the characters gives the chance for the film to focus on the overall plot progression versus the time cut between the husband and the police separately. It decreases the amount of time that audiences spend on one character and their storyline instead it forces them to understand the dynamics of every storyline and how they interact with one
...successful collaboration of sound, colour, camera positioning and lighting are instrumental in portraying these themes. The techniques used heighten the suspense, drama and mood of each scene and enhance the film in order to convey to the spectator the intended messages.
The opening shot looks like it was taken with a handheld camera, as it is somewhat shaky and we can hear a background noise. We are introduced to the character right away. We see a reflection of him at first, and then the camera proceeds to pan up until we can see his whole body. His head is turned away, so we can only see his profile. He is wearing casual clothing and a red headband. We know he is in New York City because we can see Queensboro subway station behind him. He looks to the side of the camera as it makes a few quick cuts. He crosses the street and the camera is behind him, a safe distance away. It zooms in and out and makes another series of quick cuts as it observes him reading a newspaper. He is never really in the centre of the shot and does not appear to be the main focus of the camera. We see people pass by and block our view and we even see him from the back. The next shot, at 1:50, shows his back as he’s having a conversation with somebody, whose face we also cannot see. The next shot is him sitting on a car, smoking a cigarette. Another man approaches him and they proceed to talk briefly. We cannot hear what they are saying. After another series of cuts, w...
Director Max Ophüls is known for his distinctive smooth camera movements (Liang, 2011, p. 2). Frame mobility keeps the audience focused on the subject (Bordwell and Thompson, 2008, p. 203), and this can be seen in this shot. Due to the camera tracking Lisa and Lieutenant Leopold after they enter the frame, the audience’s attention stays focused on Lisa and Lieutenant Leopold, even thoug...
Due to the film’s quality and interest it became an award winning film. The film had excellent sound effects such as the battle scenes. The image quality was also outstanding; it used many different angles to depict the actor to make you feel involved in the scenes. In the action scenes the most common viewpoint used was a close up shot which allows the audience to see and feel the intensity of the scene. The second viewpoint mostly used was a tracking shot due to the actors c...
Wong Kar Wai. Jet Tone Production, 1994. Fu, Poshek, and David Desser, eds. The Cinema of Hong Kong. Cambridge, United Kingdom: Cambridge University Press, 2000.
Most of the film was shot with 50mm lenses on 35 mm cameras. This technique carefully lets the audience see the film as though watching a ‘live scene’. This has the effect of drawing the audience closer into the action.
In this essay the following will be discussed; the change from the age of classical Hollywood film making to the new Hollywood era, the influence of European film making in American films from Martin Scorsese and how the film Taxi Driver shows the innovative and fresh techniques of this ‘New Hollywood Cinema’.
Barsam, R. M., Monahan, D., & Gocsik, K. M. (2012). Looking at movies: an introduction to film (4th ed.). New York: W.W. Norton & Co..
The Reasons Behind the Popularity of Action Films In this essay I am going to explore the conventions of action films and their popularity. People love action films, and when they go to see one there are conventions you would expect to see in the film All plots of action films are based on the same outline, Hero and villain meet, there's a disruption of order, and mission, then everything is sorted out when the villain dies and everything returns to normal. There are Stock characters that you expect to see in this genre of film, the hero, the villain and two attractive ladies. The main action is around a male hero, however, modern films have featured female heroines for example Angelina Jolie in 'Tomb Raider'. If the hero is male he is always good looking, intelligent, brave, chauvinistic, and manages to escape from life threatening situations, however the hero will always have a weakness, and if the hero is male the weakness is normally women.