The Witness: A Brief Analysis Of The Film

The Witness is based in the Pennsylvania countryside in 1984 where a mother, Rachel, and her son, Samuel, are morning the loss of their husband and father. This film follows the events that led Samuel to help detective John Book track down Officer McFee who committed a brutal murder that Samuel witnessed. This movie was nominated several times for the Best Screenplay and Best Film Editing.
In this scene based on the screenplay, Samuel is in the bathroom of the train station where he witnesses the gruesome murder by Officer McFee. As outlined in the screenplay of this film, Samuel is sitting in the train station when he asks his mother, Rachel, if he can use the restroom. He begins walking away when Rachel calls after him and places his hat over his head. Later, the audience realizes that this cause almost got his killed by

McFee.

Samuel enters the restroom and sees a long row of urinals and stalls. He stops before one of the urinals, but makes his way to the last stall since the urinal was too high for him and was making an intimidating flushing sound. As he enters the stall, a heavily bearded teen enters the lavatory and places a notebook behind the towel dispense frantically and begins to wash this hands. Samuel cannot see any feet below his stall door; he believes that he is alone in the restroom. One African-American man in a three-piece suit, and a Caucasian male in designer jeans enter the room while the teen takes a quick glance at both men. Moments later, the two men attack the teen swiftly while bumping into Samuels stall. After they cut the teens neck, they remove the notebook from the towel dispenser and were about to leave until one of the men heard a sound. He checked the stalls again slowly kicking each one with a SR caliber revolver in hand. He slowly makes his way to

Samuels stall and elbows it when it doesn’t give. Samuel retreats to the back corner of the stall as Officer McFee continues to kick at the door. In one last resort, Samuel slides under the stall partition and grabs his hat in the shot before McFee enters. The two men exit the room and Samuel opens the stall door a crack and peers at the blood-stained mirrors and the lifeless body on the ground.
In contrast from the screenplay, some shots were omitted or done differently in the film. According to the screenplay, Samuel stared at the urinals and then decided to go to the stalls instead since the urinals were intimidating. In this shot, there were only the sinks and the stalls present. Without this information, the audience would not have known Samuels motive for using the bathroom stall. Also, according to the screenplay, the heavily bearded teen enters the restrooms after Samuel is in the stall. In the film, he was already washing his hands in the sink when Samuel appears. Also, by reading the screenplay, the reader would come to the conclusion that the character at the sink is an undercover cop based on the description that he was a “heavily bearded youth” (Kelley and Wallace 1984). In the film, it is hard to tell that he is an undercover cop since he looks like an adult in baggy clothing. Also, the shot where Samuel face appears in the blood-stained mirror with the lifeless body on the ground is omitted. Instead, the audience sees the camera zoom in on Samuel’s bewildered face in the bathroom stall he escaped to. Some scenes may have been omitted or changed by the directors in order to enhance the cinematography.
Additionally, the editing of the shots with the addition of sounds and visuals helped enhance the film’s plot. At the beginning of this scene, there is a cut away with Samuel in the train station staring at the statue of an angle carrying a dead angel. This shot is used to create symbolism of Samuel carrying the dead cops legacy and name. Next shot that appears is a cross cut between Samuel and the undercover cop. The shot shows Samuel entering in the bathroom, then the cop being a bit nervous and then relaxed as he exchanges glances with the innocent boy. The only sound effects present now are just white noises of footsteps and the faucet running. Again, another cross cut is used to cut to Samuel in the stall and then to the undercover cop at the sink. This helps create drama, and illustrates how far apart they are from one another. The two dangerous men enter the scene, and the camera zooms in on the undercover cop’s face as he begins to look uneasy. Next, there is a cross cut and an eyeline match used to cut to the African-American glancing at the Caucasian male and nod his head in approval. The camera switches to a wide shot, so the audience can see the interaction and setup of the crime between the three men. The camera switches to a cut on action shot as the Caucasian man makes a cloth over the undercover cop’s head. At this point, intense music plays in the background to heighten the sense of urgency and danger. The camera zooms in on the knife being drawn out. This notifies the audience that a struggle and murder will occur. There is another cross cut to the struggle between the three men to Samuel in the bathroom stall peering through the crack observing the altercation. The director uses an invisible cut from the man grabbing the notebook from the lifeless body to Officer McFee washing his knife. The cut helps create the illusion that the audience is looking at the scene in the point of view of the Caucasian male instead of a third person viewpoint. I found it quite comical when the Caucasian male asked what Officer McFee was doing and he replied “Washing my hands man” (Witness 1985). I found this comical because of McFee’s tone and that most murders do not take time to clean up the murder scene. There is a few audio cuts utilized as well. An L-cut is used when McFee starts opening the stall doors and says “just checking it again” (Witness 1985) while a cross cut is used to focus on Samuel in the last stall breathing heavily. A J-cut is also used when the camera focuses on Samuel while in the background you hear the sounds of the doors being kicked open. When McFee is outside of Samuels stall, several cross cut shots are utilized going from Samuel to McFee. Once Samuel escapes to the adjacent stall, another cross cut is used to illustrate their difference in location, and how close in proximity Samuel is to the murder.
The use of editing, visuals, music, and screenplay all contributed to making this scene exceptional. Each of these tools helped create drama and helped enhance the plot.

Work Cited
Kelley, William, and Earl Wallace W. "Witness (1985)." Movie Script. N.p., n.d. Web. 11 Sept. 2016.

Paramountmovies. "Witness." YouTube. YouTube, 30 May 2012. Web. 12 Sept. 2016.