Silent Hill movie. - Analysis.

Silent Hill Opening Scene Analysis.

The film I have selected for the opening sequence is Silent Hill. Even though I have embedded the full movie, I will only be analysing the first three minutes.

Editing:
During the opening of this Silent Hill film, the editing starts with the fade in of the institutional information then is shown to fade out into a black scene. This was quickly led onto the beginning of the credits with; 'Samuel Hadida presents' before fading out. This keeps the Audience on their toes as instead of the title revealing itself, the opening scene begins with a cut of the female character screaming 'Sharon'. Even though a character is shown to begin the opening scene with mentioning the main characters name, the main character of this film is not shown to the audience till a little later in the opening. This helps with the dramatic questions from the audience of 'who is Sharon', 'why is this female character screaming her name at night' but also 'how is this character Sharon got out of the house with out her parents knowing.' By having these questions, the opening scene manages to pull in the audience to wanting to watch the rest of the film as they want to know the next lot of action which would answer their questions.

Further through the opening scenes with the help of different Camera Work, the editing of this film created the clips to cut in with each other one after the other while the younger women and man run through places to find 'Sharon'. This is also known as Continuity, because the scenes are followed one after the other as the area changes to show the characters moving. Once the characters started moving, the editing of the cut ins became quicker as one shot would focus on the female character, it would then rapidly change to a car driving on the bridge above before focusing back upon the female character, this creates a rapid change for the audiences though patterns creating their emotions to become manipulated as they believe that 'Sharon' may have been run over and become extremely upset for the mother. This is quickly change as the audience then see slower cut ins of the road to the women running across the rocks to then the young girl who the audience recognise as 'Sharon' standing upon the cliff above a waterfall. This then leads once again their thought patterns onto the questions of 'why is she standing on the cliff' and 'what is she going to do now, as she is young and confused.' The editing has then also manipulated the audiences emotions again to create them to be come fearful and confused. 

After the next few cut ins in the opening scene, the audience was lead onto a birds eye view looking down above the girl but also the bottom of the waterfall, this was used for the editing to lead into an special effect of an CGI, as it reveals the view of 'hell' with hot pipes and old meshed paths and flames. To reveal this special effect appearing into the water, a dissolve was used. This dissolve, created the waterfall to slowly disappear as the 'hell' appears quickly behind towards the audience as if it was opening up to the girl. The dissolve is only noticeable to the audience when they observe the edge of the waterfall. The editing then continued to zoom straight through onto another dead looking girls face before the cut in of 'Sharons' face was shown to the audience. This created the audience to believe that there was a bond between these two girls as the 'dead looking' one took control over the living. 

The continuity of cut ins was used again after this short CGI editing, this time the cut ins were quick as the scenes changed from the mother pushing the daughter down, to a close up to then the scene of the father running across the road and nearly getting hit by the lorry. The quick cut ins of this gives the audience a second of calmness as they feel relived after the young girl was saved to then a quick heart beating moment of fear as they believe that the father may have just been run over. By choosing to edit the scenes quickly from one to another did not give the audience a chance to relax over the previous action, but it aloud to them to let their guard down as if nothing was going to happen again to then get shocked at the quick reaction of the lorry missing the father by inches. 

The cut ins after these shots became then slower as they varied between the child's dreaming state as she would scream about 'Silent Hill' to then the parents as they give the response which would certify their questions and answers. The girl is only getting worse and that this has happened before. This was quickly led into a shot of them sitting all together which gave the audience the belief that, that would be the last time the whole family would been seen together. A fade out was used after into the black screen while the title of the film would fade in. Silent Hill. This would let the audience know for sure that the little girl Sharon was the main character as the film would mostly be based only upon her and the 'dead girl' they had seen earlier. 

Mise-en-scène

The mise-en-scène through out this film was used carefully to reveal to the audience that it was a horror genre. The mise-en-scène is shown through the six categories of: Setting, Decor, Lighting, Body language/ movement and blocking, Props but also Costume and make-up.

Setting:

To begin the opening, the setting is shown to be outside a lightened up house at night time. This automatically gives the audience the opinion that it is a horror genre, because most action happens at night time to give a scary feel. Also by including the house as the setting to begin with, the shot reveals to the audience that the silence of the house is abnormal and that even with no-one living close the silence shows the danger of the action which is taking place. It also shows the audience the state of the female characters emotions with no distractions, causing the audience to really feel the fear and panic that the mother has. 

During the opening scene, the region seems to change slightly from a modern housing area which is extremely quite and must be located in the country side with the noises of the crickets played, to a more urban place as the roads are shown and the underpass is covered in dirt and graffiti. This creates more fear and tension for the audience as they go from a more relaxing and safe feeling to a quick sudden shock as they expect the worse to happen in this place known for violence and drug taking people. To continue this  fear but also showing that this film is a horror genre, the setting are all kept in the darkness. This lets anything jump out and hide unexpected from the audience. 

The road which is briefly shown twice in this opening scene, continues the urban city look. This once again is also contrasted with the setting beside it. The setting beside it is shown to be a massive lake with a waterfall, leading up to this waterfall there is shown to be rugged and sharp rocks which have been chipped away. Above the waterfall there is shown to be a forest with the grass which would lead up to the road. By showing the rocks that are chipping away and the women trying to run up  them, the audience get a more of a shock as they believe that the action will only happen to her. This all changes when the camera shoots the young girl 'Sharon' standing on the edge of the cliff but also how far the waterfall goes down. This keeps them on the edge of their seat as they really feel the height that is and become terrified for the girls own life. 

Lighting:

Lighting was not used a lot in all of the scenes. The reason why the lighting was not used in most of the scenes, is because by creating a horror film most scenes have to be dark and very mysterious as it creates the audience to feel threatened and uneasy. The following scenes had shown lighting effect to cause the audience to become more unease and fearful; 

During the first few seconds a scene of a forest was shown. The lighting in this scene was only shown through part of the trees to resemble the houses lights leaking through. This also highlighted the character up to the audience as they see her rush through the branches in the distance. The lighting in this scene also highlighted the mist of the background to create a more scary feel to the audience as if 'something lurked there' like in many other films. The lighting was also used to keep the other side of the forest dark to go by the stereotypical view of a forest in a horror film. 

After the forest scene that was shown an interesting light effect being used to display the urban cities underground tunnel. The lighting was carefully used to keep a natural 'moon light' effect upon the edge of the tunnel as it only settled upon some of the graffiti and the actual edge of the beginning of the tunnel. As the audience can see the continuousness of the uneasy and unexpected actions which may happen next. 

The darkness continues to cover most of the places e.g. the road scene which is shown all the way to the other side of the road, this is a contrast compared to the left side of the road which is seen as a dark and dangerous area covered in mist while the right hand seems to be lightened up as the light reflects against the chipped rocks and grass. This creates a slightly suspense emotion over the audience as they now clearly see what lies ahead of this older female character while she tries to clamber across the rocks. Another great thing about using the lighting quite bright upon the rocks, it shows clearly to the audience how wet the rocks are, giving them the thoughts and opinions that the women is probably going to die. 

After the split second of the audience worrying that this older female character would fall, the rest of the lighting was mainly based upon the cliffs edge and the waterfall. This kept the audience uneasy and feeling noxious about the edge and how far the waterfall goes down. This quickly links them to a connection with the young girl and older female character as they try and urge the character onto saving the young girl before she jumped. This creates them to become more anxious and stressed as their own minds scream to help the young girl. 

During the last few seconds of the opening scene, before the title was revealed the lighting was played in two different ways. The first way was by lightening the artificial lighting more, so the family connection which is finally shown is revealed to the audience as the interpretations quickly become clear that something is going to break this family apart as they're shown in an small amount of the light and the rest is dark. The second way the lighting was used was to contrast against the evil that the audience had just experienced was to show a cross in small lamps right in the background. This cross does become the focus point for the audience as they have the ambiguous meanings to why the cross is shown. These reveals the audience a false safety and relaxation as if the evilness would not return soon due to the 'light' of the religion battling against it. 

Body Language/ Movement and Blocking

The body language and movement in the opening scene are used to create a connection between the audience and the characters. This creates the characters to manipulate the audiences emotions and body language as what they show the audience would also feel. During the opening scene, there was no blocking used. The reason for not using blocking is so the audience stay in tension and confusion as their emotions can quickly switch from one character to another based on their movements and body language. 

Straight away into the opening, the body language of the first shown character and connection catches them off guard before they can even settle into the film itself. By catching the audience off guard by the character showing a full on emotion of fear as her body would be tensed as she stops to a halt, the audience would then become tensed their selves as they would grip onto the name that she calls. The sudden movement on the screen would keep the audience observing closely as they wonder who and why this women is calling the 'Sharon' character. 

After the scenes of the older female character running, she finally stops after climbing up the side of the cliff. The emotion she shows of confusion and fear as she finally breathes in causes the audience to be on-ease and worried as they have the suspense of what point of view this women has before witnessing it themselves. The suspense really has an appealing affect on the audience, this is because in the horror  genre many 'creatures' or situations will reveal themselves to the character but then slowly reveal itself to the audience to feed their curiosity of what they cannot see yet. 

The next body language and movement shown would be when the young girl would rock back and forth on the cliff, her body is shown to be controlled by other things such as 'spirits' to go with the belief that the younger generation are more likely to be spiritual and possessed than the older. Her facial expressions also revealed to the audience that she way unconscious in a way as she tried to fight control over her own movements. This continued the suspense of whether she would jump or stay but also the questions of 'who was controlling her?' and 'will she survive?'

The next movement of the body to draw in the attention but also answer a few of the audiences question was when the girl was pulled down to the grass by the older female character. As soon as she was pulled down, her body would shake and tremble while she screamed 'silent hill'. All the audience would take this suddenly as a 'possession' as the girl would not react or respond to the parents. By creating the audience to translate this as a possession, the film was able to resemble that this girl will be a main character of the film as this must continue through her life. This was certified when the parents spoke about this being the second time that she had acted this way. 

To change the audiences mood for the  scenes after the title is shown, the characters choose to feed them a fake safety and happiness to the audience. The way this was shown was through the movement and body language of the family as they would huddle together in a stereotypical family hug. By creating a fake safety and happiness emotion across the audience, it would continue the manipulation of their emotions but also keep them off guard for the scenes that would happen after the title was shown. 

Props

During the opening scene only one prop was used. This was the teddy bear that the older female character was shown to run with before dropping it under the tunnel. This teddy bear is actually important in the opening scene as it signified a young child that the older female character was calling out for. This teddy bear also resembled vulnerability and innocence as the child was only young, this also then leads onto the beliefs from anyone that young children are more vulnerable to possessions from spirits than the older as they were more spiritual. This certifies the audiences expectations of a horror genre'd film. 

Costume and make-up

In this opening scene, there was no make-up seen being wore on the characters, the outfits shown to be worn by the characters resembled that they lived in the 21st century but also the fact that they were all in bed to begin with before the action applied. By keeping the characters in their pyjamas before and during the action of the opening scene, the actions become more realistic towards the audience. This is because they feel the true intentions of the characters as the action was 'unexpected' but also 'dangerous' as it started of as a peaceful every day life routine that the audience also experience. By relating the everyday outfits to the audience, the audience quickly understand and relate to what they're wearing, what time of day it is and where the characters originally were before they realised the Sharon character went missing. 

Sound:

At the beginning of the fade in of the beginning scene the non-diegetic sound effects of a conversation and crying was played. Even though this was not seen by the audience and only heard, the audience were off guard for the next shock of an older female screaming 'Sharon'. This is because the non-diegetic sound effects caused the audience to believe that the film was going to quickly open up on an argument instead of the scene after. 

During the first few scenes of the opening, the diegetic sound effects of the nocturnal creatures e.g. crickets was being played. This was used to resemble the setting as a quite and out of town place in the forest as it was a less likely place for something to happen. This was all quickly changed when an loud diegetic sound suddenly played of the cars driving across the roads, by having this full on it resembles the contrast between the peacefulness of the dark forest and the activity of a busy road. This sound effect can also cause the audience to believe that there was an accident above relating to the Sharon character. This kept them in suspense. 

Among the characters voices being played, there was two different types of sound being played. One was Diegetic which was the sound of the waterfall and the girl moaning with unconsciousness which would unsettle the audience and make them become very uncomfortable as they believe that they would know the next outcome, but the second one was non-diegetic. The non-diegetic sound was of the mood music being played, this mood music works the way it's name is. The mood music was creepy and scary to manipulate the audiences thoughts and change them to think of consequences of this girl standing on the edge of the waterfall which is completely opposite to what they would next show.

Near the end of the opening scene, chimes were played as a non-diegetic sound. The reason for this was to once again manipulate the audiences emotions into happiness and safe thoughts that the family was back together again and nothing will go wrong this time as they will mostly get over it. This keeps them off guard for the scenes after the title has been shown. 

Shot types: