Every movie and TV show is different but they all share one thing in common, cinematography. Cinematography is how something is shot. Within cinematography are three categories; photographic aspects, framing, and duration. Photographic aspects are the concrete decisions that deal with specifics of the photographic elements; contrast, the difference between black and white and light and dark; exposure, the amount of light per unit area; and tonality, the amount of contrast there is. Framing is what defines the image which include angles, levels, and height.
Duration is the period of time that a production lasts for. I could go in depth about all these terms but that is not what this paper is about. Have you ever heard of the movie “The Game? ” It was released in 1997 and was directed by David Fincher. “The Game” is about a wealthy financier, Nicholas Van Orton. It is his birthday and his brother gives him an odd present. It is a business card, on it says “C. R. S. ” which stands for Consumer Reaction Services and they are the company that runs The Game.
The Game is a real life experience. There are no rules, you just have to go along with the pranks and hoaxes that the CRS sets up for you. But besides the plot, the actual focus is the framing and the lighting. Like I said before, framing is what defines the image. With framing includes angles, levels, and height. There are angles such as high angle and low angle. Levels such as canted, tilted, pans, tracks, and dollies. Also height, which is how high the camera is being held.
Framing also involves shots such as a birds ye view shot, a shot in which the camera photographs the scene from directly overhead; low angle shot, a shot taken from below the subject; medium close up, a shot taken from the chest up; and extreme close up, a shot that singles out a portion of the face. Of course I missed a lot but I will talk more about framing once I get more in depth with “The Game. ” In the beginning, a close up shot is taken of Van Orton after he visualizes flashbacks of him and his father before his father killed himself. This close up of him in his bathroom splashing his face with water could mean a snap back into reality.
A high angle shot, a shot taken from above the subject, is used when Van Orton and Christine are stuck in the elevator. They Climb the ropes to try to get up the elevator shaft. Another element covered in “The Game” is lighting. There is frontal lighting, side lighting, back lighting, under lighting, and top lighting. The terms are pretty straight forward. Frontal lighting, the light is directly in front of you; side lighting, the light is beside you; back lighting, the light is in back of you; under lighting, the light is below you, and top lighting, the light is above you.
Lighting can also be used to set the tone of a scene or to reveal a characters personality. To get the perfect lighting there is a system called the “Three Point Lighting System. ” There is the key light, which is the most important; fill light, which takes away the shadows or lightens them, and back light, which is when the light is behind you. You can already tell that this is going to be a “dark” film because in the introduction of the production company, “Polygram Films,” the background is just plain black while the words are centered and white.
Notice how the lighting is always bright during the flashbacks to make it clear to the viewer that Van Orton is just day dreaming and it isn’t reality. In the middle of the film the scene is dark, the lights in the house are shut off, the phone rings and no one is there, you can tell there is plenty of suspense going on. Mise-en-scene and realism, what is the difference? Mise-enscene is how scenery and stage props are arranged in a play/ film. It is composed of setting, props, costumes, and staging.
Realism is “the quality of a person who understands what is real and possible in a particular situation and is able to deal with problems in an effective and practical way”(http:// www. merriam-webster. com/dictionary/realism). The flashbacks represent realism because they seem real but they are not real in the present time. Also, each prank that happens in the movie is real but then again it is not because it is all part of the game and Van Orton has to survive or get through each prank to finish the game. It is a real life experience. What is the relationship between mise-en-scene and realism?
The relationship is that the props or costumes used could make it seem like the scene is actually real. The scene where Van Orton was underwater in his car made it seem like he was really going to drown but then he figured out a way to rescue himself with one of his props. Without cinematography, framing, lighting, mise-en-scene, realism, etc there is no movie. David Fincher did an amazing job with “The Game” getting all the stylistic elements in there. The framing and lighting are the two things I noticed most in the movie, I could really pick out what they were.
