Horror Films

Knives

1. Describe
In the horror films Psycho directed by Alfred Hitchcock and Scream directed by Wes Craven knives is a convention used by these directors.
In the movie Psycho made in 1960 the weapon that was used to kill Marion and Detective Arbogast was a knife. Psycho is probably most known for its famous stabbing scene in the shower where the main character Marion gets killed. In the scene, Marion is taking a shower at the Bates Motel  after deciding that she will return home with the money that she stole (she is metaphorically cleansing away her sins) this is soon interrupted by an intense stabbing scene. Since this movie was made in the 60s, you never see the knife really stabbing her, all you see is very short cut shots going from the knife to Marion and all at extreme close ups, which gives you a sense of what is happening.
The movie Scream from 1996 also uses the convention of a knife. In this movie there is a masked killer/s who carries a large knife to kill people. Right from the start of this movie we see the knife being used as a weapon of murder with the deaths of Casey and her boyfriend. In this scene the boyfriend (Steve) is strapped to a chair outside and his body is sliced open from ribcage to pelvis with their guts rolling from the wound. This also happens to Casey. As this movie was made much later, we could see the knife slicing the characters open, this is much different to Psycho because you never saw Marion actually get stabbed.

2. Explain
In the shower stabbing scene in Psycho you never see the knife stabbing Marion because in the 60s that would have been too scary and real for the audiences back then. Also this was one of the first films to show a stabbing scene so this scene was pushing boundaries back then and was "gory" for their time. This movie changed traditions to films because after it was released many more "gory" films were made. Alfred Hitchcock said that he used very short cut shots in this scene to "transfer the menace from the screen into the minds of the audience". The use of having knives to kill people brings up the idea that you will get punished for sleeping around when not married (as Marion did with Sam Loomis) as this was starting to happen in these times. This scene has also been read as "a symbolic rape by the penetrative knife, which is seen as a phallus for the sexually deviant Norman". We know this because at the end of the movie, the psychiatrist who spoke with Norman tells us that Norman didn't kill for money, instead his interaction with Marion sexually aroused him. He knew that his mother would not approve of this so his repressed sexual arousal comes in the form of the knife penetrating Marion.
The idea of the knife being a phallic symbol is also shown in Scream. In the end scene the two masked killers, Billy and Stu, are penetrating each other with the knife possibly revealing their true sexual orientations. Unlike Psycho, Scream showed people getting sliced and stabbed by the knife this is most likely because things had changed a lot in the years between these films. By the 90s it was very normal to see very gory parts in horror movies as movies such as Nightmare on Elm Street and Friday the 13th came with all their gory. Although there was arguments about which rating to give the movie it was decided that it was fine to give it an R rating. Audiences described the movie with all these knife scenes as  "scary and gruesome" but this was the way that movies were heading from then on.


3. Analyse
I think that without the convention of the knife in both Psycho and Scream, the movies would have been nowhere near as good and successful as they were. Psycho's shower stabbing scene is one of the most famous scenes in movie history with people knowing the music involved in the scene without even having watched the movie. Without the knife in this scene it would have changed the movie completely. In Scream without the knife, it would have made the masked killer much less scary and rather more funny as it would have just been someone dressed in a costume.
The convention of the knife changed from Psycho to Scream as in Psycho you really only see the knife being used twice and you never really see it actually stabbing the people as it was too gruesome in those days, but in Scream, whenever you see the masked killer you will see the massive knife in his hand and you will see people get stabbed or sliced by it.

c.) Mise-en-scene/composition

The way in which this scene is designed gives it a feel of mystery and intrigue. The director expresses this feel to the scene by having props put in a certain position and having them shown to the camera in the right order.

The scene is set in a very misty forest in which you can only see whats right in front, this mist/fog makes the scene very mysterious because you feel like you can't see everything that you would like to and something could be hiding in the mist but you aren't sure so it makes you feel nervous as to what happens next.

Because this scene is mainly shot using tracking, it means that we see objects one after the other as if following a scene of events.

The first object we see in the scene is a gun lying on the ground, when we first see this we immediately think of murder or fighting. It gives you an idea that this movie could possibly be an action movie or a mystery movie. Also the fact that it is on the ground and not in someones hand makes you think that the person who had it before is dead or injured but probably dead because there is no sound to suggest someone is in pain. Having the gun as the first object is perfect because a gun usually symbolizes violence and there is a lot of violence in this movie so it tells you that there will be action and people dying.

The next big object in the scene is the dead body which lies not very far away from the gun. You know the person is dead because they are not moving or making a sound and since we saw the gun lying not far away from him we expect it was dropped due to him being killed. The body is also still very intact and not decomposing meaning that the person was killed not long ago, this shows that the person/thing that killed him is probably not far away. The body makes you wonder where the person who killed him is and again creates the nervous feeling because it could come out and scare you at any moment.

We soon see a skeletal, hairless cat moving over towards the body. The cat has a very creepy feel to it because it is not a normal cat like ones we see everyday. It gives you the feeling again that this forest is very strange and different and makes you feel nervous and apprehensive. This emotion could have gone a completely different way if the cat was 'normal' (with hair, and fatter) because we are used to cats looking that way and think that they are not scary. Having the cat appear this way also makes you wonder if you are in a different period of time because normally cats are not like that.

All these objects end up providing the same emotion of nervousness, scared and leave us unsure of what we will see next. They also provide us with an insight to what the movie could involve - violence.

c.) Shot size/angle + Camera movements

The camera movements involved in this scene are really interesting because there is a sense that you are right there in the action and are following where the camera is at every step.

The most noticeable camera movement is the use of tracking (where the camera itself is moving, in this case, towards the subject which is Eli). The camera starts tracking right from the start and only stops once we are positioned right in front of Eli's arrow tip. This tracking is done to show where the scene is set (a forest), what is in the scene (a gun, a dead body, a cat and Eli) and who we are supposed to be focussed on (Eli). It brings a sense of nervousness because as we are tracking past things in the forest, most of them are still and not moving which makes you think that something will soon jump out at you to bring that tension  to a close.
The tracking is also quite slow which shows that there is no real sense of urgency so there is no need to look ahead, just take in the objects that you see so that you will fully understand what is going on.

Another camera movement which makes an impact is when the camera pans (pivoting the camera to the side to follow a moving object) from the arrow being shot by Eli and following it until it hits the cat. The panning starts off fast as the arrow is shot but once it reaches across from where the camera is positioned everything goes in slow motion (the panning and the arrow) this is done to put emphasis on the arrow being shot and to show its on a direct course right into the cat, the panning then speeds up again to normal speed to show the arrow hitting the cat. The use of panning on the arrow really makes you feel as though you are in the forest watching the action right in front of you and adds to the suspense of whats happening. Compared to the previous emotion of being nervous and scared all of this panning makes you feel excited and makes you wonder what will happen next.

c.) Lighting and colours

Lighting and colours are very important to create a feeling to the opening scene. While bold bright colours like yellow create a happy scene, dark colours like dark green can make the scene creepy and scary.

In The Book Of Eli the main colours used are a dark green/blue and black which makes the scene very scary and dark. In the scene we are in a very misty/foggy forest and can't see much, the forest floor is mainly black so when the director wants us to see something on the ground they will add lighting around it to make it stand out. Above the ground where we see the trunks of trees, the colour is a very dark greeny-blue this coveys a sense of coldness and eeriness. This colour also brings a sense of alienation towards Eli as he is alone in these woods which gives an insight towards the rest of the movie as to how he likes to work alone. The colours also fit in very well with the set because these colours could bring a completely different feeling to a set like inside a room but since we are in a forest it makes us feel uneasy because we are used to forests being a grass green and other friendlier colours but since it is a dark green and blue it is strange and different creating a mysterious feeling.



There is a very low-key lighting in the scene meaning that there are much more pronounced shadows and dramatic contrasts. We hardly see objects because it is far too dark and only really look for them once we hear them, for example after you first watch it you probably hear the cat growl before you see it but after watching it again you can see the cat before it makes a noise.
This lack of lighting and colours was done to draw attention to the fact that Eli is blind and in his world everything is dark and he relies on his hearing. It helps us see partly what Eli sees and again gives us a big clue for the story.It was also done to add to the mysterious feeling there is in the scene and makes us wonder why is everything so dark and if something is being hidden in the darkness.

c.) Sound

There is both diegetic sound (sound that exists in the world of the film) and non-diegetic sound (sound/music that is added to create mood and feeling appropriate to the intended meaning of the scene) in the opening scene.
Even though it seems like most of this scene is in silence, when you are watching and listening closely you can hear the diegetic sound coming through - like the growl of the cat in the background, the faint sound of leaves hitting the ground and when you hear Eli's very clear and deep breaths.
As an example of non-diegetic sound there is also low, scary music that is added to the scene.

All of this creates the feeling of creepiness and nervousness because we associate these sounds as scary noises and are expecting something loud to come and give us a fright.

The growl of the cat is very creepy and strange as it doesn't sound like a normal cat. It brings attention to the cat being different looking and unusual.
When we hear Eli's breathing before he shoots his arrow it is very clear and loud because all of the other sounds have been removed to keep the focus on Eli. It shows that although he is about to shoot at something he is not nervous because his breath is very normal and not fast. This shows that he is comfortable with an arrow and comfortable with hunting or killing things.

This whole use of sound ends up being an extremely big clue for the ending of this movie because it all draws attention to the sounds of the opening rather than the visual, this is a clue because Eli is actually blind and only relies on sound to live, so it means that we are partly experiencing the first scene from Eli's perspective. This is especially noticed when Eli eventually shoots his arrow when everything is completely silent and then we hear, very loudly, the arrow moving through the air and finally right into the cat.
It still feels quite eerie in the scene though because even though there are sounds, we would expect more in a forest for example birds chirping, wind rustling, animals moving. Since there is none of this it puts doubt in the viewers mind that this is a real forest.

link for opening

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OYrrofV76EY

b.) genre / atmosphere

The tone of this opening scene starts off being quite scary due to the fact that at first we see a flash of bright sunlight and then move straight into a foggy/misty forest with a dark and eerie blue tinge to it. Also the fact that there are leaves falling around everywhere make you feel scared and unsure as to what could be about to happen.
This tone soon changes to being very creepy and eerie because we see a gun, a dead body on the ground and then a hairless, skeletal cat enters and starts to sniff the dead body. What also adds to the creepiness is the fact that when we finally see a person (Eli), he is wearing a gas mask which is very strange to see in a forest.

Because of this tone, there is an apprehensive and nervous mood to it because while watching it you feel unsure as to what this movie is about, why specific things are being emphasised like the complete silence and the arrow being shot.

This was all created by how the scene was set, the silence (and heavy breathing near the end) and the objects in the scene.