Thursday 24 October 2013

Man on Fire : in depth

 Man on Fire - opening scene

The strengths of the opening scene are firstly the way they have birds eye views of the area so that the viewer can get an idea for the area and how densely populated and built up it is. Another strength is how they use the fact after about 30 seconds to really set the tone for the film ' there is one kidnapping every 60 minutes in Latin America. 70 % of the victims do not survive." This give the viewer an idea of how regularly that area has kidnappings , this is then followed up really well by a short clip of a man getting taken and forced into a van in plain view of hundreds of people. One more strength is how they use pictures of multiple families in distress and this shows that this isn't uncommon.

There is many weaknesses in this intro but one of the ones i thought they had was the fact that the intro contained non of the characters that were part of the film it was just showing the setting and a random kidnapping , I think that it would have been better if the opening scene related to the people that actually got affected even if it was just a small section of them at lunch.

Overall I think that it is a very interesting and thrilling intro and gives a great start to the film , it really sets the theme and the way that life isn't regarded very highly and people don't really know what to do to help and stop it. They just have to put up the fact that it happens and hope it doesn't happen to them.

The reason for the director using the views of the city in the start of the intro is to show the viewer where they are and the type of culture that is in that area. This made the me think about the type of things that happened in the large city's of Latin america for example drugs , guns , scams and crime.




Then the fact that is used ' there is one kidnapping every 60 minutes in Latin America. 70 % of the victims do not survive."put a negative image in the viewers mind and the reason for the director doing that is because if will get a reaction from the viewer and should provoke a response and would make them want to watch the film. If the intro was slow and dull people wouldn't watch past that and then they would lose there audience.

 Then on to the fast paced clip of the man getting forced into the car , this is used to show the viewer how easy it is for these people to get taken and also how the public don't attempt to help because they don't want to get affected them selves, this made me feel like they had a sense of venerability and couldn't have much of an affect on what was going to happen. Also after the clip of the clip of the man getting taken is shows people in distress so this shows how it is affecting them specifically and also the whole population in that area.

Another thing that the director does to get the attention of the viewer is have lots of images of people who have been kidnapped and how there family's are feeling or dealing with it by doing close ups of their faces to show their emotion.

1 comment:

  1. There is some good analysis here Alex, but you need to think of a more interesting ways of presenting your information. This might work well as a Prezi.

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