Pan's Labyrinth - Scene Analysis

The introduction of the Faun is a rich piece of film making on del Toro’s part. As early as
the first shot we’re told a lot about Ofelia and her nature as a character due to the
Mise-en-scène of the scene. Her costume appears simple; A white nightdress and a grey
cardigan. However, with the lighting in the scene, as well as the general colour grading,
her costume appears to blend in naturally with the walls of the “Rabbit Hole” that Ofelia
has found herself in. This then shows the audience that Ofelia belongs in the fantasy
world with the Faun, and not in reality. The white nightdress also indicates Ofelia's purity.
This is important as it links directly to the end of the movie where the Faun needs the
blood of an innocent to open the gateway. So far we’ve been told so much about both
Ofelia and theFaun before the Faun has even made an appearance. 

Mentioned briefly before, the place Ofelia is in resembles that of the Rabbit Hole that
Alice found herself in “Alice in Wonderland”. However, it’s darker and more threatening
than that from the classic tale. This links back to del Toro’s intent and inspiration of fairy
tales with a dark twist. Moving on, we follow Ofelia with a mid tracking shot. Interestingly
enough Ofelia continues moving as the camera pans towards the wall, revealing the
Faun. The focus shifts to the Faun as he awakens. The design of the Faun, much like
Ofelia, blends him into the surroundings of the “Rabbit Hole”, albeit in a more literal
sense. This indicates that they are one and the same. They have the same intentions
and end goals, even if it’s not apparent to the audience at this moment in time. This is
also interesting when you consider the fact that the rebels always appear in nature and
look natural there too with their costumes. This links back to how Ofelia’s tasks are to
do with disrupting fascism along with the rebels.

An interesting point of notice with the Faun is that whenever he appears throughout the
film, he is always emerging out of shadow and is always illuminated in low light and
thus part of his face is always shrouded in shadow. This gives the character an uneasy
feeling and makes the audience think that there might be malicious intentions with this
character. The actors stilted performance indicates this also. I believe this was an
intentional decision by del Toro to once again emphasise his point of fairy tales having
dark subject matter. However, the audience can still tell that the Faun is a good
character, as the light that shines upon him is blue. Traditionally in fiction blue is the
colour of the hero and red is the colour of the villain.

When the Faun begins talking to Ofelia, we get a Mid Close up shot of Ofelia using top
lighting. Ofelia is in center frame and the background of the shot is not in focus. This is
to highlight the importance of what the Faun is telling Ofelia and to further convey the
innocence of the character.

As the Faun moves around the rock, we see that his movement is quite stilted and slow.
This is a visual indication as to how long Princess Moanna has been away from her
kingdom and how long the Faun has had to stay in place, lying in wait for her return.
Interestingly enough this could also be an inter-textual reference to “The Wizard of Oz”
and the character of the Tin Man, as he had also been stuck in one place and could
only move once he met Dorothy. An interesting point of notice would be the design of
the Faun itself as it represents del Toro’s theme/inspiration of dark fairy tales. What I
mean by this is that the features of the Faun, like his eyes, appear mystical and
somewhat majestic. Consequently other features, for example his teeth, are sharp
and appear to be those of a wild animal. This indicates subtle uneasiness and the dark
undertones of the film. This is the same for his body, as it is that of a tree. This can be
linked to an enchanted forest that can be found in many fairy tales, however the wood
seems somewhat decayed and old, representing evil forests filled with evil creatures
from fairy tales.

Continuing on with the scene, we get a match on action shot as the Faun walks behind
the rock. The scene cuts to Ofelia as she follows him and then back to the Faun.
Ofelia is positioned in the same place as the Faun and the framing of the shot places
them at the same height, despite the Faun being much taller. This further shows the
shared intentions of the characters as well as showing an equal power balance between
the two, as despite the fact that the Faun appears in charge, he still needs Ofelia to do
the challenges for him. Ofelia controls his future. Subsequently, the Faun can chose to
not give Ofelia challenges as he does in the aftermath of her encounter with the Pale
Man.

Despite the equal power balance between the two, the Faun is positioned higher
than Ofelia, showing that she is intimidated by his presence, specifically when he
talks of her being a princess. A mid shot of Ofelia conveys this also. Later on there’s
a long shot of the “Rabbit Hole” where top lighting illuminates the rock in the center
of the frame. The rock shows Ofelia and the Faun living in Ofelia’s kingdom. This
represents that this is the end goal for them to reach. Despite this, only the front half
of Ofelia and the Faun is illuminated. Their back half is darkened. This could represent
that dark and twisted actions that must happen to reach the end goal, like Ofelia’s death.

At the end of the scene there’s a back tracking shot of Ofelia that goes from a
Mid Shot to a Long Shot. I believe this was used to represent Ofelia’s uncertainty
about taking on the Faun’s challenges, as well as her loneliness at the house
with Vidal. This is especially interesting as these themes are conveyed as Ofelia is
leaving the “Rabbit Hole”, as she’s transitioning from fantasy to reality.

Horror - The Underappreciated Genre

The Horror Film is often disregarded. Overlooked. It’s seen as mindless entertainment with no real meaning behind it. And while it is true that there is some mindless horror out there, others have true meaning towards them. A great example of this is a movie such as John Carpenter’s The Thing (1982), where the premise of the movie was to represent the mistrust of the Red Scare during the Cold War, similar to the 1956 and 1973 versions of Invasion of the Body Snatchers.

However, the Horror Genre is synonymous for having multiple Sub-Genres. Some of these include the Slasher (With films such as Friday the 13th and A Nightmare on Elm Street) and Supernatural (Paranormal Activity and Poltergeist). Even B-Movie Horror is regularly celebrated, with movies that are “So bad they’re good” receiving praise (such as Killer Klowns From Outer Space and Leprechaun).

However, I find the Slasher Sub-Genre of Horror to be the most appealing of all the Sub-Genres. Movies like Halloween, Friday the 13th and A Nightmare on Elm Street have had a profound cultural impact on the world of cinema. Characters such as Micheal Myers, Jason Voorhees, and Freddy Kruger have become some of the most popular characters in all of cinema. The Slasher Sub-Genre hit its peak in the mid-’80s. At this point, the tropes hadn’t been worn out and the premises of the movies were still interesting. As time went on, the tropes became staler. Some of these tropes were the silent stalking killer and the “final girl”. A final girl is usually defined as a female protagonist who would usually beat the killer by the end of the film. This would be characters like Nancy Thompson (A Nightmare on Elm Street), Laurie Strode (Halloween) and Sidney Prescott (Scream). Interestingly enough, A Nightmare on Elm Street broke these tropes by having a Killer with a personality and by having the first “final boy” in A Nightmare on Elm Street Part 2: Freddy’s Revenge. The premises of the movies also became more outlandish with ridiculous premises (such as Jason X, Halloween 5: The Revenge of Michael Myers and Freddy’s Dead: The Final Nightmare).

However, there have been more recent attempts of Slasher movies that accomplish the goals set out by the earlier classics. A movie like Terrifier (2017) was a gruesome slasher following Art The Clown as he stalks and murders people on Halloween Night. Sound familiar? There isn’t much in the way of a story, as each scene is basically either set up for a kill, or the execution of a kill itself. The practical effects of the film are sublime and it genuinely instills terror. I believe that the film accomplished exactly what it set out to do - scare the audience with gruesome and grotesque violence.

Similarly, the phenomenal Cabin in the Woods was a movie described as a “loving hate letter” to the Horror Film by director Joss Whedon. The movie isn’t a straight Horror, in fact, it’s more of a comedy with horror elements. But I believe it’s worth a mention as it comments on all the ridiculous Horror tropes and pokes fun at them (for example how characters are always splitting up in dangerous situations and how they drop weapons after using them once). In fact, the entire movie is a metaphor for the state of the horror film - the old Gods (the audience) needs to see a senseless murder and violence (the horror film) with specific characters/ tropes (final girl, sex, gore) and if those things aren’t met they destroy the world (give the movie bad reviews and make it a failure). It’s quite an ingenious movie and definitely worth a watch, especially with all the Horror movie Easter Eggs.

Kill Bill - Scene Analysis

At the beginning of the scene, the Bride is shown in a medium-close-up shot conveying
her happiness.

There is a shot-reverse-shot sequence where the camera cuts to the door. Here we hear
the diegetic sound of Bill's flute mix in with the non-diegetic soundtrack of the scene.
When the camera cuts back to the Bride, she is visually distressed/concerned. This shows
that there is some negative history between her and Bill before we're introduced to Bill.

With a medium-close-up shot of the Bride, she lifts a cloth into the shot which she is
fiddling with, which further highlights her tense/worrisome emotions towards Bill.
When the Bride moves to the doorframe, she is followed via the use of a tracking shot.
Once she reaches the doorframe she freezes, while her silhouette is shrouded in shadow
due to the lighting of the shot, which I believe conveys the darkness that Bill brings with
him, along with conveying further uncertainty within Bill as a character.

When the Bride exists the Church, the Bride and Bill are framed on opposing sides
of the shot, with the Bride in a medium-long-shot and Bill in a mid-shot. In my opinion,
this conveys that Bill still takes up much of the Brides life/world. We can see the
juxtaposition between the costumes worn by the characters (with the Bride wearing
white and Bill wearing black) showing the contrast in the characters - Bill is the villain,
the Bride is the hero. This then hints to the audience that these two characters will
oppose each other - be it physically or mentally - by the end of the film.

As Bill and the Bride are walking toward each other, they never pass the halfway
point of the frame. This could be a subtle visual nod to both Bill’s desire to get the
Bride back, and the Brides desire to get away from Bill. Furthermore, we get a
close-up of both characters sharing the shot once they both reach the halfway line.
The framing of the two subjects in this shot is important to the conversation taking
place, as Bill is trying to point out the mundanity of what will be the Brides future life
and is subsequently trying to get her to go with him. The Bride holds her own and
stands her ground. The framing reflects this by having both characters positioned
at a similar height level. This shows the audience that the power balance between
the two at this moment is equal. At a certain point, Bill says “As opposed to traveling
around the world killing human beings and being paid vast sums of money?”, to
which the Bride responded “Precisely”. But as she did this, she leaned over the
halfway point of the frame and into Bills half, asserting her dominance and definitively
stating that she wants her new life. The entire scene is filled with rich filmmaking.
Each shot counts as a piece of the puzzle, and it’s clear that each puzzle piece is as
detailed as the end product.