Body paragraph

Paul Haggis uses cinematography techniques to develop the concept of power status and control. One main scene where this is used is when officer john Ryan sexually assaults Christine, the techniques used were the positioning of the camera as the cameras when looking at officer Ryan were lower and made him look more powerful and strong whereas the woman’s camera shot was up high looking down on her making her look powerless and fragile. These camera techniques unconsciously make us think of people’s relevance and power they make the good look small and the bad look strong.”Get your filthy fucking hands off me” this sudden realization of the horror happening gives us the viewer a sense of dread, nausea as the close-up camera zooms in and we can see the devastation on Christine’s face and these sort of cinematography techniques creates a feeling of sympathy and empathy for her. We also see this type of dialogue when after the incident Christine and Cameron are silent in the car and then a burst of anger unleashes. When the silence is still going on, we see the camera angle change as the positioning of it shows the sadness upon Cameron’s face and we feel sorry for him as we know due to his skin color he couldn’t have done anything to stop it, and the camera angle creates a victim like presence to him. The director’s intentions for using this is that the prejudice concept is further developed as the minorities are viewed as small and unprotected from society as the camera angle makes them look like victims and targets by using close-ups and bird-eye views and when the white cops are on camera the angles create this sense of power and strength from full shots and establishing shots.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *