Film Study

1. ‘Fistful of Dollars’, Dir. Sergio Leon, 11th June.
2. Saving Private Ryan, Steven Spielberg, 24th July 1998.
3. ‘Equilibrium’ Dir. Kurt Wimmer, 6th December 2002.

I chose all the above films but chose to focus on Equilibrium as it is more stereotypical of a thriller film and uses many conventions and codes of media language.

Narrative Structure

The opening to the films is a narrative explanation of the cause and effect of world war 3 and the introduction of a drug to stop human emotion to therefore stop all wars. The narrative is constructed with disastrous images of the 20th century wars and disasters. The grammaton Cleric is mentioned who’s purpose is to irradicate all trace of human emotion as this is what has led to all wars. Also it mentions the drug now being used to stop people feeling emotion. Then it cuts to an abandoned house with a ‘rebel’ dashing through a door shouting “police”. The rebels then start arming themselves with the stereotypical ak47’s. They are all surrounded by lots of famous pieces of art work which they start to try to hide before the gun fire starts. As the fighting brakes out they are easily over thrown by the grammaton cleric who proceed to go inside to this abandoned house and clear the building. Then two men proceed to enter the building played by Christian Bale and Sean Bean. they are greeted by a policeman who explains there are men in a room and the doors bolted shut Christian Bale goes on to say shoot the bolts as I run to the door and turn off the lights. There is a moment of suspense as you see all the men ready themselves. He proceeds to run towards the door and at the right moment the men shoot and he goes throught the door and there are a few shots fired and then silence and a black screen. Then the rebels talk and ask one another if they have shot him and there is a moment of suspense. This is ended as Christian bale starts to shoot and kills all of the rebels. The men are looking for something and this revealed as they pull up some floorboards to reveal the mona lisa and the equilibrium is disrupted as you see them burn the mona lisa with a flame thrower.

Character

The characters in the film are John Preston played by Christian Bale and Errol Partridge played by Sean Bean. John Preston is a gun kata fighter who searches out symbols of human emotion and destroys them. So this makes him seem very evil destroy symbols of what makes us human and what makes up everyone’s personalities. Errol Partridge is also a fighter against human emotion but he turns to the rebel side as he himself indulges in symbols of human emotion such as reading Yeats’ poems.

Sound

Starts with a very bassy and throbbing note and a high pitched note from synthesised sounds which naturally sounds alien to us and not very nice. This dies out to a cello playing a piece in a minor key so very sad sounding. This is accompanied by a English voice. The sound of gunfire through out the next few scenes fills your ears and then goes back to the alien music. As the fight stop and a search is taken out a church like choir is played and is very tranquil in comparison to the start until they find the Mona Lisa and at this point it then goes back to the strange alien music which builds as they take up the floorboards and reveal the picture.

Mise en scene

Stereotypical scenery; abandoned house
Stereotypical props; the rebels dressed in rugged clothes armed with AK47s and police in blue with M4s or Sub machine guns with protective bullet proof vests.
Inside the building is very dark. How the lighting is used gives a noir effect.

Shots

I like this shot of the abandoned house being shot at. It implies someone being shot as you see the bullets arc down around the window and there is an edit to a man at that window so you know someone’s there and you know the bullets would go through the thin walls so you get the whole picture without seeing the gory section.

I like this shot as it the first of many when the director uses a small amount of light to highlight something. The backlighting connotes how Christian Bale is strong and dominating due to the denotation of the Low angle shot and the backlighting highlighting him and producing a silhouette. This is the point when Christian bale storms through the door. After this shot there is a moment of suspense. The feeling of suspense comes from this shot and then guns are heard being fired from the rebels in the room, as the guns are firing the screen goes black. The black screen holds us in suspense as we can not see anything or hear anything so we are not sure if Christian bale is dead or the rebels, so we don’t know what is going to happen next. The guns die out and then the rebels start to talk asking if they have shot him. Then suddenly you see Christian bale light up from the light of his guns. This scene is very well filmed as you don’t see any gore or anyone actually die. All you see is the small amount of light coming from the guns and either Christian Bale shooting or the rebels falling back. I like this scene as it’s cleverly shot to imply a situation but not actually show the whole situation living it to the audience to work out.

I like this shot as is uses the effect of key light again to highlight something. In this case it’s the main characters eyes. I think Christian Bale’s eyes look sinister and dark opposed to Sean Bean’s eyes that look more welcoming and less evil. This is due to the emotions you find out Sean bean still feels later in the film whilst Christian bale is emotionless.







I think this shot is where the equilibrium is disrupted. This is the point when the Mona Lisa is burnt. This makes the audience feel horrified as it’s a symbol of human beauty, artistic nature and intelligence. And to see it destroyed in a flash makes you feel hatred towards the police force, the grammaton cleric.