Analyse how techniques were used to strongly affect your emotions in ONE or TWO key scenes.
Frank Darabont uses techniques such as lighting, music and camera shots in his film “The Shawshank Redemption” to effectively incite feelings within the viewers. The two most memorable scenes for me were the ‘Aria’ scene and the scene of Brooks leaving Shawshank. These scenes strongly affected my emotions and helped me to understand Darabont’s intentions in making the film.
The ‘Aria’ scene surprised me, in that Andy was willing to risk punishment to help his fellow inmates. It was very brave of Andy to defy the Warden and play the record over the loudspeaker and I felt a sense of pride. This feeling was swollen by the music, as it was a song about a servant who outwitted his master, which is also what Andy ended up doing. In this scene there is a mid shot of Andy who is relaxed with his feet up on the desk. The camera is level with him and there is sunlight shining on his face. This particular shot made me feel happy and smug as this is how Andy was feeling at the time. The light on his face showed he had hope and this also made me hopeful; that Andy would survive and get out of Shawshank Prison.
Within the ‘Aria’ scene, there is a sweeping shot of the prison grounds. We see inmates and guards alike gazing up at the loudspeakers as if some miracle had occurred. Every man has a look of awe on his face “and for the briefest of moments, every last man in Shawshank felt free.” This heightened my sense of pride; that Andy could achieve something so amazing that even the guards stopped what they were doing to listen. This camera angle also shows the green grass and trees outside the prison and this made me realise that Darabont’s main intention in this scene was to provoke a feeling of freedom.
The scene of Brooks leaving Shawshank contrasted deeply with the ‘Aria’ scene. Throughout this scene, Brooks is in shadow. This shows the grimness of the situation and it made me feel sad and lost. When Brooks lets his pet crow go out the window, the background is dark which shows there is no hope for Brooks or his bird in the outside world. This made me realise how Brooks is like an animal in captivity: when he is released he won’t know how to survive. I felt sorry for Brooks in this scene as he looked so scared and vulnerable. The long shot of him walking out of the prison shows brighter light on the inside and a dull, grey light on the outside. This makes Brooks seem like he is really walking into prison instead of out, as life on the outside looks menacing.
Camera techniques were also used effectively in this scene to help me identify with the character of Brooks. The mid shot of Brooks on the bus showed his white hands gripping the seat and a terrified expression on his face. This shot showed how Brooks was alone and unfamiliar with his surroundings and it made me feel apprehensive, as I did not know what was going to happen to him next. The close up of Brooks behind a wooden railing that looked a lot like prison bars made me sad, as he seemed to be imprisoned on the outside. This whole scene of Brooks leaving Shawshank gave me a feeling of hopelessness. I understood how Brooks felt being in an unfamiliar situation and it made me sad that he had to resort to suicide to end his misery. I think Darabont’s intention in this scene was to show us what life would be like for Andy if he lost hope and didn’t escape from prison.
The ‘Aria’ scene and the ‘Brooks leaving prison’ scene are two contrasting parts of the film. While one leaves us feeling proud and free, the other makes us feel downhearted. Darabont uses lighting, camera and music techniques in these scenes to provoke these feelings and this helps us to empathise with the characters involved. Understanding the characters’ positions and feelings is an important aspect of this film, as it is through this we are able to appreciate Darabont’s themes of hope, freedom and institutionalism.
Analyse how ONE or MORE of the following helped you to understand a main character or individual
Costume, make-up, soundtrack, cinematography, voice
Brooks is an important character in Frank Darabont’s film ‘Shawshank Redemption’, as he helps us to understand the important theme of hope. Darabont uses cinematography and the techniques it involves to help us understand the huge repercussions prison has on Brook’s life and how he lost hope, yet how important it is to have it. Through the use of cinematography we can better understand the character of Brooks and why Darabont uses the part in the movie.
When Brooks came from the outside world, he came into prison life, which “…consists of routine. And more routine.” As Brooks began to rely on the regularity of prison routine, the world outside continued to change and evolve. Different cinematographic techniques are used in the film to clearly differentiate the inside of prison to the outside. At the beginning of the movie, an overhead, sweeping shot is used, showing the green, open landscape outside the prison, while tall, grey walls surround the inside. This shows how the outside is free to change and adjust, while the inside of Shawshank is limited to the same routine, with the shadow of confinement ever present. Brooks spends 50 years within this confinement, “…it’s all he knows.” and he gets to the point that all he can depend on is the walls that surround him. He knows not of the green, the freedom and change of the outside, only the grey invariable routine of prison life. Darabont links camera shots such as this to Brooks’ unfamiliarity with the outside world to help us better understand the idea of institutionalism and how long term prisoners are affected by it.
Brooks realises that the outside world is foreign to him, and so has no hope for life on the outside. Darabont uses lighting to show how Brooks has lost hope and how prison life has taken its toll on him. Brooks is regularly seen in areas of darkness and shadow, representing how he has no hope left whatsoever. For example when he releases Jake the crow, he is almost in complete darkness. Prison has taken away his life “…the part that counts, anyway.”, so that Brooks has no hope for himself to ever readjust to the outside. He has become accustomed to grey life on the inside, and has lost hope for any form of freedom on the green outside. Techniques such as lighting help us to understand Brooks’ loss of hope and to see that prison life took it away from him. Darabont uses Brooks as a key character to portray the important theme of hope and the importance of possessing it.
Brooks left everything that he had become accustomed to in prison, and moved into a life alien to him, where the world had “…gone and got itself in a goddam hurry.”. Sound effects such as car horns and screeching brakes are used to show the unfamiliarity of the outside world to Brooks. A close up shot of his face through some wooden bars shows us that prison had had such a huge effect on his life, that even after he was free, he still felt imprisoned. Brooks was institutionalised, with the shadow of confinement ever present, even on the outside. Darabont uses the character of Brooks to show us how when all hope is lost, life may not seem so important anymore. How hope can be the reason that you keep going, or lost hope can be the cause of just giving up, as Brooks did. Through the use of cinematography, we can understand Brooks’ situation, and how important hope really is. “There’s something inside that they can’t get to, that they can’t touch…Hope.”
Frank Darabont uses the character of Brooks to show the viewer what the repercussions of institutionalism are; how prison can take away any hope for freedom, for a life not constricted by stone walls. Through Brooks we can see what can happen because of a loss of hope, and with the help of cinematographic techniques we can understand the importance of having hope. Things like lighting and camera shots can help us to see how prison caused Brooks to be alienated from the outside world, and we can recognise that if only Brooks did have hope, he may have survived. Overall, we can come to the conclusion that “…hope is a good thing, maybe even the best of things. And no good thing ever dies.”
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