Chapter 3: Exploring a Material World: Mise-En-Scene (pgs. 58 - 93)
"The mise-en-scene contains the scene elements of a movie, including actors, aspects of lighting, sets, and setting, costumes, make-up, and other features of the image that exists independently of the camera and the processes of filming and editing (pg. 62)."
The evnironment in which a person finds themselves serves as the mise-en-scene. Whether it is outside, in a public building, a church, or in a private home, these places define the activities that happens within that space. The place also dictates the type of clothing that is appropriate for that place. For example, if you go to court or to church you would dress more formally. On the other hand, if you were at the park or hanging out with friends, you would dress more casually. The same would apply to hair styles and , for a women, whether make-up would be required or appropriate. We respond to our environment depending on the feeling that space evokes. What an actor wears or how they look evokes different responses and expectations from the audience. The audience can share the feelings or perspectives of an actor portraying a character.
"A prop (short for property) is an object that functions as part of the set or as a tool used by the actors (pg. 69)."
Props used to tell the story in a movie take on greater significance when they are relatable to a character who gives that prop meaning. Props can have cultural significance depending on how it is used related to that particular culture. The color of a prop may hold significance as well. Like the red phones in the movie The American (2010). The color may represent freedom to the main character, Jack (played by George Clooney). Freedom from the life of an assassin. Jack tells his connection over the phone that this job is his last. He wants to retire. Every time he makes a phone call on the red phone it brings him that much closer to getting out for good. Or so he thinks.
"Movie spectaculars are films in which the magnitude and intricacy of the mise-en-scene share equal emphasis with or even outshine the story, the actors, and other traditional focal points for a movie (pg. 89)."
Like in the movie Avatar (2009), the avatars themselves, along with the spectacular planet on which they live, take on more significance than the human actors in the movie. Audiences that enjoy these larger-than-life movies want to be transported to another world and want to be awed by the magnificent creatures that inhabit that world. The special effects in Avatar (2009) creates just this type of world. The world created by director, James Cameron, is so spectacular that you get lost in this imaginary world and forget that it is not real, it is only a movie. That is the beauty of this form of escapism. You are magically transported from this world into another.
"The most fundamental value of mise-en-scene is that it defines our location in the material world: the physical settings and objects that surround us indicate our place in the world (pg. 85)."
The external boundaries describes the limitations that human beings are faced with, therefore, creates the context in which they can live within those set boundaries. Whether it is a natural environment, a social context, or a spectacular artificially-created world, each has its own limitations and depending on the context of the situation, the characters act accordingly. Making meaning out of the world in which a character finds itself, is an important aspect of mise-en-scene.
In the movie The American (2010), Jack, the assassin, finds himself in a remote mountain village in Italy after a job that went wrong in Sweden. Even though he tries to fit in, everyone in the village knows about the American photographer. There is no where to hide. This is the mise-en-scene that this character finds himself in during this movie.
Works Cited
"The American (2010) - IMDb." The Internet Movie Database (IMDb). Web. 03 Apr. 2011. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1440728/.
"YouTube - Avatar Trailer The Movie (New Extended HD Trailer)." YouTube - Broadcast Yourself. Web. 03 Apr. 2011. <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cRdxXPV9GNQ>.
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