research into mise-en-scene

Mise-En-Scene

Definition- an expression used to describe the design aspects of a theatre or film production, which essentially means "visual theme" or "telling a story"—both in visually artful ways through storyboarding, cinematography and stage design, and in poetically artful ways through direction. Mise-en-scène has been called film criticism's "grand undefined term"

-Settings and iconography
-Costume, hair and make-up
-Facial expressions and body language
-Lighting and colour
-Positioning of characters/objects within the frame

This particular scene is from a recent film called 'Deliver Us From Evil,' this shows a lot of thriller  aspects within this brief clip.

The setting of this scene is very dark, representing a mysterious and strange storyline. The intrigued character Ralph Sarchie is questioning the one of a few possessed characters trying to solve what is happening within this strange scenario. During this sequence; the physcotic girl has been put into a prison setting, this shows that the girl has been resembled as an animal, being put behind a cage, which allows the audience to put into a perspective that the girl is in a zoo plot. An animal behind the bars in a cage. This also interprets to the audience that she is not in a normal situation, acting in-human. As she is being perceived as an animal, there is also a realisation towards the audience that the behaviour from her is also animal like; showing that she is out of control.

The costume, hair and make-up is very much thriller relevant as it the stratches that are made out on her face show that she has no control over what she is doing to herself, in this case it would be seen as self-harm but after being possessed, having no recollection of her taking part in anything that she had done. Her costume looks like it was meant to be a white colour, but has turned into an off-white, grey colour. This is meant to make the audience look at more of the face rather than being distracted by the surroundings, hence the reason everything is a very dark, boring colour, and the only thing you can see with detail is the face of the girl and her very detailed, realistic make-up design, which makes the scene even more effective.

The body language of this girl is all curled up, just like an animal, or even child like. I interpreted this with a child aspect as when you are a child you like to play around and you are very immature, this is what the girl is like, no care in the world towards how the police man is judging her. The police-man, Ralph; is standing very confidently, you can tell he is very confident in this scene as there is no fear in his eyes and by the end of the scene he puts his arm out to the girl, showing her a picture on his phone, even though he was aware that she was a dangerous spirit. He is also the hierarchy of this sequence as he is stood confidently and she is curled up in a ball at the side of the room, representing that the spirit that is in her doesn't really understand how to act with interactionality, doesn't know how to control the body language. Her facial expressions look very intimidating; as soon as she is introduced into the scene, she immediately hisses at the police officer, which represents she does not like him or want to feel his presence. She walks up to the two police officers with a hunch back and her hands stuck out, which represents a form of anger and does not slur her words, she shouts them, pronouncing them as well as she can, to show power to the officers and to show who is the hierarchy now, as the spirit is more powerful and strong than the two officers put together. I think she also uses a lot of mouth expression when talking, is to show the girls actual spirit trying to communicate, to show fear inside of her, but the evil spirit is more strong and is taking over the real spirit in which belongs to the body. 

The lighting of this scene is very dark and dull, not so much where the police men are standing but where the girl is lying, to represent an evil presence that surrounds her. This then also adds effect to the face of the girl, as it is all focused onto her, which creates more of a scare to the audience as you can see every one of her facial expressions without being distracted by the background of the scene. This then makes it very effective as is creates more of a thrill towards the audience. The colour is set to be dark, mysterious colours to show fear, sadness, anger etc, instead of using neon colours or bright colours, which would be represented as happiness, which would then make the audience confused as it does not give a clear interpretation. 

The positioning of the characters is meant to represent who is the stronger character personality wise. Showing who has the higher ranking of the scene. By the end, they are both in a competition to see who is the stronger character, as the girl stands up and tries to intimidate the police officer. As the police officer has a strong personality and is extremely curious to find out what is going on, he does not back down. After this scene, the frustration of the competition gets too much for the possessed girl and takes out aggression by biting the arm of the police officer, this shows that she is not use to having to retaliate towards people. The positioning of the character is to represent power, showing a lot of high angle and low angle shots; showing who is the most confident and who is uncontrollable and unaware of what is happening. Also, a lot of mom-diegetic sound is used in a lot of thriller films, particularly this film, as it creates tension to the audience, a lot of riding if sound and as soon as something scary happens, the music would suddenly rise, which would make that particular scene.

Research into mise-en-scene is benefitical as it allows me to understand the concept of it and why it is effectivce towards the genre of a thriller. It is effective as it can get an insight towards a part of a certain scene from a successful thriller and increase my knowledge for thriller films. As mise-en-scene can range from a various amount of things, it is very important to include them in my opening sequence, as they can range from what the character is wearing to then the setting of a scene and the mood of it.