Explore the use of film language for effect in an opening sequence to
‘Shutter Island’. How does the director engage the audience?
The director uses various techniques, predominantly camera
angles, shots and lighting to engage the audience in the opening three minutes
of the film. The Camera angles and lighting provide a ‘bone chilling’ sense to
the opening scenes, whilst also establishing the genre, characters and
atmosphere.
The opening
to the film is a screen of fog, from which appears a boat in a wide angle shot.
Though the audience might not yet know much regarding the film, the use of the
boat appearing from the fog, along with the sound of crashing waves emits a
sense of danger, which immediately engages the audience, as action and danger
is known to be exciting. Later, when the first character, played by Leonardo
Dicaprio, is introduced to the audience, the director, Martin Scorsese, uses Chiaroscuro, with a
mid-shot through a door way to show ‘Teddy’ throwing up. The use of the dark
lighting and mid-shot is too reveal to the audience what is happening, but
suspend the meeting of the character, which leaves the audience slightly
desperate wanting to know who the character is, what he looks like, and what he
is like. As the camera the snaps to an ‘over the shoulder shot’, Leonardo
Dicaprio, who plays ‘Teddy’ stands, revealing himself in a mirror as the
lighting on his face is now brighter, but the entire frame is now in key
lighting. The director deliberately introduces ‘Teddy’ in this way, as it
introduces him, while keeping the sense of a bleak and uncomfortable ship.
There are a few zoom pans used next, which follow ‘Teddy’ as
he makes his way to the outside of the ship. The zooms and pans are used to
reveal parts of the ship, such as the hand cuffs hanging from the ceiling in a
room where low key lighting is used. This reveals to the audience what kind of
boat it is, as it becomes clear that it is some sort of prison ship, and the
use of the low key lighting is to darken the room, and make it seem more
frightening. The scarier and darker the scenes become, the more interested the
audience becomes, which is clearly shown throughout the opening of this film.
As ‘Teddy’
meets his partner, the audience becomes aware that he is a police officer,
which is done by Martin
Scorsese in a clever use of dialogue, so that ‘Teddy’ never actually says that
he is, but there are small hints. As the two characters meet for the first
time, close up two shots are used, with the low lighting and inclusion of the
cloudy sky to continue the theme of bleak darkness. By this point the audience
will have realised that the two characters are on a prisoner transporter on
their way to the prison. This alone adds a sense of dread and fear, leaving the
audience wanting to know what will happen once they arrive. The scene then cuts
to a longshot of an island, again with the clouds and low lighting to darken
and add fear to the theme. The reflections of the water make the shadow, and
the island continues the theme of dark colours so that the sense of
inevitability and darkness is never lost.
The music being played is using low brass instruments,
which increases the tension as the captain says ‘the dock is the only way on or
off’. Martin
Scorsese uses this classic move of creating one way to escape so that the
audience becomes even more fearful. The use of that line tells the audience
that at some point they will need to escape, which is cleverly done so that the
audience want to keep watching.
To conclude, Martin Scorsese uses low lighting, dark music and several important
camera angles to introduce the audience to ‘Teddy’ and reveal the setting of
the plot. The dark shadows on the boat along with the two shot of the officers
while talking emphasises the bleak and dangerous island, creating a sense of
fear which is the main skill used to engage the audience.
