Opening Scene Analysis

 Now You See Me 

Camera Work: 

Close-ups/over-the-shoulder close-ups: these shots help direct attention and focus on a specific character. It draws attention to way they are saying, what they look like, and what their emotions are. 

Focus: the focus changes between the cards and the boy character to make sure the audience is paying attention to the right thing at the right time.  

Establishing shot: this shot follows after the close-ups of the characters. The camera is moving throughout the city and shows the dark night with bright lights, helping indicate where the movie is taking place. 

Aerial view: the camera shows above all the characters celebrating in the city and slowly zooms into a specific character who seems less excited than all the others. It also highlighted the fact that he was not by anyone else whereas the other people were very close together.  

Focus pulls: the camera is continuously moving with characters and zooming into specific things to help draw attention.  

Close-up eye shots: the camera is zoomed into just the eyes of characters to help emphasize the emotions. It also symbolizes that there are lots of thoughts behind their eyes, which could be evil or innocent. 

After all the quick shots and close-ups of each character, the location of the movie has changed. It shows an establishing shot of the water. This now indicates that it is daytime and is in a location on the water. The camera continues to not stay steady and continuously move with the characters. This helps create the crazy and overwhelming feeling for the audience. It helps indicate the future of suspense and issues that are coming later on in the film. 

Editing: 

All the editing just consists of straight shots. If the transitions are dragged on, then the suspense of the film may not be as high for the audience. It helps continue the film and keep it flowing as quickly as the shots are taken.  

Mise-en-scene: 

Lighting: natural lighting 

Makeup: no specific paleness in the skin; regular day look 

Wardrobe: some characters are wearing more professional office clothes while the others are wearing darker, more casual clothes 

Setting: a city on the water 

Props: a deck of cards 

Reasoning: 

This film follows along the thriller subgenre of having revenge. In our final film we are planning on creating a film that involves an action with the main plot being about revenge.  

 

Film: “Now You See Me” (2013) 

Directors: Louis Leterrier, Jon M. Chu, Ruben Fleischer 

Producers: Bobby Cohen, Alex Kurtzman, Roberto Orci. 

Key Writers: Ed Solomon, Boaz Yakin, Edward Ricourt 

Wins: Favorite Thriller Movie (People’s Choice Award 2014) 

Nominations: Saturn Awards, Empire Award for best thriller 

Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u_diRgwPCS8