Life of Pi

Life of Pi (2012), which is directed by Ang Lee, is a American live-action computer-animated adventure drama film based on Yann Martel's 2001 novel of the same name.

Mise-en-scene:

• Conformed to realism
• Location
• Zoo: the place Pi has lived
• Ship: had a wreck
• Lifeboat: Pi and the tiger has lived on it and it was floating on the ocean
• A secret and mysterious island
• Hospital in Maxico
• Costume
• Simple
• Woman were wearing Indian clothes
• Pi’s clothes were dirty, messy and broken, later he was even half-naked: to show that his situation became worse gradually
• Pi was saved eventually and he wore white clothes: clean, new life
• Time
• Pi’s past and present day
• When the accident happened: storm, at night

Cinematography:

• Focus
• Rack focus
• From LAN to tiger
• From Vishnu to those who were throwing something on them
• From Pi’s face to his shaky hand holding a meat to Richard: show his reckless and nervous
• From Anandi to Pi: show their connection
• Selective focus
• Only focus on Pi but not his father and brother: show the main character
• Focus on Pi and his brother but not his father as they were mumbling that his father can’t hear
• Camera angle
• Low angle
• When father was telling Pi how dangerous the tiger was: to exaggerate the danger and scare of the tiger
• Showed Pi’s power and determination when Pi was extremely hungry and there were a huge amount of fish on the lifeboat
• When Pi was dying and looked up to the sky: to show that he was talking to his family who were in the heaven
• High angle
• The tiger became a little bit scared of Pi because of his threat and determination
• Eye-level
• When there were many fish flying towards Pi, it has used his eye to present what was happening in front of him
• Lighting

• source
• Always available especially when Pi and the tiger were on the lifeboat: came from nature: more realistic
• Mixing sources? At night, but there were many jellyfish which provided the light in the ocean
• Available? The light came out from the sky when Pi met up the storm again
• Colour saturation
• Saturated: at the beginning: showed the wild animals in zoo
• Desaturated: in the past: greyish, washed out, like ‘Slumdog Millionaire’: poor and simple places, like slum
• Camera distance
• MCU
• When father was blaming Pi: to emphasize the father’s anger on Pi
• When Pi was saved and calling his family: his loneliness on the lifeboat
• Pi was crying when it was back to the present at last: focus on presenting the true feeling about his life
• CU
• The face of the tiger: to focus on its facial expression in details
• When Pi was looking up to the sky: to show his worse situation on the lifeboat
• XLS
• When Pi was inside the warehouse of animals: to show his loneliness
• When Pi was jumping into the ocean and nothing was there except the fish: he was the only human there
• After the storm, his boat was floating on the ocean with nothing around him
• When there was a whale passed by: openness, freedom, comparison between the enormous whale and Pi with the lifeboat
• Nothing else except the lifeboat on the ocean and became peaceful again after second storm
• XCU
• The tiger’s eyes when Pi opened the cloth to see the tiger: emphasized its hostility through its eyes
• From LS to CU
• At last Pi told people another story: to help focusing and build up the emotion gradually
• Camera movement
• Aerial shot
• There was a storm when Pi’s family was on the ship: to show what was happening on the ocean and the seriousness of the storm
• There was nothing left except the boat, Pi and the tiger after those animals being eaten by the tiger
• Handheld
• When Pi was running on the deck: to show how shaky the ship was
• Always used when Pi and the tiger were on the lifeboat to be more realistic
• Tilt
• Pi was running on the deck: to show the ship was extremely shaky and inclined

Editing:

• Continuity editing
• Establishing shot
• house surrounded by trees and wild animals
• the church and the surrounding when Pi was 12
• Shot/ Reverse/ Shot
• When dad was blaming Pi angrily
• Eyeline match: use a lot but just some special moment
• Always used as Pi looking at the tiger
• When Pi was saved and looking at the place that the tiger went away: means that Pi wanted to see the tiger
• Re-establishing shot
• Always showed the ocean again to remind the audience that Pi and the tiger were still on the lifeboat drifting on the ocean
• Shot transition
• Fade in/out
• at the beginning: animals to animals
• always used as eliminating the time or the progress
• brought back to the past and present
• fade to black
• when Pi was the only one in his family to be saved and then: fade to black, the storm was over
• wipe
• when Pi was describing his life with the tiger and the lifeboat, the scene was wiping another aside to start to present what he has experienced

Use of sound:

• Non-diegetic sound
• Soft tone at the beginning: create a wild, natural and comfortable atmosphere
• The background music was like an orchestra when Pi met up the storm again: a bit passionate to lift audience’s emotion
• Pi was as a narration to tell his story in the past
• When Pi was fighting with those left animals, there was always no non-diegetic sound: more realistic, can focus more on what they were doing
• Dialogue privileged over other sounds: escapist, illusion of real space and time

Others:

• Allow space for memorable dialogue: ‘Above all, don’t lose hope.’
• Theme
• Life
• Region
• Treasuring
• Stories and narrative structure
• Types: adventure
• Linear, backstory: flashback, dialogue
• Closure
• Not exactly following the Todorov’s theory as it had many difficulties and Pi solved them
• Who appears in them
• ‘hero’: Pi (and the tiger): a young boy ( and an animal)
• Villain: Pi’s family
• Use of stars
• Not a particular star that has been used in another film before
• But the type, Indian, is always used in such kind of film
• i.e. bad situation: have no money, living in a poor place
• e.g. ‘Slumdog Millionaire’
• Technology

• Production perfection
• Meet audiences expectations and experiences of changing technologies e.g. special effects: animals, lighting
• Digital technology
• filmed in studio

Orphan

Orphan (2009), which is directed by Jaume Collet-Serra, is a American psychological thriller horror film.

Characters:

• Everyday family and people
• Monster: human: the psychotic orphan: Esther
• Victims: 
• father: Johnny
• the son: Daniel: reckless
• Sister Abigail (Respectable member in society)
• Survival:
• mother: Kate (a lone woman eventually)
• daughter: Max (an almost completely deaf girl)

Plot:

• Results in  wave of violence leaves many dead
• Esther first killed Sister Abigail and then the son and finally the father
• She wanted to kill the mother and the daughter but failed
• She hurt other classmates who has teased her before
• Survivors begin to fight back
• When Esther wanted to use a stone to kill Daniel, Max came out to stop her
• Kate found out Esther's genuine background and wanted to send her back to the orphanage
• Kate tried to call Johnny to leave with their children to avoid being killed
• When Esther was trying to kill Max, Kate protected Max and wanted Esther to be arrested
• When Esther was pulling Kate's legs into the water, Kate has killed her
• Dissent in the group as a result of tiredness/ fear puts the group at greater risk
• Johnny didn't believe Kate that Esther is abnormal
• Johnny and the psychiatrist thought that Kate misunderstood Esther
• Kate was in the hospital but Johnny still insisted on taking care of Esther without taking Kate's advice
• àEsther had the chances to kill Daniel and Johnny
• Those who have come into contact with the monster may try to warn the larger community
• Sister Abigail told Kate and Johnny some terrible facts about Esther's past in order to remind them being careful but then she was killed by Esther immediately
• They may go to the authorities but are met with disbelief
• Kate brought Esther to see psychiatrist Dr Browning so as to figure out Esther's problem but failed
• Dramatic showdown: climax with varying results
• Esther put on her make-up and wore Kate's dress, revealing her adult identity to Johnny while Kate was told the truth of Esther and going back to the home to save her family

Mise-en-scene:

• Beginning setting
• dream: like heaven, mysterious
• bloody floor and baby
• Costume of Esther
• Before: (like a child)
• exaggerated dresses
• always wear those ribbons on her wrists and her neck all the time (foreshadowing)
• like little princess
• After: (like an adult)
• wore adjusted Kate's dress and put on her make-up
• Setting
• Location
• a barren isolated big house: no one can help them
• a little tree house ( to kill Daniel and hide the corpse)
• Time
• winter: snowy
• usually at night
• thunderstorm
• the day when Johnny was killed
• snowy day
• at night
• dark house without electricity

• Props (to kill or threaten people)
• hammer
• gun
• cutter
• stone
• knife
• Props (to irritate Kate)
• alive flowers for Jessica, who died in Kate's tummy 

Cinematography:

• Beginning: dream
• soft and high key lighting
• colour: cool light (relaxing)
• selective focus: focus on the couple
• bird's eye, dolly and pan
• Lighting colour
• always cool: white blue, grey: cold
• Lighting
• artificial
• thunderstorm is the source to light up Esther’s face when she standing behind max
• source: fish tank, turned on and off by Esther, blue light on her faceà cool and scary
• mixing sources
• mixing by natural and torch: more realistic and torch can help focusing, soft intensity
• Camera distance
• MCU/ CU
• Esther's and Johnny's hands connected: new family member and the story began
• swing swaying
• how Esther used the gun: familiar to use it
• words on the search screen: Kate thought Esther was Borderline Personality Disorder, antisocial personality disorder, character disturbed children, children who kill
• Esther’s shoes, machine showing the heart beat, her face: tell us she wanted to kill Daniel, her happy face felt like victory
• knife: shadowy manifestation: wanted to kill Johnny if thing went wrong
•  the knife hurting Kate
• XLS
• look from Max’s eyes: Esther standing on the slide: powerful, scary, everything is controlled by Esther
• showing Max was going to pick up the gun while Esther was trying to kill Kate
• the back of Kate and Max: the end of this tragedy and Max and Kate were going to have their new life
• XCU
• the crack was made: to show that the ice floor was going to crack
• Camera angle
• low angle
• look from Max’s eyes: Esther standing on the slide: powerful, scary, everything is controlled by Esther
• Esther was threatening Daniel: powerful
• high angle
• Daniel was threatened by Esther: reckless, scared, fearful
• eye-level
• use it to represent the one who was walking e.g. Esther, Max
• Camera movement
• handheld: shaky: nervous, scary
• pretend someone looking down from the rooftop
• Esther was walking on the corridor: edgy
• quick moving towards Kate: realistic, scary
• Frame: Esther got out from the little frame (the orphanage): new story of her began
• Position: Max and Esther playing outside the window and out-focused but always in the frame: main characters as grandma and mum were also talking about them

 Editing:

• Simultaneous events: help creating the tension, let audience wait for the moment when two events meet up and what will happen next
• Johnny and Kate were arguing when Esther was painting and smiling
• the psychiatrist Dr. Browning was describing something good about Esther when she was acting madly and angrily in the toilet
• Esther was cutting the dress when Johnny was drinking wine and smoking
• Kate was told the truth about Esther when Esther was crying and removing her make-up and feeling angry about Johnny hurting her
• Kuleshov effect
• turning the pages of scrapbook while Esther was smiling
• Esther was looking at the fish tank which had some scary drawing on it and she looked scary
• Eyeline match
• always used as someone turned around/ looking for someone
• e.g.: the girl was looking around including the swaying swing, child coming out from the slide etc.
• create tension because she didn't know where Esther was
• Action match
• Esther pushed the girl down the slide
• Esther was using the hammer to strike and kill the Sister Abigail
• Esther was killing Johnny by knife many times
• Kate stood back when she heard the shot
• Esther was using knife to hurt Kate
• Re-establishing shot
• when the house was without electricity

Use of sound:

• Diegetic sound
• Esther was singing inside a room: attracted Johnny to find her, which connect them
• some boys were suddenly laughing with echo when the girl was finding Esther: give audience a scare
• Esther was suddenly growling from the back of the girl
• Non-diegetic sound
• violin: always high pitch suddenly
• always have some deep bass music e.g. cello, double bass
• mysterious, control the audience's feeling, terrify the audience, create a nervous atmosphere 

 Others:

• Use a dream and story to give a background
• Use the same scene but different result: Johnny appeared in the mirror: scared
• Manifestation
• Esther used a stone to kill the bird, which started to show Esther's character and afterwards killed people
• If Esther's ribbons were touched, she would scream out: Esther wanted to hide something behind the ribbons