Screen Analysis 2

8/11/2019 Screen Analysis 2

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Screen Analysis: Cach

Joe Wells

I have selected the opening 13 minutes of Michael Hanekes psycho-political thriller Cach

(English title: Hidden, 2005) for its application of the four elements of filmmaking

(cinematography, editing, mise-en-scene and sound) for multiple purposes; to make the

mundane horrific just by displaying it, to divide the objective view from the subjective and to

introduce us to the films characters, conflicts and themes from the get go.

Georges (Daniel Auteuil), a host of an intellectual talk show, begins receiving CCTV recordings

of his house from an anonymous source of his peaceful faade of a home. Thought ostensibly

nothing is happening in these tapes, they spark an investigation to not just for the identity

of the sender but deep into the recesses of Georges subconscious and an uncomfortable

truth of his past. The use of camera work elevates in this segment I have selected elevates an

accessible whodunit premise (not dissimilar to the plot of David Lynchs LostHighway, with

similar themes of innate darkness lurking beneath the everyday societal frontage) into a

meta-textual study of guilt, responsibility, how we register our world and how it differs from

the objective.


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Shot 1 (0:00 2:55, 2:55 long)

Visual:The film opens with a static mounted shot of the Parisian townhouse on a domestic

city street pictured. The far sides of the frame are obscured by buildings adjacent to the

focal house, with the camera being closer to the left-centre of the front door, partiallyobscured by the shrubbery out front. Behind are some apartment buildings blocking out the


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skyline. The camera does not move during this nearly three minute shot, with the only

activity being a car and bicycle passing, some pedestrians eventually crossing the street and

a female exiting the house. During this sequence, credits are written across the image and

fade away.

Audio:To match the inertness of the imagery, there is little audio effects (as per usual in thefilms of Haneke) outside of slight street ambience and off-screen dialogue two minutes in. A

French (presumed) couple calmly finding something in a plastic bad on their porch and

whatever was in it containing nothing. We, the audience, are not sure where the source of

the dialect is from until a couple of shots later. Towards the end of the shot we hear

footsteps and a door being opened, with the girl questioning what is wrong.

Interpretation:This subversive shot has come under much analysis and deconstruction from

film scholars and audience alike since the release of the film in 2005 for its unconventional

use of length to transform the mundane into the unnerving and later terrifying and its

deceptive use of compositional layering to reflect the central conflict of the narrative. It

didnt require being artfully framed, and at first it isnt, but as is the case with Haneke, there

are a myriad of hidden structural aspects that further enhance the disturbance. Starting

out as a typical establishing shot, it lingers for just too long in true Haneke fashion. Whereas

the director is criticized for not knowing when to end a shot, here it becomes more and

more uncomfortable, as the characters that live in the house are just made aware that they

are being watched. Not only does this put the characters and audience right into the central

mystery of the film while giving the characters space to develop their situation and

personalities further, it instantly creates a voyeuristic nuance between the audience, the

CCTV recording and the characters, simply by having them be disturbed by the fact thattheyre being observed. Discomfort and suspense is built every time we return to this POV

throughout the film, as we assume that were watching the tapes whenever the camera

holds for a few seconds. Not only has Haneke transformed the mundane into the terrifying,

he has used this ordinary domestic environment and somewhat unconventional framing to

spell out the themes of the film. The English title of the film is hidden and indeed, someone

in the house is hiding something. It is aesthetically appropriate that the house have a front

gate to keep people out and a hedge to camouflage it from the street. Up at the top of the

frame, out of the way and behind the focal house as if less important are a block of high rise

apartments, foreshadowing their involvement and an individual who resides in these locals

to the mystery. This is related to the secret the protagonist holds that drives the films

central conflict and this framing suggests that the block, though not the focus of the shot

like the family and their residence, loom over the family like a subconscious horror. This

stacked visual layering suggests that things may be normal and mundane down on the

street where the only activity is a bike or car passing by, any number of things in the implied

subconscious could be occurring, symbolised by the numerous windows visible on

neighbouring houses and apartment blocks. As per the subversive view of reality the film

portrays humans as possessing, a more universal truth in the strategies we use to live our

lives is established. Be it a secret, a regret, a desire or whatever, something darker is being

hidden just below the surface of the everyday.


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Shot 2 (2:56 3:46, 0:50 long)


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Visual:We cut to the next shot, which is located out the front of the same domicile we saw

in the opening sequence, from an angular position just down the street. The lighting is

dimmer than the first shot, suggesting it is a different time of day. A casually dressed middle

aged man cautiously exits the house and examines the surrounding area as his presumed

partner follows him and hangs by the door. The camera follows from a mounted position as

the man crosses the street and inspects the point between the two buildings where we

opened the film from. He finds nothing of note and his wife ushers him back inside. The

camera follows him back, as he closes the gate and looks out unsurely at the street.

Audio:Similar to the first shot, we only hear dialogue and street ambience (i.e. the gate

opening and closing, footsteps, etc.) in this shot.

Interpretation:In this second shot, we are visually introduced to the protagonist and (most

of) his family, as well as two rules the film uses throughout the story to communicate the

narrative and themes; objective/subjective camera dichotomy and the tapes being used for

scenes to transcend time in place of the conventional use of transcending location. As film

critic Roger Ebert stated in his four star review of the film A stationary camera is objective.

A moving camera implies a subjective viewer, whether that viewer is a character, the

director, or the audience. Haneke uses the technique of making the camera move in time,

not space. The characters are searching for the meaning and origin of the tapes through

their individual human perspective (implied by the use of camera motion) and finding

nothing, as opposed to the locked down camera of the first shot that displayed all. This

comes into play in the follow couple of shots to be expanded upon. The shot is also notable

for using the cut between scenes to establish a difference in time, instead of the usual the

change in location. After the characters return inside at the end of this shot, we revert backto the framing of the first shot.

Shot 3 (3:46 5:05, 1:18 long)


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Visual:The shot is framed identically to the first, with cars and bikes passing sporadically.

The image then starts fast forwarding in the manner of a VHS tape until we see the

protagonist exiting his house, to which the shot is then reversed and paused as he is walking

to his car.


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Audio:The audio follows suite from the previous shots with its use of dialogue and near

silent background noise until we hear the click of a remote. As the image fast forwards, we

hear the gentle whirring of the VHS player speeding up the shot and the partners talking

over this. As we are revealed that the establishing shot was a tape being watched by the

characters, the discussion between the couple confirms that theyve been watching a

mysterious tape sent to them and it runs for over two hours.

Interpretation:We the audience are now aware that the opening shot was a subversion, as

it is in the form of the mysterious tape sent to protagonists and watched, shown by the fast

forwarding and rewinding. As this shot was taken prior to the present of the film and being

viewed in-universe, we are positioned by Haneke to question the reality of the images he

will present to us and their relation to how the characters register them. The

objective/subjective camera theory applied by Haneke is being mashed and through the use

of the rewinding and character awareness, the objective camera has become subjective in

the eyes of the viewer. The video was once observing and now is being observed. Thisobjective nature of the camera adds suspense to the motivations of the person leaving the

tapes and the overall ambiguity of the film.

Shot 4 (5:06 8:11, 3:16 long)


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Visual:We are now inside the house that we have been watching for the last five minutes.

The previous shot is paused on the lounge area television, being viewed by the stumpedcouple from the previous shots. As the man turns off the television, they stand around and

mull over the explanation behind the bizarre incident, before the woman exits off-screen to

complete dinner. As per Haneke tradition, we follow the man with the camera steadily

tracking his unbroken movement across the lounge and into the kitchen. It hangs there as

the two prepare dinner and speculate further over their day. The two then exit the kitchen

after the male checks what he believes is the plastic bag that the tape was sent in (camera

still keeping a focus on his movement) and sit down to eat dinner. He pours the two wine

and inspects the actual plastic bag by the television before returning to the table and

welcomes his son home to eat dinner. The camera now moves around their son as he finds a

seat at the table while his mum exits the screen and brings him a plate from the kitchen.

The camera follows her as she finds a seat. The camera is now steadily moving but the

length of the shot remains strong.

Audio:Once again, we hear the natural sounds of the environment were seeing without

exaggerated sound effects or score. The television and tape player being switched off,

plastic bags being ruffled by hands, pasta being made in a pot and served on plates, off-

screen doors being slammed, etc. We are given some exposition among the discussions of

tape, finding out the names of the couple (Georges and Anne Laurant), their relationship to

their son Pierrot, among routine discussion and further guesswork.

Interpretation:Beyond dialogue being used to establish the situation and personalities of

the protagonist and his family, the mise-en-scene of the house setting further establish the

lifestyle and traits of the household. The living room that the camera undistractedly follows

Georges through as he prepares dinner and sits to eat it is covered wall to wall in books,

looking more akin to a stylish library than to an eating area. This establishes that Georges

and/or his wife are intellectual and well-read people. They are also shown to be quite

wealthy by wide space tracked by the camera in their inner-city home, wide screen

television (in 2005 mind you) and smart looking dinner with wine. This one is subtly placed

but as Georges crosses the lounge to inspect the plastic bag the tape arrived in, behind himyou can see a professional mic and stand in the corner. From the placement of this prop,


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you can assume that the two make their comfortable living in a media or arts area, backed

by their implied wealth and knowledge of literature. These are all plot points later in the

story and are established through mise-en-scene elements of props and setting. The inter-

family relationships are more bluntly communicated also to the audience through the

characters and their interaction over dinner. The married couple seem tense with each

other and passive aggressively snipe over the plastic bag the tape was found in, all while

helping each other prepare and set up dinner. The teenage son arrives home late for dinner

and gets into small stand-off with his dad about where he had been, while his mum brings

him dinner. They talk about their routine and the shot ends on the wife making a guess that

the tape is from an unbalanced fan, with the son looking up from eating confused.

Shot 5 (8:02 9:09, 0:58 long)


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Visual:We cut to Pierrot in swimming gear doing practise lap turns in a pool. The camera

follows him for about a minute up and down the lane as he practises turn after turn withthree other children in the lane.

Audio: In this scene we hear the sound of children swimming in the lane at the pool, with

the teacher giving commands and advise to the swimmers off-screen. It isnt apparent that

anyone else is present swimming at the pool, as the only pool noises are coming from the

three swimmers.

Interpretation: We chose swimming because the young actor who plays Pierrot can swim

well. Its very simple. If wed chosen football or skiing, the audience wouldnt believe hes on

the team. Its also very cinematic, with the water and the noise nothing more profound

than that Michael Haneke.

The shot following the dinner scene of teenaged son Pierrot at a swim practise has left some

viewers confused at the purpose of the shots inclusion to the overall meaning of the film.

Allegories have been made to the 1961 mass drowning of Algerians in Paris that is a plot and

thematic point later or the symbolic water cleansing of the old French by the next

generation have been made by speculators. Going by the word of the director, I can only

assume that this scene was included in the film to establish that Pierrot is on the swim team

whose race his parents attend later in the film.


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Shot 6 (9:10 11:46, 2:36 long)

Visual: We then cut back to a similar camera position of the first shot, this time at night and

a bit further back down the street. The lights are on in some of the apartments in the

background. Once again we wait statically for about a minute and a half before a car pullsup to the house by the street that the camera is placed on and reverses into a spot behind


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the camera, lighting up the house and surrounding street with its headlights. Georges walks

from the bottom of the frame and into his house.

Audio: The Street is silent at this time of night and the only sound we hear in this shot is of

Georges parking his car and closing the door.

Interpretation:Once again we are viewing the life of Georges through the stationary

camera placement outside of his house. Though aware that we are watching these

characters through a camera after it was established in the third shot, we are not aware

why or from whom. As a recurring image in a mystery without a possible definitive answer,

this repeated shot becomes more and more uncanny and disturbing as we are given time to

mull over not only the source and purpose of these tapes but the implication of our view of

these tapes. As we give a couple seconds before we are sure its not an establishing shot, we

watch an everyday site from the perspective of an unknown voyeur in a period we are not

sure of within the linearity of the story. As previously said Haneke has taken a simple device

of the repetition of a static VHS camera shot of a house and used it to not only raise

questions about its placement in the film and what this means to the audience watching this

but has made the normal site of parking in a domestic street unsettling.

Shot 7 (11:47 12:47, 1:00 long)


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Visual:From the video footage of the house, we cut to the filming of the end of Georges

round table television talk show about literature from an SDTV camera. He wishes a farewell

to the viewer as the camera pans out and Georges turns to make end of episode chatterwith a co-host. The backing out camera displays the rest of guests in conversation and


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displays the full set of bookshelves around the table, similar looking to the living room in the

family house. The camera fully pans out and Georges is interrupted from his conversation by

a woman stage hand who tells him something that removes him from his chair and takes

him backstage to talk on his mobile phone. The camera pans past the set and follows

Georges backstage past studio workers organising cameras and equipment, holding on him

as he walks towards the camera from behind the set to receive the news presumably about

the new tape arrival.

Audio

The audio in this shot is more animated than the previous scenes at home and on the street,

as it takes place in a television studio. As Georges looks upon the in-universe camera and

wishes the audience goodbye from the show that is followed by an operator commanding

the people on screen not to move until the camera has stopped panning back. As per usual

with this kind of broadcast you cant hear what the screen personalities are saying as the

camera moves back and the conversation Georges has with his co-host is silent with some

mild workplace noise and conversation. When Georges is alerted to his phone call by the

studio assistant, we do not hear what the situation is and are left to infer from the previous

shot that its from his wife and about the new tape.

Interpretation:This shot confirms that Georges makes a living from being in the media as an

intellectual figure and introduces the element that media plays later in the film as a

background and thematic element. Similarly to how the use of objective/subjective camera

placement had been applied before, the use of camera in this scene is also interestingly

used. Starting out as the camera to Georges television show, when fully retracted as per

usual with television camera technique it follows Georges as he goes backstage to talk on

the phone. This would be impossible for a mounted television camera, so the line between

in-universe camera filming and conscious film camera is blurred in an easily miss able way

that can further bolster the sense of ambiguity to the audience about objectivity and

subjectivity within the realms of narrative pictures. Linearity in the picture is also subverted

here, as Georges is being made aware by his wife on the phone about the arrival of a new

tape, which we viewed as the previous shot.


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Shot 8(12:48 12:54, 0:06 long)

Visual:The next shot is a close up shot of the family living room table from a slanted angle.

On it is a child-like drawing of a face vomiting blood, the remote and some newspapers.

Annes hand brushes the drawing as she reaches for the remote to rewind the tape, which

we see in the next shot.

Audio:In this shot, all we hear is a line from Anne establishing that this drawing we see was

found with the tape of shot 6.

Interpretation: In this noticeably shorter than established shot (the quickest before this 50

seconds long), we are introduced to the drawings that will be found with the future tapes

delivered to the Laurents doorstep. It looks creepy due to its unclear message (is it a threat?

Is it a recollection of the past?) and its childlike imagery, further obscuring the identity of

the tape sender. The shot doesnt dwell on this like the others before it and cuts right to the

viewing of the next tape in a manner of seconds. In this shot, Anne rewinds the tape and we

see this action in the next shot. This is another example of the characters interacting with

camera and blurring the lines between objective and subjective camera, with the objective

view of the house in the shot 6 being mad subjective by the rewinding and the audience

being made aware that it is an in universe shot being viewed by the characters.


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Shot 9(13:14 13:17, 0:19 long)

Visual:As in the previous shot we established that the couple is watching the new tape

(displayed by the drawing found with the tape and the reaching for the remote), the image

is being manipulated by the VHS player at the start, rewinding until Georges parks his car

like we saw in the shot 6 and the image is paused. It hangs for a couple of second and we

cut to the next shot in an act of subverting audience expectation through establishingconvention within a film.

Audio: In this shot we hear nothing but the rewinding of the VHS tape until it pauses and we

hear nothing for seconds.

Interpretation: This shot, once again uses the narrative rules of subjective/objective camera

dichotomy and transcending of time through static camera. This time, instead of a static

camera showing the objective world of the Laurents house, it is subjective right from the bat

by being reversed in the previous shot by the people watching it. This differentiates the

image from its first use in shot 6 as an objective camera, subverted here by the characters.

What is important about this shot is how it leads into the next, through expectation and


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subversion, the films established trump cards. As we look deep into the image as it holds for

a couple seconds after being rewound by Anne waiting for a cut back to the two like they

did in shot 3 and shot 4, instead we are hit by shot 10.

Shot 10 (13:14 13:17, 0:03 length)

Visual:We see a young ethnic looking boy peering through a window. He wipes blood (we

presume) from his mouth and the shot is over. This is the shortest image we have seen so

far in the film.Audio:Like the shot leading into this one, we hear nothing. Haneke has used silence

extensively in his work to build horror (see: Funny Games (1997) and it is applied well in the

cut between these two shots.

Interpretation:Breaking his own rules at this point, Haneke has edited this film up to this

point with long takes to establish story, characters and motifs at a steady pace and build an

atmosphere of the uncomfortable from everyday images through the ambiguity of

narrative, voyeuristic implications and the lack of noise coupled with the use of generally

wide and revealing shots that take their time. Now he cuts from a tape shot (which have

gone on for minutes with each segment) abruptly 19 seconds in to show a boy with blood

on his mouth, linking back to the image seen in shot 8. To go from this steady and creepy

pace to a particularly jarring shot functions almost as a horror jump scare but without the

urgency because of the silence. In the fashion of Cach, the suddenness of this clip hitting

the audience doesnt make them jump like a slasher jumping out with an axe, but with

curiosity to its position within the narrative. The irregular nature of the shot gives it the

quality of a repressed memory flashing back into the subconscious, which it might actually

be as it is not a representation of reality for the past of Georges (he told his parents as a

young boy that his soon to be adopted Algerian housekeeper bit the head off of a chicken to

remove him from the picture, whereas he actually decapitated the chicken). Once again,


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Heneke has used the elements of filmmaking (in this instance, editing), to portray a flawed

and in this instance, incorrect version of reality.

As stated previously, these thematic elements of the sinister lurking just below the surfaceof recognition and the reality of our characters being a fabrication or alteration of the truth

due to natural human bias is a theme that often recurs not only in Hanekes films but also

David Lynchs. A film that is analogous to this one is Lynchs Blue Velvetin that they both

leave so much open to interpretation while still telling a gripping and coherent story. I wont

spoil either story or what is left open to interpretation, especially in Cach, so I will simply

say that both films have story elements that are up to interpretation that can completely

change the nature of the film.

To quotes the great Abbas Kiarostami (Director, Certified Copy), The best form of cinema is

one which poses questions for the audience Clearly Michael Haneke agrees with this notion,as seen in the opening of his (in my opinion) opusCach.

Bibliography

http://cinephile.ca/archives/volume-5-no-2-the-scene/gaze-suture-interface-the-suicide-scene-in-michael-haneke%E2%80%99s-cache/

http://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/great-movie-cache-2005

http://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/cache-2006

http://www.filmcomment.com/article/endgame-michael-hanekes-cache

http://www.culturesnob.net/2006/08/the-tell-tale-tapes/

http://internationalfilmstudies.blogspot.com.au/2013/04/cache-

franceaustriagermanyitalyusa.html
http://cinephile.ca/archives/volume-5-no-2-the-scene/gaze-suture-interface-the-suicide-scene-in-michael-haneke%E2%80%99s-cache/http://cinephile.ca/archives/volume-5-no-2-the-scene/gaze-suture-interface-the-suicide-scene-in-michael-haneke%E2%80%99s-cache/http://cinephile.ca/archives/volume-5-no-2-the-scene/gaze-suture-interface-the-suicide-scene-in-michael-haneke%E2%80%99s-cache/http://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/great-movie-cache-2005http://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/great-movie-cache-2005http://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/cache-2006http://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/cache-2006http://www.filmcomment.com/article/endgame-michael-hanekes-cachehttp://www.filmcomment.com/article/endgame-michael-hanekes-cachehttp://www.culturesnob.net/2006/08/the-tell-tale-tapes/http://www.culturesnob.net/2006/08/the-tell-tale-tapes/http://internationalfilmstudies.blogspot.com.au/2013/04/cache-franceaustriagermanyitalyusa.htmlhttp://internationalfilmstudies.blogspot.com.au/2013/04/cache-franceaustriagermanyitalyusa.htmlhttp://internationalfilmstudies.blogspot.com.au/2013/04/cache-franceaustriagermanyitalyusa.htmlhttp://internationalfilmstudies.blogspot.com.au/2013/04/cache-franceaustriagermanyitalyusa.htmlhttp://internationalfilmstudies.blogspot.com.au/2013/04/cache-franceaustriagermanyitalyusa.htmlhttp://www.culturesnob.net/2006/08/the-tell-tale-tapes/http://www.filmcomment.com/article/endgame-michael-hanekes-cachehttp://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/cache-2006http://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/great-movie-cache-2005http://cinephile.ca/archives/volume-5-no-2-the-scene/gaze-suture-interface-the-suicide-scene-in-michael-haneke%E2%80%99s-cache/http://cinephile.ca/archives/volume-5-no-2-the-scene/gaze-suture-interface-the-suicide-scene-in-michael-haneke%E2%80%99s-cache/


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Screen Analysis 2