THE BABY MONITORDECONSTRUCTION OF A SHORT FILM – PSYCHOLOGICAL THRILLER

PSYCHOLOGICAL THRILLER DECONSTRUCTIONNow that we have decided upon the genre of our short film (psychological thriller), I have decided to deconstruct a short film that already exists from the same genre for inspiration, and to see if there any particular codes of conventions that we should follow when we create our own.

The film begins with a series of establishing shots from a high angle which let the audience know where the film is set, and at what time. This film appears to be set in the USA, and the audience can tell this from the ‘highway’ style of road featured in the shot. Other elements of mise en scene help to suggest that the film is set in the US, such as the stop sign. It also seems to be night time. I know this because the shot is deliberately dark.

The road featured is deserted, which is an indication that something is unusual or wrong here.

The high angle helps the audience to see everything that is going on and take in all of the surroundings to help them recognise where the film is set. The angle changes gradually from high angle to eye level as the establishing shots to continue, as if bringing the audience in to the diegesis.

Non-diegetic sound is present in this clip – music is playing which wouldn’t be heard within the diegesis. The music is eerie, which helps to create a tense mood.

These shots occur before the title sequence.

The series of establishing shots eventually pans round at about 0:50 seconds to show the audience this building – a house where the rest of the film takes place.

As it is set in the darkness with only one light on, it is reinforced that it is night time. The house being on its own also helps it to look creepy and scary, setting the mood for the action that is about to occur within the house.

The shot then pans in towards the window, and begins to fade to black as the title pops up, although the window is still somewhat visible in the background. This indicates to the audience that the window is important and they begin to consider why.

The shot appears to be handheld as it is shaky, although it actually pans around very smoothly from a relatively high angle, which could suggest that the camera is actually on a jib and the movement has been made to be shaky on purpose for effect – to make the audience feel like they’re really there. The shaking could also represent the fear that we feel as an audience, as the camera is our view into the diegesis.

The title is written in a font that connotes that a young child drew it – some of the letters aren’t formed properly, some are capitals letters whereas others are lowercase, and the letters are written in different colours which doesn’t follow a pattern. This isn’t particularly aesthetically pleasing and isn’t something a professional would design, unless they were trying to create the impression that a young child did it. This indicates that a child is going to be a main part of the film.

The title appears in the bottom right of the screen. This doesn’t follow the two thirds rule, but it is still noticeable because of the contrast of the bright, happy colours against the dark, depressing colours of the setting. The bright colours of the title could represent the innocence of the child in the film against all of the bad things that happen.

The title is removed from the screen using evenly spread lines which ripple downwards, once the audience has been given time to read and take in the mise-en-scene of the title. These lines represent the slits in the closet that will become more important to the plot as the audience continues to watch.

The next shot zooms from a long shot of the baby monitor to a close up of the baby monitor (this screenshot is from the middle of the movement). All the while, there is non-diegetic sound being played in the background - the music from the establishing shots which has been continued, but is quieter now, and also harsh diegetic sound which appears to be coming from the baby monitor - cracking and wisphering.

The next shot zooms outwards from the baby monitor in what appears to be the baby’s room. These two shots put together have formed a transition from one room to another.

The music has stopped in this shot, and so have the harsh sounds coming from the baby monitor. The sound we can hear now is diegetic – whispering.

The mise-en-scene helps the audience to understand that we have moved to the baby’s room, as there are stuffed animal children’s toys in the shot, and also white shelves against a coloured wall – a stereotypical layout for a young child’s bedroom.

As the shot pans out further, we are introduced to the two main characters of the short – what appears to be a mother and baby sharing an affectionate moment. This shot creates the impression that mother and baby both feel at home and that they are content in each other’s company because the baby looks relaxed and so does the mother.

Now the shot also has more elements of mise-en-scene which suggest that they are in a baby’s nursey, including more toys and the bars of a cot.

In the next shot, we are flicked back to the baby monitor which is making the horrible, harsh sounds, and then flicked back to the calm environment where the mother appears to be putting her daughter to bed.

In the close up shot of the baby monitor, there is a shadow. This appears to have been created on purpose to add another dimension to the shot and create some mood lighting, which contributes towards the tense and creepy atmosphere that is being created.

The next shot is a low angle close up shot from the baby’s perspective as he/she has just been put down in their cot. This shows that audience that the baby looks up to this lady, who appears to be their mother.

The sound in this shot is diegetic. The lady says “My precious angel” reinforcing the audience’s general reading that she is his/her mother, and she cares for them a lot. She then begins to sing softly, as though trying to get the baby to stop its crying and go to sleep, another indication that she is the baby’s mother.

The lady’s gaze appears to be soft, as it would be if you were talking to someone you love and care about, especially if they are young.

The bars of the cot in the foreground are blurred out so the audience’s attention is focused on the lady’s facial expression.

The woman begins to leave the room once she has finished her song, when she hears a bang come from the cupboard and looks over her shoulder to see what it could be. At this point, the audience is unaware of what the noise is, and it appears that she is also unaware because she looks shocked and unnerved by it.

The shot is framed so that the woman’s facial expression can be seen as she turns, but the doors which are open slightly (connoting that there is something in there) can be too, because both are important to the narrative at this point.

The woman then goes to put her hand on the door handle to open the cupboard where the sound is coming from.

This is done as a close up and all of the movement within the shot is extremely slow to build suspense.

Harsh, loud, non-diegetic sound is also present which contributes towards the tense nature of the shot.

At this point, the audience is captivated because they are intrigued to know what is behind the door of the cupboard.

However, the woman is distracted from opening the cupboard by a noise that makes her jump. The sound is diegetic and turns out to be the baby playing with a toy in her cot. The shot quickly, and jerkily moves up to the actress’ face to replicate her shock and surprise, and she leans on the door of the cupboard, making it shut completely before walking out of the room.

A fade then takes us to a series of shots from different angles and distances of her using her computer. The director is drawing a lot of attention to her actions here, making the audience suspicious.

This shot represents the view of whatever is in the cupboard; it’s filmed from their perspective, from inside the cupboard through the slits. It gives an alternative view for the audience and creates a sinister mood because it is presented as wrong for the thing in the cupboard to be watching the innocent, defenceless baby sleeping. The audience gets the impression that the thing in the cupboard is about to strike and do something horrible to the baby because this is the kind of thing the audience expects from horrors and psychological thrillers because of their conventions.

The woman hears the baby crying through the baby monitor which distracts her from her work. She gets up and leaves the room, assumedly to see what is wrong with the baby, but the shot doesn’t move from the position it was set on when we last saw her – the extreme close up from the side of her face. The focus simply shifts as she walks out and the scene fades into the next, as shown above.

At this point the audience is worried that the baby is crying because the thing in the cupboard has done something to harm or upset the baby.

This shot follows the woman down the corridor as she goes to see the baby. The camera is moving, but smoothly – it appears to be on a dolly.

The woman is trailing her hand along the skirting board, which is a odd action and connotes that she is unfamiliar with the house because she appears to be exploring with her hands.

This type of shot, following someone down a corridor is typical of a horror film and so it creates more tension, suspense and fear.

In this shot, the body positioning of the woman blocks most of the baby’s face, this is to disguise the fact that the baby isn’t actually crying in this shot. The sound of the baby crying isn’t coming from within the shot, but is still diegetic sound as the director wants the sound to seem like its coming from within the diegesis. As this film features a baby who is not fully responsive to requests and is not fully responsible for its own actions yet, it would be impossible for the baby to cry on command and this is why elements of mise-en-scene, like body positioning, and editing are so important in this scene.

Another shot from inside the cupboard is used here, as though the ‘thing’ is watching the lady put the baby bac to sleep. This shot is shaky – it is handheld and shaken deliberately – as if the ‘thing’ in the cupboard is preparing to do something.

The woman walks out of the baby’s room and into what appears to be her own bedroom. She picks up this photo of who the audience assumes to be her boyfriend or husband, and strokes it lovingly.

Eerie non-deigetic music has begun again, but it is a different song to last time, using bells.

This is an over-the-shoulder shot, showing the action from the protagonist’s perspective.

This shot moves from one side of the dimly lit kitchen to the other, towards the phone where a message recorded by the answer machine is playing. The voice is of a man and the audience assumes it to be the same man as is in the photograph upstairs as he refers to the woman he is calling as “honey” and recognises that she might be with the baby. His tone is chatty, caring and affectionate as he tells her that he will be home soon.

This is the longest piece of dialogue in the whole of the short, and it is only a few lines long. This helps it to stand out as being more normal against the eerie and unnatural infrequent use of dialogue in the rest of the short.

The lack of lighting represents how the kitchen, and therefore the man on the answer machine message, is cut off from whatever is happening downstairs. It feels far more peaceful and normal than the scene upstairs where the camera follows the woman.

The movement of the camera across the kitchen helps the audience to feel like they are locating the phone themselves, as they would be if they were there in the diegesis, and it also helps them to pick out elements of mise-en-scene within the kitchen to draw a deeper reading from the shot.

The woman upstairs appears to be oblivious to the voice message that is being recorded downstairs. She has stepped behind the door of this cupboard, which appears to be a wardrobe and is identical to the one with something lurking in it in the baby’s room, and has got changed into a long white dress.

The white dress connotes purity and innocence, and gives the audience the impression that she is going to bed, which they silently beg her not to do because they know this would be the perfect time for whatever is lurking in the cupboard to strike.

She then goes to put pink lipstick on, cancelling any suspicions that she was going to bed as normally, women take off their makeup before they go to bed, not put it on. The pink of the lipstick and her outfit change connotes that she could be putting it on to impress her boyfriend/husband when he returns, as the audience learns that she must be expecting him home from his message.

This shot is of her looking in the mirror. It is important not to get any reflections of the camera in the shot, otherwise the diegesis is ruined and so the angle of this shot will have had to have been carefully thought about. Part of the back of her head is included in the foreground, although out of focus, to show the audience her view in the mirror from her perspective – this is another over-the-shoulder shot.

The pace of this scene, as with the others and the transitions, is very slow so that the audience can keep up and think about every little detail to try and work out what is going on.

She then walks back into the baby’s room and goes straight over to the baby. There is then a sudden high pitched noise, she stands up very straight and looks in the opposite direction of the cupboard, towards the camera, looking shocked. The cupboard is included in this shot to indicate that the noise came from in there.

The shot then cuts sharply to a close up of the door handles, creating more tension and suspense.

More shaky, handheld, over-the-shoulder shots are used to show the woman turn around and look at the cupboard. Again, the shakiness represents the fear of the woman and the audience.

Her face isn’t centres in this shot to give lead room so that the audience can follow her gaze across the screen and in the direction of the cupboard. Not only does this guide the audience’s gaze, it helps to create a smooth transition between this shot and the next shot of the cupboard. It also allows room for her to walk out of the shot, without moving the camera as she advances towards the cupboard.

We see her open the cupboard from the inside, so that whatever is inside isn’t given away to the audience immediately, creating more suspense.

The shot is filmed from a low angle, as if the audience is looking up at her from the perspective of whatever is in the cupboard.

This shot is accompanied by non-diegetic sound. It is a high pitched uncomfortable noise which puts the audience on edge and creates more tension.

The shot pans down and we briefly catch a reflection of a woman who appears to be gagged in the bottom left-hand corner of the screen. The non-diegetic sound is continued and is accompanied by the diegetic sound of muffled squeals from the woman.

The light outside of the cupboard is bright and the room appears light and airy. This is a binary opposition to the darkness in the other half of the shot coming from the inside of the cupboard, showing the woman who is gagged to be in a horrifying place.

This is a big twist that most people won’t have seen coming so at this point, the audience is surprised.

The shot then turns and we see the gagged woman from the other woman’s perspective and it becomes clear that the women look very similar. The gagged woman begins to struggle and panic, hinting to the audience that she could be trying to get out to see her baby. This could start a theory in the audience’s mind that she is actually the mother and the girlfriend/wife and the woman in the white dress is trying to take her place.

It becomes more obvious to the audience what this woman is trying to do when she wrestles the gagged woman for her ring and slaps her across the face whilst doing so. In this shot, she slides the ring on and says “finders keepers”. This indicates to the audience that she is indeed trying to take the place of the gagged woman so that she can be with her boyfriend/husband. Her use of speech here is powerful and effective because it is one of the only times she speaks throughout the whole short film, so the audience knows she means what she says – she is not just speaking whatever comes into her mind.

Finally, the audience gets to find out the purpose of everything that’s happened already and now everything seems far more significant. The audience’s wonder is finally fulfilled, but this is where the narrative ends. After this, she simply shuts the cupboard when she hears the boyfriend/husband shout “honey, I’m home!” from downstairs, leaving the audience wanting more and indicating that the short has been successful. The slow pace has been drastically changed in a short amount of the run-time to be extremely fast and choppy.

In this short, we hear the boyfriend/husband speak the most out of the characters, even though he is the only one we don’t actually see. This shows how it can be much more effective not to have speech in a short if the acting is good enough from characters you can see to portray the meaning you intend to as a director, whereas it is a complete necessity when you can’t see the character on screen.

This shot is low angle, as if we are seeing the woman from the gagged woman’s perspective, knowing that there is nothing we can do to stop this woman, even though we want to, just like the gagged woman can’t. It adds a level of realism to the narrative for the audience.

Now the credits begin to roll. They are presented in a similar font to the one used for the title, although it is slightly different as it is essential that the credits are easily legible, and it may give a bad impression if they are written in child-like font because it may give the impression that a child could have put together this short, when of course this is not true.

Similar colours to the title are also used, and the random pattern of colours is used in the titles of the production team, but not their name. This is because it is important to the team to have their names clearly presented so that they can be recognised for their work.

The more ‘important’ roles get their own credits slide, whereas the lesser roles scroll down on the final screen, but in the same font as all the other names.