Slumdog Millionaire

In my opinion, Slumdog Millionaire was breathtakingly deep, showing a range of different emotions throughout the film. The story was about a boy along with his brother and their friend Latika and their journey through life. It was about the struggle and misfortune of the three, but also a love story.

The film is set in an investigation office after being accused of cheating on the television game show ‘Who Wants to Be a Millionaire’. The story is about how Jamal knew all of the answers, going back in time to a part in his life when the answer occurred. This made the film unique, but if you weren’t focusing at all times, the story line would deplete and not make too much sense after a while. You have to concentrate on what’s going on to really understand it. Near the end, time catches up and the flashbacks stop, then he’s granted permission to finish his last question on the game show, completing the film smoothly and orderly with a romantic ending.

The film was rumored to be based on a true story, and although it is not specifically, director Danny Boyle said “If the story isn’t true, it should be”. The conditions of the slums in India are terrible. The things the boys went through were horrible, not to mention the additional pain the brothers caused each other. There are different kinds of sadness portrayed throughout the film. The boys were lied to and taken advantage of, they lost their mother and spent their lives fending for themselves. One brother turned against the other and stole the girl he loved, years later repeating the same thing only in the end Jamal gets his girl back.

There were features used in the film to show more depth in individual scenes, eg. lighting and camera angles. Symbolic actions were used to exaggerate thoughts and feelings of the characters throughout the film. This gave the viewer an enhanced outlook on the characters experiences and lifestyle.

All in all, I found Slumdog Millionaire to be an emotional experience, educational but also enjoyable. I would definitely watch it again.

Mise-en-scene

Setting:
Time period, physical location, economic situation are all part of the setting in a film. These factors will help you understand the situation more, fitting to the theme of the film. A reason for choosing the setting so carefully is to help you understand the mood of the film, and the character’s state of mind. When filming exterior, you must consider things like the weather, which must fit the scene and make the mood.

Props:
Props are used to show certain traits of a character. The prop may appear often to show its significance and importance to the character. For example, a regular prop for a killer is a knife; the knife may be shown before striking an attack. A busy business person may be on their cell phone all the time. These things can help portray a characters personality and give the viewer a better understanding.

Lighting:
Lighting can be used in many ways to create a scene. There are different uses of brightness, quantity, colour and direction that can create a mood in the film. Using a dark/dim coloured filter can make a film dark and mysterious, whereas a brighter or a clearer filter will make a lighter film. Shadowing with a light (lighting from a side to make a shadow on a wall) is a classic horror movie technique to make the scene darker and scarier, along with back lighting (lighting coming from behind the actor to make them appear as a dark figure, and lighting from underneath for a ‘scary story’ look). The quality and quantity of light is also used in different genres of film, less light for scary ones, more light for lighter movies.

Key elements.

Mise-en-scene:
Mise-en-scene is a phrase used to roughly describe the design that is used in theatre and film.

• Set design is the setting of a scene and objects. It can be used to amplify character emotion or the dominant mood of a film, or to establish aspects of the character.
• The intensity, direction, and quality of lighting have a profound effect on the way an image is perceived. Light can emphasise texture, shape, distance, mood, time of day or night, season, and can focus attention on particular elements of the composition.
• The depth, proximity, size, and proportions of the places and objects in a film can be manipulated through camera placement and lenses, lighting, set design.
• Costumes are specified simply to express the characters personality.
• There is enormous historical and cultural variation in performance styles in acting in the cinema.

Cinematography:

is the making of lighting and camera choices when recording photographic images for the cinema.

• Film stock is photographic film on which motion pictures are shot and reproduced.
• In photography and videography, a filter is a camera accessory consisting of an optical filter that can be inserted in the optical path. Filters allow the photographer to have more control of the images being produced.
• A camera lens is an optical lens or assembly of lenses used in conjunction with a camera body and mechanism to make images of objects either on photographic lens or on other media capable of storing an image chemically or electronically.

Editing:

Editing is the process of selecting and preparing language, images, sound, video, or film through processes of correction, condensation, organization, and other modifications in various media.

Sound:

Sound is a mechanical wave that is an oscillation of pressure transmitted through a solid, liquid or gas, composed of frequencies within the range of hearing and of a level sufficiently strong to be heard, or the sensation stimulated in organs of hearing by such vibrations.

Shot: A shot is a continuous piece of filming without interruption. From the time the camera is turned on and starts filming, to the time it is turned off.
Eg. While filming a conversation between people, a shot would be used of the person whom is speaking at the time, and changed to the next person when it is their turn to speak.

Edit: And edit is a break in the film where one shot finishes and the next one begins.

Scene: A scene is a collection of shots arranged through editing in a specific order.
Eg. There may be someone trying to escape some sort of trap created by villains whom while this is going on are planning further traps, swapping from the escaper to the planning villains.

Frame: The frame is literally the boarder or edge of the screen in the cinema. The physical boundary that contains what the audience sees.
Eg. Aliens may be landing on the Opera House but the frame might only include image of an office in which world leaders are sitting arguing over what to do.

Framing: Framing is the art of deciding what images the audience sees within the frame of the cinema screen and how these images are arranges within each shot.
Eg. A classic horror film technique is to frame the monster outside of the shot so the audience cannot see it. He shot shows the helpless scrambling people without showing the monster itself.

Degesis: The digesis of a film is everything contained within the world of that film. Therefore a diegetic element is an element within the world of the film, while a non diegetic element is any element outside of the world of the film.