Tag Archives: Alfred Hitchcock

Friday Fundas

How Hitchcock altered ideas on Censorship

How Hitchcock altered ideas on Censorship

For the past few days, the movie Udta Punjab produced by Anurag Kashyap is trending for the reason that it is being demanded to make unreasonable cuts by the censor board. Well, Mr. Kashyap said it is his fight and he would fight for it. I sincerely hope he wins. In this week’s Friday Fundas, I would like to highlight how the legendary director Alfred Hitchcock had constantly challenged the censor board in many ridiculous ways, broke many of their rules and in effect changed the idea of Censorship.

Out of the many instances, two of Hitchcock’s movies are still very popular for the kind of controversies they evoked with the Censorship. Notorious released in 1946 starred Cary Grant and Ingrid Bergman. The signature scene in the movie is the kissing scene between Cary Grant and Ingrid Bergman. Hitchcock wanted to shoot a two and half minute kissing scene. But the censor board at that time allowed only three seconds long kissing scene. In order to achieve what he wanted, he had interrupted the scene every three seconds to pass the movie through the three-second rule in the production code.

The movie Psycho which he had made in 1960 evoked more controversies right from the production stage. You could watch the movie Hitchcock or read the book “Alfred Hitchcock and the making of Psycho” written by Stephen Rebello to learn more about it. Out of the many controversial scenes, there was a scene in which the toilet is shown with visible notes being flushed. Till that date, none of the movies had shown a toilet in the movie and censor board initially rejected it and eventually had to give in as there was hardly any logic behind it. The shower scene is the money shot for the movie. Hitchcock knew he would be ridiculed by the censor board. So he had deliberately made it more violent so that he had negotiated with the board to arrive at the output he wanted. The board also had objection over the opening scene of the movie. He negotiated with them that he would change the scene and reshoot it provided they allow him to keep the shower scene. He also had said he would reshoot with the censor board members on the set under their advice. As they did not turn up for the reshoot the scene remained.

Post the release of Psycho the censor board was never the same again. The movie relaxed many of the censorship rules giving more freedom to the filmmakers.

Hope you liked this article. Leave your comments and thoughts below. In case you are interested, you can read more articles from Friday Fundas section.

 

Friday Fundas

Kuleshov Effect or How Hitchcock turned a kind gentleman to a dirty old man

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Kuleshov Effect 

In the last Friday Fundas section I had covered one of the basic units of film grammar Reaction Shot. In this week’s Friday Fundas I am going to cover a related topic called as Kuleshov Effect.

Russian filmmaker Lev Kuleshov demonstrated a very powerful editing technique in cinema during the 1920s. His experiment involved shooting 4 different shots.

1. Face of an actor with a neutral expression

2. A bowl of soup

3. A dead girl in a coffin

4. A hot woman on a divan

Now he created three films out of these shots. In the first film he alternated between the face of the actor and the bowl of soup. In the second film he alternated between the face of the actor and the dead girl in the coffin. In the third film he alternated between the face of the actor and the hot woman on the divan. He now showed this to three different set of audience. The audience who watched the first film said he had an expression of hunger. The audience who watched the second film said he had an expression of grief. The audience who watched the third film said he had an expression of lust.  Many of them also complimented the acting performance of the actor. But in reality the expression of the character was the same shot. Kuleshov proved that audience when watching a film bring in their emotional reactions to the shot. This would mean that two unrelated shots in reality can be assembled together to create a new meaning. This is the power of editing in films.

An editor should be able to define the meaning the film wants to convey by arranging the shots in a specific order.

In one of his famous interviews Alfred Hitchcock explains the importance of Kuleshov’s effect. He calls it the pure technique of assembling the shots in cinema.

He shows the shot of him squinting, followed by a shot of a woman with a baby playing in the park. Then there is a shot of him smiling. He represents a kind gentleman who loves babies. Now he replaces the shot of the woman and the baby with a shot of a woman in a bikini. You see him squinting at something, then the woman in a bikini is shown and then the shot of him smiling is shown. The whole meaning of the scene changes now. He suddenly becomes a dirty old man.

Watch the video here.

Thus is the power of Kuleshov effect. The power of editing involves assembling of shots to evoke the desired emotions from the audience.

Isn’t it amazing that most of us emote the same way to a particular scene? The magic of cinema continues…

Related Articles: Reaction Shot  | Over the shoulder Shot | Types of Shots | Breaking the 4th Wall

Friday Fundas

Friday Fundas: Reaction Shot

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Reaction Shot 

In this week’s Friday Fundas we would see one of the basic units of film grammar – Reaction Shot.

A Reaction shot is the one where the camera moves away from the main sequence to show the reaction of a character to the main sequence. It could be a response to a dialogue or an event in the preceding shot. Reaction shots are usually a medium close up shot.

The famous shower scene from Alfred Hitchcock’s Psycho is a great example of a reaction shot. You see the killer approaching the shower and opening the screen. Immediately the next shot is the woman screaming and then the scene shifts back to the killer and proceeds from there. This might appear to be trivial. Now try to imagine the entire sequence without this single shot you would not feel connected to it.

Reaction Shot - Psycho

Reaction Shot – Psycho

The reaction shot is usually present in the shooting script. When the screenplay is written there would be no mention of the reaction shot but when the script is converted to a shooting script there would be mentions of reaction shot.

Usually this is determined by the director’s vision for the script.

Panchathanthiram
Panchathanthiram

In a comedy film the reaction shots play a very important role in making audience laugh. If you can think of comedy movies like Panchanthanthiram you would now be able to relate to some of the very effective reaction shots.

Usually the reaction shot occurs post the actual main shot. However many film makers have improvised on this to show a reaction shot before the actual main shot to make it more dramatic.

Jurassic Park - Reaction Shot
Jurassic Park – Reaction Shot

In the movie Jurassic Park as the crew is taken for the first tour around the Park they spot the huge herbivores walking around. Initially Spielberg shows the reaction of the people in the Jeep and then later shows the actual scene to which they are reacting to. This is the first time the audience see a full dinosaur in the movie and this just increases the anticipation and prepares the audience for something spectacular.

Few directors have omitted reaction shots on certain occasions to create a suspense that would be later revealed in the movie.

Sixth Sense Restaurant Scene
Sixth Sense Restaurant Scene

In the movie Sixth sense restaurant scene director Manoj Night Shyamalan does not show many reaction shots during the most part of the conversation Crowe’s wife’s face is not shown. Only later when she is signing the cheque her face is shown which works effectively to conceal the secret the climax would reveal later.

Whether reaction shots are present or not present they are very essential to the visuals. Effective use of it is elementary to an engaging movie.

English Movies, Genre, Must Watch, Rating, Reviews, Suspense, Thriller

Rope

Rope – is an English suspense thriller released in 1948. Two friends commit a murder of another friend just for the pleasure of committing a murder and on the same eve with his body still in their apartment they host a party to the dead man’s family and few of their common friends. The movie is directed by Hitchcock based on a play by Patrick Hamilton

The movie has the usual element of suspense that you would see in a Hitchcock movie. But the specialty of this movie is such that the entire movie seems to be taken of a single continuous shot. There is a peculiar party thrown in celebration of a murder committed by two men. What happens through the party is the rest of the movie. The movie has some wonderful performances, great dialogues and good use of props. The set is extremely detailed. Overall a thrilling screenplay makes this movie a compelling watch.

Must Watch

Friday Fundas

Inspiration of Rajni’s Famous Cigarette Scene from Ninaithale Innikum

In Ninaithale Innikum there is a comedy sequence of Rajni getting into a bet with a rich man.

Rajini Throwing Cigarette
Rajini Throwing Cigarette

The bet is as follows he has to throw the cigarette into the air and hold it by his mouth 10 consecutive times. If he does that he would win the Toyota car of the rich man, if not he would have to part away with his little finger. The scene is so gripping at the same time so hilarious, backed by some brilliant performances. Factually the scene is inspired from the short story Man from the South written by Roald Dahl. The only difference being in the short story the bet is about lighting a cigarette lighter continuously for 10 times with just one click. Alfred Hitchcock included this as an episode in his TV Series “Alfred Hitchcock presents“. Later this was re-made into the opening episode of Dahl’s show “Tales of the Unexpected” in 1979 and again re-made in 1985 for “Alfred Hitchcock presents” series in color.

So many people had shot this sequence with different actors, the value of suspense and holding the audience or reader to the seat with a very simple plot is a brilliant piece of work by Roald Dahl.