Bigger Than Life Film Techniques

The combination of the eerie shift in music, the horror-like, hallucinatory state of Richie’s room becoming distorted for Ed, the close-up of Ed’s face, and the inclusion of red serve the purpose of depicting the severity of Ed’s psychosis. For most of Bigger Than Life, wider shots remain central to the film, with close-up shots being used sparingly, but strategically. Previously, the emphasized close-up shots had solely been applied in order to depict Ed’s turbulent mental state. For instance, a close-up of Ed’s face is used after he delivers a speech in his classroom to his students’ parents, conveying to them with a strong sense of superiority how they need to restructure their academic system (i.e. after Ed declares, “If the Republic is to survive, we’ve got to get back to teaching the good old virtues of self-discipline and a sense of
As Wally enters to rescue the Avery family members, he noticeably enters the way Richie instructed him to earlier in the film — shoving the door open, not just playing with the doorknob. Throughout the majority of the fight sequence between Ed and Wally, close-up facial shots are not applied, differentiating from the scene before, as most of the angles return to wider shots. However, what proves to be significant pertaining to the Wally and Ed altercation, along with the fact that it leads to Ed’s psychosis’ eventual possible demise, is the locations of where the fight takes place: both the household’s staircase and the household’s living room. The staircase, in particular, holds such a strong centrality to the film that it becomes the setting of its darkest moment and most dramatic encounter between Ed and Wally, along with the former and his