Witness Scene Analysis Essay
Witness (1985) Analysis:
In this analysis I looked at the lunch scene in the middle of raising the barn in Peter Weir’s “Witness” made in 1985. I mainly look at dialogue and mise-en-scene.
The whole film is about an Amish boy and his mother, Rachel, who witness a murder and a policeman, John, who goes into hiding as protection until the trial. The scene itself is one where the community is brought together to build a barn in a day for a newlywed couple of the town. The setting is very specific because it’s focused on an Amish colony, therefore the audience has a hard time relating to a lot of things but this brings out John’s feelings much more because he doesn’t understand much about the Amish either. This particular scene had no dialogue …show more content…
The framing of the scene is tight even though it starts with an extreme long shot because in the first shot there is the barn and a house on the left with a tree on the right. The house and the barn are in the rule of thirds so the focus is on them and while on the left next to the house is open space of about the size of another house, on the right the tree ends right where the end of the frame seeming to give it an open, free feel on one side and a closed off feel on the other, it’s almost as if there’s no escape, they’re stuck in/with the situation.
There is natural framing from a tree encircling Rachel and John when she’s pouring him a drink. The framing brings the focus directly onto them without depth being compromised; the entire scene has an infinite depth in it. Keeping everything in focus, also keeps the movie very real to the Amish culture because it’s not complicating things by obviously using technology to bring focus to things and
In this analysis I looked at the lunch scene in the middle of raising the barn in Peter Weir’s “Witness” made in 1985. I mainly look at dialogue and mise-en-scene.
The whole film is about an Amish boy and his mother, Rachel, who witness a murder and a policeman, John, who goes into hiding as protection until the trial. The scene itself is one where the community is brought together to build a barn in a day for a newlywed couple of the town. The setting is very specific because it’s focused on an Amish colony, therefore the audience has a hard time relating to a lot of things but this brings out John’s feelings much more because he doesn’t understand much about the Amish either. This particular scene had no dialogue …show more content…
The framing of the scene is tight even though it starts with an extreme long shot because in the first shot there is the barn and a house on the left with a tree on the right. The house and the barn are in the rule of thirds so the focus is on them and while on the left next to the house is open space of about the size of another house, on the right the tree ends right where the end of the frame seeming to give it an open, free feel on one side and a closed off feel on the other, it’s almost as if there’s no escape, they’re stuck in/with the situation.
There is natural framing from a tree encircling Rachel and John when she’s pouring him a drink. The framing brings the focus directly onto them without depth being compromised; the entire scene has an infinite depth in it. Keeping everything in focus, also keeps the movie very real to the Amish culture because it’s not complicating things by obviously using technology to bring focus to things and