When watching films, as an audience we sometimes have a 'reading' of a film. This reflects what we watch and how we react after we have been watching it. The hypodermic needle reflects that we watch the film and want to go do what we saw, for example we see someone being killed and we get the urge to do that. Stuart halls theory reflects that people have there own preferred reading, for example they watch the film and have there own feelings about it.
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| (Fig 1) |
We first see Vince walking up to Mia's house, there is a note on the window, when Vince picks up the note, you can hear Mia's voice reading out what is said on the note. The effect of her reading out this note makes her seem mysterious, and we are curious as to what is going to happen. There is then a flash transition as he walks into the home, which you can see a bit of in Fig 1. This flash transition gives the effect to us the audience that Vince has walked into some dream-like state or a daze. Because of the drugs in the film this could also be seen as him tripping or being 'high'. This kind of editing and work makes the audience have engaged with the preferred reading in this part of the film.
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| (Fig 2) |
As we start to see him walking around the home, the mise en scene is white and the camera is following Vince and we are interested in what he's doing and what he's looking at so at this point we are aligned with him. At this point we do not see Mia's face at all, continuing to show that she is mysterious, she is sat watching vince moving the cameras and following him. This can show that she is dominant and 'in control'. There is then all of a sudden an extreme close up of her red lips (Fig 2), avoiding her face again, to keep the mysteriousness. Tarantino was trying to suggest that she's a sexual character especially from what we know earlier about her previous experience with a foot-rub. There is also sexual connotations with her mouth being so close to the microphone and the shape of the implement reflects what she may be thinking. There is a preferred reading in these scenes with a sexual nature because the audiences will watch the film and think that something is going to happen between these two people. The fact that we don't see Mia at all is Tarantino playing with the audience and creating entertainment though the tension that is being created.
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| (Fig 3) |
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| (Fig 4) |
At this point parallel editing was used because Mia is talking over the tannoy system to Vince guiding him around the house. It seems to the audience that he's lost his confidence like he is complying with her orders, the fact that we have this hard gangster that has all of a sudden lost his confidence to a woman is meant the amuse the audience this comedy is put into the film by Tarantino deliberately. The alignment during these scenes switches between the two characters, an example of this is when vince is walking to get a drink from the station and then the camera cuts to the security camera and Mia looking down on him we are then aligned with her. Just as the security camera is moving there is another shot of her hand (Fig 3) of her moving the camera showing that she is in control, and also keeping her mysterious because we haven't seen her face.
We are aligned with Vince when he is pouring a drink. There is then this obscure high angle shot of Vince staring at a picture of Mia, this shot shows that Vince is looking up at Mia and Mia is looking down on him, again showing she is in control. (Fig 4)
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| (Fig 5) |
The next cut is Mia walking around the house, with bare feet but we still haven't seen her face, and we can now only see her feet. The shot type used when we are following Mia is a tracking shot, closely used by Stanley Kubrick in The Shining. The way that she crosses her feet at the end of the scene reflects that she is playful and she's going to do something. The feet symbolize what happened to the guy before for giving Mia a foot rub. This shows that Taratino is controlling us. (Fig 5)
As an audince we are constantly thinking that we don't want Vince to try anything with Mia because we already know about the man who was thrown off a building for giving Mia a footrub, we are aligned with Vince because we are scared for him, but this contrasts what he does for a living, he is a tough gangster and the audience are made to be in his favour yet he is a murderer.
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| (Fig 6) |
In the second sequence we seem to be aligned with both the characters because the camera is completely in the centre of the Vince and Mia. Shot reverse shot is used here to help the conversation flow, and to show there facial expressions towards each other for example Mia is being very sexual and seductive by sucking on a cherry, and just staring at Vince such a way that suggests lust. Mia goes to the toilet to 'powder her nose' but we know she has just taken drugs, and she's 'high'. We are aligned with Mia when she is in the bathroom but it makes the audience think twice about if we like her or not because she could get Vince killed for being how she is towards him. This control of the audience was deliberately done by Tarantino because he knew that the audience would get a preferred reading from this part of the film to have feelings towards vince, this is an example of Stuart Halls theory. When she walks away into the toilet we as an audience start to understand more about her. During the meal, they start to dance and this is meant to make the audience laugh, because the actor who plays vince (John Travolta) Who is well known for the film Grease (1978), and he dances a lot in this film so Tarantino is trying to have a laugh with the audience this is because of the star theory, people know the actor so this would also tempt them to see this film. When they get home, Mia and Vince are so comfortable with each other and they dance through the door (Fig 6) as the audience we get worried that Mia and Vince will try something on each other and we don't want Vince to get hurt because we are aligned with him. Because we are aligned with Vince at this point, this is what the director wanted to get across, Stuart Halls theory is that people gain there own preferred reading of a film rather than taking the reading the director wants the audience to take. In this case we are taking the reading the director wanted us to take; this would be called stuart halls dominant reading.
The third sequence is the overdose scene, this scene starts with Mia putting on the music this makes the audience think maybe she is going to get some atmosphere going, and then there is a long-shot that follows her while she is dancing, and the camera goes past a column within the house, and this kind of breaks up the audiences concentration on Mia, another reading would be that this reflects what happens later on in the film with Mia 'coming back to life'. Parallel editing is used when Vince is talking to himself in the toilet and Mia is then taking drugs that she found in his pocket. Vince is talking to himself, and trying to convince himself not to try anything with Mia, but as the audience can see how Mia is dancing, we can see that she is not interested, and this makes us as an audience worry because we know she doesn't want anything and he thinks she does.
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| (Fig 7) |
Mia then has an overdose of drugs, and ends up on the floor with blood on her face. As an audience we are screaming at the film because Vince is still in the bathroom, then a blackout occurs and the effect of this is to show time has passed because when the camera comes back we can see Mia almost dead on the floor (Fig 7), foaming at the mouth. A close-up has been used and doesn't come off her face at all even while Vince is talking. The effect of this camera shot is to make the audience panic because they know she is not well but Vince comes out of the bathroom talking normally, and having a conversation with Mia, then we can hear that he notices the body and and he notices that she's not well. The camera stays in the same place even when he grabs her face and picks her up. This is Tarantino controlling the audiences feelings by the way he has shot these scenes and the shot angle he has used.
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| (Fig 8) |
Vince is then driving to Lance's house, and he is trying to call Lance, and he is sitting in the chair, and we are begging him to get up and answer the phone but he doesn't. The audience is in panic mode because we don't want Mia to die. Eventually Vince gets to the house, and crashes the car into the house, however this shot is interesting because the camera follows Lance out the house, and they are just juggling with Mia's body. The camera is hand-held and is one continuous shot throughout the scene. The camera is made to look like the audience is in the scene and that we are there with them in the room. We want to help Mia, and we keep screaming get the shot and we want to get in the room and help them find whatever it is they are looking for and help save her. This kind of shot brings the audience extremely close with the characters and at this point we are not really aligned with anyone but ourselves; however there could also be a prefered reading that we want Vince to succeed in bringing Mia back to life. Just as Vince goes to give her the shot the action goes extremely slow and he goes to stab her in the stomach, there is three close ups of Lance's face, Vince's face and the needle (Fig 8). She is then given the jab, and she jumps up and comes straight back to life. The pace of editing slows down during the jab, and close-ups. Then when Mia is back to life the pace of the editing and camera shots becomes fast again, using these shot types controls the audiences reactions, for example with the slow shots we are holding our breath as an audience and whens Mia is back to life its like we can breathe out and breathe easy again. Tarantino would have used these shot types for this reason, to control the audiences.
