cinematography Audience as Voyeur - camera tricks?
- Thread starter Semiazas
- Start date
I like it when the camera looks through stuff. Off the top of my head, first thing that comes to mind is this really cool scene at the beginning of "Unbreakable". Bruce Willis hits on this girl sitting next to him on the train. We watch the whole thing through the space in between the seats, from the seats in front of them. It's as if we're sitting in those seats, spying on them.
Yeah, using dirty shots is a great way. Have the camera look through a window, shoot from under a table (as Mel Brooks satirized in High Anxiety), shoot from behind a plant or the edge of a doorway. Stuff like that. Also, blocking your actors so they sometimes have their back to the camera (because obviously they don't know it's there) could add to the effect, just don't overdo it, you don't want the whole film to just be peoples' backs.
Not quite the same thing, but in "The Changeling" (1980 w/George C Scott) John Russell moves into a house where the resident spirit is trying to get his attention. Since the voyeur is unseen the camera is, at times, moving towards and/or around Russell when he is in the house.
You realize later in the film that the camera angle is low because the spirit is that of a child, and some of the actions taken to attract attention are childlike tantrums.
And from a sonic perspective try "The Conversation" (1974 - Francis Ford Coppola) about the trials and tribulations of a surveillance expert.
I don't know whether you mean voyeur in a literal Rear Window way- in which case I recommend Porky's 
I'm assuming you mean in a more subtle 'make the audience feel like they're seeing something they shouldn't' sort of way. This is probably more difficult. The shot that leaps to mind is (I think) in the opening of Panic Room where the camera tracks around the house and through the kitchen and then (seemingly impossibly) squeezes through the handle of a kettle. I don't remember the scene perfectly, perhaps other people will do. And I have no idea how Fincher did it, but the effect of the whole sequence is deeply unsettling.
Otherwise I would second the scene from Unbreakable, further evidence, if it was needed, that Shymalan is a better filmmaker than writer.
I'm assuming you mean in a more subtle 'make the audience feel like they're seeing something they shouldn't' sort of way. This is probably more difficult. The shot that leaps to mind is (I think) in the opening of Panic Room where the camera tracks around the house and through the kitchen and then (seemingly impossibly) squeezes through the handle of a kettle. I don't remember the scene perfectly, perhaps other people will do. And I have no idea how Fincher did it, but the effect of the whole sequence is deeply unsettling.
Otherwise I would second the scene from Unbreakable, further evidence, if it was needed, that Shymalan is a better filmmaker than writer.