I don't get this angle a lot of directors use.

H

harmonica44

I've been studying a lot of angles used in movies for storyboarding my next project. One angle I cannot figure out are these ones, which are used in Blood Simple, for example. 5 minutes and 6 seconds in:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FOwDBifKN2c

A lot of other movies use this angle too. Mostly in cars, such as Halloween, Lars and the Real Girl... United 93 even did it on the plane, with the pilots, for a lot of their shots. Why not put the camera in front of them pointing straight on though? Or a dirty OTS shot from the side. Why shoot an actor's head, diagonally from behind, not getting much of the face as a result. A lot of times the director picks the angle of the shot, depending on the emotion he or she wants convey, but I am not getting any particular emotion from this odd angle.

So what is the emotion that I am missing, if that's the case?
 
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Maybe the director doesn't want the audience to cross the line and get "too close" to the characters.
Maybe there are some secrets that we are not supposed to know.
Maybe the characters are hiding something.
Maybe the director wants to remind us that we are only mere eavesdroppers.
Maybe....
Maybe....
Maybe....

I haven't seen Blood Simple but if you really want to know why the director used this angle, analyze the characters in context on what the film is about, its themes and what it is trying to say.

That being said, there really is no right and wrong answer. It just depends on how a person interprets a shot/angle. As the director, you have to find out yourself how you could use this type of angle to your advantage to convey what you want to say.
 
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I thought about maybe the director wants to do an angle which suggests a secret or mystery is being revealed, for Blood Simple that is. For Lars and the Real Girl, or United 93, the cats are already out of the bag and their are so secrets in those scenes that they are used though.
 
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With these shots, it can sometimes make you feel like you're even closer, as if you're just behind them eavesdropping.

In car stuff it's much easier to sit in the back seat and shoot those angles than rig out a car completely.

Also straight on shots tend to show you a lot about a character, here not much is being revealed to us - consider why?
 
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Okay thanks. Well I have a scene in a car, that is a relationship related argument between a couple, while driving. I don't want to use the backseat angle though, since there are no emotional reasons for it. I want to get something more frontal to show their faces more.
 
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jax_rox said:
Also straight on shots tend to show you a lot about a character, here not much is being revealed to us - consider why?
Click to expand...

Set the answer in bold for emphasis.

It could have been a function of not having the rig to mount the camera on the hood, but I doubt it. Remember though that this was shot in 1984, so the equipment used is much larger/heavier/more unwieldy than what you are used to seeing these days.

Really though, the safe bet is that this particular instance was a simple case of intentional obfuscation.
 
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We usually use those shots to convey that the character is looking off into the distance. If anything, they couldn't get in front of the actors because of the environment. Or the actors are peering over a boat or railing.
 
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I never really got the whole watching them of United 93. I mean their are no twists left to reveal, so why not just cut to more emotional frontal shots of everyone? Everything is shot from a secret observer's point of view, when really the whole plane was isolated from any secret observance tone. I guess that's my take of directing on it though.
 
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harmonica44 said:
I never really got the whole watching them of United 93. I mean their are no twists left to reveal, so why not just cut to more emotional frontal shots of everyone? Everything is shot from a secret observer's point of view, when really the whole plane was isolated from any secret observance tone. I guess that's my take of directing on it though.
Click to expand...

They made that movie with full awareness of how close to the actual incident they were. Greengrass stayed away from most of the sterotypical "dramatic" shots and dialogue -- it's all underplayed because the reality of the situation is more important than stylistic flourishes.

They could have done all manner of dramatic slow-motion reveals and closeups and put a giant focus on the "let's roll" line, but they instead opted for an observer's point of view with minimal exploitation. In my opinion, that was a very, very wise thing to do.
 
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I agree they don't need a close up on the let's roll line. I like how Greengrass rolled the dolly forward past the passenger as he said it, and you can see other passengers as well. But I think that showing dramatic close ups in other parts wouldn't have hurt. Just my style though. I mean Titanic is not considered exploitative and they have more 'dramatic' shots. But I guess that's just the angles I like. I was never much of a fan of Greengrass's documentary style, but there's nothing wrong with it. When the Terminator says "husta la vista baby, and it was shot from behind him diagonally, instead of in front of him, a lot of us might feel it wasn't as effective therefore.
 
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When the Terminator said 'Hasta la vista' he wasn't choosing his words carefully, he wasn't staring in the distance and contemplating life & he wasn't (at times) looking away from whom he talked to.
No.
He was direct and blunt towards the target and the audience.
The objective was to make it sound cool and impressive.

When shot from diagonally behind you can also show what the character looks at.
Actually it's an over-shoulder while the character talks to the 'air'.
In Blood Simple you see when she does look at him and when she looks away. (Thinking? Shy? Uncomfortable?)
 
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