Horror genre analysis 1

Film: Delicatessen
Directors: Marc Caro and
Distrbutor: Miramax Films
Country: France

i watched Delicatsessen, a French black comedy based on the tenants of an apartment building in Post apocalyptic France, and their desperate bids to survive. One of the main characters has come to replace a previous tenant whose disapearance is unknown. The apartment owner runs a butcher shop which applies for employees whom the butcher lures in and kills and butchers as a cheap source of meat for his tenants.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VtbTe52lmlc

Camera work: At the beginning of the opening scene a low angle shot is used as the audience looks up at the butcher who then swings an axe down on it. This shows the character having power over the audience and other charatcers. Much of the camerawork used is handheld so that the camera can swoop in and out between the different objects, it also zooms in and out to focus on particular objects. It also uses panning shots to scan across all the items and to view them all. The fact that all of these items are in close proximity with each other shows that the area is cluttered, and filled with random objects such as newpaper cuttings and broken CD's.

Mise en scene: The butcher at the very beginning is shown wearing an old fashined butchers outfit, like a kind of apron. His hair is also tied back, this iconography helps to set the scene and make it clear who the butcher is. There is not a lot of colour displayed during this sequence, this also adds to the idea that it is set back in time, rather than recently, like it has yellowed over time, like a newspaper would. All of the objects seem to have been placed on a desk of some kind perhaps in an office, which provides an underlying theme of the plot, that something more sinister is being planned.

Sound: The yell of the butcher and the scream of the victim are the first things that are heard in the opening sequence, which straight away grabs the attention of the audience and keeps them interested.