(SWA) Movie Analysis 3/5

Brian Ingebretsen

3/10/14

ENGL 1A

(SWA) Movie Analysis 3/5

Terror can be influenced by a number of factors; whether it is by sound, sight, or feel. This method is why horror movies are so successful in omitting terror, with the right combination of the factors; one can easily be terrified beyond belief. Of course there is also trial and error that accompanies the horror drama because any wrong mixing of the factors can lead to a bland and boring attempt at horror. Starting with the 1922 German vampire movie “Noseferatu”, the premise relies on visual, throughout the entire movie, the viewer is subjected to shadow shots, quick transitions, and close ups. The films downfall comes at the hand of having too much visual scares and not enough tension build-up which can come from the feeling and sound.

The next movie that we watched was “The Shining” and this film added a sense of depth that we didn’t receive in Noseferatu. This depth created an intense claustrophobic feel to the film which was a great way of developing tension that leads to the payoff scare. That being said however, it failed to fully build tension because alas the music was a bit too upbeat for the movie to be taken real seriously and some of the visuals were just laughter inducing.  The final movie was “The Conjouring” and this movie utilized all three factors however the biggest payoff came from the sound that the movie omitted. The sound would differ from being completely vacant to a sudden high pitch screech which brought up the tension in a fast way. The downfall to this film was that they didn’t utilize the combination to its fullest extent, in other words they went a little soft on the scare factor.