Mission impossible: Ghost
Protocol opening scene analysis
Analysed the first 2 minutes
Mission impossible: Ghost
protocol opens with 4 short shots, one from outside a highly secured prison,
the second and third being of criminals in their bunks asleep and the fourth on
the main character throwing and catching a ball against the wall, it is
completely silent apart from the repetitive diegetic sound of the ball bouncing
of the wall. The camera then pans down from the prison onto a mobile van unit,
this and off screen sounds of dogs aggressively barking highlight to the
audience how something is about to happen. The audience then sees a couple of
medium shots of inside the van and the spy tech that is laid out, a close up
shot of one of the spy like characters shows him typing. The camera then
switches back to inside the prison which shows a long shot of 4 guards relaxing
in the control room, either reading, sleeping or playing cards. The screens
that the guards are supposed to be watching goes black for a split second and
then back to a normal screen. This creates some enigma codes for the audience
as they want to know what the spy like character is up to and if he is going to
get caught out. The prison setting, lack of sounds, prison officer’s uniforms
and prisoners highlight to the audience that this film is part of the action
genre and most likely something exciting is going to happen.
The audience then hear an
enhanced sound of a verification buzzer, combined with the diegetic sound of
one set of cell gates opening. A medium shot shows the prisoner surprised that
his sell is opened. The audience then see a short perspective shot (from the
spy’s computer) of the prisoner opening the cell and looking out, the camera
switches back to a close up shot of the spy character smiling successfully. As
the prisoner walks out of his cell, there is a continued off screen background
noise of the ball still being thrown against the wall. As a guard discovers
this prisoner wondering about, the camera switches back to inside the van where
the character says a short dialogue to himself. With another enhanced sound of
a verification buzzer, the camera switches back to the prison where two more
prisoners are released from their cells. The camera switches back to another
perspective shot from the spy's computer where the audience can see the three
prisoners beat up and get into a hustle with this guard combined with diegetic
sounds of the guards cries for help. Then there is a close up of the spy
character mouthing “sorry” and pulling a awkwardly sympathetic face.
The camera then switches to a
completely new setting of a female character running down a dark and dingy
sewer combined with diegetic sounds of the water splashing below her feet.
This switching back from
inside and outside the prison is known as parallel editing where it switches
between two or more events occurring at the same time, in this case I think
it's applied to cause the audience confusion and persuade them to carry on
watching.
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