Hot Fuzz (Edgar Wright, 2007)

An over-ambitious police officer is relocated to the countryside where he soon finds himself on the trails of a brutal murderer.

I watched this on a popcorn night but nevertheless I couldn't quite enjoy it like Shaun of the Dead. It has its funny parts, but somehow the story felt a bit too contrived.

Instead I wanted to give a shot at analyzing the camera positioning/editing: the first scene in the police department. I am becoming interested in shoot-reverse-shot scenes and alternatives to them, so maybe it's good to start with a standard setup.

The scene is important as it is presents the protagonist with his big obstacle - being transferred to the country side. The viewer learns that officer Angel is quite oblivious and stubborn. His character traits will get him into loads of trouble later in the story. (He still felt a bit flat, though)

Here is the setup as I see it: (click to enlarge)

C1, C2 are closeups - one whip pan on C2/OS2
OS1, OS2 are over the shoulder shots (coming in two framing sizes and one lift-shot in OS2) - they are also dollying later in the scene.
P1, P2 are profile shots (long lens)
P3 (not in the diagram above shows the room from the middle of P1,P2)
D1, D2 are dolly shots (D2 is above eye level)
D3 (not in diagram) is the final shot, where Angel gets confronted with his office mates (last shot)
S1, S2 are "special" - S1 is a low shot wide-angle, S2 is a close-up of the phone

Thinking about production: 12 setups, three of which are a bit more complicated to setup, either because of dolly or because of additional extras - I assume that production had approximately 3 hours for this scene planned, maybe an hour more.(??)

SHOT	IMAGE
C1
C2
OS1
OS2
P1
P2
D1
D2

In terms of editing the scene has four "emotional build-ups" - which rely heavily on musical cues. The "special shots" are used at the end of each part, except for the dolly shot D1, which is in the middle of the first part.

The "promotion", which turns out not to be one: A musical cue announces "happiness", but there is the vinyl-turntable-stop effect, when Angel realizes he is being transferred to the country.
The part ends on C1/C2 very close.
When the ouraged Angel demands to talk to the inspector, there is "tension" music as he is ordered to the office via phone. The inspector repeats the exact same line as his sergeant.
This part ends with S1 and S2 (Sergeant calling the inspector)
When Angel asks for the chief inspector, again musical tension. Payoff: The CI has been waiting outside the door. (and repeats the same line)
This part ends with the whip pan of C2, and P3 the CI entering.
A comparatively long buildup with tension music, when Angel resorts to his last method: the team! Payoff: The team has prepared a fare-well party.
It builds up tension by dolly on the CI and Angel. This part ends with D2, D3.

I assume that the shooting was planned in such a way to keep the 'special shots' reserved to one of the punchlines/end-of-buildups. Morale: it's all in the preparation. :)

Time of the Gypsies / Dom Za Vesanje (Emir Kusturica, 1988)

A supernaturally gifted boy from a Gypsy community is forced to survive in the world of crime. The intriguing qualities of Kusturica's films I've seen is his relentless depiction of basically crazy communities. Not just agreeably potty, they're usually outright interstellar-nuts. Here, he follows the fate of the rather harmless boy Perhan, that leaves for Italy in hope of a better future for him and his loved ones. There are some enormously interesting images in the film that kept ringing long after. The ritual in the river and the last scene in the church ruin (with a horse standing somewhere far back in the image...). After sketchily mapping out the scenes it is surprising how rigorously three-acty the screenplay is constructed. The first act seems quite long in terms of time and number of scenes, but there is also a lot of imagery spent on depicting life in this crazy universe, which makes the second part in Italy much more believable. And there is a certa...

Detour (Ulmer, 1945) #TSPDT #390

A hitchhiker is picked up by death and then picks up his personal tormenting devil. The plot looked fairly straightforward, but the magic of this gem is that the story strand convolutes until it tightens into a strangling gordic knot - which is pretty much exactly what happens towards the end. The flashback structure are very noir-ish, so was the plot - everything straight down, right from the beginning. I really rooted for the guy to get out of this situation, but every time he takes a decision it actually gets worse - so in the end I was just hoping he might die and get relieved. Most striking was the jaw-dropping performance of Ann Savage. She pops out about a mile and her character is rendered so immensely unlikeable that I wondered that she has not been called the godmother of a new type of acting school (maybe she was?) This is definitively a film worth studying again. Its shortness does nothing to diminish the impact and it is rich on details.

Scarface (de Palma, 1982) - TSPDT #490

A cuban refugee wreaks havoc on Miamis drug industry and realizes his version of the American Dream. The main character is really something - the acting is great and the character suffers from the most fatal of all flaws: He cannot lie - although in a practical sense he does exactly that. So his attacks on the american society he has worked so hard to become a part of work really great - he has a deep insight but at the same time he is hypocrite enough to fall in the same trap in a way. The only time when I felt that the script had to "pull" a little to take the story where it wanted it is when Tony's mother calls to ask about his sister. Her character was a little too much on hating Tony.

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