Monday 28 February 2011

Transsiberian - Thriller intro

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_lPSrc9cpAY&feature=related

The film starts with an establishing shot showing an industrial road going through a cold and snowy port probably early in the morning somewhere in Siberia. This shot has no non-diegetic sound atoll because the establishing shot wants to give the viewer an idea of the location as if they were there; the almost quiet sound with a couple of dogs barking in the background, the cold environment and the quite shaky handheld camera make you feel like your there in a remote area of Russia.
While a couple of credits appear and disappear while moving slightly at the bottom of the screen. You see a car appear at the other end of the road you are looking at, coming towards the camera and turning while the camera tracks it by panning left. Again you hear exactly what the microphone on the camera hears which is the car driving by on top of complete silence; As if you were there. Then you see a credit under the car introducing the location of where the intro is set, which is Vladivostok in Russia. You then see the car heading towards a boat with lights on.
Then the shot cuts to two Russians in coats in the same dark industrial location smoking and one says to the other in Russia 'On your toes.' All of the aspects in this shot show an element of fear in the two men because of the dark, dim, cold, remote surroundings, the big coats, the smoking, what the man says, the way he says it and how he's standing. The viewers are given a feeling of mystery and a lot of questions to ask: what will happen next? who's in the car? what are they doing there? All the viewers can do is keep watching.
The next shot shows the car parking opposite the too men which are probably police officers because they are standing next to a police car. A figure then comes out of the back seat of the car and walks towards the officers which then say 'good morning, inspector Grinko' introducing the mysterious character in the black coat whom we haven't seen close up yet. We now know that this character is an inspector and that he's most probably at the scene to investigate a murder or a crime of some sort.
The shot then cuts to a shot of a watch which is taped a couple of times probably because its not working, because its too cold or it might be one of the films many mcguffins. It then cuts to another shot showing showing inspector Grinko's face looking down where you can hear him taping his watch, he then looks up and takes a breath. The shot changes to a traking shot of him walking down some stairs of a boat from a low handheld angle going behind a police officer to give the audience a feeling of them being there again as an invisible person or one of the many police officers. He then walks past the viewers stops at a ledge and looks down; the camera does the same and looks at what Grinko is looking at which is what looks like a dead frozen person at a table having breakfast. This being the crime-scene.
It then cuts to an image of frozen fish in ice which in a way mirrors what has happened to the dead person in the crime-scene. This then focuses behind the fish where Grinko is there to investigate.

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