Research + Spectatorship

La Haine

• La Haine was released in 1995, falling under the genre of drama and suspense. It was directed by Mathieu Kassovitz. The three main actors are Vincent Cassel, Said Taghmaoui and Hubert Kounde.

• Synopsis: The film is in black and white, focusing on three youths living in the slums of Paris. During this time, their friend Abdul is beaten by police officers amidst a riot. While engaged in a scuffle with police, Vinz obtains a police offers gun. It becomes a reoccurring question whether or not he will shoot someone, after he states he will shoot a cop, in the event of Abdul's death.

• The riots started to begin around the time the Interior Minister, Nicolas Sarkozy, went to see the new implementations on law enforcement on urban crime. He was met with violence as the people threw a variety of projectiles at him, in protest on the new measures. The rioting mainly began in response to the death of two teenagers, when trying to escape from police, they attempted to climb an electric fence and as a result were killed.

City of God

• City of god was released in 2002, and is categorised as a crime drama. It was directed by Fernando Meirelles, it only became world renowned a year later after its release, in 2003. The key starts include Alice Braga, Leandro Firmino Da Hora and Alexandre Rodrigues. 

• Synopsis: The film focuses on two young boys that grow up together in a rundown neighbourhood in Rio de Janeiro. As they grow older, one of the boys pursues a life as a photographer, while the other boy grows up to become a drug dealer.

• In the way of context, the film strongly conveys life in the favelas to a global audience. It communicates the idea of the hardship that goes alongside living in the streets of Rio de Janeiro; ridden with gang fights, drug trafficking and poor living conditions.

A clockwork Orange

Through analysis of the key sequences, the protagonist,  Alex, is the focus of the audiences, displaying the situation from his point of view. This causes the audience to join him when he commits violent and brutal crimes. These crimes include murder, rape and vicious assaults. Some of these crimes, specifically the rape scene, incorporate a voyeuristic nature. With this in mind, the audience are made to feel like they are a part of his actions. This is later emphasised when the audience is made to feel guilty, as we witness the traumatic therapy Alex undergoes. The camera focuses on Alex, conveying his responses to the therapy, adding to the audiences guilt, as we witness the outcomes of the violent crimes we are made to feel a part of, through witnessing.     

Platoon

Analysing the intro and ending sequence of the film, conveys the evils of war and how there are no winners in war, with a focus on the death that arises from battle. The body bags captured in the begin, can be seen to foreshadow the men in the regiment getting off the plane, due to the ending having several long shots, in order to capture all the people that have been killed. With these images, the audience feels saddened by these events, as they are a reflection on actual events that have happened, as there have been many wars throughout history.