Public Enemies
2
Conor Window 12A Public Enemies (2009) Public Enemies is a movie based in the American Depression era starring Johnny Depp as the protagonist, famous real life bank robber John Dillinger. The FBI makes Depp the first Public Enemy Number One after escaping them a numerous times, as well as even escaping from prison. The movies main antagonist is Christian Bale, who co stars as FBI Agent Melvin Purvis, a man who is given seemingly impossible task of bringing Dillinger in… dead or alive. The trailer begins with a contrapuntal, non diegetic piece of dialogue, in which the audience hears a female character “What is it exactly that you do for a living?”. The woman is wearing a red dress and lipstick, a common convention in gangster movies. This denotes luxury, however as red is commonly associated with such themes as blood and warnings, the dress could have been used to connote the danger in which this female character may put her self in if she wishes to get involved with John Dillinger. This is followed by a montage of jump cuts as Dillinger and his accompanies’ robbing a bank. Action editing and elliptical editing are used to great effect in this sequence of shots. The audience is then formally introduced to our main protagonist, who replies: “John Dillinger, I rob banks.” During this conversation, shot/reverse shot and the 180-degree rule are used. The mis-en-scene of the scene shows the two sitting at a table together. The denotations of this shows the two are out for dinner, this connotes to the audience that the two could be in a relationship and they are on a date, however we later discover this is not the case, and the two have only recently met. Crosscutting is now used to introduce our antagonists, we see the head of the FBI declaring “The United States of America’s first war on crime”, as well as showcasing the criminal life style our protagonist is involved in. The scene does this by showing criminals shooting their guns and taking hostages. The use of a Tommy gun a prop connotes the era that the film is based in, as this was a common weapon during the particular moment in time. We are then introduced to our second antagonist, Melvin Purvis, as he
description
342r312er
Transcript of Public Enemies
Conor Window 12A
Public Enemies (2009)Public Enemies is a movie based in the American Depression era starring Johnny Depp as the protagonist, famous real life bank robber John Dillinger. The FBI makes Depp the first Public Enemy Number One after escaping them a numerous times, as well as even escaping from prison. The movies main antagonist is Christian Bale, who co stars as FBI Agent Melvin Purvis, a man who is given seemingly impossible task of bringing Dillinger in… dead or alive.
The trailer begins with a contrapuntal, non diegetic piece of dialogue, in which the audience hears a female character “What is it exactly that you do for a living?”. The woman is wearing a red dress and lipstick, a common convention in gangster movies. This denotes luxury, however as red is commonly associated with such themes as blood and warnings, the dress could have been used to connote the danger in which this female character may put her self in if she wishes to get involved with John Dillinger. This is followed by a montage of jump cuts as Dillinger and his accompanies’ robbing a bank. Action editing and elliptical editing are used to great effect in this sequence of shots. The audience is then formally introduced to our main protagonist, who replies: “John Dillinger, I rob banks.” During this conversation, shot/reverse shot and the 180-degree rule are used. The mis-en-scene of the scene shows the two sitting at a table together. The denotations of this shows the two are out for dinner, this connotes to the audience that the two could be in a relationship and they are on a date, however we later discover this is not the case, and the two have only recently met. Crosscutting is now used to introduce our antagonists, we see the head of the FBI declaring “The United States of America’s first war on crime”, as well as showcasing the criminal life style our protagonist is involved in. The scene does this by showing criminals shooting their guns and taking hostages. The use of a Tommy gun a prop connotes the era that the film is based in, as this was a common weapon during the particular moment in time. We are then introduced to our second antagonist, Melvin Purvis, as he is asked to go after Dillinger. Throughout this trailer we see many of the regular conventions of gangster movies. The most obvious being suits. All the men the audience see in this trailer are wearing suits. This connotes the luxury lifestyles in which these men live, as they can afford to pay for expensive attire, especially during the ear of the Great American Depression. The trailer is full of subliminal cuts and jump cuts. This connotes to the audience that there is never a moments rest, just non-stop action throughout the movie. This attracts more viewers, widening the demographic of the movie.
At the beginning of the second trailer for the movie, the first thing to appear is the universal logo. This immediately informs the audience of the high quality production of this film, as this is a world famous production company. Followed by this is sequence of action-edited shots. ‘Americas most notorious criminal’ is an effective like as it connotes the scale of Dillinger’s crimes, as the whole country was aware of whom he was and what he does. This trailer also uses shot/reverse shot to display a conversation between our protagonist and antagonist. We then see a montage of subliminal cuts showing Dillinger escaping prison. This is effective as it shows just enough to interest and attract the audience, whilst leaving them on edge, wanting to see how
Conor Window 12A
Dillinger did it. This attracts them into seeing the movie. During the next montage of shits there is an asynchronous voice over. This is done to create suspense, once again leaving the audience to piece the trailer together with the words.
