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What's The Last Movie You’ve Seen?

In american cinematography these low angle shots are used more to show mystery or horror..
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Wes Mantooth said:
I think power and fear much more accurate.
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I mean, do you know what the Hitchcock term McGuffin is? they often use those type of low angle shots to build to the mystery of the object, like when Vincent Vega is inspecting the contents of the briefcase...
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^literally the first image on google when u search McGuffin...

Also in Psycho look how Hitchcock uses the low angle shots on and inside the house behind the hotel.. there's a mystery/suspense building element..

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Here is Kubrick using a low angle shot not to demonstrate power or fear, but more as a suspense building element, to demonstrate how vulnerable young danny is.

The real reason you do it is to basically eliminate depth, makes it seem like you have more of a 2 dimensional space and this draws more attention to the lines the weights and the tones.


In the old Japanese masters movies, they used those angles to sort of simulate eye level if you were kneeling in their house as you would traditionally (and because of what I wrote in the sentence directly above)
 
One of my favorite low angle vs. high angle uses is in White Men Can't Jump. The initial shooting contest hustle scene 8 of the first 9 shots are made and shot at a low angle to show confidence and what looks to be a close and easy shot.

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But the last shot is done at a high angle to show weakness in confidence and to shot how far away the shot seems to now be once the hustle has been done.
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Great use of cinematography in that scene.
 
Darkwing Duck said:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Low-angle_shot
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Bro thAT wikipedia explanation is literally 10x ******** than the one I gave above discussing lines, weights and tones... People not discussing composition is like a big red-flag that its consumers speaking and not producers..

Have you ever seen Tokyo Story(1953)? It's considered by many critics to be the greatest film ever made, It's top10 on all the big lists..

Consistently the low angle shots are not what you guys are describing...

Plus like what about Low Angle shots with no people in them? then your guys explanation does n't even apply, right? Its not a thorough explanation after-all...

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this is some shot to establish dominance?, to make the tree over the mountain look more imposing? thats obviously not the purpose of this shot, this is flashed after the father and daughter have a big fight and illustrates the fragility and defiance of the daughter...



In garbage *** movies, like lets say the Jason Bourne action movies, where the camera is constantly jittering and moving and the average length of the scene is 2 seconds... yes the low-angle shots are gonna be used to do exactly what y'all are trying to pigeon-hole here... But thats just one application (and a *****yone at that)..


Those bourne movies where the scene lenght is 2.5 seconds and then 2 seconds is a perfect counterpoint to what im talking about with Yasujirō Ozu's films... In a movie like that where they are butchering the whole thing down to try and get it to a managable 120 minutes for their no-attention-span-having audience.

In actual films, ones made for storytelling purposes and not mass consumption, you'll see more creative uses, like Ozu, who's average length of scene has gotta be closer to 10 seconds.. In lots of films thse angles are used as 'establishing shots' in Ozu's films thats not really how it is, there's something more poetic and patterened about it..combined with the lack of camera movement, there's clearly a pacing element involved..


Watch a Tokyo Story... These Low angle shots are used poetically in a chain of scenes to grasp their effect... Listen to the conversation before this shot is flashed... You'll see clearly in that moment that these angles arent just used for what you're saying they are...

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just cause your accustomed to something doesnt mean thats how it is... hollywood certainly is out to force feed the masses ****** example after ****** example so its easy to see how this sorta mistake is widespread.
 
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Lord Bullingdon said:
I mean, do you know what the Hitchcock term McGuffin is? they often use those type of low angle shots to build to the mystery of the object, like when Vincent Vega is inspecting the contents of the briefcase...
maxresdefault.jpg

^literally the first image on google when u search McGuffin...

Also in Psycho look how Hitchcock uses the low angle shots on and inside the house behind the hotel.. there's a mystery/suspense building element..

Image21.jpg

Here is Kubrick using a low angle shot not to demonstrate power or fear, but more as a suspense building element, to demonstrate how vulnerable young danny is.

The real reason you do it is to basically eliminate depth, makes it seem like you have more of a 2 dimensional space and this draws more attention to the lines the weights and the tones.


In the old Japanese masters movies, they used those angles to sort of simulate eye level if you were kneeling in their house as you would traditionally (and because of what I wrote in the sentence directly above)
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Yes I do, I actually had a Hitchcock class in college and have probably seen over 20 of his films.

That said, you originally said horror/mystery. Horror is a poor word choice. I think in general the shot offers a sense of vulnerability that, depending on the scene and surrounding elements, can lend itself to mystery, suspense or superiority/inferiority but in general the latter is virtually always present.
 
Faust (1926) This movie is so cool.. Mephisto's character looks amazing. My favorite Murneau Film over the more popular (and older) Nosferatu.
 
Lord Bullingdon said:
Faust (1926) This movie is so cool.. Mephisto's character looks amazing. My favorite Murneau Film over the more popular (and older) Nosferatu.
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****. This brings back memories. I’ve never seen the film but the title seemed familiar and based on your comparison to Nosferatu, I thought it was something I had read in college by Goethe. He in fact is the author but it says it was a play which doesn’t ring true with me. I’m gonna bust the book out tomorrow.

Edit: Actually I think I only read a journal by Goethe and the author of what I’m thinking was someone else. Maybe that Hauptmann guy?
 
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I think the text I’m thinking of was a short story by ETA Hoffmann if I’m recalling the author’s name correctly.
 
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My Neighbor Totoro(1988) absolute masterpiece from Studio Ghibli. 20/10. Best Japanese Animated movie i've seen, supplanting the legendary Akira.


Posssibly the cutest movie of all time... I've seen soooo many movies.. Can't think of anything even close tbh..



Satsuki and Mei are definitely some of my very favorite sister characters ever.


I would actually go as far as saying I'd recommend finding a physical copy of this and paying for it to keep.. It's a true masterpiece of animation up there with Pinocchio...


Nothing I've seen from the Japanese Animation studios flexes as hard as this movie does, and tbh Akira tries really hard to flex, with its crazy Neo-tokoyo landscapes and the crazy animation sequences at the end.. Whats in this movie is even more impressive to me.
 
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Dance of the Fireflies(1988) Another Studio Ghibli gem. 9/10. This one's easily found free on YT btw. It's really good but still not on the level of My Neighbor Tortoro, which is just pure magic.
 
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Honestly, I'm pretty sure the influence for the pokemon Snorlax comes from My Neighbor Tortoro..

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There's some western influence in this stuff too as much as im sure they'd like to hide it/detract from it.. Can't help but think of the Cheshire Cat when looking at a few of the designs...
 
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