Take me back

Thank you! And well I didn’t plan on doing it, but I started to take a look at that scene and then I couldn’t stop talking about it. 

And unfortunately I lost my first draft. Ugh. At least it’s less of a disaster than if I’d lost the draft of the Water post (took 8hrs in total).

First, lets get it out of the way that this is a series of shot-reverse shots of a subject (the shot of the swamp and crow people) being reacted to by the reverse shots of those in the War Rig. They are reacting, as a collective, to a scene; Max with the look of Oh No I Have Seen FUBAR Like This Before, Furiosa with Huh Ok How Do We Kill It If We Have To But We Might Not Have To Yet, and backseat characters with That Shit Is Creepy.

Onwards!

First shot is a tripod shot (camera is locked down), which makes compositions tons easier because all you have to do is have actors/objects hit their marks. You don’t have to figure in external movement, (be it zooms or the camera moving) wobbling the composition.

So what do we have then?

Center-framed deformed/collapsed tree, with a crow person (please let me know if they have an official name and I’ll change it) standing by it:

The deformed tree is the point of interest here, and that looming overhang of the foreground tree with the crows.

Two subjects then move into the frame, the War Rig and another crow person in the foreground. The scene cuts here:

When the War Rig hits centerframe with the deformed tree.

Check out how precise it is:

Crow person on the Third, branch of the three on the sweetspots and on the horitzontal Golden, looming. 

And apparently I’m finally going to be talking about diagonals.

This entire composition is created to create a stifling feeling. The POV and object with the most agency/movement in the shot is the War Rig, both of the crow people are turned towards it. But the vertical lines, the foreground crow person on the Third and the foreground tree is literally ‘locking’ the War Rig into a small horizontal space. It doesn’t feel expansive, it feels congested, looming. It feels small, and perhaps even intimate.

…if you want to be intimate with something that creepy.

Compare to the ‘close’ feeling of this scene which I’ve talked about before in reference to culture and tying together three generations of War Boys:

So there was this one reblog on that post where I discussed Center framing, Composition, and Male Gaze with this comment:

The comment continues in typical mansplaining manner but I want to address this first bit specifically. Because the assumption that the women are framed that way because it’s an action shot is wrong from a technical standpoint.

There is a difference between Wanda gesturing with her hands almost having no space for her head in a composition that highlighted her breasts …

…and the way Tony is given ‘headroom’ while gesturing with his hands (see: any Iron Man Trailer). He still has his face prominent at the sweet spot of the Golden Ratio (for more discussion on what/where this is scroll down to the diagrams), his hands are on the other sweet spot, and it’s a very dynamic pose with great use of diagonals both foreground and background.

There is also a difference between Natasha almost having to bend her head so that her face stays on the screen while her chest and hips land in the sweet spots…

And the headspace that is given Thor. Thor’s face lands on upper Third (Rule of Thirds). They are both holding/threatening with weapons. 

But wait! you say, what if we want to emphasize the weapons?

Yeah there’s a way to do that too, without sexualizing your character and smashing their head almost off the frame…

Look again at the background spaces behind Thor and Tony, the arches are pointing at Thor’s face and the architecture is pointing at the repulsor. Now go look at what the edges of the building is doing for Wanda and Natasha.

Look at where the women’s faces are. Then look at the men’s. That area is called the upper/lower thirds and where you’d put scrolling titles and name cards:

Conservatives: PERSONAL RESPONSIBILITYYYY!!!!

Health authorities: It's time to take some personal responsibility and wear a mask to protect yourself and others.

- Tina Fey, Bossypants

“What will your boyfriend/future husband/potential friends/employer/mother/grandmother/father/grandfather think?”

A very powerful way to reject this policing of us is to say we don’t care what people think, especially since that is often the way we are policed.