sounds, shot types, and editing

Looking into continuity editing

Batman - the dark knight
Christopher Nolan, 2008
Starting off with a longshot of the truck we know where the scene is taking place. As we see the joker point his gun at the second truck we are lead to an inserting shot(where we see who/what the gun is pointing to.) This helps the audience follow through and understand the next shot as they see the bullets come through the other side of the vehicle. If the audience didn't see the bullets hit the outside of the truck, they wouldn't be clear as to where the bullets came from.At 0.28, one of the characters say 'What is that? A bazooka' This leads to a shot of the joker firing at the car (this is the insert shot) which takes the audience through the scene step by step to when the car is blown into the air. This shot contains many sudden changes of shot from one viewpoint to another. This helps, not only to build up an image of what is happening in the scene but is also deliberatley done to shock the audience, create tension and fasten the rate of the scene, keeping the audience engaged with every character throughout.

LOOKING AT SOUNDS, SHOT TYPES AND EDITING

Primeval
Michael Katleman, 2007
Starting off with a crane of the woodlands and the wildlife makes the sudden darkness in the next shot unexpected and frightening. The sound emphasises the eerieness from the whistling and tweeting of the woodlands, to the thunderstorm. The short extreme close ups create enigma as the audience are urging to know what the objects in the trailer are and what relation it has with the serial killer. The black scenes between each individual shot break up the continuity, speeding up the rhythm of the trailer. The blurry shots at 0.35 make it hard to make out who the characters in the film are. It makes the trailer more horror like as we are left unknowing who is who and why they have blood drippin down their face. The screaming in this section also emphasises on the sinister approach to the movie. The low angle shot in this section makes the character seem more dominant and controlling yet in the next shot we see rescue helpers carry dead bodies. This creates enigma as the audience have no idea how the character was killed. The forward tracking at 0.52 gives us a good look at the characters expression, making it obvious the serial killer is approaching her. She is left speechless, exaggerating her emotions. Finally, after a minute into the trailer sequence, we are introduced to the serial killer for the first time where his appearance is made even more disturbing with a close up. The long lingering darkness at 1.19 leaves the audience in suspence and thrill as they urge to know what's going to happen next. They are greeted with a shocking close up of someones mouth and a scream in the background. 1.40 is an establishing shot as we are introduced to the mise en scene and character as he directly addresses the camera. The sound differs with great extent from the 'drop' of the blood into the water to the 'RUN.' The different sound volumes and effects, shot types and fast snappy shots create an unexpected feel of the movie.
The Commentary/voice-over narration is used to introduce particular parts of the movie. The voice over starts with reading what is on the screen, yet follows on to add extra information which is not evident from the picture (it anchors the shot). We are told 'He is real, but he is not human' before we see the serial killer. Giving us a moment, to imagine what we think the serial killer will look like. As a whole, the voice over links the different shots in the trailer together.The commentary confers authority on a particular interpretation, in this case, the voice is a deep males voice: adding to the horror theme of the movie.