Deconstruction of Intruders

We are continuing to look at many different scenes from horror films to prepare us for filming our supernatural horror opening, this week I watched the film 'Intruders' (2011) which is about two children living in different countries who are visited nightly by a faceless being who wants to take possession of them. I looked at this specific scene from the film to deconstruct in terms of mise en scene, camera angles, lighting, and sound.


   Sound:

• The non-diegetic sound at the beginning of the sequence is very low and deep rumbling music, it is played quietly as the girl stands up from her bed.
• It begins to gradually get louder as she starts walking across the room, and a slight screeching higher noise is played subtly over the deep music to make a build up towards whatever she is walking to.
•  It continues to get louder until she reaches the cupboard with the mirror she was walking to, the music makes such an impact on the scene up to this point as it creates fear within the audience.
• When the cupboard door shuts and you see the girls face in the mirror all non-diegetic sound comes to a stop and there is silence.
• As she applies lipstick to her face the screeching music gradually begins again but not as loud as before.
• There is no diegetic sound within this scene but the non-diegetic music still has a big impact upon it, this is a technique we would like to use for our own opening to make it effectively scary without using any dialogue.

The scene begins with a POV (Point of View) shot from the demon who is hiding in the girls cupboard. The audience is shown the majority of her room from this angle, it fits the conventions of a little girls room within horrors, she has a white bed with fairy lights around the head and a matching white bed side table, she has a picture frame above her bed and classic girly bed sheets. Low key lighting has been used to show it is night time and create a scarier atmosphere.




The little girl is then shown with a close- up shot, she looks about twelve or thirteen, has long brown hair, is naturally pretty, and looks innocent and cute, these are all classic conventions of a little girl in horrors. She gets up from her bed and starts walking towards the cupboard we were shown in the first shot.

She reaches the cupboard and the door shuts showing a mirror and revealing her face but with no facial features anymore. This is only what we see from the mirror we do not get a shot directly showing her face from this point onwards. The audience instantly know from this point that whatever demon is in the cupboard has now possessed the little girl.

At the end of the sequence the girl applies purple lipstick to her featureless face which then shows demonic lips. It is shown from another  POV shot from the demon as it did at the beginning, which I think works well to show the huge contrast and change between the innocent represented by the girl at the start compared to her now she is possessed.