Bullet boy textual analysis
The film I will be analysing is ‘Bullet Boy’ by Saul Dibb. The film starts with non-diegetic sound playing and with a graphic of a fire or explosion which turns into the BBC films logo. This already sets a mood for the film and give us the sense of drama or tension already. The font or typography of the credits appearing on the screen is very simple as it is just a white simple font. This helps to set a pace to the film along with the non diegetic music. We also here diegetic sound of a car driving with the volume of the Non diegetic music increasing which helps to create more of an atmosphere. We see a medium shot of someone who appears to be a young boy in maybe the boot of a car or in a dark crowded place, which due to the sound of the car driving, we may presume to be maybe the boot of a car. This makes the audience start to guess straight away as to why the boy is where he is. This is due to some of the technical codes working together to give this mood. For example the ambient music with the nearly pitch black lighting gives a mysterious mood straight away from the start of the film. The character takes out a small flash light with a blue light and points it towards the camera which then fades into a white screen appearing with the title of the film. The gives us the impression of maybe the character doesn’t know where they are and maybe they are lost. The whole beginning scene still gives the sense of maybe a Drama film. The audience in this case may be people who enjoy drama films and have maybe been recommended to see the film.
This then fades into a medium shot of a foggy or glazed window with scratched/etched markings on with the figure of a person behind it. The camera then unfocuses then focuses again through the glass to see a black middle aged looking male lying down. The camera is unsteady, almost like a hand held camera shot which ties in with the diegetic sound of jingling which as an audience we would suspect to be keys. These things may all connote a jail cell as the character sits up to show barred of windows and a very plain room with very little in it. The camera wobbles more and becomes more unsteady as the door opens and the character sits up. This helps to give a sense of movement which makes it more realistic for the audience. We find out for certain that the character is in the jail cell the woman who opens the door for him is where a police uniform and says to the character ‘Give your details to the PL then we can get you out’. We see a two shot of the character and the police officer as we see the character barging past, which shows to us that he is maybe eager to get out of prison to get home. This again implies that the character has been in prison. The whole sequence of the character in the cell and then standing up and going past the police officer is in one continues tracking shot, which helps to create a sense of movement. The unsteadiness of the almost hand held like shot helps to reinforce this. This again helps the scene to become more believable for the audience as the shots are quite simple, instead long strung out shots. The character that is being portrayed in the jail cell may be seen as a stereotype, as he is wearing a grey nikey track suit, a gold chain etc. This could be seen as a stereotypical ‘chav’ or ‘youth’. We might establish that maybe the character was involved in some gang related crime or violence, due to the stereotyped view that some people may carry.
The character starts talking to the LP by saying ‘Alright guv’ which suggests that the character is most probably from London, as he is using slang which most commonly used is London . This may help establish an audience. It may be people from London and who have maybe involved in gang crime in the streets of London or maybe been a victim of gang crime. It could be people who have seen or are interested in films such as Kidulthood, Adulthood and Shank etc and may have not heard of Bullet boy before these films, as they are of a similar style as they share some of the same themes and issues. These themes and issues such as crime and gang crime are quite relevant issues in the UK and the world in general today.
We see a medium shot of the LP as he asks the character to step back from the counter. The way the LP acts is very confident and as he has dealt with many similar situations before. We are then shown a close up/medium shot of the character to show his reaction to the LP’s attitude and then the shot cut backs to the LP, this is obeying the 180 degree rule as the conversational line is kept the same, this helps to give a more realistic feel to the whole scene. When the shot cuts back to the close up of the LP with him replying with ‘You’re not out yet are you?’ This is intended as a rhetorical question tot eh character as we can see by the facial expression of the LP, in addition to this while camera is showing the close up, we here diegetic and ambient sound of things such as phones ringing to give a realistic feel again of a work place. However the Non diegetic that has been running from the start is still running in the background. This is still helping to create a mood and atmosphere. After a close up shoot of the main character, the camera cuts to a wide shot to show the setting of the whole scene which we see to be a police station. This helps to establish a clearer picture as to what’s going on, in the audiences mind. We hear the character as being born in 1984 which implies to us that he is maybe in his early twenties. This helps to establish character along with some other character codes. After this shot, the camera then cuts to a close up of a stamp and some documents then back to the stamp pad, this shows to us that ehy are some sort of legal document to do with the character maybe getting out of prison or something like this. We then shown another conversational close up of the two characters then a medium shot of the character picking up his bags.
The next shot we see is a point of view of a driver. The scenery is of a country side which get the sense of being quite as there are no others cars on the road.
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