Déjà vu
Starring Denzil Washington

21.01.10

In our media lesson, we watched various clips from well-known ‘thriller’ films. The films included; Seven, Panic Room, Arlington Road, Dead Calm and Déjà Vu. Within these opening clips of the films, suspense was created to draw the audience in and keep them interested. The films created suspense through the use of camera work, mise en scene, sound, editing and (in some cases) the presentation of their titles. The film that I think created suspense the best is ‘Déjà Vu’. This is because the introduction of the film deceives the audience of what it is really going to happen.

The use of sound within the clip was orchestral music; however, it was not used to create an eerie effect but a joyous and celebrating atmosphere. At one point you here music from a marching band which creates a sense of celebration. With this the use of camera work shows long shots of what is happening – many sailors running to greet their family and the public for a boat party. There were also many long shots of the location which was on the pier with many boats. This is done so that it emphasizes the how happy and positive every one was feeling. Editing is also used to create the happy atmosphere with slow motion of the sailors running to their families which lengthens the clips. This was also used so that the audience could see the extent of the sailors’ happiness to be back home with their families. Which leads the audience in a false sense of security as something bad will eventually happen.

However, suspense is soon created with a close-up of a little girl dropping her doll into the sea. Editing, slow motion is used to prolong the situation as the audience is anticipated to see whether the little girl will catch the doll in time or not. The use of mise en scene of the doll is effective as it resembles a baby. This creates suspense because for a split second the audience is deceived in thinking that it is a human baby until it splashes into the water revealing that it is only a doll. This creates a false plateau as the audience believes that the ‘baby’ dropping into the sea is the real tragic when it is really a doll and there is more tragic to come.

Another way in which this clip created suspense was through parallel editing. Firstly the audience saw the celebrations of the boat party and then another scene of a man becoming very suspicious of an empty car with its engine and radio on. The lead-up of the man looking into the car window, to see who was in the car, was prolonged by edits back to the celebration of the boat. Eventually, he finally gets a look into the window and the camera shows a close-up of several bombs within the car. This scene created suspense as although there were celebrations on the boat, the slower music of what was happening with the man and the car gave the audience suspicions that something bad was going to happen.

In conclusion, I feel that ‘Déjà vu’ was the best at creating suspense as it lead the audience into a false sense of security – the celebrations and happiness was destroyed by the end of the clip with it all blowing up by a bomb explosion. However, I feel the presentation of the titles did not create suspense as they zoomed onto the screen in white ‘typed’ font. This contrasted greatly to the titles of ‘Seven’ as they were in the font of a child-like handwriting and were slightly vibrating – which created suspense as the vibrations showed unsteadiness and child-like handwriting, along with the eerie music, created a spooky atmosphere.