Khayrul - How is genre conveyed in 'Taken'?

How is genre conveyed through the technical features in your film opening?

The Genre of the film Taken is Thriller and Crime. Thriller is mainly to shock the audience with its indescribable scenes. The scenes are alarming which gives the film that taste which takes your breath away.

The Camera work used in the film opening is mainly extreme close ups and close ups. By using Close ups and extreme close ups the audience focuses on a particular object or person throughout the film, this is called enigma codes which leaves the audience puzzled which is the main aim of the Genre thriller. Hidden messages are good ways of keeping the audience interested.

Taken uses close ups on specific objects like a model horse in the first few seconds on the film and a picture frame with a girl on a horse which may connote the fact that the horse may have a larger meaning in the film.

In addition another camera shot is over the shoulder shot which are mainly to show the characters are conversing. In the film the main character spoke to a music shop owner, this scene showed over the shoulder shot in action

The film Taken uses Editing such as jump shots and flashbacks. Memories make the main actor who he is. When the flashbacks appear the camera uses a mid shot, which then goes into the flashback, then goes back into the mid shot again. Transitions are also added in. the film opening starts of with a flashback on his daughters past and the picture is all fuzzy meaning that it was a transition of a video recorder being played.  Jump shots are used to cut through long walks in the film; this may mean that he is in a hurry.

Taken conveys sound as a cheerful way in the opening with children laughing, running and having fun. This shows equilibrium in the beginning because the film is fine in the beginning then turns into disequilibrium in the middle and in the end is turns back into equilibrium. This theory means that something bad happens in the middle, which the main actor has to prevent from happening and when he has fixed the problem everything is fine at the end.

Mise en scene in the film is all about the costume used. The costume he is in is a long black coat this means he is very inconspicuous. He likes being secretive and being in the dark

Khayrul Islam