Action

The Dark Knight Rises:

The first shot is an establishing shot of the Gotham City at night which is effective as it is the known place for where the film is set, therefore will be favoured by fans. The non-diegetic sounds of the high pitched notes creates an eerie atmosphere and already starts to create tension. The voiceover added over the top plays an effective role in making this an action when narrating the film and at the same time engaging the audience. For example, the opening line is “there is a storm coming” however, this is not literally and as an audience we can infer that, making us curious to find out exactly what that ‘storm’ is. We are constantly fading in and out of black; this is successful as we know this adds a dramatic touch to the trailer and engages the audience. We have a medium shot of a lady wearing all black clothing and a black hat titled down to cover her face, her deep red lipstick and suspicious appearance allows us to connote that she plays an important role in this movie. It also creates enigmas for the audience which is very intriguing. The next events that occur are shown through seamless shots which gives off a more professional appearance and represents the characters in this way. A close up of the villain is shown by lifting off a mask, where part of his face is covered by some black device. Behind him are 2 trained soldiers that look like they are in the army; from this we can connote that the villain is dangerous and the audience can clearly see that without any action yet. Already the trailer has shown a repeat of the colour black as well as low key lighting, this is efficacious as black implies death and evil. The silence throughout the whole first minute of the trailer is successful at making the audience feel uneasy and engaged due to it being different from the up paced music we see in other action films.

We get an over the shoulder shot of the female dancing with a male. Again, she is still very mysterious wearing a dark mask and deep red lipstick. When the male asks ‘you sound like you’re looking forward to it’ she replies ‘I’m adaptable’. The question itself is very general, again adding enigmas. Looking forward to what? And her answer is even vaguer, not giving too much away to the audience creating suspense. Her pearl necklace and earrings imply that she is well off therefore may have many skills in this particular business. A two person shot of the villain grabbing a man by the back of the neck is the first time we get to understand something about the character. The man asks in fear ‘what are you?’ Straight after this we see traumatic events take place which we can imply is caused by this mysterious villain. We get medium shots of the ground falling through soccer, bridges falling down on swat teams and banks being robbed pulling out citizens hiding, potentially to kill them. These shots are successful as we can see that the world is no longer safe and citizens fear for their lives. This all adds to the cry for help for Batman to save the day, building excitement and suspense to when we are going to see him.

A long shot of the city is shown and milliseconds after we see 2 major bridges collapsing into the sea caused by a bomb explosion. The use of explosions follows the codes and conventions of an action film. The colours shown are dull and gloomy symbolling the citizens emotions. We then see this through a close up of school children looking out the window in misery, making the audience even more tense waiting for batman!

The music starts to become more intense as it becomes louder and more upbeat, this is mixed with shots of the city falling apart therefore is effective as the audience are anticipated, waiting for the reappearance of batman. We hear the diegetic sound of a female voice, “you should be as afraid of him as I am”. From this we can interpret that this is going to be the hardest and mostly challenging war of all time between the hero and the protagonist. We get a medium shot of batman surrounded by smoke, his facial expressions look worried but determined. However, the audience would still be feeling uncomfortable and confused with what is going to happen. For example, is the hero going to lose and the protagonist going to win? We don’t know what kind of twist this film will have making more people want to go and watch it. We get a long shot of batman standing on top of a building, in the shot we see him looking over the cities with his cape in the wind. This is a very powerful shot as Batman looks over his city and hopes he can save it and with the upbeat and triumph music hope is all restored in batman once again.

Throughout the shots of the battle we see explosions, chases, gun fires all following the codes and conventions of an action. Then we cut to the title, going into silence. The title is effective as it is the recognisable logo of the bat, the background is a light blue with the logo shining through, the bat shatters out and the background makes the dark blue letters of the title stand out This is effective as it is different from the black background and white writing. It also contrasts from the whole trailer which was shown in low key lighting, this is successful as it makes the title bolder.