Timed Analysis of Horror Genre

By Morgan Redman

Women in Black• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oCR4tfQBd6w

• 2012• Drama, horror, fantasy.• A young lawyer travels to a remote village where he discovers the vengeful ghost of a scorned woman is terrorizing the locals.

• Opening scene.

0:02

• Three young girls are having a tea-party. • Connotation of innocence and childhood which could be

taken away.• Fragility of china and possible damage or injury.• Mid-close up shot.

0:11

• Tea party.• Playing with dolls; connotation of motherhood.• Close-up shot.

0:15

• Tea party.• Age of doll connotes the period in which the film is

set.• Dolls create an atmosphere of horror. • Close-up shot.

0:17

• Three girls having a tea party.• The room is obviously a nursery and thus is a room of play and

happiness.• The toys strewn on the floor could connote bodies after murders. • Mid-long shot.

0:22

• A young girl brushing the hair of her toy doll.• Connotation of motherhood, nurturing etc.• China is fragile and easily broken.• Close-up shot, shallow depth of field.

0:24

• Young girls playing with dolls.• Dressing them as though they were dressing a dead body.• Laying the doll to rest. • Close-up, shallow depth of field.

0:26

• Girls at a tea party.• Young girls are smiling and happy which could easily

change in a horror genre.• Mid shot.

0:29

• A young girl isolated from the others. • Smiling to show happiness.• Mid shot.

0:35

• Tea party.• Ominous looking through the camera. • Reverse dramatic irony, they see something the audience

do not. • Long shot.

0:42

• Ominous looking towards something out of shot.• Reverse dramatic irony.• Mid shot.

0:44

• The use of negative space.• Connotation of three windows for three girls.• Tension building. • Mid shot.

0:49

• The three girls are rising after looking towards the window.

• The clothing demonstrates the period.• Close-up shot.

0:51

• The girls are still rising from their seated position as too does the climax and tension which is building.

• The loose grip on the handle draws association that it may break.• Mid-close up shot.

0:52

• The china cup is dropped and smashes into pieces on the floor. This displays the fragility of childhood.

• This could connote the fall and destruction of the three girls. • Close up shot.

0:54

• The three girls abandon their childhood toys and walk towards the window.

• Their vitality of life is being left behind.• Close-up shot.

0:56

• The foot crushes down upon the toy teapot which shows the chaotic destruction of something fragile which could serves as a metaphor for the three girls.

• Extreme close-up shot.

0:57

• The other girl crushes the face of the doll as though she had fell from a great height and had cracked her skull open. Foreshadows the fate of the three girls.

• Close-up shot.

1:00

• The three girls walk in unison towards the window with each lining up to an individual frame able to commit suicide.

• Mid three shot.

1:06

• The three girls line up with the windows and the assumption now can be made that they are possessed, or something alike, and are planning to commit suicide.

• Long shot.

1:08

• The cut in shot on the hand opening the window is an example of match on action. This further leads to the assumption that they are going to jump from the windows.

• Cut in, close up shot.

1:15

• The three girls step up onto the window ledge in preparation to jump out. The camera angle is connoting that someone else is watching over them as they do so.

• Long shot.

1:24

• The empty window frame is left after the three girls jump out.• This could connote the emptiness that the mother will have in

her life after her daughters die. • Long shot.

1:25

• The doll watches on after the girls jump from the windows. She serves as the only witness to what occurred.

• Extreme close-up.

1:29

• The backwards pan shot leads towards the figure who watched over the death of the young girls. The figure is the woman in black.

• Long shot, pan backwards, high angle.