Analyzing opening scenes- The woman in black

Analyzing opening scenes- the woman in black

The very start of the opening two minutes depicts a typical English tea party with three sisters sitting down playing with their dolls. In the background we hear the start of an ominous song starting to slowly become louder.

The kids then start to do what most little girls did at the time which is play with their dolls and stare blankly at what they are doing. The start of the movie looks like its based in post WW2 with the girls in very traditional English clothes and antique furniture all around them.

 The room they are in is very dull with the floorboards being a very dim grey and the walls relatively the same colour. It makes the atmosphere seem a lot darker and takes away what could of been a normal situation. With the music in the background slowly getting louder it also makes us think about their surroundings and what could happen.

The girls then look startled and look towards what is presumed to be the door to this specific bedroom, their facial expressions show that they look a bit scared of whatevers there and yet we don't get to see it yet. The girls then look towards the window and then slowly and surely stand up, turn around and then open the window. This makes the audience feel a bit on edge as they don't seem to be in the right state of mind while they are doing these things and so it makes us feel hopeless.

The scene is then shot using mainly quick short shots and long shots to give a feel of normality until we have the view of whatever malevolent spirit is by the door.

The girls then approach the window, open it and subsequently jump to their deaths much to the shock of the audience as it is so early in the movie.

Camera angles used-  mainly it used long shots to express the distance we are from them, it may do this to make us feel like we are in the shoes of this unknown entity, the only real time it uses close shots is when it zooms in on the dolls, this might represent the eerie atmosphere it is trying to create because the dolls look antique and almost demonic like at a close up camera view. The scene also uses a zooming shot when it zooms in on the window which the kids inevitably jump out of. It also uses close shots on certain aspects of the kids such as their hands or feet to symbolize the fact that they are not in control of their own bodies. The scene also uses a three person tracking shot of the girls walking towards the window, this is eerie because the blank expressionless face the three girls possess shows clearly that they are having little to no influence on the ways their bodies are acting.

Characters-the characters attire looks like it is set in the mid 1920's sort of era with very traditional girly dresses with smart shoes, All three girls are wearing the same sort of dress with the same style to maybe represent that the parents have on purposely gone out and got the most expensive clothes or best quality clothes possible just in different colours. The characters look like they come from a good background because they are playing with fancy teapots and china, but there is also dolls who have glass heads so they wouldn't have been cheap, the furniture surrounding them is very antique and quite dull maybe representing the parents influence on freedom through not allowing them to decide on their own colours. When the children start walking there is a pram in the background which maybe represents the traditional roles of genders in society at the time, this could be a way yin which the mother teaches the children how to be good caring mothers and probably teach them how to be posh and respectable to everyone.

	Age:	%:	Gender:	%:	Class	%:

	4-6	0%	Male:	60%	AB	25%

	7-11	0%	Female:	40%	C1	19%

	12-14	0%			C2	19%

	15-24	29%			DE	37%

	25-34	29%

	35-44	15%

	45+	27%

the table shows that the majority of people who watched the woman in black were male and aged around 15-34. This shows maybe that the horror genre appeals more to the men because they like horror films and jump scares more. The age range is the age in which men like being scared and so they try and watch the scariest movie possible. However there was 40% woman which means that the horror film genre also appeals to a wider audience with many people enjoying the thrill of being on the edge of their seat.