the holiday

The Holiday

The film that I am analyzing is called”the holiday”. This is a romance, you can tell this straight away as it opens with very bright high key lighting, that is coming from the sun, this moves on towards a couple that are kissing. The concept of this shows love and happiness, which is what the genre is about. The next thing you see is the camera angle widening, so you can see that the kissing is on a TV/computer screen. As the camera angle widens you can hear soft and sweet music playing. This is being played by a guy (jack black) on a piano. As he plays this his eyes are closed and he has a smile on his face, this shows that he is taking the music in, and that he enjoys playing the music, we can also assume that he is a loving character. As he opens his eyes and sees the girl he loves, as she approaches he kisses her hand. This shows a gentleman side of him. Also the lighting in this scene is high key lighting.
As this is all happening, you begin to hear a females (Kate Winslet) voice in a narrative form, talking about love. The tone of the voice shows that there is happiness in the person talking. You can assume that the voice is a voice over and has been recorded separately and added on, this called a montage.
The interesting thing is as she talks about love she begins sweet and soft, till she begins to talk about her own love life, which is when her tone of voice changes in almost a way to be against love.
As she is talking the camera fades away from the male playing the piano and onto the next scene which is the female sitting at her desk during an office party. The lighting in this scene is similar to the scene before as its still high key lighting.
One thing you notice is the camera angles start off as a close up, but then change to a (POV) point of view camera angle. The use of this camera angle shows that she must be an important character in the film.
As she begins walking across the room you can notice that her narrative changes into her thoughts, still talking about her love life. Whilst she is doing this you can notice that even though she is at a party, she doesn’t seem to interact with anyone or even look like she’s enjoying it, as her facial expressions show. The director makes her seem more singled out, by using the cameras to filter across the room showing other people enjoying themselves and drinking wine.
You then notice her staring at a guy, who we can tell from her expression, is the guy whom she loves.
As she seems to be gazed by this. A work mate comes across after noticing that she is upset, by seeing that she has tearful eyes. As she is trying to comfort her, the camera angles remain at (POV) as she is the main character in the scene.
In all you can tell from the opening sequences that this is a romance film. As its main focus is love. It also shows two main characters in the opening sequence.