The movie On the Waterfront begins with a long shot and the surroundings on the edge of a waterfront. There is a dark lighting like sunset is about to hit, and we are able to see a giant cruise liner in the harbor. The giant boat stands out in the light, and the much of the water is dark. There are many horizontal lines that define the giant boat, and a few vertical lines are able to get distinguished by the small boat with the mast on it as well as the shed on the side. The music has rapidity and suspense that leads you to think that something bad is about to happen. The camera has a long shot that moves to medium. The long shot is balancing with the rapid music because since there is a long short is not as suspense with the hurried music and you feel more comfortable. The Men come out of the small shed by the dock. They walk in a straight l, one behind the other, wearing long dark coats with a mysterious look on their faces. Most of them are wearing the long coats that fall to their knees, and one of them is wearing a square pattern shirt with his right hand in his jacket , his and expressions unhappy.
Generally what happened in the first five minutes was that Terry was tricked into convincing Joey to go up to the roof of the building kill Joey by throwing him of the building and making seem that joey fell by accident off the building. The ambulance arrived at the scene as soon as the incident happened and Joey’s sister Edie, arrives as well desperately claiming what had happened and who would want to kill Joey?.
Throughout the first five minutes the shot changes from long to medium within this time frame when the men get out of the shed and walk to the car were there is an elegant looking man waiting for them. The worker with the pattern shirt takes his own route, that is where we see a close up of his face and clothing. The next scene starts from a long dark shot to a gray-scale medium shot facing the man, Terry. In this scene we see camera angles changing from high to low on the characters. It is night-time now, and everything looks isolated and cold. We see the camera angles change from high to low with short camera shots back and forth. The music begins to get louder and the clarinet or flute instruments in the music begin to use high pitch sounds. The long shot was used when the film initiated showing the giant boat and dock and the medium shot was used the sister was at the scene of her brothers accident. We see high and low angles when Terry is calling Joey to come to the window.
The music has suspense and it is alarming, the drums are used mainly to make a loud and frightening sound. Its sounds like something is about to happen or something just happened, something unscrupulous. The dock looked dirty as if it was deserted and no one visits it. We see a few well-dressed men with long coats and hats. We also see a man dressed in a squared pattern long shirt with dark pants. This face looks suspicious, frustrated and anxious. The voices of the men at the beginning are direct and appointive. Compared to the voice at the end with the women, it is are anxious and questionnaire.
The emphasized areas of this work are the camera shot angles. We see many short, and long shot angles. The short are mostly emphasized on Terry and the long shots on the surrounding Terry has. The long shots are calming while the short shots bring tension and questions in the movie of what could happen next. It focused a lot on Terry and the people who tricked him into taking Joey to the roof. We see a lot of short focus on the shots at the beginning. When we get to where the news spreads that Joey fell of the roof the shots in the camera movement get longer and soft. It does not move around at much when the people are at the scene then when Terry goes to talk to Joey that is in the building.
The unity to variety is 35/65. The unity of the movie was coherent and it builds sense of what is happening and what the movie will involve and what it will be about. There is a lot more of variety in this movie; we see many changes in the angle, distance and movement of the camera. The sound effects and cinematography apply together making a whole because when the movie was at a close shot the music would get louder and build up interest in it and when the camera was at the distance it would be less nervous to me and more relaxing.
If I could make a change the first scene in this movie it would be that instead of Joey falling of the building Terry is forced to kill him that night. Instead of Terry following orders he decides to talk to Joey and convince him to make a plan that he really did kill him but, he disappears instead and goes away on a boat. With this change the setting would now be taking place in the dock where Terry is supposed to kill Joey and throw him into the shore. The camera movements would be between Joey and Terry when they are talking about a plan to convince everyone he really is dead. They will have a short shot and in between a long short length shot to a far boat where someone is watching everything that is happening. The music should continue to be suspense and loud playing instruments. The long shot will balance the loud music with the extreme distance close ups.
I am not a big fan of black and white movies. It does not interest me, especially because it is mysterious and dark most of the time. At the beginning I did not take much interest in it because I was confused of what was happening and why it was happening. After reviewing it with the class the beginning made sense, so the second time I was more focused on the movie than the first time where I was just in blank about it.
