Be sure to read Roger Ebert's Great Films essay on Cat People and especially this quote:
"Tourneur and his cinematographer, Nicholas Musuraca, who also worked together on the great film noir "Out of the Past," are masters of light and shadow. They often place Irena in darkness, cast the silhouettes of other characters on the wall behind her, enclose her with shadows that work like a cage."
Choose one scene that exemplifies Irena being presented in darkness and describe the entire scene cinematically. Analyze the implied meaning Tourneur and Musuraca present through the cinematic presentation of Irena in this scene.
Due: Friday, October 24.
One particular scene from Cat People in which i noticed the presentation of Irena was the scene where she follows Alice into and through the park, unsuccessfully. This instance of shooting Irena in the dark was the freshest in my mind because of how interesting it was to see her following Alice, while at the same time not actually seeing her a single time. More importantly however, as the scene moves to the sidewalk walking, Irena becomes surrounded by darkness, as well as becoming dark herself, whereas the shots with Alice become a sort of reverse silhouette as she appears completely lit, while everything around her is darkness. To me this symbolizes the two women's transition in plot and life as Alice inches closer into Oliver's life, while Irena steadily drifts away. As alice grows more and more aware that she is being followed, she becomes increasingly worried actually causing her to become even more lit. The same goes for Irena but the exact opposite as she becomes less and less visible, again almost literally meaning that Alice is walking quickly into Oliver's life while Irena walks quickly out. Near the end of the scene Alice decides to hop on a bus to ensure her safety (which I found interesting as we rarely see characters make the smart decision in horror movies) telling the audience that Alice already knows that something is not right. In the last shot of the scene we see the rustling of a bush on top of the walkway which one must believe to be Irena, especially having seen the rest of the film.
ReplyDeleteThe ending of the scene shows the viewer that Irena clearly has no more hope to be normal. The rustling of the bush gives off a pretty animalistic vibe that leads me to believe that at this point Irena was already a "cat person" with no looking back. The symbolism previously described of Alice and Irena walking into and out of Oliver's life is backed up by the rest of the film in which Irena is pushed away by Oliver entirely and Alice is befriended and for lack of a better term "belovered". In my eyes, it is this that drove Irena to insanity. I don't believe she was destined to be a cat person, I think that the thought of it in her head was fake but the depression brought on by Oliver abandoning her is what drove her to become a cat person.
Jack...I'm impressed. I like your theories.
Deletethe scene i chose the hotel pool scene. Alice goes into a hotel to go for a swim at night and Irena goes after her. in this scene Alice turns off the lights so that the only light we have/ see in this scene the the light from the pool. the light coming from the pool is low and because theres water the light is reflected everywhere in weird shapes. these lights are kinda disorienting because of the moving water reflecting the light everywhere. the light from the pool also doesn’t hit the lower parts of the walls making it the optimal way for irena to sneak around.
ReplyDeletenow in this scene we don't see irena until the end when she turns on the lights. but we can assume that she's there in her cat form. Alice hears the cat noises and get frighted and starts looking for the thing making the noise. with the light being all disorienting and having a shadow on the lower part of the walls, Alice can not seek out what is making that noise. its kinda like Alice is in a cage ( the pool ) and Irena is outside it watching, taunting Alice.
While watching this scene, us watching this movie also don't know what is making this noise. we know irena is down there and we know the stories of the cat people but we don't know what is there. we are left in the unknown as well and wondering what is going on. at one point the light being reflected makes a shadow of what we can assume is a cat but we still aren't fully understanding what is there. the shadows and the light in this scene keep us guessing and disorient us with the disorienting light and the fast shots of Alice spinning in the water.
Frank--Excellent response. I wish you responded to all of the blog questions!!!
DeleteThe use of shadows in "Cat People" establishes Irena as a monster without the audience ever actually seeing her in cat person form until the end. The scene in which Irena traps Alice in the pool room makes use if lighting and shadows for suspense and implied meaning. It starts with Alice in the dark locker room, frightened by the roar of a big cat. The only light comes from the open doorway, where shadows play on the walls. The significance of lighting in this one spot is that it is her only possible path of escape. The rest of the room is almost pitch black, which represents the terror of the unknown all around her. When she dives into the pool for safety, she remains in light while the walls of the room are cast with huge moving shadows. The moving water in the pool has the effect of further distorting these shadows and this image that Irena is giving off. The tops of the walls are where the light and shadow has an effect. The bottom of the walls stay completely immersed in shadow, allowing Irena to lurk about and her monstrous form to remain a mystery.
ReplyDeleteDuring the scene in which Alice goes down to the pool and Irena follows, shadows are used to create the threat to Alice and the suspense in the scene.
ReplyDeleteIn the scene, Alice heads down to the locker room and turns the lights off as she prepares to go to the pool. The railings of the stairs create almost a venetian blind effect or a jail bar effect on the wall opposite her. Through these bars the shadow of some sort of animal or person comes across. The growl of a large cat lets us know its Irena. When Alice jumps into the pool, the water begins to make the lights on the wall have strange patterns from refraction and reflection. This creates an interesting look for the room. Once the "cat" is near, the shot of Alice in the pool cuts to shots of the wall. In many of the shots, the entire part of the wall will go dark as the cat passes by. As the editing tempo increases, so does the suspense and Alice's fear. Finally when Irena reveals herself, she turns on a light. Her face is at first in shadow and upon turning the light on, her expression is revealed and she is smiling. This scene managed to create something that was not really there just through lighting, acting, and sound design.
When working with such a low budget, one becomes very limited with their opinions as to what they can do, but out of limitations breeds creativity. The scene in which Irena finally transforms and attacks the Dr. Judd after he attempts to kiss her really uses lighting and shadow to its advantage. To start with as Judd is talking to Irena they are both harshly lit with a back light. This is interesting as a soft back light would give them a warm somewhat angelic glow, but the harsh lighting gives the scene an eerie feeling as we already know what is going to occur after Judd makes that fatal mistake. As he kisses her, the camera cuts to a close up of Irena’s face with Dr. Judd’s directly in front of it casting a shadow on half of her face, as he pulls away from her the light hitting her face is diffused and soft giving her an angelic glow before her transformation which one can assume was done ironically as to make the transformation more surreal. As Dr. Judd backs away in a panic, he pulls his cane sword and knocks over the lamp that is providing the room with light. This leads to the actually mauling of the doctor depicted as a series of silhouettes projected on the wall. Not only was this a budget friendly idea, but the fact that the cat person is still not fully revealed just continuously builds the tension. While providing the template but leaving the actual visuals to be decided upon by the viewer just allows for more suspense. Not only that but the projections of the attack on the walls and divider that are full of cats really helps set an eerie and unsettling tone for this scene and for Irena in general.
ReplyDeleteThe lack of a large budget was one of the factors that the makers of “Cat People” had to work around. Such a setback forced them to use shadows and other cinematic strategies to convey feelings of fear to the audience. Such techniques can be seen in one scene in particular; the pool scene. The scene opens with Alice being followed by Irena down into the dark swimming pool. Alice has no idea that Irena is coming for her, but, the audience does which establishes suspense. The pool locker room is immediately dark, with well-defined shadows. This sets a tone for the way the scene will play out, it also makes it very apparent to the audience that anythign entering the pool area will have a visible shadow. Next, theres a breif shot of a cat schreeching at the stairwell, where we expect Irena will come down from. This is followed by a shot of the stairs with the shadow of the railing centered on in the frame. This draws viewer’s focus to the shadows rather than the stairs themselves and sets the viewer up to anticipate Irena’s shadow as she descends the stairs. Soon, Alice turns out the lights completely, drawing even more attention to the illuminated stairwell. There are brief cuts here between the stairwell and Alice. This increases the tension and serves to “trap” the viewer with Alice. Finally, after drawing out the viewer’s anticipation, a shadow appears, moving on the stairwell. The director implies that Alice sees the shadow with the Kulishov effect and then has Alice run and dive into the pool. The pool casts starnge shadows and distorts the light on the walls in an eerie way. From here on, the camera cuts between Alice’s face and the wall behind her. Alice’s face tells the audience whats being seen with her looks of terror while the shadow moving back and forth on the wall gives us the idea that there truly is something menacing in the room with her. The sound design is also effective in this shot. There isn’t any music so we are forced to only hear the sound of the pool and the growling of the monster. This gives the scene an even more menacing and realistic feel without even showing us the face of the creature. Eventually, Alice begins screaming and the hotel staff comes and turns the lights on, revealing the creature to simply be Irena. The scene is effectively scary because we never see the monster and our imaginations run wild with the ideas of what Irena truly looks like in her terrifying form.
ReplyDeleteCarl--If you mention the Kuleshov effect in your presentation in January, you are sure to impress the IB examiner!!! Nice job.
Delete