'Gaslight' film analysis

Gaslight is a 1944 mysterious dramatic thriller. We decided to analyse this film as it is the same genre and has similar features that we plan to use in ours. The film is about a man ruthlessly manipulating his wife, for nefarious reasons, into believing something other than the truth. Her husband, the person to whom she is closest, turns out to be the murderer; in our film it is her closest friend who is the murderer so we thought the themes of the two films were similar.

When Paula was younger, a strangler roaming the streets murdered her aunt, who lived at Thornton Square in London. Paula goes to stay in Italy and some time later meets Gregory. She and Gregory marry and afterwards they move to London, back to the exact house Paula lived in, which again links to our opening since the character is returning to where she once lived. One of the opening lines of Gaslight is: ‘The ghost of a man out of my past...’ This links into our movie since it is the story of a girl deciding whether to run from the ghost of her past or to confront it.

Throughout the opening of Gaslight, the scene is set. It is black and white, the costume and props show the period in which it is set. The lighting and atmosphere is very dull to add to the mystery of murder. The sound continues throughout the extract it adds tension and shows the mystery. The extract begins with a fade into a wide shot of the main street where the film is to be located. There are a few more establishing shots with period props and costumes that show the location. We are then introduced to the storyline with a close-up of a newspaper article, the non-diegetic score becomes more dramatic. It then cuts to a low angle shot looking to characters coming out of door, introducing the main character. They are in higher class period costumes. Cuts to a mid-shot of the main character, showing her emotion and connecting her to the newspaper article. The reporters and onlookers set the storyline with their facial expressions, while looking at the main character they connect the main character to the newspaper with looks of sadness and pity. The scene then cuts to a mid-shot inside the house, to prepare the audience for later in the film and to show the class status of the characters. Cuts to a mid-shot of the main character with onlookers showing sympathy, which allows the audience to understand the atmosphere. Cuts to a wide-shot of a carriage driving away which adds to the period theme. It then cuts to a two-shot inside the carriage. This is the point at which the diegetic dialogue begins. The extract then ends with a zoom into a close-up of the main character's face showing a reaction-shot from the secondary character's dialogue.