Mise-en-Scene

What is Mise-en-Scene?

'putting in the scene'  'placing on the stage'  'everything you see on the screen'

Its roots are in theatre and is one of the key components within film language.

5 elements

➤settings and prop    ➤costume, hair and makeup    ➤facial expressions and body language    ➤lighting and colour    ➤position of characters and objects in the scene

Setting

⇢sets are either built from scratch or a deal of time is put into finding somewhere that already exists

⇢can manipulate an audience by building certain expectations and then taking a different turn

⇢visual information 

Props 

⇢short for property 

⇢artifacts used to convey a general sense of the period that the film was set in

⇢also confirms the film genre for the audience 

⇢examples of props in different genre movies;

SCI-FI - a moon, futuristic, advanced technology, labs, spaceship

ROM-COM - wine, roses, beaches, train stations, flower petals, bubble baths 

HORROR - knives, guns, chainsaws, abandoned, fake blood

WAR - bombs, tanks, machine guns, minefields

WESTERN - cowboy hats, shanty town, tumbleweed, sand

Costume, hair & makeup

⇢acts as an instant indicator to us of a chatacters personality, status and job

⇢tells us whether the film is set in the present & what society / culture it will centre around

Facial expressions and body language

⇢can tell us about relationships, how someone is feeling

⇢tells us about social status and the environment they were brought up in

Position of characters and objects in the scene

⇢draw attention to an important character / object

Lighting and colour

⇢can show / reflect emotion ( sadness = blue tones )

⇢can also show genre ( lots of black & red = horror )

⇢highlights important characters / objects in the scene