Critical and Contextual

Studies Film Analysis:

Now You See Me 2 - Security

Check Card Trick Scene, The

Chip SceneBy Onder Aslan

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gSDAZC6oRbs

What shot types

(framing/angle/movement) have been

used and why?

Throughout the whole scene there is a lot of different shot types. So the scene starts off with an establishing shot of the room where all of the action is taking place. This is possibly to set out the location and the characters involved. However, the tension of the room escalates with different camera movements as there is a lot of shots captured from different angles. This varies out from over the shoulder shots to shot reverse shot. As this scene is very vocal you can see a lot of conversations taking place. Normally when a conversation is taking place in films like these you see a lot of shot reverse shot and in this instance you see that. All most in every section of this scene you see an extreme close-up of the playing card which is being thrown around from one compatriot to another. You could tell by now that the main focus on this scene is the card which is their route out, so the camera especially focuses on capturing every movement of the card. We follow that every movement as it shows on our screens. Throughout the whole scene the camera movement is at fast pace because the camera is trying to capture moment and also the card is trying to be get rid of before it is found by the security guards who are searching all of the compatriots. There also is a lot panning as the cameraman possibly wants to capture all the movements going on. Furthermore the 180 degree rule is used quite a lot to show the surroundings and action taking place nearby.

This is about the purpose of the scene – how do the

filmmakers achieve an emotional response.

Well the whole point of this scene is about the playing card which has a disc inside to get access into the software of this big company. The four compatriots are given a challenge of tricking these security guards into thinking that they are there to pay a visit. However, they have something else to mind to overcome and that is as I said to get access of the system. So what the filmmakers did to achieve this was to use a variety of different camera shot and techniques to capture all of this. It is easy for us to watch it and see it happen but it takes a real genius to come up with all of this because on paper it would take around 2 sentences to write a script for that scene in particular. On the other hand, what the filmmaker did was really clever because he transformed a 30 second scene into a 5 minute scene full of imagination and creativity. He does this by using all of the space possible to capture the movements of the actors/actress. Additionally, the more camera shots he used the better as it just made us the audience entertained rather than bored as we were witnessing every movement and footstep in the scene. I could go all day talking about how many times the card got passed on but I prefer not to. The card is basically a trace that the security guards are trying to spy on as they were suspicious of something going on after one of the compatriot was gone missing for a few seconds while trying to get access into their system. The camera techniques also show the work ethic of the filmmakers because it makes want to carry on watching to find out what happens. In a way you can say that it is a bit of a cliff-hanger although this isn’t a series but its true because at the end of the each shot you’re like what's going to happen, is the guards going to find it, I wonder what happens next. So it is a bit of a cliff-hanger.

What cuts have been used and why? Throughout the entire production of this scene there is a variety of different cuts which have

been made. Two in particular are eye line match and match on action. There is a cut every 2 seconds throughout the 5 minutes of this scene. The cuts in-between every shot defy the movement of the card because if you look close-by in every shot the card is in a new place or at the hands of a different compatriot. The eye line match cut was used when one of the compatriot was looking at another trying to their attention but it suddenly just cut there as you didn’t know what was going to happen next. In addition, the match on action cut was introduced in almost every shot as the next shot was almost identical to the first. For example when the old guy had the card in his hand for some time but got rid of it just in time for the girl to catch it with her hand to create the same shot which is another use of match on action. The reasons why these cuts have been used is because the filmmakers want to show tension inside the room as the atmosphere is building with every movement of the card as it is defiant on whether they get access or not and whether they get out of there in one peace as long as the security guards don’t find it. This was what the filmmakers were trying to show. The editing throughout was top class although there wasn’t any transitions used which would have been better. The sound in this scene was just tension music building up the atmosphere to try and get the audience to carry on watching to find out what is going to happen. Mise-en-scene was a key factor in the production as the location was shown with the first shot of the scene (establishing shot) and the costumes/colour was pretty much casual apart from the security guards who were in uniform to show they were representing this big company.