City of God Question

"Explore how a deeper analysis of cinematography and/or the aesthetics techniques can deepen a contextual understanding of chosen films"

The scene uses cinematography in order to deepen contextual understanding as we watch the same long shot of the apartment through different periods of time at first the camera is placed far away from the criminal activity of Dona Zelia. The first apartment owner as we see her grant sexual favours in the bedroom of the apartment, the camera is between a door at this time showing the distance crime has on the apartment itself which links with the current un crime-ridden Reo at this time. This is also supported by the use of mise en scene in the scene, the setting as we see the apartment is decorated like a family home, with the use of props and the setting we see a table decorated with a table cloth and the walls having pictures and decorations like a family home would. This is due to Dona Zelia's reason or crime being to provide for her family, the colour of this scene is also a yellow warm colour which conveys hope and happiness due to its colourful bright atmosphere.

We see as the Dona Zelia's business is taken over by her favourite client Big Boy as we see the frame the shot slowly fades as she is grabbed and forced out of the apartment, like a distant memory we see flashes of the history with the use of editing making Dona and the other characters fade in and out of the frame like ghosts from the past.

We watch as Dona tears of the table cloth as the scene fades into Big Boys reign in the apartment as the apartments setting/props (Mise en scene) change from the friendly family atmosphere as it is stripped away and replaced by empty space by Big Boy. The cinematography also changes to empathize this growth in crime as Big boy, unlike Dona, moves further towards the camera becoming intrusive as the obscure the frame, and the distant rooms of the bedroom are shadowed in darkness. Signifying the rising crime rate in Reo as drug lords and gangs rise up in the slums due to the rise of unemployment.

During Bog Boys ownership of the apartment, we watch as the colour of the previously yellow and warm atmosphere lessens and darkens as the scene goes on showing the corruption of crime of the apartment as natural colours of the sun become artificial as the light bulb becomes there the only source of light. This transition from natural to artificial cold low key lighting conveys the hope of Reo has been lost in the '70s as they now live in a crime-infested world.

We watch as carrot and Big Boy fill both sides of the frame showing the crimes consumption of the apartment as it covered and dominated by them, we see the final light exist from the scene as Carrot kills his friend like a stage light going out which then cuts to the raid and takeover of Big Boys business at night. The darkness represents the story as a day-night circle as we saw him take the apartment in the bright and warm sunlight and we see as it grows darker and darker as if it was becoming later and later into the day until the darkness overwhelms him and the new morning comes in the form of the blue sad colour pallet of the present day of the seventies. The day cycle shows how the dark crimes have Reo symbolised by the night have changed the days of Reo which symbolises life in the slums forever.

This is Blackys apartment now tattered and empty from the days of Dona as the wall are stripped the setting and props that made it a home, as now it has no pictures no decorations just makeshift furniture rather than there being stuff in the apartment there is just one a table filled with drugs in a barren room. The apartment is Reo a city absent of its former glory, empty and without hope, no life in Reo symbolised in the absence of decor in the apartment just crime as all life has been replaced with drugs and gangs.