Shoot Like Scorsese- Sample PDF

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SHOT LIKE

SCORSESEThe Visual Secrets of Shock, Elegance, and Extreme Character

C H R I S T O P H E R K E N W O R T H Y

M I C H A E L W I E S E P R O D U C T I O N S


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Published by Michael Wiese Productions

12400 Ventura Blvd. #1111

Studio City, CA 91604

(818) 379-8799, (818) 986-3408 (FAX)

[email protected]

www.mwp.com

Cover design by Johnny Ink. www.johnnyink.com

Interior design by William Morosi

Copyediting by Gary Sunshine

Printed by McNaughton & Gunn

Manufactured in the United States of America

Copyright © 2016 by Christopher Kenworthy

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any

means without permission in writing from the author, except for the inclusion of

brief quotations in a review.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Kenworthy, Christopher.

Shoot like Scorsese : the visual secrets of shock, elegance and extreme character

/ Christopher Kenworthy.

pages cm

ISBN 978-1-61593-232-0

1. Scorsese, Martin--Criticism and interpretation. 2. Cinematography. 3. Motion

pictures--Production and direction. I. Title.

PN1998.3.S39K46 2015

791.4302’33092--dc23

2015013291

Printed on Recycled Stock


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V

CONTENTS

I N T R O D U C T I O N . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . vii

H O W T O U S E T H I S B O O K . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . x

C H A P T E R 1 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .1

THE MOMENT OF CHANGE: Taxi Driver

C H A P T E R 2 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17

FRANTIC ACTION: The Wolf of Wall Street

C H A P T E R 3 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .29

TENSE CONFRONTATION: The Wolf of Wall Street

C H A P T E R 4 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41

CONTRASTING MOTION: Raging Bull

C H A P T E R 5 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .63

THE DYNAMICS OF POWER: The Aviator

C H A P T E R 6 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .75

LAYERS OF DEPTH: The Aviator

C H A P T E R 7 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .85

SUDDEN ACTION: The Departed

C H A P T E R 8 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .97

REVEALING THE VILLAIN: The Departed

C H A P T E R 9 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .105

BARRIERS: Hugo

C H A P T E R 1 0 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .121

MAKING CONNECTIONS: The Age of Innocence

C O N C L U S I O N . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .132

A B O U T T H E A U T H O R . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .133


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VIII I N T R O D U C T I O N

He’s made a lot of ilms, including many great ilms that aren’t

even touched on in this book, but the essential techniques are all

covered here. This book shows you the moments when he rises

out of the ordinary and uses strong visual symbolism to createsubconscious feelings in the audience.

With Scorsese, you often watch a scene and think it had great

acting, but you don’t realize how incredibly well planned the

shots were. This book shows how his concentration on framing

and screen direction, along with simple camera moves, makes

him able to tell astonishing stories. Whether he’s showing a calmconversation among the aristocracy, or a taxi driver falling off the

edge of sanity, his ilms are always thrilling to watch. By the time

you’ve inished this book you should be able to set up scenes with

the same depth and grandeur as Scorsese, and apply it to your

own style of ilmmaking.


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IX

HOW TO USE THIS BOOK

Watch every Scorsese ilm you can before you read this book, and

buy copies of the ilms that you can keep, so you can watch these

scenes (and others) to decode the techniques. The chapters are

illed with spoilers, so make sure you watch the ilms irst. Most of

the scenes are from relatively early on in each ilm, to avoid giving

too much away, but you should still watch all the ilms covered

here before reading the book.

You can work through the book in order, or pick a chapter that

interests you, or work through according to your favorite ilms.

The techniques can be applied to your own work. If you’re creating

a scene that needs sudden action, there’s a chapter dedicated to

that, and you can go straight there. You can also pick out indi-

vidual techniques from a scene and use them in your own scenes.

Before you read the chapter, watch the scene in question if you

can and try to see how and why it works. Once you’ve read the

chapter, watch the scene again, perhaps with the sound down so

you can focus on the camera moves, and see how the scene has

been crafted.


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1T A X I D R I V E R

C H A P T E R O N E

THE MOMENT OFCHANGE:

Taxi Driver


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3

W in some way, Scorsese

shows the character acting out the change visually. Most

importantly, he uses camerawork to emphasize the nature of the

character change.

In this sequence, Robert De Niro’s character has cracked for the

irst time in the movie, and goes from being unconventional to

aggressive. He is framed centrally for most of the sequence. Rather

than ilming this scene with conventional coverage, Scorsese

keeps the antihero in the center of the frame so that we can focus

on the character and his growing intensity.

When a character snaps, let the audience see that person-

ality change as visually as possible, by framing the character

centrally throughout the scene.


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C H A P T E R O N E : T H E M O M E N T O F C H A N G E4

Filmmakers are often told not to waste time showing somebody

entering a room. Start the scene in the middle of things, you are

told, or it usually will just get edited out. This is often true, but if

your character is crossing a threshold or entering new territory itis vital that we see the crossing of that threshold. De Niro walks

through the door and even as he closes it behind him, his eyes are

ixed on a point behind the camera. We can see the change and

determination as he crosses that threshold.

Good screenplays give your characters many thresholds to

cross. Show this, even if the barrier is as modest as a glassdoor. The audience will sense that change is afoot.

As De Niro walks forward the camera moves away, as though

pushed back by the force of his presence. It moves back at his

walking pace and he remains centrally framed throughout this

walk. This is achieved through slight pans during the dolly move.

As you can see in the inal frame, the camera operator didn’t

chase him too exactly, but his face is always in the central third

of the frame. This gives him an astonishing sense of presence

and momentum.

Let the camera’s move be dictated by the actor’s speed and

motion. When the actor approaches the camera, back off, keep

the same distance throughout the shot, and pan as needed to

keep the actor in the center of the frame.


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The camera pushes in on Cybill Shepherd at a pace that is notice-

ably faster than De Niro’s walking pace. This creates a small

moment of panic for the audience, as though he is looming up on

her. Shepherd is also framed quite centrally, but unlike De Niro shedoes not move during this shot. This has the effect of making her

seem like a victim of his world. She’s trapped in the same framing,

but is unable to move. At the end of the shot, the camera pans onto

her so that she is almost in proile, which is the opposite of De

Niro’s direct gaze. This makes her seem more vulnerable than him.

Push in fast on a motionless character, using a central framing,and you will make the character seem vulnerable, especially if

you pan to put the actor in profile.

As the camera rushes toward her, we glimpse her coworker and

friend, Albert Brooks, on the right, but he is quickly pushed out

of frame. This fast camera move isolates her from her coworkers

in a moment, making it feel like she is alone in the room with De

Niro. The shot lasts just over two seconds, but achieves several

powerful effects that let the audience know this is going to be a

dramatic scene.

When you want to show a character’s fear, let your dolly move

isolate that character from the other people we have glimpsed

in the room.


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De Niro encounters his irst obstacle, as Brooks comes in from

frame left. De Niro is stopped, but the camera does not stop at the

same time. It dollies back for another second. This emphasizes his

momentum and makes us feel that nothing is really going to stophim getting what he wants.

When your character is stopped by an obstacle, keep the

camera move going for a moment to show the strength of the

character’s momentum.

Shepherd moves into the frame, but with her back to the camera,

and we don’t cut to see her face. She is there as a presence for De

Niro to react to. The camera stays on him and he remains central.

As he lunges forward, Brooks restrains him, but it is De Niro’s face

that remains in the middle of the shot. We are forced to watch him

and his reaction to the unfolding events.

When your main character’s emotional journey is vitally

important to the story, make sure that actor remains in thecenter of the frame, and don’t let the other actors’ faces

intrude on the scene.


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Brooks repeatedly urges De Niro to leave and pulls him toward the

left of frame, but De Niro always heads back to the center of the

frame, even as Brooks tries to physically move him away. When

Brooks succeeds in moving him to the left, the camera pans tokeep De Niro centrally framed. You can see in the second frame

that De Niro has moved in relation to the background, but the

camera has panned to keep him central. This shows that the char-

acter is unrelenting.

Your character can resist any attempt at removal, but if

forced to move to a new position, pan across to reframe theactor centrally.

When Brooks inally succeeds in dragging De Niro to frame left,

there is a rapid camera move that puts him back in the center

of the frame quickly. As De Niro heads to the door the camera

dollies forward — toward the point where De Niro was previ-

ously standing — and pans hard left. Even though his back is to

us, he has again been placed in the center of the frame. By having

this momentary sense of defeat, the tension is increased when

the fast camera move happens, and we sense that De Niro is far

from defeated.

Let it look as though your character has been defeated by

breaking the central framing, but then dolly and pan rapidly

to reestablish that framing. The audience will sense that more

trouble is coming.


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A physical struggle begins in the doorway, as De Niro shows that

he is not willing to be thrown out. We are at another threshold, and

he’s refusing to be controlled, so it makes good visual sense for

his inal reaction to happen here. By the second frame, Shepherdhas again entered on the right (her face still unseen) and Brooks

is pushed away, almost out of view. Although De Niro is small in

the frame, and his stance borders on the comical, it’s clear that

he won’t let anybody control him. He is alone in the center of the

frame with nobody obstructing the view of him, showing both his

isolation and his continued determination.

When the scene seems to be over, show your character

reacting or resisting, and move the other characters aside, so

your character is alone in the center of the frame.

De Niro heads back toward camera, still staying in the central

third of the screen, and although the backs of the other actors ill

most of the frame, it is still De Niro’s face that we see. No matter

how they block him, the framing keeps our focus on him and his

journey through the scene. Even at the point where he is about to

leave, he’s facing the camera and framed centrally.

Keep your main actor’s face more visible than any other face,

so we continue to listen to the actor’s on-screen rant.


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We cut to a shot of De Niro exiting the building, and he’s right in

the center of the frame. The main incident is over, but to have him

wander away from the center of frame at this point would make

it look as though the confrontation had broken his resolve. Evenas Brooks follows him out, the camera dollies left to keep De Niro

central. We see that his character has changed and nothing will

change him back to the way he was before.

If the scene moves to another location, continue with the

central framing until the scene is completely over, to avoid

weakening the character’s conviction.

De Niro heads briely toward the camera, and the dolly move

stops. Then, as he turns 180 degrees and heads down the side

of the building he’s just left, the dolly reverses and tracks to the

right, to keep him central. It is very rare to reverse a dolly move,

because it can look obvious and awkward, but when guided by the

actor’s motion, the move feels right. Most importantly, it preserves

De Niro’s central framing. The dolly travels faster than De Niro

and moves away from him, so that we are slightly ahead of him.

Although he remains in the center of the frame, this distancing

makes him appear to be less in control than he would like to be.

Although the central framing should continue to the end of the

sequence, you can move your camera away from the actor, to

create the sensation that the character is being overwhelmed

by events.


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