The Unborn
The opening scene starts of with an overhead extreme long shot taken from the air, looking down onto a highway/motorway system. There is snow covering the ground that is surrounding the network indicating that it is the middle of the winter season in this part of the world. The scene of the area and the expected weather style for the rest if the film is now set. The credits for the film are also shown across the bottom of the screen during this shot. The follow up shot of this is an overhead long shot, of an old, classic and very picture perfect bridge in the middle of an icy winter river follwing silently by, that fits perfectly into the setting of the frozen but beautiful landscape. As this is a horror film we know that it wont be picture perfect for very long and so the director gives us this shot as an opening to tell us this. A female then comes into the shot from the bottom of the screen as she jogges across the bridge from south to north at a mid range pace, indicating that she is not runing for fear or away from somthing but she is running for pleasure at this point in the film. She will most likely be running away from something later on in the film and this is used in the opening scene for irony as we know that she will later in the film become scared and in danger. The camera then tracks down towards the female until the shot is directly flat on the bridge with her continuously jogging now away from the camera. The use of the tracking can be used to make us feel as though we can see her and are watching her from behind but she cant see us as she continues to move away and does not look back allowing us to hear her diegetic sound of panting as she moves. The bridge is empty apart from the lone female and so this also adds to this feeling of isolation and that only us and her are on this bridge in a very derilict and empty area. During this scene the non diegetic sound of a very simple, high pitched ery music can be heard, which along with the location, camera movements and her movements adds to the feeling of everything is not as simple and innocent as it seems from the visual aspect of the scene, as she jogs along the icy winter bridge.
The third shot in this scene is edited so that the camera switches to a medium shot of the front the female, which is introducing her to us as someone very important to the film, as she is the only person that we have seen so far and also the fact that her face is shown to us very clearly to ensure that we remember her. It identifies the main character to use quickly. In this shot she is still jogging but this clearly shows to us that she has in her ipod, which tells us that one of her senses has been taken away as she cant hear anything around her, making her vulnerable on this remote road, as she is surrounded by trees and from what we can see there are no houses or people around in the case of need of help or assistance. The diegetic sound of her panting can now be heard more loudly over the non diegetic sound of the ery, high pitched music.
The camera then returns to an overhead long shot of her continuing to jog along the road. This has been edited as a continuation of the first shot of her jogging along the road, so that the audience is seeing her from where they left of. From this overhead long shot we can see that the main path is clear of snow and due to this is a very black tarmack colour. The darkness of the road then contrasts with the woodland area on either side, as this is covered in a very clean white snow allowing anything on the ground to be seen very easily, and the darkness of the bare tree trunks to stand out away from the ground. These also are a dark brown/black colour and leafless at this time of year,allowing the camera to see straight down to the ground, without being blocked by and canopy style leaves. The contrast between these show that she is alone on this road but if anything does come from the trees towards her, then we as the audience and she should be able to see it very clearly against the white snow on the ground, brightening the whole area and making everything visable.
The camera then switches into a medium close up shot and her face is once again introduced to the audience for a second time allowing the audience to recape on the fact that she is the focus during the long shots. The scenarey behind her is also visable to us allowing us to recape on the picture perfect icy river, snowy ground and bridge that she first crossed, and this is also setting us up for a scare by making us feel as though she is in the middle of this beautiful location and is safe, because she can see everything in the trees surrounding her and on the road ahead of her. The camera then pans left still within a meduim close up range to reveal the whole scenary behind her as she jogs also adding to this feeling a safety that they audience now has. The female then suddenly stops jogging and looks directly past the camera to the right hand side as though she has seen somthing interging. Allowing only the diegtic sound of her panting heavily for breath to be heard once again over the non diegetic music.
The editing then swithes to a reverse shot of what she can see ahead of her. Also allowing us to try and find out why she stopped running so suddenly and what has intreged her so much. From the shot we can only see the open road ahead of her, and a cold but unexplained mist rising from the cold snow on the ground surrounding the road giving an ery and uncomfortable feeling to the audience. There are also trees to the right hand side of the shot that are visable but do not fit in with the previous images of the surrrounding bare winter trees as open with bright snow on the ground at their feet to brighten the area up. These trees are in a dark dense group all close together, with no snow on them or around them, making it dark and difficult to see through them. This image in the shot has been used as a sign of danger and as a sign that their is no longer safety surrounding the female on this open road.
The camera then changes into a steadicam with a close up of the females face. It shows her distarction by something laying on the middle of the road which the audience cannot see but is going to find out.
A reverse mid shot has then been used showing from her feet up to her knees, as though the camera is laying on the road and is tilted upwards towards her, with a focus pull on the object in the road that has taken her attention away from jogging. She bends down into the shot of her lower quarter and picks up the unknown object.
Another steadicam shot has been used, for a close up of her face, as she stands back up straight into an upright position. A presence is then felt behind her by both herself and the audience, with only her head to block the image of what it is as her face is in the centre of the frame. As she slowly turns around an over the shoulder shot is used to reveal a small boy standing erily in the middle of the road further down the lane, where she was jus running. He is awardly silent and standing compltey still, simply staring at her erily. He is now centre of the frame and centre of the audiences focus. His presence there is unemxplained as if he came from in the trees we as an audience would be able to have seen him during the over head shots and if he came during her jogging he would have been visable coming through the trees against the white snow by either us or her as she jogged. A focus pull is agian used to show him an she is not in focus as she stands very close to the camera still in a close up range. The non diegetic music is now unheard and there is just silence, making this shot even more effective as all attention is on the situation betweent the female and this unidentified small boy.
A shot reverse shot is then used as the camera changes to an over the shoulder shot from the small boy looking at the female. This has been editied to give the audience the view from him and also clarifying that he is really there and is looking at her standing in the road looking back at him with no words being said, showing that she doesnt know who he is, but he seems to know of her and seems to have been either waiting or lookinf for her. This is the climax that the scene as been building to straight from the begining of the film, giving the audience as scare within the first 3 minutes and also building for the action in the rest of the film.
The camera then swithces to a shot of the small boys shoes, as though the camer is on the ground and slowly begins paning up his body, all the way to his face. Once it gets to his face the camera freezes for a few seconds, allowing the fact that he has no eyes to be revealed to the audience. Also the condtion of his grey, cold and dead like skin complextion is revealed to the audience. The editing has been done like this to give the audience a scare and also to allow them to analyse the boy and to reaslise that he may not be alive and so how is he here watching the female?
The camera then reverses shots back to a close up of the females face once again and reveals her expression of confusion and unbelief of the small boy and his condition. This has been edited though so that we as the audience do not know whether she can see in as much detail as we can and so dont know if she can really analyse his no eyes and dead like state in the same way we can. We might know something that she doesn't adding enigma to the story.
The camera then reverses shots once again back to where the small boy was just standing, giving the audience the females point of view again. But to the audiences confusion now, she has seen something that they havn't and instead of the small boy standing in the road, a bulldog stands there in his place. Behind the dog in the background is same mist that was seen just before the boy was revealed, but this time after he has disapeared so quickly. The editing in this shot has been done in this specific way to state a pattern to look out for throughout the film, of the mist being seen in the scene just before the boy is revealed and after he as left, allowing the audience a warning from now on that danger is around.
