Lovefield Analysis

The film starts off with an establishing shot revealing the barren location, as the score slowly sets in with a typical thriller style sound which keeps the audiences attention, the diegetic sounds of the wind is heard brushing crops which again sets the location in a very open area. The camera then pans to the left where you here squeaking, a road sign is shown slowly swinging with a crow standing above it. A close up shot of the crow is shown whilst it calls out and turns towards something. The camera goes to where the crow faces and slowly the sound of a phone is heard and then we see it lying on the ground, as the camera is continually panning we see money beside it then a blood stained cloth, suddenly the sound of a woman in pain is heard and soon after she is shown lying on the floor but only her foot is shown, the score then comes in with a deeper tone sounding very sinister.

As the woman slowly stops moving the score gets louder and then stops simultaneously with the woman's movement. Suddenly we see a bloody hand holding a knife stabbing the floor with an extreme closeup and focus pull right in front of the camera as the score gets louder. This is very effective to scare the audience and the suspense leading to this multiplies the effect of it. The crow is seen again in a mid shot panicking then cuts back to the bloody hand with a crane shot which slowly moves upwards to show the characters face as he seems nervous. An over the shoulder shot is used to show the character looking at the crow as a focus pull is introduced. Crows are related to death therefore the audience naturally presumes the woman has been murdered.

A long shot of the man shows him looking around as if hes on the run or looking towards something and he then suddenly begins to run, as he runs the camera is showing hand held mid shot of the bottom half of the character to intensify the situation and conveying the character is frightened. The man looks like a stereotypical farmer as he wears similar clothes and has long hair with a cap. When he stops he reaches his car and opens the boot as he takes out his keys you see the character is in a nervous state as he uses wrong keys to open his boot. When he opens the boot a mid shot is used from inside the boot as he is getting a bag out, then he hears a noice and looks up, he sees the crow tapping his car and he looks confused, he then carries on to take a big cloth out and starts to run with it he notices the crow is following him and he ignores it and carries on.

As he approaches the woman there is a deep focus on him walking towards her and a focus pull switches it to a shallow focus, and you see the woman's lifeless feet as he reaches her. A perfect low angle shot of the man going on his knees and reaching out with the blanket convinces the audience of what exactly is happening, as he is doing this there are many cuts going back and forth from the crow calling out and the man moving closer. As the crow and score stops we see the man leaning in with a mid shot of him as he reaches for a baby. As this happens you see the woman who was thought to be dead handing him the baby as the mans facial expression completely changes from nervous to relief. He then laughs and says "Its a boy", then a close up shot of the woman whispering "thank you". This was the only dialog through out the film which kept the suspense and concentration strong.

The film finishes with an establishing crane shot moving upwards showing a truck there which is the farmers and a police car going to them which explains the phone on the floor. The stereotypical view that farmers/hillbilly's are all dangerous and evil is contradicted by the mans actions he had taken to help the women.
Overall the massive twist creates an outstanding scene which had many emotions concealed within it. A very important factor which the audience might not have noticed is that throughout the entire film there was a slight sepia tone and as he reached for the baby it slowly changed and made the picture brighter which gave it a more neutral feeling and the danger theme had vanished. What made this film work was the combination of score, no dialogue, danger theme and the different emotions.

By Zeyad