Tuesday, 25 June 2013

Short Film Analysis - Batman Dead End


Batman Dead End

Heavy incidental music, the sound of an orchestral hit on an empty (black) screen with titles slowly appearing in the centre of the screen a compilation of someone putting on the ‘Batman’ clothes that we know to be the Batman still with incidental music and a voice over from what sounds like a police radio talking about “trouble in Gotham City” and “The Joker once again escaped from Arkham Asylum.” We never see the face of the actor playing Batman as he is getting ready by putting on the classic Batman gear all of the shots in the opening of the short film is medium close up shots so we never reveal his face leaving a layer of mystery over the opening.

Establishing shot of a building we can assume is ‘Wayne Enterprises’ to set the location of the short film (the shot was clearly archive footage possible taken from one of the Christopher Nolan Batman films) we see a few forward tracking shots following Batman and the Joker as they run through the allies of Gotham City, there is a use of shots which transition into each other a close up shot of Batman as he lands into a puddle so all of the water splashes around him leaving his cape laying around him on the floor, to an amazing crane shot showing him crouching on the floor and seeing his cape almost into the Batman symbol, with orchestral music playing as he slowly rises up bringing the cape up as he rises.

We see a lot of shot reverse shots between Batman and the Joker as they fight and speak to each other about the Joker’s face and calling the Batman “Daddy” because the Joker believes that the batman created him because without Batman, Joker wouldn’t have anyone to fight so without each other their lives would be pointless.

Through a twist of events we see the Joker being snatched by a Xenomorph (Alien from the Alien’s Saga) we see an extreme close up of the Joker’s knuckle duster as it falls to the ground, we then see a Xenomorph  rise up from behind Batman from an over the shoulder shot from Batman’s front.  We then see an extreme close up of Batman fighting a Xenomorph as we see Batman struggling with the Xenomorph we see the three iconic dots of the Predator’s shoulder cannon, and we hear a blast noise as the camera swaps showing the Predator for the first time.

There is a fight between Batman and the predator, this shows the conventions of a short film extremely clearly by having the equilibrium of Batman fighting the Joker and taking him back to Arkham something any Batman fan knows is the normal situation in Gotham, we then have the Twist where we see the joker be killed by a Xenomorph something unknown to the Batman universe causing distress to the characters in the film, we continue with the un- equilibrium of the Predator being introduced into the mix and finally the equilibrium at the end when the Predator is defeated by a heavily beat up Batman, but then questioning the conventions there is another twist as more Predators take appear from nowhere clearly turning off their cloaking device.  This is a good example of a short film as it mainly sticks to the conventions of a short film with all of the twists etc. it also doesn’t give us a back story on any of the characters but this could be because most people know the story surrounding Batman and the Joker but it keeps to the convention of short film by keeping the story short and full of action.

NA nananananana Batman!
 
 

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