Monday, September 22, 2014

TODAY'S NUGGET: Hot Fuzz (2007) - Sound and Visual Transitions

[Quick Summary: A London police officer smells something funny in a small country village.]

This my favorite film of the Cornetto trio.

As I read it, however, I was struck by the artful use of matched sound and visual transitions.

[Matched transition = You hear/see something in Scene A that is matched in Scene B.]

Here, they do more than move us from point A to B.

They also reorient the audience to a new scene/location/point of view.

1 - SOUND

Note how the common 'hissing' sound moves us to a new location.

ex. "INT. GEORGE MERCHANT'S KITCHEN - NIGHT

MERCHANT is dragged by his feet and dumped into a kitchen chair...GLOVED HANDS empty beans into a pan...Bacon is fried...Gas taps are turned on full...Gas hisses...

INT. DANNY'S HOUSE - NIGHT

Static hisses as the video flickers to life." 

2 - VISUAL

"Beer" is the common visual clue here.

I like that as we follow the beer, we also figure out that we've switched points of view.

ex. EXT. DANNY'S HOUSE - NIGHT

...DANNY: Unless you wanna come in for a coffee?
ANGEL: I don't drink coffee.
DANNY: Tea?
ANGEL: No, no caffeine after midday.
DANNY: How about another beer?

INT. KITCHEN - NIGHT

A fridge opens...We see a number of bottled beers...

GEORGE MERCHANT grabs a beer and swigs it as he staggers to the toilet. Outside the CLOAKED FIGURE watches."

WHAT I'VE LEARNED: I now have added matched transitions to my writer's tool box.

Hot Fuzz (2007)
by Edgar Wright & Simon Pegg

No comments:

perPage: 10, numPages: 8, var firstText ='First'; var lastText ='Last'; var prevText ='« Previous'; var nextText ='Next »'; } expr:href='data:label.url' expr:href='data:label.url + "?&max-results=7"'