‘Laura’ 1944 – Otto Preminger. Scene Analysis.
Otto Preminger has been celebrated for his ‘interest in the art or technique of filmmaking’ (Hirsch, 2007). This is especially evident in his Melodrama, Crime film Laura. This film contains a dream sequence film, in which the audience do not know whether our detective protagonist, McPherson, is awake or not. Preminger presents many cues that would lead the audience to believe the whole scene is a dream through the use of music, lighting and cinematography. However, the narrative of ‘Laura’ being alive continues through the rest of the film.
Preminger has selected specific mise-en-scène techniques to convey the cue of a dream sequence; the emphasis on showing the prop of alcohol makes McPherson appear drunk. He is clearly drinking the alcohol in the low angle shot as he falls asleep with a glass in his hand, looked down upon by the portrait of Laura. This dominance of the portrait is significant as it represents the impactful nature of Laura’s alleged death. He is ‘falling in love’ with her as Waldo said earlier in the scene, and cannot focus on anything other than the case; this is a strong explanation of why he then would’ve began dreaming of her. Another justification could be that McPherson is actually mentally unstable as Preminger has presented the prop of the pinball concentration game McPherson plays at many points throughout the film; he is slowly losing his mind over the case which is why he then hallucinates seeing Laura as it would benefit him in solving the case.
Preminger uses a track-in camera movement when McPherson falls asleep which limits the audiences view on the rest of the set. Then, a door opening is heard off screen as the camera cuts to a long shot of Laura entering the room. The track-in used is another clear cue that McPherson is dreaming; ‘dreams are less common than flashbacks in the Hollywood cinema…when they do happen they draw on track-ins and music’ (Thompson, 1988, p166).
The off-screen diegetic audio of Laura’s apartment door is successful in giving the audience a real sense of the set the film takes place in. ‘We are aware of off screen space as not just, or even primarily, pace, but as place’ (Fujiwara, 2008, p19). This makes the film more believable for the audience, and therefore makes the whole narrative more intense and mysterious. This sense is strengthened before the door opening in this scene as Mark falls asleep and the audience are freed of his point of view, which they were restricted to previously. This then gives the audience more of an omniscient viewpoint, as if they were solving the case themselves instead of just watching McPherson. The haunting theme music score used was composed by David Raksin and is very successful in making the audience think it is a dream. It is very mysterious piece of music, which Raksin called the Len-a-tone. He also stated that ‘The idea of the main title was the make the audience feel the magic of this girl’ (Raksin, 1974, p68). This therefore proves that Raksin wanted the audience to have a magical sense, which is highly linked to the dreamlike sequence.
‘Through this scene the complete portrait of Laura was painted, while the other scenes accentuated portions of her character.’ (Zimmerman, 2014). This can be seen through Gene Tierney’s acting in this scene. As Laura enters the room, she is followed by the long tracking shot when she turns on the light and questions McPherson “what are you doing here?”. This is a very brave movement from Laura, just showing her greater inner strength, by approaching a complete stranger. In this scene also, she also shows her vulnerability when she quickly sits down on the chair after being shown the newspaper. She is overcome with shock and Tierney exhibits this through physical movement instead of just her facial expression. This range of emotion or ‘dual personality traits of strength and weakness’ (Zimmerman, 2014) has been shown through the technique of cinematography. Preminger builds suspense in this scene by using the long tracking shot of Laura before she questions Mark. He has used low angles to accentuate her authority in the scene. Even the supremacy of the portrait watching Mark is enough to see that she is the dominant figure here, and the whole film revolves around her whereabouts up until this point. However, Preminger opposes this analysis by using the high angle shot when Mark then stands over Laura as she processes what has been happening over the weekend. The audience then view Mark as the dominant figure in this shot, which would be more socially understandable as men were always the figure of authority during the 40’s.
Lighting has been used in the film in order to illuminate Laura’s figure and positioning here. When she is standing, staring at McPherson, Preminger has used high key lighting on her figure, while the rest of the apartment is dark, to exhibit her strength and bravery in the scene. It has also been used to show the audience that it is really Laura, therefore completing the mystery of her death, but not who the murderer was. This lighting was commonly used during the early forties as it ‘seeks to display attractively all areas of the frame’ (Peterson, 1974) therefore Preminger can ‘show off’ his attractive model actor, as well as the setting she is standing in. The editing techniques limit the audience in what they can see, for example we are not shown Laura coming into the room, the camera only cuts to her when she closes the door. Add a bit more to this, and how the audience would react to the lighting effects.
This sequence presents various cues in the for of film noir techniques to lead the audience to believe the whole rest of the film is a dream, Preminger was very successful in highlighting Laura’s character in this scene, and portraying her for the first time that was not in the point of view of another character.
Bibliography:
· Fujiwara, C. (2008). The world and its double. New York: Faber and Faber.
· Hirsch, F. (2007). Otto Preminger. New York: Alfred A. Knopf.
· Jr., K. (2014). An Analysis of Film Technique in Laura (1944). [online] Ken Zimmerman Jr. Available at: https://kenzimmermanjr.com/analysis-film-technique-laura/ [Accessed 6 Dec. 2017].
· Peterson, L. (1974). Study notes for the slide set from some visual motifs of film noir. 10th ed. London: BFI Education.
· Raksin, David. "Raksin on Film Music." Journal of the University Film Association 26, no. 4 (1974): 68-79. http://www.jstor.org/stable/20687265.
· Thompson, K. (1988). Breaking the glass armor. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press.