Textual analysis of Se7en (David Fincher, 1995)

Story Line
An unidentified character appears to be making a scrap book, things in the book include:

• Documents - he is seen covering words with black pen such as 'pregnant', 'transsexual' and 'fantasizing'. This could hint at the characters views but it creates the feeling that he is hiding something.
• Photographs - the character is developing film. Examples of photos are a small boy with his eyes blacked out, a picture a person with something metal coming out of the back of their head and some one who appears to be dead an has a mutilated face. We don't know anything about them as people. This them of death and possibly torture definitely reflects the horror genre.

These very graphic images aren't shown for long, in fact the last one only flashes onto the screen for a split second.

• Writing - the character is shown writing pages and pages of information. We are not shown or told what the writing is about and this is the only close up where the text is decipherable. 

I can make out the phrases 'all that mankind' and 'in modern mans'. This shows a generalisation no names are mentioned, just the whole of mankind is referenced. This could be an insight into that characters personality and ideas. If he is a killer (which I assume he is from the photos and withholding information) he doesn't seem to have particular targets. The text is upside down in the sequence and shown for less than two seconds so if I was watching this without pausing and backtracking there is no way I would have picked up on it. This is disorientating and unnerving for the audience, with things flashing up so fast it is easy to miss things.

• He is also adding bits of other things to his book. In this shot he is handling some hair with tweezers. This re-enforces the incredibly sinister feel of the sequence.

I assume it is hair from the person in the picture in this shot. 

The whole book looks like a record, perhaps a record of his victims. 

Enigma Codes
Questions that are raised:

• Who is this man?
• What is this book?
• Who are the people in the pictures?
• What happened to them and what does this character have to do with them?

Characters
There is only one character in this sequence. We don't learn who they are, where there from or really what they are doing. The only shots of the character are close ups of the hands. This means if we were to see them later in the film we wouldn't know it was them, therefore the killer, this creepy individual could be anyone.

They seem like a very isolated, lonely character, I get this impression from the locations featured in the sequence.

Locations
Not only could he be anyone, he could be anywhere. We can't see anything of the main location other than a window casting light. Another location is a dark room in which he is developing photographs. I like how there is no reference to the outside world. There is no recognisable landmarks to tell us where he is, we cant even see the view from the window which could give us a faint idea or point of reference.

Lighting
The lighting is incredibly low key. Their are lots of shadows from items illuminated by the window. I would have expected a horror film to be darker as other horror films are. Darkness and shadows are unsettling because there are endless possibilities to what could be lurking where the audience and the characters can't see. But the extreme close ups compensate for the lack of darkness because not much is shown in the shots.

Cinematography
All of the shots are close ups or extreme close ups reavealing next to nothing to the audience. We can see the character is writing but not where he is whilst writing, if he is alone or with other people. A range of angles are used. Mostly either high angle or level shots. High angle shots are used to show a better view of things, for example the pages of the book. Whilst the level shots give an ambiguity as we can't completely see the things on the table. This lack of information is typical of the horror genre because if everything about the antagonist was shown there would be no story, he would be stopped and nothing 'horrific' would happen. Something else that contributes to this is the focus. In all of these shots the background is out of focus so we can't see where he is. It withholds information from the audience.

Out of focus background gives no clues as to the characters whereabouts. 

Editing
The editing is extremely fast paced to disorientate the viewer, we are not meant to understand what is going on. The transitions vary between cuts and fades. Some shots overlay each other such as when the words are being blacked out. The layering of shots is quite confusing to watch as you can't really concentrate on one nor the other.

This technique and the editing style as a whole resembles a reel of film. Things flash up in-between bits of action.

The numbers and letters don't seem to correspond to anything. They could be part of a labelling system for the scrapbooks he is making. But, the point is we don't know and aren't told and this is confusing for the audience.

None of the continuity rules such as eyeline match or shot/reverse shot were overly present. The lack of continuity adds to the confused, unstable feel.


Sound
The sound is mostly non-diegetic ambience music with noises that sound like scratched records. The scratchy noises are really strange as they don't seem to be connected to the action at all. The only dialogue is also non-diegetic and matches the action in the shot. The spoken line is 'you get me closer to god' suggesting a religious aspect to the the characters motives. 


Titles
The titles are presented in a font that looks hand drawn. The white text on a black background stands out at is easy to read but the movement is quite off putting. The words sort of vibrate adding to the uneasiness of the sequence. The Title 'Se7en' is in a different font to show its importance.