THE IMPORTANCE OF... ARENA

By Laurent Kelly / June 25, 2011

The arena or chosen location (s) of a film script is often neglected despite playing a major role in the atmosphere on screen. A good writer will know that the arena is just as important as the characters and that it serves multiple purposes in establishing the mood, commenting on the characters progression throughout the film and emphasising various emotions including happiness, paranoia, confusion and freedom. In real life we are effected by the environment around us and often act accordingly to where we live - for example if we live in a gang fuelled area this is likely to have an impact on our sense of confidence and wellbeing (although I probably wouldn€™t notice seeing as most of my day is spent either watching films or on the internet but anyway I digress.) Our location has an impact on our personality and so it makes sense that it should work the same way on screen. Too often however there seems to be a sense of filmmakers pondering over where they can place there characters rather than focusing on which characters would be the most interesting to explore in that given arena. Today we are looking again at various genre examples to highlight the importance of arena in adding great sub text and drama to the world of film.

DRAMA

Taxi Driver Taxi Driver is perhaps one of the more obvious examples of a character being directly effected by their arena seeing as protagonist Travis Bickle brings up his hatred for his city on numerous occasions. The arena is used masterfully within this film to highlight both the character€™s great isolation and inner hatred and also to create a nightmarish vision of the world he sees around him. The only light conversation that appears in the film is during Travis€™s scenes with Betsy and in her busy and professional workspace and dignified café that they attend Travis is able to act in a more calm and relaxed manner. He has been polluted by the city however and this is what leads him to take his date to an inappropriate hardcore movie flick, with the obvious desire to enact the same treatment on Betsy. Despite being offered a glimpse of a better, more meaningful life, Travis is too tempted by the sinful environment around him and this really brings up an interesting point about him protesting perhaps a little too much about his hatred which could be considered a forced resistance against his own true sinful desires. At the same time the scenes of Travis locked away in his taxi are very important as they almost represent the prison like existence of a man who is unable to co-operate with the world around him.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AYEvuA70hD0

ROMANCE

Before Sunrise The story of two young people who strike up a rapport on a train and decide to spend the day together in Vienna would probably not have been as romantic if set in say Grimsby. Instead the arena helps to ignite the passion between the pair and express their sense of freedom and vigour. As the characters warm to one another€™s company and become more expressive and emotive, the location is essentially used to capture this sense of energy. The couple react on instinct and use their heart before their heads and this is partly because the arena has given them this heightened sense of liberation in which to explore their romantic tendencies. The arena works on more than one level however and in one brilliantly worked scene in an isolated record store in which the characters keep glancing at one another before shyly looking away and smiling; a key psychological moment is established as the characters have by this point fallen for one another on a true emotional level rather than just becoming carried away in the romance of their surroundings.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nQpYHiB0k6k

War

The Pianist There were some complaints about the detached nature of Polanski€™s film but for me this is truly its greatest strength. Using a laconic and underplayed style we spend most of this film locked away in small hiding places with the protagonist Wladysaw Spzilamn. In great detail we gradually watch him become more sick, hungry, alone and afraid never knowing when he might be found out or captured. This sense of being locked in with the protagonist provides great empathy for his tense situation; after we all we can only really see and hear the things that that he does and so we spend the film in this isolated position €“ observing horrific glimpses of the war only through window frames and through the terrible sounds of death and desperation. The arena is used to serve key purposes both textually and textually. In a very literal sense it creates a feeling of paranoia for the audience who are unable to catch a break with the outside world. But this sense of perspective also captures the director€™s ambition to only present an object of truth surrounding his subject matter. He is after all telling a story about the Holocaust, not €œthe story€ of the Holocaust and as such it is important that we only witness the action from the point of the view of the character that we are following. This focused representation makes for perhaps the fairest depiction of the tragedy I've ever witnessed.

HORROR

Se7en

There is never a moment of light in this film on both a literal and emotional scale. Filmed with dim, low key lighting the cmaera explores a nameless revolting city of violence and scum which seems to be representative of a ture hell on earth. The endless gloomy weather is indicative of a film which provides very few bright moments; it is after all exploring the horror of real life and it resonates in the film€™s world from first frame to last. The arena essentially explores the theme of the film as speculated on by Morgan Freeman's character at the end of the film, that the world is far from a fine place but it is indeed worth fighting for.

THRILLER

North by Northwest

Hitchcock's film is a perfect example of an arena being used to fully maximise the mood on screen. The sequences on the train emphasise its romantic nature, the chase on top of Mount Rushmore pushes the extravagance and drama to the limit and the initial shots of the New York crowds immediately foreshadow the chaotic and convoluted structure of the plot. In the famous crop duster sequence the vast space surrounding Cary Grant offers a great sense of vulnerability and unpredictability with the waiting game providing key tension and suspense. It is a film which expertly uses its locations to squeeze every emotion possible from the audience making for a glamorous but highly suspenseful masterpiece.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M5D1aeNB2Bc

FOREIGN LANGUAGE

A Man Escaped The minimalistic approach of Luc Bresson€™s Prisoner of War drama is quite breathtaking within its execution. Instead of focusing on the external anxieties of the prison environment, the film instead showcases the internal trauma of its protagonist. The repetitive nature of being locked in a tiny cell €“ the same sounds, the same thoughts, the same faceless people in the same order of the day; this clockwork chain of events focused on in intense detail presents a true nightmarish vision of the subtle horror of prison €“ the institutionalized threat of having your senses numbed to this environment. It is this sense of insanity that the protagonist is trying to escape and so he works piece by piece in his bid to escape from the confines of not just his situation but also the growing paranoia of his mind. Very much a film of the senses, every sound counts in the film as the protagonist is receptive to every noise he hears; his sense of paranoia heightened by the claustrophobic environment in which he inhibits. In the end he must escape not just for his own livelihood but also to prevent himself from going crazy.

SCI-FI

2001: A Space Oddysey A film which is very much arena-dominant. It is the endless and absorbing nature of space which creates the mesmirising envionment of the story but the arena is also carefuly crafted to highlight both the wonders and dangers of our solar system. When set to the enchanting sound of the Blue Danube we are offered a great sense of freedom and calm but in other sequences where the location is more unpredictable and nightmarish in its tone we are aware that the characters are in fact far from safe. Perhaps the best example of a film that documents how the film's arena is as important as any of the characters, it contains images and sounds that will still look and sound breathtaking a hundred years from now.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ou6JNQwPWE0

So in conclusion, the arena of a film as shown by the examples above plays an instrumental role in establishing the atmopshere of the film and reflecting the mindset of the characters. When effectively orchestrated the arena can add great layers to the drama and help to emphasise the necesarry emtoions of the storytelling. They can also greatly support the film's genre by using space and metaphor to scare, excite or charm. Thanks for reading and please return soon for another installment of the Importance of... series.