CHILDREN OF MEN ANALYSIS

CHILDREN OF MEN

The film starts off with the diagetic sounds of the news being played. The theme of the news and the sounds of the female and male reporter sound as if it is the BBC style news. The news tells us “good morning” which sets the time of day. The sound of news makes the audience asks questions about why it has started with the news, giving the viewer a sense there is a problem. The report on the news gives a sense of a serious issue occurring. Which makes the viewer ask all sorts of questions?  

The first visual image is high angle shot of a variety of people all staring at the same thing all have facial emotions of seriousness and worry. In the shot we can see variety of people some in suits and some in casual clothing as it’s an English accent from the news we can tell the location is in England. This is also shown when the London red bus drives past the shop window. This also shows the film is set in London. Looking closely at the first visual shot explains that it is in the morning in a London sandwich bar when the city workers are getting breakfast and watching the news everyone in the café are concerned. We get all this information in the space of a minute. 

The scene continues, everything is still and focused the scene is Disrupted by the main actor Clive Owen as he pushes his way to counter. We can see that as he does this the people are still fixated on what is going on in the news report. The first close up of the report is shown. The report is on the world’s youngest person dying aged 18. This sends a clear message that there is a huge problem in the world if the youngest person is 18.

As Clive Owen receives his coffee the camera hand held follows him out the shop the last shop before leaving the café is where the camera tilts up to at the news one last time. This makes the audience feel their apart. As Clive Owen turns left out the café the camera pans to the right showing the road, then panning back to the direction of Clive Owen. The title appears saying “London 16^th November 2027” the scene of London is grey and gloomy setting this mood of depression. Looking at the cars on the road show that technology has not got much better since 2009. The vehicles are noisy and dirty still look like there polluting the air. We can see technology has happened as the news is spread all over the buildings. The Camera continues following Clive Owen, as he stops to pour some rum into his coffee the camera rotates around him framing him to the left and the street as the main focus then the “Bang” occurs causing a visceral response which aims to make you jump. The camera runs towards the scene of the explosion, the camera is shot as hand held to make it more realistic. With the diagetic sound of a screech, then the title of the film appears.