Research Movie Trailers: Law Abiding Citizen

This one is the last of the three trailers which I researched and unlike the others doesn’t have any supernatural element within the storyline, but also shows many of the conventions that are found within suspense films regardless of its plot. The storyline for this film is that a man who loses his wife and child to two criminals seeks revenge against them and against the justice system for letting of the them walk free after a deal was made for a testimony.

The trailer explains as much within the first minute, with the trailer beginning with an establishing shot of a cityscape (and although both of my other trailers also did the same thing I believe it to be co-incidence as it’s more about where the film is based, not that it has to be a city) which transits using a fade to black effect to a shot with the protagonist and his family, with a piano non-diagetic music which represents both growing tension but also happiness/times of good. As the camera tracks to back of Clyde (the protagonist) it uses a slight shake cam technique, a technique which is used during the next sequence as the criminals break into Clyde’s home to show fast-paced action. Also the trailer doesn’t explicitly tell the audience what is happening to Clyde’s family but we are able to understand through the use of fast edit shots between the criminals and Clyde’s family, as well as the dialogue of the wife screaming and the smaller criminal urging the other to move and the build up in the non-diagetic soundtrack. The last shot we see is an extreme close-up shot of Clyde’s face, seeing him struggling to break free as the shots fades to white, after which the production studios are titled.

The titles fade to black and the next shot fades from black, another establishing shot of what looks like a governmental building, with a dialogue that follows onto the next shot-reverse-shot sequence showing a conversation between two lawyers, one of which is another main character (an important comment to make here on character is that in a suspense film it is not always clear which person we should be supporting, as these films tend to have two protagonists who both face each other on opposite sides of a moral field. In both this film and Death Note, the two protagonists (Clyde and Nick for Citizen, Kira and L for Death Note) follow this convention as it keeps the viewer neutral to them and increases the tension when they come into conflict with each other.)

The shot fades to another establishing shot of a skyscraper then straight edits to another shot-reverse-shot with a single straight edit to a different scene that is related to this story point, again this is purely in an effort to keep the story moving on. The biggest point here is the scene where the criminal shakes the hand of the Nick, with an emphasis added to this shot by doing a close up shot of the hand shake and showing the expressions on the face of the criminal and Nick as well. The music crescendos again and this time the shots “flash edit,” with each shot closer to Clyde broken up with white flash like a camera flash (appropiate as there’s many journalists in this scene) and every edit punctuated by the background music. After a dramatic text title on what looks like a misty background this same technique is used as he walks away, repeating everything done in the previous section.

We have an extreme close up shot of a key object (a bracelet Clyde daughter made him) which blurs out to focus on Clyde holding it before the “flash edit” is used twice more, now showing Clyde’s plan in motion. This “flash edit” starts to become a signature technique for this trailer, as by flashing the white the viewer’s attention is briefly distracted by the flash which causes the next scene to have more of a memorable effect upon the viewer, although personally much like how the flash shot is used in “Death Note” I find it too disorientating, especially when it’s used this many times.

In conclusion this research has helped greatly in terms of shaping the trailer, as each of these trailers makes a noticable use of audio and transistions as much as the content of the video clips themselves, choosing mainly to keep the shots not too complicated in order to allow for faster editing between the shots, in order to build the tension up to the end of the trailer. As well as this smaller details such as the usage of darker lighting to create a more oppressive atmosphere as well as possibly not ending the trailer on the film’s title, but instead on a final quote or scene that will give them one last moment of the film.