Analyzing Baz Lurhmann's Film Language for Scene-Specific Audience Response

Categories: FilmLanguage

Moulin Rouge tells the story of Christian (Ewan McGregor), a young writer in Paris who begins a doomed romance with the city's most famous courtesan, Satine (Nicole Kidman). Satine is the star of the eponymous nightspot, whose future depends on her marrying a wealthy patron (Richard Roxburgh) the duke. In a plot twist borrowed from "La Bohi??me" (which Baz Luhrmann (director) filmed for Australian television in 1993), she is also suffering from tuberculosis. Although it takes place in Paris at the beginning of the 20th century (1900) it uses dance and music from the contemporary pop culture.

Some elements of film language that is used in the scene that I will be looking at are special effects, music and sound and many more. When I first saw the scene I was indulged by the use of red and gold in santine room where the whole scene was based, the use of these colours made it portray a romantic scene ahead along with the romantic pose that Satine and Christian began the scene with, which shows Christian leaning over Santine in a clinch, but this scene was completely the opposite and it was a scene of comedy, tension and bizarre actions.

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The scene that I have looked at was based in Santines room in the house of Moulin Rouge, the sets main colours of the room where red and gold, the red would signify an intimate atmosphere and love, the gold in the room signifies how high class Santine is in the social class, it shows how classy she is and what a luxurious hooker she is.

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Also in the set Santines room shows there are nude pictures and fruits such as grapes this would imply that her room is one of erotic atmosphere and anticipation. This would make the audience feel that Santines room is one of passion and love.

The Mise on scene in the room seemed to be placed so Christian could hide, Baz Lurmann did this to make the audience react excited and tense while Christian was rooming around the room trying to hide from the Duke. The costume that santine was wearing in this particular scene was a bask, this was to give a sense of eroticism, the bask she was wearing was ni??gulate and there was no practical reason for her to wear that, she used the bask as a prop and used it to do what she wanted to do for example hide Christian, the costume shows the audience what Santine status is, which is a very high profile hooker.

The costume of the duke was suite this signified to the audience his status as a very rich person, which Baz Lurhmann wanted to emphasis. The lighting in this scene was significant, it shows us the audience the kind of atmosphere ahead. In this particular scene the lighting was bright and entertaining and it was more focused on certain areas of the set such as sculpture being highlighted and the lighting being slightly subdued nearer the bed. The camerawork in this scene, used a variety of techniques such as point of view shots, close up shots and tracking shots.

The camerawork that was mostly used in this scene was a point of view shot from Satine and a tracking shot showing movement all around the room whilst Christian was hiding, this is significant as it is one of only a few shots that would portray the tension and excitement of scene. Dramatic irony is used when Santine Is singing to the duke the camerawork plays an Important part in this as it shows Satine point of view and we can see she is actually singing the song to Christian not to the Duke which is dramatic irony.

The special effects used in this scene are when Santine finishes singing her song to the duke, the duke thinks that she was singing the song to him but the audience knows she is really singing the song to Christian and therefore in amazement of the song stars appear in the Duke eyes, symbolising love towards Satine these are very corny special effects. Also Sound effects are used when Satine grabs the duke on to the bed, comical sounds used to illustrate the bedsprings, which typifies the bizarre, comical scene that is shown to the audience.

Sound effects are also used when Satine opens and closes the duke's legs in order to communicate with Christian, the effect this has on the audience is to show that satine is putting on a show for the duke. The music used in this scene are modern songs, they are used when santine is seducing the duke, this makes the scene fake but the duke thinks they are great made up poetry. The audience realise this is they no she is only seducing the duke in order for Christian to escape.

At the beginning of the scene when Satine and Christian are in a classical pose the music suddenly wines down when Satine realises that Christian is a penniless writer and not a rich duke. This has sad meaning for Satine and makes the audience tense on how she will react. Baz Lurhmann wants the audience to react exited, comical and on the edge of their seats to see whether the Duke spots Christian rooming around the room.

I think Baz Lurhmann has been unsuccessful in this because for me he hasn't shown enough point of view shots of the characters to show the intensity and consequences of what will happen if Christian is spotted. Lurmann also uses poor special effects to illustrate the comical side of the scene, which the audience need to indulge themselves into as in nowadays special effects play a big part in the movie.

Updated: May 03, 2023
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Analyzing Baz Lurhmann's Film Language for Scene-Specific Audience Response. (2020, Jun 02). Retrieved from https://studymoose.com/explain-baz-lurhmann-uses-film-language-make-audience-respond-scene-particular-way-new-essay

Analyzing Baz Lurhmann's Film Language for Scene-Specific Audience Response essay
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