Research: Continuity in film clips (Inception)

Inception (2010)

The first 40 seconds of this clip is made up of lots of shot/reverse/shots as a conversation between two people is being filmed. There are 11 OTS shots in a row, switching each time from Ariadne to Cobb. Each shot is slightly more zoomed in than the last one, making the audience feel more involved and as if they are moving closer and closer into the action. It also allows the viewers to see the expressions on the characters’ faces, which becomes more important throughout the sequence as Ariadne is becoming more confused.

At 0:42, there is a master shot so we can see the characters in relation to each other and their surroundings, and also to vary up the shot types and avoid it becoming too repetitive. It also fits in with the fact that Ariadne is looking around to find out where she is, so we follow her gaze and take a look around too, making the audience feel more in touch with the character. There are then three more OTS shots as the characters talk a bit more, then a cutaway to show a close up of the cup of coffee shaking on the table. This moves away from the whole action of the sequence and focuses momentarily on a small part of the action, in this case the shaking cup to show that the whole place is actually shaking, again adding variety to the shot types.

Shot order is important in this sequence too, as it deliberately goes back to the OTS shots before the CU of the cup, otherwise it would go straight from a wide shot to a close up which wouldn’t flow very smoothly. At 0:56, there is a reaction shot of Ariadne looking shocked at the shaking cup, and the cut matches as she is looking down at the cup, then we see her look up in the next shot. After all of the books explode from a shop, it cuts to another, further out, master shot so we can see what is happening all around the characters.

At 1:00 there is another reaction shot of Ariadne reacting to the exploding and flying objects, and she looks in the right direction so it makes sense. There are lots of match-on-action shots at the end, because when we some that some objects have already exploded outwards, they are still in logical positions in the next shots, and they don’t seem to have moved back in time or moved too much.

There are also lots of special effects at the end of this sequence and specific techniques have been used in order to make it look as if all the humans in this scene have frozen whilst all of the exploding chaos happens, adding to the effect of this impossible dream world. Of course the diegetic added sounds of the crashing objects and bursting ground fit perfectly with the action so it seems to the audience as if these actions really are creating that noise.