Film Journal | Inside Man (2006)

Film Details & Story Outline

Inside Man (2006) is a thriller American movie directed by Spike Lee and wrote by Russell Gewirtz. The integral characters in this movie are Keith Frazier, Dalton Russell, Madeleine White, and Arthur Case. This story narrated an armed robbery with hostages situation had happened in the Manhattan Trust Bank. This is a well-planned robbery that manipulates by their leader, Dalton Russell. Detective Keith Frazier is the main detective in charge to negotiate with the gang of robbers. During the progress of negotiation, Detective Frazier realises that this is not only a simple robbery.


Exposition

The story’s opening begins in medias res, with Dalton Russell confesses their offences. It is a flashback scene as it has been placed at the ending part once again. He has clarified the  “who, where, what, when, why” of their robbery. However, he does not tell us the “How”, creating suspense and mysterious to the audience. 




Similarity& Repetition

A dialogue that happens between Mr. Frazier and Mr. Mitchell have mentioned about the diamond ring before the investigation started. Mr. Frazier has asked about the information of diamond ring with one of the released hostages. Mr. Case’s bank locker has a big diamond ring and a note with a sentence “Follow the ring”.

Besides, one of the robbers mentions about the gum when Mr. Frazier grabs the opportunity to get into the bank. Eventually, Mr. Frazier founds some gums in Mr. Case’s bank locker.

Time

Temporal Order

This movie is edited according to non-chronological order as the exposition in the opening part is repeating the scene aftermath. Besides, there are many interrogation scenes that intersperse among the plots before reaching its climax.


Meaning

Explicit Meaning

The film name, “Inside Man” in explicit meaning refers to the robber, Mr. Russell who hides inside the mysterious cubicle that built collaboratively by the robbers. The explicit meaning of this movie is the criminal will be penalised and pay for what he has done in the past. As the old saying, justice will never be absent, it will only be late.

Implicit Meaning

In contrast, the implicit meaning of the movie title refers to the bigwigs, Mr. Case and Ms. White who think that they are capable to manipulate the overall situation with immoral approaches as they are the “inside man”. Unfortunately, all these “inside men” have lost their privileges since someone is grasping theirs scandals. This movie reveals the evil deeds and offences that done by the bigwigs and opportunist with noble gesture. For instance, Ms. White and Mayor chat courteously in the public but the Mayor is foul-mouthed when they are having a secret talk.


Film Language

Scene Editing

In the opening, the scene frequently switched between the surroundings of Wall Street and the robbers are doing the preparation for robbery. The audiences enable to connect these elements, understanding the location and the characters of this story without using any dialogue.


Colour Arrangement

The colour arrangement of the scene that represents in the interrogation room is high contrast. There are two function with the highly contrasted colour arrangement. The first purpose is to discriminate between the flash-back scenes and chronological scenes. Besides, it is implying that the interrogation room is a place to reveal the truth and differentiates black and white. 



Conclusion

To conclude, the screenwriter is done extremely well in writing this script as the plot makes me feel surprise. Mr. Russell’s anti-renaissance capability is one of the characteristics that most attracts me. The non-chronological plot makes the audience need more time to understand and digest the whole movie. Hence, I am here to suggest you guys watching this movie twice. It will probably make the audiences understand the movie from other dimensions. 

 

References

AFI CATALOG OF FEATURE FILMS. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://catalog.afi.com/Catalog/moviedetails/54821?sid=d64d3982-0d17-44a4-9027-7eb2da7b10be&sr=3.7660565&cp=1&pos=0



 



 


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Film Journal | Sumatra's Last Tiger (2010)

Image
Introduction and Story Line  Sumatra's Last Tiger is a documentary film released in 2010. Its director is Harun Rahman and the story background is located in Tambling, Indonesia. (Pulfer, 2019) The film shows the Sumatra conservation area which also the territory for the Sumatra tiger. It shows the disadvantages of humans illegal activities that cause the extinction of Sumatra tiger. The Sumatra tiger's conservation activities and its difficulties were demonstrated in this film. Mode of Documentary Poetic A poetic documentary mode is implemented in this documentary film. In the plot development, the voice-over mentions the tiger is overcoming the food shortage problem and tries to attack humans since the poachers have hunted most of the animals in Tambling, Indonesia. Besides, the illegal logging activities causes Sumatras tiger to lose their territory and approach the village in Tumbling. A blurry and linear scene is shown to act as the vision of a starved tiger that perceives...
Read more

Film Journal | Bicycle Thieves (1948)

Image
Introduction & Story Development Bicycle Thieves (1948) is an Italian Neorealism movie that is directed by Vittorio De Sica and written by Cesare Zavattini. Its main characters are Lamberto Maggiorani as Anthony Ricci and  Enzo Staiola as Bruno Ricci. (Bicycle thieves, n.d.) This movie is narrating a poor family living in Rome the city. Anthonio is one of the unemployed men at that time. He strives to ransom his old bicycle and eventually grabs the opportunity of working. However, his bicycle is snatched by thieves on the first day of work. Hence, he launches the investigation of the stolen bicycle. In the end, Anthonio not only fails on the investigation but also try to steal others bicycle and being caught by its owner at that moment. MODERNISM Halting delivery In the Bicycle Thieves, a halting delivery is shown in many scenes. The characters will suddenly vary their direction while they are walking to some places. For instance, when Anthonio spots the th...
Read more

Film Journal | Braveheart (1995)

Image
Introduction and Story Development Braveheart is an action movie released in 1995. It's director and writer respectively are Mel Gibson and Randall Wallace. Mel Gibson is also the integral character in this movie as he acts as William Wallace. The other characters are Angus Macfadyen as Robert the Bruce, Catherine McCormack as Murron MacClannough, and Patrick McGoohan as Longshanks- Edward I.  ( AFI catalog of feature films ) In the thirteenth century Scotland, Edward I is an ambitious king as he has been trying to occupy Scotland for many years. In William Wallace lifetime, his secret lover and father both killed by the English. Therefore, William Wallace has mustered the Scottish and set up an army to grab the opportunity of freedom for the Scottish. Eventually, he was betrayed by the Scottish noble and was executed a death sentence by the English. Although he is unfortunately killed by the English, his legendary stories and noble spirit have be...
Read more