Textual Analysis- Zahid Ahmed

The film I am going to be analysing is the film Hostage, which was released on the 11th of March in the year 2005. The film was directed by the French director Florent Emilio Siri. The film is a hybrid and therefore the genre associated with the film is combined with the genres Action and Thriller to form an action Thriller film.

The film is structured in the conventional Todorov’s Equilibrium model, as it starts off with the equilibrium where we are introduced to the main character Jeff Talley, gradually as the film goes on we see the disruption where the main character tends to negotiate with a man who happens to also be a kidnapper of his wife and son, who all eventually die. We then see that Talley’s wife and daughter have also been kidnapped. We see the new equilibrium when Talley rescues his wife and daughter by killing the antagonist.

The film is in chronological order as there are no flashbacks, and it more or less shows the film to be in real time. The narrative is closed as we see a clear ending to the film, which means there should be no other views on what happens next. The narrative is omniscient as us the audience are never really restricted from any part of the film, whether it be the protagonist or the antagonist, it is all omniscient.

The Actor Bruce Willis who plays the cast of Jeff Talley as the protagonist, who is a former police. This a conventional aspect of the genre as the protagonist usually in such genre films has skills such as police or relevant type skills. Also it is a conventional aspect in the genre of action that someone is held hostage, in this film the main element is people being held hostage.

The class of the protagonist is that of middle/upper class, whereas the antagonist tends to come from a working class background, this is also a conventional aspect as in all such films the social class tends to be of such, as represented within this film.

The use of camera is used effectively in a conventional manner throughout the film, there are also various camera techniques such as pans and tilts used throughout the film to add to the effect of the genre of thriller. There are some parts of the film where we can tell that the camera is handheld, this is to show that the atmosphere within the scene is part of the disruption.

Mise en scene is also used effectively throughout the film mainly through props, costume and lighting as there are guns and knives used to signify that it has got action as well as it being a thriller. Costume is also used effectively throughout the film to represent class. Lighting is a main conventional aspect within the films associated with the genre of thriller, this is something that in scenes such as hostage scenes will have the main effect, for e.g. in a hostage scene it will always tend to be dark rather than bright, this is due to the fact that it will have more of an effect, this is similar to our film Bound by Blood, as in this film we will also tend to be using low key lighting as it will have a deeper thriller type atmosphere.

Editing is also used effectively throughout the film, as again it is conventional for the genre of thriller to use fast cut editing as well as, using sound effects within certain scenes to create a thriller atmosphere.