Suspense

 

The clip that I chose from the reading "A Brief History of Cinema" was the short film "Suspense". The film is about a family that is eventually invaded by a tramp when the husband is away and working. The movie starts off with the husband saying he will be home later since he is busy with work. This starts of the chain of suspense in the movie. It creates an uneasy feel of something bad will end up happening. The movie goes on until eventually a tramp starts wandering around the house and ends up getting inside which prompts the wife to call her husband. This is where the most suspenseful part of the film begins. We have a race between the husband getting home and the tramp getting to the wife. Couple of obstacles get in the way for both of the characters until the husband is able to get home in time to get to the tramp. The police then arrests the tramp as they were following the husband. 

The movie although being very old was able to create a good amount of suspense from what they were able to use. I think one of the best examples is when the tramp walks by the window and the wife does not notice. This makes the audience feel on edge and wanting to scream at the wife to look out the window. Another part of suspense that I enjoyed was when the wife, husband, and tramp are in a 3 picture divided shot just like the picture above. The wife is telling the husband to get home and then eventually the tramp cuts the phone line. This then starts the whole race of getting home or getting to the wife and baby. 

This film was only 10 minutes but I ended up enjoying this film clip the most compared to the other ones present in the article. It was interesting to see how suspense was first implemented into film and how some shots are still being used today. Just like when the tramp walks pass the window momentarily. We get to see this a lot in many of the horror films that we watch nowadays.