KNIVES OUT - Scene 3

Scene 3 - marta arrives at harlan’s manor

Camera: Static/ car mount
notice how colors are not completely accurate due to reflection off glass
- It’s acceptable to let colors drift due to occasional flares or reflections. It gives context to the shot.
  - when these shots are aggressively corrected to look normal, they break down quickly.
- POLARIZATION likely used to cut out majority of reflections.
is the split lighting on marta’s face natural or INTENTIONALLY crafted?
- possible negative fill on left side of car?
- possible reflector or bounce board on right side of car?
Focal length is fairly tight for most closeups in this movie.
- face fills a large portion of the frame

camera: static
subtle focus pull from reflection of the house to marta’s face.
like the shot after this, the camera is positioned to frame for the resulting action. This is actually a very common theme in this movie
- i.e. fran walks into harlan’s study (scene 1), marta turns around to accept the phone call from walt (scene 2).
notice how the darker reflection of the house on the window allows us to get a glimpse into the car.
- the shape of the house in the window is sharp and THREATENING… “knives out”.
notice angle of the camera is set to tilt slightly down. this allows us to see more details inside the car.

camera: subtle tracking with marta’s face on tripod.
Extremely tight lens with faces that fill the frame for closeups. We are inside marta’s head at this point of the movie.
camera is not perfectly smooth with this shot, as with many shots in the movie. This is okay!
lighting is natural and likely not manipulated too much
- overcast sky acts as a large diffused light source.

camera: dolly in, digital scale in
- not sure why this was used but the movement makes for a very engaging shot.

camera: steadicam leading meg into a two-shot. digital zoom in on resulting frame.
dynamic shot that progresses dialogue

Camera: Steadicam leads marta and meg at an angle.
This shot breaks continuity from the previous shot. It’s alright to break continuity in moments.
- Thelma Schoonmaker, the editor for “the wolf of wall street” once said, “ The priority is absolutely on the best take on performance…it doesn’t matter. do you know why? because you’re being carried along by the power of the film.”
Meg vapes in this scene. Little things like that shows thoughtful character design.

camera: static
- close up shot where face fills 16:9 frame
this was likely shot as coverage. we return to this shot later.
Let’s take a look at the lighting in this shot. the lighting ratio is a bit high contrast, when compared to the frame where marta is exiting the car. She is next to a building, which may be acting as a negative fill.
- if she were to be further away from a building, but we were going in for a closeup, you’d get the same effect by using neg fill.

camera: static
It’s possible that a large light source was used from frame left. Based on BTS footage of the set, there were many occasions where arri SKY PANELS or led strip boards were x,y coordinate matched with daylight and used to amplify daylight.

Camera: pans left
Artificial light source amplifying and carrying daylight tones into the house.
- BTS Frame below shows how diffused light panels were used
- This light source separates marta’s coat from the background.
Possible that diffusion was hung above them to light faces during shots in the lobby.
notice how low angle the camera is! why is this?

camera: static
focus pull with Richard as he walks up to marta and linda
intentional lighting for richard’s face is very obvious here. Very soft light falloff on his face.

camera: truck right, pan left, and scale in (post). This is a slider shot, based on the bts photos.
pretty diffused SOURCE that was used in previous frames are likely lighting trooper wagner’s face.
- this light reflect off the black glossy wall in the background.
once again, this film is not afraid to mix different color temperature lights.