Sunday, October 5, 2014

Dutch Angles and Ghost Storm (2011)



When you watch as many bad movies as I do, you begin to pick up on little things that they have in common.  There are trends throughout bad movies that, though not necessarily the thing that makes the movie bad, may signal to you that you are watching a bad movie.  They are small story beats, camera tricks, or thematic similarities that are frequent in the bad movie portion of the film landscape.  I’ve noticed a few of them through watching bad movies, and thought that I’d focus on one specific trend in this post.

For this week’s post, I watched a movie called Ghost Storm.  This 2011 movie told the story of Hal Miller (Carlos Bernard), a sheriff on a small island who, along with his wife Ashley (Crystal Allen) and daughter Daisy (Cindy Busby), must stop an attack by a giant cloud of ghosts.  The ghosts are those of a group of former residents of the island who committed suicide a couple of generations previous.  With bad effects and some decently cheesy performances, the movie is quite entertaining to watch.

What really stands out in the movie, however, is the camerawork.  And that’s where we get into the trend that is apparent throughout Ghost Storm.  How the movie looks, in terms of colours, is pretty great.  It’s a treat on the eyes, really.  I wasn’t expecting the colours to pop like they do.  But there is one major setback in the camerawork that stands out over everything else.  That is the use of Dutch Angles.

Most of you should know what a Dutch angle is by now.  I say this because most of the people that read the blog come from my posting links to it on Twitter.  The people that follow me on Twitter are all into movies and probably know what a Dutch angle is.  I’m still going to explain the camera technique though, because there may be someone reading through blogs someday.  They’ll stumble upon this post and think to themselves “Dutch angle?  What’s that?”  A Dutch angle is when the camera is tilted on an angle while filming something in order to give a disorienting look to the shot.  It’s as simple as that.  The angles vary, but there is always an angle present in a Dutch angle.  That’s why angle is in the phrase.

The Dutch Angle is overused in bad movies.  I don’t know the reasons why, exactly.  I’m still going to give my thoughts on why I think Dutch angles are overused.  It all comes down to the director and the cinematographer.  They think that a Dutch angle looks cool.  Instead of finding a moment in which this style of filming can be put to good use and give an eerie feeling, they instead throw it in anywhere that they want an interesting visual.  It essentially becomes a quantity over quality case as they care more about their movie being stylistic than having the camerawork make sense.  The use of these techniques ends up taking away from the movie.

There is great craftsmanship in using a Dutch Angle if it is used properly.  Many filmmakers use this style of camera positioning to signify madness, possession, or anything that sets a character off of their normal, sane mindset.  There are actual thematic reasons that a good director or cinematographer would use the technique in a movie.  When any thematic reasoning for the technique is taken away in favor of a cool looking shot, it removes the good qualities from the use of it.  Instead, it makes looking at the movie a little more irritating.  The more the technique is misused, the more annoying the look of the movie gets.

Ghost Storm uses a lot of Dutch angles throughout its runtime.  About half of the time, they are put to good use.  The technique is used in the movie to signal the frenzy of trying to escape the storm.  The glaring issues were when it wasn’t used as part of the action.  In those moments, the use of Dutch angles simply stood out as a frustrating use of the camera.  It didn’t take too much away from the dumb fun of the movie.  It simply felt out of place and ugly.

The Dutch angle is just one of many techniques and tropes that are commonly used in bad movies.  It is also one of the most apparent because it is in front of the audience’s eyes the entire time.  There are many others that stand out as well: news broadcasts, montages, the director starring in the movie, ninjas, etc.  These are the things you notice when you watch a lot of the lesser movies that are released.  They are the things you remember because you have seen them so often.  And I watch bad movies often, so I recognize the familiarities.
Are you familiar with my notes yet?  Here are more notes:

  • Ghost Storm was suggested by @erincandy, who previously suggested Glitter.
  • One of the earliest common traits I covered in bad movies was the use of the word “robot” in a title when I watched the movie Robot Jox.
  • Crystal Allen played Ashley in Ghost Storm.  She was also in the final two Anaconda films.
  • She wasn’t the only actor in Ghost Storm who has been in other Sunday “Bad” Movies.  Steve Bacic played Carl in Ghost Storm.  He was previously in The Marine 3: Homefront and Ballistic: Ecks vs. Sever.
  • What other bad movies have Dutch angles in them?  Do you like or dislike Dutch angles?  Do you agree with anything I wrote?  Do you disagree with all of it?  Have you seen Ghost Storm?  You can answer these questions in the comments or comment about anything you like.
  • If you want to suggest a movie for me to watch for the Sunday “Bad” Movies, you can either contact me on Twitter or leave the suggestion in the comments.

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