Compare the opening scenes of two film versions of Great Expectations and review how effective they are in creating an atmosphere of tension.

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Compare the opening scenes of two film versions of Great Expectations and review how effective they are in creating an atmosphere of tension

The purpose of this essay will be to analyse and compare two versions of the opening scenes of Great Expectations. The first was produced by David Lean in 1994 and the second is an adaptation produced in 1997 by the BBC. In particular, observation will focus on how effective each is at creating an atmosphere of tension with regards to media techniques, sound effects and other film features.

Right at the beginning of David Leans version of Great Expectations a book appears which starts to be read by a narrator, the narrator is Pip grown up. This reassures the viewer that Pip survives his eventful child hood. After about a minute the pages start to turn over and then the book starts to fade. I think the book is there to show everyone that it is also a novel written by Charles Dickens, The pages start to turn over which represents the weather which is windy. As soon as the book fades you see Pip running towards the graveyard. To give a tense atmosphere the set is dark and deserted, and the sun is setting, casting a gold tint over Pip, and sound effects of the wind howling have been added.

This version is done in Black and White because they did not have colour in 1944. Even though it is done this way it creates more tension of atmosphere because you look at where the light is and the light will only be on the main feature.

When Pip gets to the grave yard he begins to pull out all the dead flowers from his mothers and Fathers graves. When he pulls out the weeds we can see from the close up of the grave that it has been neglected. The viewer makes the assumption that Pip is the only person that ever visits the grave. After he has pulled a few out he suddenly he stops and looks around making the audience think what will happen next. He looks at the trees swaying and the camera gets a close up of one tree which has an image of a dead face which represents the grave. Lighting is also used on the tree.
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The audience can see and here exactly what is making Pip uneasy, and should begin to experience some of the fear which is obviously affecting him.

The convict then jumps out on the left side of the screen and the brain automatically starts from the left hand side because people read from the left hand side so as soon as he jumps out you will immediately react.

It is at this point that Pip finally runs into Magwitch. David Lean builds up the tension very well here, by keeping the camera on Pip constantly, following ...

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