Mise-En-Scene - Ms Georgiou

Mise En Scene is a french term meaning what is put into a scene or a frame, Usually this includes the visual information in front of the camera; or also simply reffered to as what the audience would be seeing while watching the scene.

Mise En Scene consists and is made up of 5 different elements, all of which are communcation essential to the audiences, these include;
- Settings and Iconography, These consist of background/backdrops and objects/props (Iconography) placed within the scene.
- Costume, Hair and make up, The appeal of the characters within the movie, make up can also be used as a sort of fake blood and scars on a character for some certain scenes.
- Facial-Expressions and body language, The use of expressing emotions through both facial expression and body language
- Lighting and colour, The use of the filler lights, back lights, and a key light (as well as the use of low key or high key lighting)
- Positioning of characters/objects within the frame/scene

Settings and iconography
Both the settings and location of where the scene takes place play an important part in film-making and are more than just "mere-backgrounds" as what most people consider them.
This is mostly because settings such as the background and location of the current scene can manipulate an audience by building certain expectations and then deciding to take a different turn.
For example a peaceful neighbourhood with nice tidy houses which seem well kept and then once the character decides to enter the house, a massive fight starts to break out, a good example of this would be in the movie Kill Bill and in the following scene below

Iconography also plays an important part, and as just seen in the above clip, you can see that the props/objects are arranged in a casual, tidy way rather than scattered and cluttered all over the place, which in turn gives us the expectation that a formal or casual day is going to take place for the character, which then we find out in the next scene it goes in a completely different way.

Costume, Hair and make up
These act as a sort of instant indicator to us about a character's personality, their status, and their job title/role. A example can be a man in a flashy business suit who then later in the film is working in a office in a scene, but before we saw what his real job was in the film, by judging by what he looked like and what he was wearing, we could already assume he has a formal and office based work.
Below is another good example of how mostly costumes can be linked and represent characters in a film (mostly involving their job status in this case)
Costume, hair and make up can also immediately whether the film is set in the present, past or future (for a sci-fi which is set in the future, some sort of advanced robotics suit may be used, while for present times movies it would just be the usual suit or sweater.
Certain costumes can also signify certain characters/individuals, such as the example video above with "the agents" who are wearing sunglasses, a suit, and a radio ear piece. More examples can include a black and red cloak of a vampire, or even in the movie Spiderman; the spiderman suit the hero wears.

Facial expressions and body language
Facial expressions can provide a clear indication of how a character feels and is reacting to the situation, if someone is smiling broadly, we assume that they are very happy, however other factors such as by adding a certain sountrack to that scene can make us feel differently about that. An example can be by adding a slow and tense soundtrack, we can assume that while the character is smiling, in truth the character is trying to keep calm or trying not to panic.
Body language can also indicate how a character may feel towards the situation, or even another character and their possible relationship between them. A good example can include that a character who has their arms folded and not keeping direct eye contact with another character who is trying to have a converstation with them may not be as interested in listening to what the character has to say, but however if he had his arms not folded and was looking at him keeping good eye contact, we can assume that he is interested in what the other character has to say to him.

Positioning of characters and objects within a frame
By using positioning within a frame, it can draw our attention to an important character/object in the scene. In an example; by putting a valuable or glowing object that stands out within that scene, it can focus for us to look at that specific object, or the character who may be holding it.
Positioning can also be used in terms of characters to indicate their relationship between each other, mostly a couple who is quite a good distance apart from one another can show they may face breaking up or are having conflicts with one another. While a couple who is close to each other are perfectly fine and are happy with one another.