Film analysis

The opening of the film "The Cleaner" starts off in the streets of the city as we follow a woman to her mother's house. The colours of the starting sequences is very grey and dark while we see smoke/smog coming up from the ground. This was done intentionally as it sets the mood for the film as being dark. it also corresponds to the type of job that the main character does as it is a dirty business. The use of the voice-over is instantly recognised as Samuel L. Jackson, which is the main character of the film. The viewer comes to the film knowing this so knows straight away what he is saying is important and relevant to the narrative of the film. The voice over is the biggest narrative tool as it is the only thing that informs us of what is going on. Without the voice over we could've interepreted the opening differently for example, during 1:02 the narrator details the women's death. We also start to get an idea of the Jackson's character before we've even seen him because of how easily he is able to talk about his gruesome profession and how lightly he feels about death. The camera shots become jumpy at 1:13 for only that part of the clip because it is meant to represent the frame of mind that the women is in after seeing her dead mother. The non-diegetic soundtrack at the start of the film opening, I feel, is quite mysterious as the narrative is beginning to be created. It also starts to become low and more quite as the death of the mother is described and her daughter's cries can be heard. Although, after that it becomes more casual as we're now past the initial death and moved onto the business side of someone dying. It almost makes it seem normal and natural to the main character that his job revolves around people dying.