Immediately conventions are used. Extreme close ups show two characters in conversation restricts our awareness of who they are leaving us 'in the dark'. One character smokes a cigarette, a classic thriller convention giving a serious and sinister image. Another classic convention is that of a spiral staircase. These are conventions because they obscure the literal view of things on different levels when they can or may still be heard. This creates an unnerving atmosphere. Also they can represent distance, disorientation and confusion. In this scene in the hotel, high angle shots are used to show the main man in danger as vulnerable and as if easy prey for the 'hunter'. Later in the film after the first scene in the hotel, there is yet another spiral staircase. Here a young girl sits at the top of the staircase smoking a cigarette. This creates a contrast between the apparent innocence of a young girl and the fact that she is smoking which connotes the complete opposite.From the first scene we are aware that drugs are heavily involved in the motivations of some of the characters within the film. This is a classic motive for a thriller film because of the stereotypes of drug dealers. How Leon is different is that the criminal drugs related dealing situation is put into the context of a family and them suffering the consequence of the involvement in such things.
Leon is revealed as a hit man early on in the first scene however, in the second scene he is shown as a kind man with slight immoralities (stealing milk). When he saves the girl from the murdering gangsters he shows yet even more compassion to the girl who he has sympathy for.
Leon is represented as an excessively organised person who does everything systematically, he also appears not to be social around people which almost suggests some form of autism. It is frequent to have a significant character who has an unusual mental state, for example in Phsyco where Norman Bates has a split personality disorder which leads him to commit murder.
Sam - there is some good general analysis of character her but you need to look at each sequence carefully and describe how the shots are composed and edited to create suspense. You need to identify how the audience uses the thriller conventions in order to anticipate what is going to happen and also how the sequences challenge the conventions of the gnere.
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