clip from a movie, we can only generalize in dis-
cussing them in a movie as stylistically rich as
Sleepy Hollow. Throughout, however, Burton’s
mise-en-scène reflects a fairly consistent use of
framing and camera movement. Reinforcing the
closed nature of the movie, the frame is tightly
restricted on the characters being photographed.
Even many shots of the landscape are equally tight,
providing little sense of the sky above or even theearth below; and when they do, the sky is invariably
overcast.
The lighting creates a very moody atmosphere.
The exterior lighting—where mist, chimney smoke,
and flashes of lightning are constant motifs—is
slightly less dim than the interior lighting, which is
provided seemingly by candles and firelight. The
total impact of the design elements in Sleepy Hollow
is that they produce distinct emotional responses
in the viewer that perfectly complement our emo-
tional responses to the narrative’s twists and turns.
We are repelled by the superstitious fears of the
entire community and are made uncomfortable by
the conspiracy among the townspeople to hide the
secret of the Horseman, and the mise-en-scène
reinforces our discomfort even as it mesmerizes
our eyes.Sam Mendes’s American Beauty
American Beauty (1999; production designer:
Naomi Shohan), about two families in crisis, the
Burnhams and the Fittses, is essentially a verisim-
ilar movie, totally different from the fantastic world
of Sleepy Hollow. But it is also subtly satirical, and
its overall mise-en-scène is central to making us
aware of its satirical slant. The director and pro-
duction designer use many aspects of their design
scheme to define characters and comment on vari-
ous aspects of contemporary American society,
including consumerism and corporate culture, vio-
lence, puritanical sexual mores, mindless patriot-
ism, self-empowerment jargon, peer pressure, drug
use, unemployment, loneliness, and discrimination.
These details are integral elements in an overall
vision, patiently creating and revealing the charac-
ters while establishing the context for their lives
and conflicts. American Beautyis a movie whose
total mise-en-scène makes us laugh and feel terri-
fied at the same time.
The Burnham family includes Lester (Kevin
Spacey), an advertising salesman who quits his job
in an attempt to free himself from the limits of middle-
class life; his wife, Carolyn (Annette Bening), a real-
estate agent who is a perfectionist; and Jane
(Thora Birch), their teenage daughter, who coolly
regards her parents as “gross.”1
2
Expressive details define characters in Sleepy
HollowIn a movie as brilliantly stylized as Tim Burton’s
Sleepy Hollow, one in which the story hangs on the struggle
between superstition and reason, many of the characters are
defined in part by their costumes, makeup, or the props with
which they are associated. For example, [1] Katrina Van
Tassel’s (Christina Ricci) book, A Compendium of Spells,
Charms and Devices of the Spirit World, associates her
clearly with the witchcraft that bedevils Sleepy Hollow, while
[2] Ichabod Crane’s (Johnny Depp) wonderful eyeglasses and
bag of medical instruments, including some of his own
devising, tell the town’s inhabitants, as well as the movie’s
viewers, that he is a man of science.LOOKING AT MISE-EN-SCÈNE 215