The world moves at a rapid pace
Our lives slip through our fingers. We have no control of time
Except of course if you're a filmmaker
Slow motion has become such a commonplace technique in modern film
It's just a major part of the language, and filmmakers intuitively manipulate
the speed of the image
It's used heavily in action cinema
From Sam Peckinpah to John Woo and on.
Often in action scenes it's there to aestheticize the violence. To make it more operatic or balletic
In fantasy or sci-fi it can show a character's
superhuman powers. Their ability to manipulate time. Or it can even be used
literally, to show the different layers of time.
And it can help us focus in on details that will not be registered at normal speed
by the naked eye
It can also be used to get us inside the head of the lead protagonist
Martin Scorsese does this frequently, illustrating a character's racism.
His intense jealousy. Or the moment he falls in love
The slow motion in this sequence from Full Metal Jacket is especially dramatic
because of its economy. And though the shots aren't from any specific character's
point of view, it represents the squadron's collective POV
They are being drawn into a dangerous conflict by a cunning sniper who is playing on their sympathies
Slow motion can also heighten emotion
Wong Kar-Wai is a great practitioner of this using it in synergy with music
to express the romantic longing of his characters
And he often experiments with slow shutter speeds to increase the intensity
And the sensual romanticism the technique creates can be used in direct contrast
to something abrasive
In Dredd there's a street drug that's literally called slo-mo,
as drugs can make you feel as though you're in a time vacuum
Weren't you supposed to be training Mickey right now?
No it ain't til 9 O Clock
Dicky it's fucking 11:45
What?
There are suspense sequences where everything to slow down
Because characters are in a heightened state where every last second counts
In Carrie's prom sequence this is pushed to the point of absurdity
The audience has already been told that this is all headed towards tragedy
so Carrie's intense joy here is undercut with dread
And the technique also assists in mocking the whole Prom scenario
Quentin Tarantino has used the device to make his characters appear hip and cool
but it could also be argued that it's a self-reflexive commentary
Because ask yourself. How many of these characters will make it out alive?
How would it have been any different if you had just decided to shoot that at the normal speed
Well, this is precisely the point. I did it when at the normal speed
it was not possible to see things, or at least indicate a possibility
that there is something different to be seen
They were fighting together. But you had to indicate they were still in love together
Wes Anderson will often end his films with slow motion
It gives a chance for the audience to collect their thoughts and digest everything
they've just seen
As well as it being the last fleeting moments of an experience they don't want to end
And perhaps this is why slow motion is so synonymous with the death scene
Capturing those lost precious moments of a character's life
that an audience is helpless to save