Analysis of opening 2 minutes of Les Misérables

• Les Misérables is a 2012 British epic romantic musical historical drama film produced by Working Title Films and distributed by Universal Pictures.

• The film starts underwater with telling us the back story. It gives us the year and what has happened before we join the story. As the text fades away we hear a muffled drum beat. We then see what looks like a french flag as we get nearer to the stop of the water. When we reach the top there are lots of bubbles and the first thing we see when we get out of the water is a ship that looks like it has crashed. 

• The music is very loud when we come out of the water, there are trumpets which represents an alarm of war or a command to march. It is very dark and gloomy which could show us that it is night or to represent that it is going to be depressing and dismal. The waves are crashing up against the boat which could show that it is stormy, which is pathetic fallacy, foreshadowing something bad will happen. We then see the whole of the ship and at the other side are men pulling the boat with ropes. The music seems to be coming to a stop. The men grunt as they pull the rope to show that the work is hard, also they are getting hit with the waves constantly so we get the feeling that this is not voluntary. 

• The camera zooms in to the men and they all look tired, dirty and angry. From a worms eye view we see someone standing above the men, this is to show his authority over the other men. The men have chains on them which could suggest that they are slaves or prisoners. The men start singing, “look down.” which is like an order that they have been told to follow, though one man keeps looking up and this could show that he is disobeying. The slave is dressed in rags, has a long beard and dirty face and the officer is wearing blue which connotes to royalty and looks clean and well presented.

• The main is told to ‘retrieve the flag’ and as he picks up the flag pole the music gets louder and more prominent, this could be to show the strength of the man. The French flag is dragged through mud which could show us that bad things may happen in France in the rest of the film.