BW Film Analysis - The Hole

The Hole (Nick Hamm, 2001)

I recently watched the psychological thriller film, The Hole. I thought the film would be useful in terms of film research as it follows an asynchronous film narrative, starting at the end of the story and slowly working it's way back through in the same way that we plan to make our opening.

I noticed the following points:

1. If we are jumping between time zones or points in the narrative, these need to be made clear using titles. As well as this, sharp contrast in colours often suggest a change in the point of narrative.
2. Starting with the ending works well. Although it means that the audience knows that the character in the end does not die, it retains the mystery and the suspense as the audience knows that something will happen to the other characters.
3. The film will become confusing and disorientating if the narrative jumps between time zones too many times in the opening sequence. We need to keep this down to a minimum.
4. Having the end as the start is engaging and is likely to 'grab' the audiences attention quickly.