This research is conducted to study the elevator scene coverage in films. I will be looking into the ways these scenes are covered, what is the relationship between these types of coverage and the space they are set in. Due to time limit and other reasons, this research mostly focuses on cinematography, staging and directing actors, and their relationship with the environment, which in this case, are elevators.

After 19 films with elevator scenes are viewed, 16 are selected to be studied in this research. Based on the complexity of scene coverage, they are divided into three sections, Simple, Advanced and Complex, and this research will be deconstructing them while finding out what can be learnt from them. The methods used in the research will not only include examining the techniques used, but also making assumptions about ‘what if the scene is shot in open space instead of an elevator’, and compare the differences.

Starting with this scene in 500 Days of Summer is the first encounter of Summer and Tom. Between the closing and the opening of that elevator, it is covered with only a mid-two shot from eye level, perpendicular to the actors and the elevator. The actors’ physical positions do not change, and they are barely moving. It is the simplest choice to cover an elevator scene. There is a similar scene in Lost in Translation (2003, Sofia Coppola), which is a static shot where Bob Harris (Bill Murray) is surrounded by a group of short Japanese men. The coverage of that scene is simple but achieved an interesting effect. This designed scene deepens the film, by showing that Bob is physically misfit in the environment, and also implying that culturally and emotionally.

There is an elevator scene in Thor: Ragnarok (2017) beginning with a short-reverse-shot, mid close-up coverage during the conversation between Thor and Loki in the middle of this scene, it cuts to the same kind of two-shot mentioned above. Meanwhile, the tension of a classic brother-bonding moment is relieved, and the scene quickly picks up a comedic tone. That’s not rare using a wider shot to relieve tension or suspense, even to transit to a comic plot. However, in the elevator is an interesting scenario where the actors are normally all staged towards the gate, which in some cases, is also straight to the camera. Visually, their facial expressions and body languages are exposed directly towards the audience, enhancing the impact of acting. At the end of this scene, Loki (Tom Hiddleston) turns his face back from Thor (Chris Hemsworth) while delivering the line “we’re not doing GET HELP”, there seems to be a moment of breaking the fourth wall. We can acknowledge his words as being said to both Thor and the audience; maybe the only reason he faces this way is because he is in an elevator, but it can also be read another way. This standing position in the elevator provides this ambiguity to help the director pull out this little trick without compromising the overall setting if self-reflexivity is not a characteristic of the film. Another thing to note in this scene is, the scene is clearly done on a set with green screen, and the city outside the window is done by CGI. If observing closely, it is noticeable that the ‘elevator’ is moving quite slowly, Arguably, this mistake compromised the authenticity of this scene. 

In a similar scene in Vanilla Sky (2001), the truth of David Aames’ (Tom Cruise) tragedy is revealed in a panoramic elevator. Although the technology at the time was far behind, the elevator still seems to be operating at a reasonable speed. (starts from 0:42 in the video below)

There is a scene in Spider-Man 2 (2004) that is similar to Thor, except instead of brothers, it is two strangers sharing an elevator ride. The director, Sam Raimi, acknowledged the indiscriminate intimacy that the elevator forces onto its riders. He took advantage of that quality to create an awkward atmosphere between Spider-Man and this stranger, thus enhancing the humor in dialogue. So far all the scenes that are studied for this research are done with simple coverage choices, and they all seem to achieve a comedic effect one way or another This discovery raises an intriguing assumption to be examined; there might be a connection between genre and the complexity of its scene coverage. (The scene starts from about 1:05 in the vidoe below)

Compared with the simple coverage, the next part is what I categorise as advanced elevator scenes, it is noticeable that scenes in this section are more orchestrated. In a scene from The Amazing Spider-Man II (2014), Gwen Stacy (Emma Stone) just escaped from the chase of security and got into the elevator. The camera isolates Gwen alone in the frame to create an illusion that she is finally safe. However, Harry Osborn’s (Dane DeHaan) voice suddenly intrudes, and the camera pans about 45 degrees to the right to reveal that Gwen is actually not alone, maybe not safe either. The audience is tricked by the camera, and that would not work in an open space. Imagine if this scene happens in an open space, Gwen is in the shot and Harry calls her from behind, it would only appear to be a mere surprise because he could come from anywhere; it might just be recgnised as a coincidence. While when the scene is set in an elevator, the audience will realize that Harry is there at the start; not having that information could be dangerous to Gwen since Harry is a potential villain in the film. The narrow and closed nature of elevators helps to build this mysterious characteristic of Harry, as he frightens both Gwen and the audience.

A sign of the advanced coverage, as I note, is the use of various shot choices. Some coverage goes beyond the cinematographic choice of eye-level mid-shot, to a combination of different shot types and angles. This elevator scene in Joker (2019) is shot mostly from low angles, which normally make the characters look powerful and dominant, but it’s quite the opposite in this scenario of Joker. Again, imagine if the scene is set in an open space, Arthur (Joaquin Phoenix) meets Sophie (Zazie Beets) and her child, then we use a low angle on Arthur or Sophie. In the background, it is a landscape consists of the city and the big blue sky of Gotham. That background can extend thousands of miles, and the characters appear so tall in that low-angle shot like he/she owns the whole world. However, these characters do not own anything; on the contrary, they are at the bottom of the society, they are the lower class. Looking at this scene, they are in this small, shabby and barely-functioning elevator. The low angle only makes Arthur’s head closer to the ceiling, he is surrounded by walls right next to him, that image is also achieved with a relatively longer focal length. The environment seems like boxing in, which makes Arthur look even more depressed, trapped in his desperate situation. That is another way to take advantage of the narrowness of scene setting. The same technique can be found used in that elevator scene in Drive (2011) when the three people stand silently, trapped in a small space where an intense combat can happen anytime.

In regards to the act of violence in elevator scenes, there are some other examples. In James Cameron’s Terminator 2: Judgment Day (1991), Sarah (Linda Hamilton), John (Edward Furlong) and T-800 (Arnold Schwarzenegger) are running away from T-1000 using an elevator, and the battle begins on two sides of the elevator ceiling. Interestingly, rather than an elevator fight, the coverage of this scene is very similar to a car fight. There are many scenarios where someone A is on top of the car trying to kill someone B from outside, and B also wants to kill A from inside. So they try to shoot or stab each other blindly through the roof. Cameron shot the scene just like that, except he does not show the man on top of this ‘vehicle’. His choice of not showing the enemy puts a more intense, threatening layer to this scene because the audience are as ‘blind’ as the characters in the elevator, they cannot see where the blade is coming from. And the handheld shaky camera makes it more immersive too. The coverage by Cameron reveals another useful point of the elevator, its isolation; all the information and knowledge are limited to what you see, and the outside world can be dangerous because of its mysteriousness. Limiting the scene to the elevator riders’ perspective keeps the suspense, nonetheless showing what’s outside can spoil at least half of it (starts from 0:53 in the video below). In contrast, the elevator fight in Suicide Squad (2016) is just a normal one-on-one combat with average level fight choreography, there are some better ones in the complex coverage sections worth looking at. (scene finishes at 0:52 in the clip below)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z6UKAJyrPF4

There are some wonderful elevator combat scenes in films such as Smokin’ Ace (2006), Die Hard with a Vengeance (1995) and Captain America: the Winter Soldier (2014). The directors use the space and the design of elevators to gradually build up tension to a fight, both the prelude and the climax of these scenes have lots to be learnt from. Compared with the other two, Die Hard with a Vengeance is made quite earlier, so it is possible the ones after borrowed some approaches from it to cover similar scenes. There are some connections that can be detected between them. In this scene from Die Hard, the fake cops get into the elevator one by one and intentionally surround John McClane (Bruce Willis), the camera is set at the back with slightly lower angle to make McClane shorter than them hence present him in a weaker position. McClane looks around him, and the film cuts to a point-of-view shot following his eyeline, as both McClane and the audience pick up the clue which suggests that these are actually villains. After some classic McClane nifty words to distract them, there begins the shooting. During the shooting, there is a shot where McClane and a villain point guns at each other and the director conducted a series of camera movements in one shot; whip-pan left, then tilt up, then to the right to end this shot. This shot would work in an open space too, but it just looks more intense in a narrow space. Then, the director took a shot from a very high level, which would make no sense in an open space because there would not be a reasonable perspective for that kind of shot; but in the elevator it just seems like a reasonable angle to have. (starts from 0:17 in the clip below, ends at 1:35)

In this scene from Die Hard we can see the director uses the camera to capture the reflection on the elevator, but quickly panned to the object; this use of reflection is further explored in Smokin’ Ace. This scene from Smokin’ Ace starts with a horizontally sided angle, giving out the position of two characters to the audience; it is important to clarify the position of actors if the scene later involves crossing the imaginary line. As mentioned before, the elevator is an unusual scenario where people face the same direction, which makes this shot more than a normal dirty shot, but a shot from which we can see both actor’s facial expressions simultaneously. The assassin (Nestor Carbonell) takes up a larger proportion of the frame than the agent (Ray Liotta), suggesting that this assassin currently has the upper hand because the agent does not know his true identity; the agent who’s standing at the corner appears to be in unknown danger. Next we can see the director uses the agent’s eyeline to lead some point of view shots as the agent picks up clues of who this man in front of him really is. The assassin is facing back to the agent, so from the agent’s point of view he only sees the reflection of the assassin on the elevator gate, the reflection can be seen as an implication of the assassin’s disguise; that is similar with the scene from Die Hard. Then, the camera on steadicam starts to track in, the shot gets closer to build up tension, metaphorically the agent is getting closer to the truth at the same time. When the verbal confrontation is near to an end, the camera jumps the line to disturb this moment, signifying the upcoming shooting. This shot across the line uses the mirrors in the elevator to expand the spatial sense, and still informs the locative information to the audience; it is a really smart way to cover this scene. The scene also takes that high angle shot from Die Hard further to make it a top shot, hence creating a central-symmetrical composition and achieving a fairly good aesthetic effect.

While examining this scene from Captain America: Winter Soldier, I find it is almost a combination of Die Hard and Smokin’ Ace but just with more henchmen for the protagnist to fight. The henchmen come in to gradually surround Captain and the camera took a shot from the back, just like Die Hard. Interestingly this shot is from eye level, that is probably because Captain America is to be portrayed as a strong fearless superhero, so he should not look too weak in the film. With so many people crushing in a small place, the fight choreography becomes very important. The way they staged the fight is very smart, the director first uses a series of quick shots, each showing the Captain (Chris Evans) take down one of them. Then when only a few remain standing, they will start to get up to make sure there are always two henchmen fighting the Captain; until the end where they are all down on the floor, which is finished with a top shot like Smokin’ Ace. The point about this scene in Captain America is, if we observe carefully, we can discover that this coverage is quite reflexive about the fact that it is shot in an elevator set instead of a real elevator. There are many shots captured from impossible positions that deny the existence of the wall or the exterior of the elevator. This happened in the scene from Drive as well when the driver crushed the assassin’s head with his foot.

Is the scene shot in a real elevator or a set? That is an crucial question to ask. Does it have to be? It is clear that Captain America and Drive are shot in a set, but what about the others? The situation can get complicated for different reasons, and these reasons are about more than just the complexity of the coverage. Lost in Translation and Spider-Man 2 can be done either way. The scene in Spider-Man 2 might only require a panel at the back. Inside Lleywn Davis is set in the 1960s, so it requires an elevator set that suits the time period in which the film is set in, unless there are real elevators built during that time and still exist. Scenes like Thor, Amazing Spider-Man and Vanilla Sky will certainly require a green screen. While Die Hard and Terminator need a set that they can damage freely. Through the films above we can see that a set is always more convenient to shoot an elevator scene, within budget, of course.It is flexible and can be customised, most importantly, there are tons of them in studios.

It was mentioned when studying the simple coverage of elevator scenes, that there might be an connection between genres and the complexity of coverage in elevators. From the examples I looked at, simple coverage is mostly used to achieve a comedic effect and complex ones are always action, while the genres of advanced coverage is quite mixed. However, I realize that it is not responsible to conclude on that with this small sample of scenes. Revolver (2005) has its climax in an elevator scene with simple camera work and voice-over, but still brings the film to a thrilling moment of suspense. The drama film You’ve Got Mail (1998) has a fairly complex scene in an elevator. The actors are staged to move around, and there is a time span indicated by a jump cut; the shot angle radically change from eye level to top shot, plus the positions of actors are apparently different. All of these argue back with the early assumption, not to mention there are hundreds of elevator scenes that are not yet examined for this research.

Through this research project, though I did not succeed in concluding the connection between  genres and complexity of coverage; I did summarise that there are a series of questions to ask before planning an elevator scene. Such questions include: What’s the purpose of this scene? How significant is this scene in the film? How many people are in this scene? What effect(s) are trying to be achieved? These questions seem universal, but we also should consider if the scene is shot in an open space, what would be different? Is the scene going to be shot on set or in a real elevator? The elevator has its own perks as a narrow space, how should that be used in a coverage? After working out these questions, it will be highly possible to make a good elevator scene. In the end, it is necessary to address that there are other factors such as lighting, mise en scene and etc, that determine the making of a good scene. Unfortunately, as mentioned before, this research cannot include them all, but that does not mean they are not important components in an elevator scene coverage.