QUESTION 2// CUFFS

2. Analyse how far the extract depicts the police's point of view rather than the criminal's point of view. 

In this extract the police's point of view is the one from which the audience sees it, because of several factors. Firstly the camera-shots enable us to see the police in a variety of ways through the camera, for example there are several close-ups of the policemen, as well as other shots and angles used, like medium-shot, letting us familiarize with the policemen. Whereas the criminals are simply shown in longer shots. The close-ups make the policemen stand out more and appear more unique from one another, as well as it gives the audience a clearer knowing of each of the policemen. However, because we don't see the criminals faces very clearly, we generalize them as just criminals, with no characterisation.

In addition to this, the editing allows for the policemen to dominate the screen. When the policemen act, we don't see any reactions from the criminals. However when the criminals act, it is followed by shots of reactions from the policemen. This shows to the audience their higher significance to the criminals because we see the policemen's emotions, rather than the criminals and this also gives the policemen more screen-time than them.

A narrative is also created, in which the relaxation of the characters we have already got to know, has been disrupted by characters not yet met by the audience. For example, we were watching an unwinding scene, where the younger, new policemen was waiting to receive his lunch and, just as it is placed in front of him he has to be dragged away because of the criminals, and is unable to eat. This is a fairly relatable scene, as no-one likes to be taken away from their food, and therefore makes the audience biased into disliking the criminal.

Additionally, the narrative follows the world of the police, not the criminals, who are only seen in the presence of the police and this, therefore, makes the police seem more important. For example we are closer and no more about the police because we saw them eating their lunch, however we did not see the criminals eating their lunch.

However, there are some sections that we can't see from the police perspective. For example, when the truck crashes into the shop, we see a clip from the CCTV footage and this, obviously, would not have been seen by the police yet.