The Lonely Villa Suspense Analysis

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Suspense is a 1913 film that portrays the story of a tramp intruding into a family’s home, where a mother takes care of her child while her husband is away. The plot is a common one that had been used previous times before the film’s release, such as in The Lonely Villa (1909). However, through taking advantage of the single frame shot, the filmmakers were able to create a masterful aesthetic of two separate stories that turn a basic plot into a complex story. The film created an inventive way of illustrating stories within cinema by allowing the audience the chance to consume more narrative in less time within just one take. Parallel editing, or cross cutting, aligns multiple storylines that are happening at the same time in order to sustain the actions of each characters. In Suspense, this technique is used continuously to follow the paths of the tramp, wife, husband, and police. However, the …show more content…

The police and car owner follow close behind him, trying to get the husband to pull over. The use of the single frame displays the husband’s dark silhouette as the camera focuses on the rearview mirror where the police can be seen gaining on him. It allows the viewer to take in both storylines simultaneously. The husband is still racing home to help his wife, but the police in the mirror also show the duality of his worries as they literally and figuratively hang over his shoulder. Meanwhile, in the mirror, the police are seen trying to grasp the husband in order to get him to stop. The two spaces for the characters gives the chance for the film to focus on the overall plot progression versus the time cut between the husband and the police separately. It decreases the amount of time that audiences spend on one character and their storyline instead it forces them to understand the dynamics of every storyline and how they interact with one

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