Remember The Titans (2000)

Remember The Titans

Writer: 

Gregory Allen Howard

Director:

Boaz Yakin

Actors: 

Denzel Washington as Coach Herman Boone

Will Patton as Coach Bill Yoast

Wood Harris as Julius Campbell

Ryan Hurst as Gerry Bertier

Donald Faison as Petey Jones

Craig Kirkwood as Jerry "Rev" Harris

Ethan Suplee as Louie Lastik

Kip Pardue as Ronnie "Sunshine" Bass

For this particular blog posting I am going to be writing about the lighting in the above pictured/mentioned movie: Remember The Titans. The directors and all the personnel involved did a magnificent job bringing this movie to production. The lighting used in this movie was alternated between high- and low- key lighting. There also seems to be a little bit of three-key lighting thrown into some of the scenes. 

Watch the Leave No Doubt scene from the movie:

The three-key lighting in this scene is phenomenal! All the lighting is on the characters in question with the darker shadows being cast on those in the background. The background characters are just as important to the scene and the overall feel of the movie but all the focus is being placed on those in the bright lights. 

Now what Coach Boone's Speech:

The remarkable shadows in the background of this movie are great!! This is a great example of low- and high-key lighting. A high-key lighting design has very bright light over everything, with few shadows and relatively low contrast between the lightest and darkest parts of the scene....A low-key lighting design looks dark overall by comparisons. It is marked by extreme use of deep shadows, with very high contrast between the brightest parts of the scene and the darkest parts, which are obscured in shadows (Goodykoontz, B. & Jacobs, C. (2013)) There are parts of the scene where you can see everything clear as day with no shadows and then there are parts where you get a slightly eery feeling because the importance of the scene is extremely clear. 

The theme of this movie was a school divided by race. The school and the white students felt they were being forced to welcome non-white students leading to tensions and drama. These tensions spilled onto the field. The lighting throughout the movie played on those divisions in personalities extremely well. Bringing into focus (and light) the races at different times throughout the scenes but bringing them together on the field as only the lights of a football field can. You feel you are with those actors as they begin to meld into one unit no longer seeing race as an issue but each person as an individual beginning to work as a team. 

Having grown up in a state where football is a key element of life (along with ranching/farming), this movie was indeed portrayed in an accurate manner. 

References:

Atkinson, Dorsia. (2010, Oct 1). Leave No Doubt. [video file]. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i8vXroMMGdM 

christianlty (2008, Jan 20). Remember The Titans: Coach Boone Speech. [video file]. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E_HFCYz4x6o 

Goodykoontz, B. & Jacobs, C. (2013). Film: From Watching to Seeing. San Diego: Bridgepoint.