Heroic Abeyance (on Donner’s Superman)

(An obscenely long post about a superhero film?  I must be teaching again.  I am!  This class, in fact.)

Richard Donner knew that Superman needed a powerful entrance in Superman (1978), but he also knew that the one element that it would necessarily lack was surprise.  The audience knows who Clark Kent is and knows that Lois Lane won’t actually plummet to her death, and Donner knows that the audience knows that.  Because he can’t rely on the narrative to carry the weight of the scene, he must resort to using spectacle to carry the weight of the narrative.  The scene begins innocently enough, with an extreme long shot (in deep focus) of Lois Lane approaching a helicopter parked on a skyscraper:

Why go with the extreme long shot?  Because he needs to establish the relation of the helicopter to this mischievous cable:

How do we know it’s mischievous?  Because he cut to a close-up of it.  The audience may not know why they are being asked to pay attention to this cable, but they know it will play some role in the narrative about to transpire.  Donner then cuts back to the original shot to show Lane entering the helicopter:

Note the deep focus here: even though the camera remains positioned exactly as it had been in the first shot, the scale of this would be considered medium long.  Why?  Because the most important element of a shot helps define what a shot is.  It could be argued that the helicopter is more important in the first shot, in which case it would have been a medium shot of a helicopter with Lane visible in the background.  But I’m going to argue that Lane is more significant than the helicopter 1) because she occupies the central position in both shots and 2) because her yellow jacket contrasts both the black to the left and the red to the right.  Besides, if Donner wanted the helicopter to be the central element, he would’ve just done this:

An even more extreme long shot of the helicopter pad works as a re-establishing shot.  Because of its scale and the lack of on-screen movement, this shot imparts a calmness to the proceedings.  Everything is going according to plan.  It is now safer for the audience to join Lane in the helicopter:

Donner situates the audience immediately behind Lane, but the shallow depth of field results in the back of her head being out of focus.  This shot is uncomfortable because it’s contradictory: her centrality indicates the very same importance the focus diminishes.  Everything may not be going according to plan:

By cutting from the cockpit shot to this close-up of the cable, Donner is momentarily disorienting the audience in a manner that mimcks the disorientation about to be felt by Lane and the pilots.  Where is that cable?  Where is moving?  What is snapping?  Maybe these guys know:

Probably not.  From that distance, a black cable on a black helipad would be well-night invisible.  At least until it snaps and snags the bright white foot of a helicopter:

Now, via this close-up, the audience can finally see what the problem is.  Donner then pans back so the audience can better see its consequences:

Notice the significance of Lane’s yellow jacket: that wardrobe decision was not made lightly.  It is a vital element in the staging of this scene.  Who’s in danger?  Lois is.  Why?

A cable.  One tiny cable.  The first time the world will meet Superman is because of one tiny cable.  Now, if ever there were a time where almost imperceptibly quick edits were warranted, it would be filming a helicopter spinning out of control.  Donner obliges:

I’ve turned the subtitles on as a means of identifying how quickly Donner cycles through these shots.  Extreme close-ups on the pilot’s face, then Lane’s, then his hands on the control.  Note that all these shots are within the helicopter.  The audience is being momentarily denied the same information Lane is: they both want to know “What’s happening?”  This quick cutting continues for a full thirty seconds before Donner finally answers the question:

This second re-establishing shot is even longer than the last, but more important is the angle of framing: switching from level to a high angle of framing makes the helicopter appear small and vulnerable.  The framing is also canted, which creates the impression of instability and chaos.  Although this shot would have worked on its own, it is all the more effective when paired with the earlier one.  Donner then spends the next three minutes 1) cutting very quickly inside the cockpit and 2) hanging the helicopter off the side of the building.  As above, all of the reverse shots inside the cockpit are shot from within the cockpit (if not from Lane or the pilot’s point of view, then something very close to it).  One the plane comes to a stop, Donner pulls the camera out of the cockpit:

The camera’s perspective is now looking in through the open cockpit door.  Because audiences have an implicit sense of where a camera is in space, this shot is slightly disturbing.  Why?  Because of where the cameraman’s standing:

Of course, there is one person who could comfortably shoot atop fifty stories of thin air, but he hasn’t arrived yet.  As the camera focuses on her panicked face, Donner starts jumping between shots that emphasize her panic:

There’s no compelling reason to do a reverse close-up on her face other than the fact that it’s not something that’s ordinarily done: the speed with he effects it combined with the rarity with which the camera reverses on the same person creates a disorienting sequence.  And why shouldn’t it be?  Vertigo is plenty disorienting.  At this point, Donner begins editing the scenes in the helicopter and the scene on the ground in parralel.  Every one of the disorienting sequences above is paired with a scene of chaos on the street:

Those shots are then followed by an eyeline match of the helicopter:

Which Donner uses to transition back into the helicopter:

The extreme close-up on Lane’s seatbelt is a grace note.  The last thing someone hanging out of a helicopter which is itself hanging off a building should do is unbuckle her seatbelt.  But!  If Lois doesn’t, she’s not in an adequate amount of jeopardy.  It might lead to this:

After cycling through the cockpit/ground/eyeline match sequence for two minutes, Donner’s frenetic editing suddenly slows.  He holds a long shot of a man exiting a building:

The man calmly picks up a yellow hat:

Then his eyes follow everyone elses and we get a point of view shot from the ground:

The camera calmly cuts back to a long shot of the man, who proceeds to shoot a phone kiosk the stink eye:

Meanwhile:

The close-up on her hands slipping heightens the suspense.  But is it really suspense that’s been created in this rather long scene?  Is she really in jeopardy?  I would argue that Donner is amping up anticipation.  The audience knows how this will end, they just want to see the spectacle of it.  They want to hear the horns pump and see the man in the pajamas rescue the lady in the yellow jacket.

And they will.  But you won’t.  (At least not until the next post.)

[The complete list of my visual rhetoric posts can be found here.]