Analysis of 'The Raid' Fight Scene Dir. Gareth Evans

What is first most noticeable when analysing the fight between the two brothers (Rama and Andi) and Mad Dog is the intricacy in which it is edited. Since in the 7 min long scene there are hundreds of individual cuts to make the scene make sense visually and to make sure you know in the cinematic landscape where all the characters are. Some of the effect of the scene is down to the sheer length of it, as mentioned it's about 7 mins of constant non-stop fighting, all extremely well choreographed and as good at it is as a film this scene also benefits from being a master class example of the type of martial arts they're doing.

One of the grapples involving all three actors in frame.

At all times the fighting is on screen and is seen to be realistic due to the angles in which it is shot from. Positioning seems to be key to not only to make the punches look like they connected but also for the reaction from the victim of the hit to seem most realistic too.

Here you can see Mad Dog recoiling from a kick to make it look more real.

This is partly down to the cinematographers Matt Flannery and Dimas Imam Subhono opted for a very handheld feeling to the sequence, this gets across the raw, brutish feel to the fight. It's kinetic and its visceral and the handheld camera shows this very well. Even when a few punches connect the camera jolts as if it too is being hit by the impact. This idea of making the camera reflect the action is extremely key to making this sequence work as well as it does and is something I will definitely try to emulate when I shoot our fight sequences. This handheld aspect is something I think I could best achieve using the shoulder rig, but with more movement around the fight to exemplify the energetic feel.

Utilising the environment they're in and involving things around them.

The cuts are quick as well as plentiful showing that each shot has been shot multiple times from multiple angles, to give the editor as much leeway as possible when it comes to cutting and keeping the fast pace of the action maintained. This is something again I'll definitely take to heart when I'm on set of our film, like our indoor scenes we will want to shoot each aspect 2/3 times to make sure Tom has enough to work with when he gets editing. This may vary on the day though as the shoot will be much more physical we don't want to tire out the actors so they're visually fatigued by the end of the day, we will have to take notice of how they're doing too.

Here Mad Dog and Rama have framed Andi so the audience knows where he is still within the scene, while the action continues.

What's noticeable is that for a lot of the fight there isn't any visual damage to the actors this is probably a practical decision since it means they will be able to shoot any part of the fight scene again if they needed to without having to get the actors in and our of make-up. This isn't a problem we're going to encounter on our film because we won't really use and make-up in our production, the punches will mainly be to the torso so wouldn't cause blood and a lot of the kicks/punches are dodged.

A rare single close up of Mad Dog to briefly delay the action for it to build up all over again.

There is a repetitive pulsating score running throughout the scene too, what is most noticeable and best about this is that it reacts to the fight. For example it stops slightly when no one is hitting and are just getting their breath and it skips slightly occasionally if there is a particularly hard kick/punch, this sort of visible and audible synchronicity is one of the ways the scene comes across as so outstanding and so well crafted.

An exmaple of both the clear colour scheme (exemplified by all the other images too) and how later in the fight blood becomes more clear on the actors, seen slightly here despite being a bit blurry.

The colour scheme of the scene is very consistent of grey-y blues it gives it a sort of visual cohesion that keeps it aesthetically pleasing to look at. This is helped by the fact it is an indoor scene so that can be controlled much more.

Here you can see how it's developed into using weapons to finish the battle.

The final thing noticeable about the fight is how it builds as it goes, it starts of as very pristine clearly choreographed fighting then as it goes on it gets more brutish and though still immaculately choreographed it seems more sloppy. Finally it goes onto to ending the fight using weapons, this sort of build seems like a very natural progression for the situation and therefore makes sense and is something I think we should emulate in our sequence.

My notes from watching the scene