In Time – key film techniques used
Technique/aspect
Description of the technique
Examples/key scenes that highlight the
technique
Parallels and
contrasts between
characters
Archetypal
characters
Symbolism
Allegory
Lighting
Dialogue
This is what an online critic had to say about the film as an allegory. Do you agree or disagree? What parts of this
could you use to inform your own response to the film?
In Time both is and isn't an allegory for our own widening gap between rich and poor. On the one
hand, the actual situation is very different — there's no unemployment in Niccol's future, because if
you don't work you die. Labor costs, in real terms, are at rock bottom. One of the ways the system
encourages poor people to die off is by engineering runaway inflation, so that just buying a cup of
coffee shortens your life by four minutes. So it's not a picture of life in the Lesser Depression, with
massive unemployment and borderline deflation — rather, it's a picture of a world where extreme
laissez-faire capitalism has won. And yet, Will Salas proves that a hardcore capitalist world is actually
fragile and precarious.
There's no middle class in this movie, at least not that we ever see — there's just the immortal few and
the short-lived many. Which makes this movie the perfect metaphor for the idea of the 1 percent and
the 99 percent. In real life, poverty does kill people, and even the middle class are one serious illness
away from being wiped out financially. Etc. etc. etc. So maybe In Time will become the semi-official
movie of Occupy Wall Street — it's not a bad piece of propaganda.
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=439x2202965
Some tips for your essays

When you use filmic evidence in your essays it’s different from when you write about written texts. You
need to be really detailed with your examples because you are translating what you see on the screen into
words.

The best way to incorporate evidence in a film essay is actually to focus on key scenes that highlight what
you are discussing and then you can explain how a range of techniques combine for effect. You should not
be simplifying it to “Dialogue is used to show the idea…” because directors are only successful when they
combine the words (dialogue) and images on the screen to communicate their message.

You need to make sure you break down what the question is asking you to do and then plan carefully before
you write.
Some example questions:
(1)
Analyse how verbal AND visual features of a text (or texts) you have studied are used to give
audiences a strong idea.
(2)
Analyse how important techniques are used to engage your emotions in a text (or texts) you have
studied.
(3)
Analyse how atmosphere is established and maintained in a text (or texts) you have studied.
(4)
Analyse how the beginning AND ending of a text show an important change in a character or
individual in a text (or texts) you have studied.
(5)
Analyse how a character or individual is influenced to make decisions in a text (or texts) you have
studied.
(6)
Analyse how the growth of a relationship affects the climax in a text (or texts) you have studied.
(7)
Analyse how symbols are used to develop an idea in a text (or texts) you have studied.
(8)
Analyse how successful a text (or texts) you have studied has been in influencing you to think
differently about an issue