Hunt for the Wilderpeople Movie Analysis

📌Category: Entertainment, Movies
📌Words: 667
📌Pages: 3
📌Published: 16 April 2022

Hunt for the Wilderpeople is a 2016 film that has captured adults and children all over the world. It focuses on Ricky Baker, a foster care child, who, after the death of one of his carers, flees into the New Zealand wilderness, with his other carer, ‘Uncle’ Hec, inspiring a national manhunt. This shows that children, especially in the foster care system, are often ignored and left behind. Director Taika Waititi uses a range of cinematic techniques to influence the viewers’ reading of different characters in the film. These include sound and music, camera shots and angles, and costume. All these elements combined give depth to the film. 

Costume is a major technique used in the film. Costumes, or what the character is wearing, are used to change what the audience thinks of the character wearing it. Taika Waititi uses different styles of costume to create different impacts and change the audience’s perspective of characters. For example, in the opening scene, ‘A Real Bad Egg’ Ricky is wearing ‘gangster’ clothing with the Illuminati symbol on it. This symbolises that the protagonist is a bit of a rebel, but also maybe wants companionship. Throughout the film, Ricky’s costume changes from being a more city gangster outlook to the clothing of someone more used to life in the bush. This shows that he is more comfortable being himself and not trying to seem tougher. This can be seen in the ‘On the Run’ montage where Ricky is seen emerging from a hut with new clothes. This also occurs throughout other parts of the film. In the opening scene, Hec is seen wearing ripped, hunting gear, to show that he is a tough bushman or Paula, and the other police are seen wearing very military clothing, as they are trying to intimidate Ricky and Hec. This shows that costume plays an enormous part in what the viewers may think of the characters.

An extremely important element in every film is Sound and Music. Hunt for the Wilderpeople is no exception, with a lot of diegetic and non-diegetic sounds used throughout the film. Diegetic sounds are from the world of the film, whereas non-diegetic sounds are added by the producers. Music is also often added to create emotion and match the theme of the film. An example of this is when Leonard Cohen’s ‘The Partisan’ plays throughout the snowy montage at the end of chapter eight, the melancholy music combining with the lyrics to show that they are being hunted. Likewise, this also features at the end of the film when happier music plays as Ricky and Hec trek back into the bush to try to find the Huia. Sounds are used to make the audience feel like they are in the world of the film and are experiencing what the characters are experiencing. For instance, a strange, mysterious sound plays when Ricky enters at the start of the film, a non-diegetic sound. Another example is gunshots, or the sounds of the bush, both of which occur throughout the film, and are non-diegetic sounds. These elements play a very important part in this film, in creating emotion, as well as engaging the viewer.

What would a film be without camera shots and angles? These are what make a movie a movie. Camera shots and angles are all about where the camera is in relation to the action. For example, how low or high it is, how close or far it is, and whether and how it is moving are what make up this technique. Many camera shots are used in Hunt for the Wilderpeople. These include at the beginning, where an establishing shot is panned over the New Zealand wilderness, setting the scene, and showing the audience where this move will take place. On the other hand, close-ups of characters’ faces are also used, which show what is running through the characters’ minds, and what they are feeling. Overall, these examples show what an important part sound and music have in this film. 

Overall, Hunt for the Wilderpeople director Taika Waititi uses a wide variety of cinematic techniques to engage the audience. Three of the most influential are costume, sound and music, and camera shots and angles. These, when combined with many other elements, are what make Hunt for the Wilderpeople such a great and successful film.

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