Coming Of Age In The Film The Graduate

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The film The Graduate talks about Benjamin Braddock, who has just finished college and is back at his parents' house. He's trying to avoid the one question everyone keeps asking: What does he want to do with his life? An unexpected change comes up when he is seduced by Mrs. Robinson, a bored housewife and friend of his parents. But what begins as a fun rendezvous turns complicated when Benjamin falls for the one woman Mrs. Robinson demanded he stay away from, her daughter, Elaine.
The main theme expressed in the movie is the coming of age. It focuses on the growth of a protagonist from youth to adulthood and the obstacles he goes through. These problems and feelings are conveyed to the audience through the use of cinematic techniques. Because
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This scene is shot in Benjamin’s house. His parents have thrown for him a 21st birthday party and ask him to show off to the guests the gift they got him, a scuba diving gear. After forcefully accepting to go out in the scuba diving suit, the image switches to a subjective view from his own point-of-view through the glass of the mask. His perspective shows his parents' distorted faces and words that he cannot understand. From the images seen through the glass of the mask we can tell that he is moving heavily, with his fins on, through the crowd. This way of filming makes the audience feel the discomfort and unease that the character is experiencing. He later submerges himself at the bottom of his parents' pool for peace and silence where he can no longer hear his parents mumbling. The speed of change between the shots of his parents to the shots of the water submerging him create an impact on the audience showing them contrast between the discomfort he was experiencing around his parents and the peacefulness he is now experiencing under water. He appears to remain there covered by the water indefinitely - never surfacing from …show more content…
The director shows an innocent Elaine in the foreground as an out-of-focus . Mrs. Robinson appears through the cracked door in the background. The camera “rack focuses” to Mrs. Robinson’s defeated face, then racks back to Elaine as she herself realizes the truth. After Elaine screams and kicks Benjamin out of her room, the director shows a medium close-up of Mrs. Robinson, expressionless and make-up running down her face. As she says, “Goodbye Benjamin,” the director zooms out to leave Mrs. Robinson a small, ashamed figure deep in the frame. It’s one of the greatest uses of symbolic depth of field. In the final scene, after Ben and Elaine run off together they jump into the bus. Trading smiles and worried faces, unsure about what to do next. As the bus rides off into the distance, we wonder whether the young lovers have made a huge mistake. Each one of them is surrounded by a window creating limited space. This is a symbol to how they have not completely become one person surrounded in the same frame, but still two separate people worried about what they have just

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