Written On The Wind Film Analysis

Visual Design: Colors as Implements for Deciphering the Film
Set in the bourgeois background, the film Written on the Wind (1956), directed by Douglas Sirk, entertains the audience successfully as a family melodrama by depicting elaborately the intricate love affairs among four young adults in the wealthy oil family, Hadley. However, far more than a mere amusement, the film is a masterpiece of aesthetics in that director Sirk meticulously arranged every single component in the movie and thus established a surreal version of the actual society, inciting people to consider more profoundly about the reality beneath and encouraging them to see through the superficial prosperity to the true essence. The specific use of visual design elements in …show more content…
Standing for the state of love, passion, and lust, the red color is closely associated with the main plot, linking up the love triangle (or rectangle) among Kyle, Lucy, Mitch and Marylee. The diffuse use of red in the scene above insinuates both Kyle’s and Mitch’s ardor towards Lucy and heralds their pursuits of her afterwards. In addition, the deliberate arrangement that Kyle and Lucy both wear bluish-grey clothes while Mitch is alone in a brown suit suggests Lucy’s later choice of Kyle. Nevertheless, the red and white tablecloth presages that their later marriage will be entwined with …show more content…
Its purpose of emotionally and cerebrally approaching the audience and thus deciphering the fictional plots and characters to call attention to real-world problems are perfectly realized by its ingenious use of colors as well as lights and projections. The film sufficiently demonstrates the momentousness of the visual design in making an eminent