Two Ways of Shooting a Scene

By coincidence, the two films I watched yesterday (functionally speaking) both involved an authority figure of some sort (in Blue Ruin a police officer and in Wendy and Lucy a security guard) waking up the protagonist that had been sleeping in their car. But what interested me even more was the way in which the two directors filmed it. There is no doubt after watching much of both director's oeuvres that I prefer Reichardt in general, but these instances are perfectly indicative of their respective styles. For Saulnier's part, he shoots it in a subtly showy way. It starts with a push-in from the front passenger's seat that follows the police officer before panning to show her tapping on the window. He then cuts to a close-up from the driver's seat that pans up as Blair's character wakes up, then tracks laterally as he unlocks the door and speaks to the officer briefly. Finally, it cuts shortly to a view of the officer from the passenger seat, then a shot from the outside of the two cars. For Reichardt, she uses a perhaps less fluid and/or showy but more impactful method. She begins with a close-up on Wendy's face as the tapping on the window begins. Then, a long static shot from the passenger seat is used as she gets up and puts the key in the ignition. An extreme close-up is used on the key, before cutting back to the same shot. That shot is held until the next segment of the scene, as Wendy and the security guard push the car. I'm not entirely sure why one works better for me; perhaps I simply admire how Reichardt works much better with her protagonist. But regardless, it's fascinating how such a specific scene appears in two radically different films.