LOTR: Return of the King analysis

The scene starts with a wide shot, intended to make the audiences eyes wander about the frame in search of some sort of danger for Frodo. The use of low-key lighting, a horror genre convention, throughout this scene is also for this purpose and to create suspense for Frodo and the audience by making him vulnerable in the darkness. We see a shot of Frodo from the front and enveloped by darkness, leading into the cave and away from the light i.e. the safety of the outside and into a trap. Frodo has been told to go through this dark place by Gollum, yet its lighting is a key signifier of danger for anyone who ventures into it. The small amount of blue, gloomy light is around the corner; posing a question to the audience of what is further into the unknown.

A tracking shot from Frodo’s P.O.V leads us unwillingly towards light at the end of the cavern. A sense of anticipation is created in the idea of being forced around a corner without knowledge of what may be on the other side. The cavern is filled with webs and a hive-like pattern along the walls, suggesting insects and especially spiders. It’s an unnatural light at the bottom of the passage, immediately making Frodo and us uneasy of what may lie beyond. Could it be a potential escape for him?

Another P.O.V shot, this time from the stalking spider Shelob, hunts Frodo from the shadows. Frodo is framed as such to make him look weak and small compared to his predator. The audience, in contrast, has privileged information that something is there watching. This make us feel afraid for Frodo, now only lit by a small amount of light. The camera tracks backwards following him from the same P.O.V as before, as if Shelob is hiding from Frodo and backtracking in case of being found; he becomes the prey to Shelob’s predator completely unaware of his situation.

In this next shot, medium at a low angle, reveals a foreground out of focus while Frodo walks from right of camera to left. The foreground becomes focused and reveals various rotten bones, themselves suggestive of death and foreshadowing his fate if he should be trapped by Shelob. This shot also tells me that Frodo is unaware of his situation, because he walks by the evidence of the spider’s apparent victims.

The framing of this next shot increasingly isolates Frodo, as the camera tracks towards him and he’s literally trapped within the frame as panic sets in at the sight of the spider’s webs. The webs denote a trap set for insects and other weaker victims, very much as Frodo is in this cave he has no real knowledge of. The framing also suggests that he is moving away from the light in the background and into the darkness or a trap of some kind. The camera is next obscured behind a spider’s web and another cavern wall, suggestive of a P.O.V shot from Shelob’s perspective and that the creature is hiding/waiting to leap out. The slight pan from left to right in a bobbing motion suggest that the spider is stalking Frodo desperately. Frodo is obscured in the background and appears small and vulnerable to attack again. These P.O.V shots are conventions of the horror genre as a way for the audience to see through the eyes of some entity or killer. They’re used by director Peter Jackson to build suspense and fright within the audience and create the atmosphere of a very oppressive and gloomy area of this cave.

Suddenly, we are moved forward towards Frodo through a tracking shot used to emphasise his fear and the realisation that he is truly alone in this cave. This is also used to show that he realises that he’s being watched by something, as we pan around to his face in close-up. He is trapped. Panning from left, to right and then back again in a frantic motion from Frodo’s P.O.V – suggesting the weight of choosing which way to proceed is too great in a panic. The camera tilts to reveal the more bones from an animal below, emphasising the danger involved in this scene. Then, in a cut-in, shots of animals strung up in webs appear. These animals include a bird, a vulnerable and weak animal very much like Frodo as prey. These cut-ins are used to frighten Frodo into action and add to his realisation of danger lurking in the shadows.

A P.O.V of Shelob is now utilised, craning around the walls after Frodo down a passage of the cave; very similar to the technique made famous by director Sam Raimi of the horror series ‘The Evil Dead – yet more horror conventions. Frodo is hounded by this, again, unseen menace through the dark passage.