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Mostly through the entirety of Se7en it rains, or it’s overcast. It’s gloomy bordering on paranoia.
Se7en makes a strong case for shooting on film stock and sticking to traditional film processes. Cinematographer Darius Khondji used a chemical process to deepen the blacks in Se7en, but this has the side effect of muting colors. He had to use another process and color timing to get the colors to pop. If you want to know more about the cinematography style of Darius Khondji, please check out this video:
If you haven’t heard or watched Se7en, there’s obviously some spoilers here. Very briefly, Se7en is a psychological thriller about two detectives, a veteran and a rookie, who hunt a serial killer using the seven deadly sins as his motif. The exact city they live in isn’t specified, but it is a dark, crime-ridden city.
In this video, I wanted to highlight an aspect of Se7en not typically discussed: the use of color.
There are three levels to the color story in Se7en.
The first color story of Se7en
At the top level, the color of the city is a cold blue. Mostly every time you’re in an exterior location the color is blue. Even when you’re inside someplace, the blue light crashes through the windows and invades your privacy. You can barely escape the city’s brutal clutches.
The only place there’s any warmth is in the interiors. The interiors are orange, with warm fixtures throughout. It shows how a city copes with a cold and wet exterior by contrasting it with warm interiors. Characters feel safer and more comfortable inside. Remember this, because we’ll revisit this in level three.
Darius Khondji goes to great lengths to achieve this warm-blue color separation in almost every shot in the film. There is an eternal struggle between good and evil, and no one’s clearly winning. Yet.
The images are of great contrast, as if there aren’t enough light bulbs in the city. This is very much Darius Khondji style, as also seen in the beautiful Delicatessen and The City of Lost Children.
What are the primary colors used in Se7en?
Fincher employs black, gray, beige and dull, earthy tones. The color palette is overwhelmingly brown and murky. The lack of vibrant colors mirrors the dehumanization and decay of the city as a whole. Humanity is morally corrupt and on the brink of total meltdown.
On top of this we add the three primary colors – red, green and blue. These three colors are used in strong ways in no uncertain terms. This brings us to level two.
The second color story of Se7en
Due to the film process used most of the colors in Se7en “disappear”. Darius Khondji and production designer Arthur Maxx had to go to great lengths to introduce color through lighting and set design to tell the color story of seven.
There are seven murders in Se7en, each representing one of the seven deadly sins. To the killer, every dead body is a finished work of art, different. He wants the detective finding these bodies to appreciate his work. In this case, that detective is Somerset, a totally cynical and world-weary Morgan Freeman.
This detail is important, because the colors of each set come into full view when Morgan Freeman is in the frame.
Let’s start with Gluttony. The home has warm fixtures, the exterior is blue, just as we saw in level one. How does this scene stand out then? The first trick they used was to switch off the lights and make it pitch black. The torch lights are then the main light sources. They used bounce cards to get back some fill in places.
All said, the predominant color of gluttony is black. It is used to reflect the decay associated with the sin of gluttony, creating a claustrophobic and unsettling atmosphere.
The light sources are hard, and the shadows are hard and deep as well. Nothing about this situation is cheerful. The only people smiling with glee at these scenes are the cinematographers. What can I say, the images are the most beautiful kind of ugly.
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The second body is greed. When we first see the greed set it’s sort of white, with venetian blinds breaking the light in the office. However, at this time Somerset isn’t at the scene of the crime. When he arrives later, after they discover a clue, the scene changes to blue due to the UV light.
In a way it reflects the person who was killed. Someone who has a veneer of being a do-gooder but is sleazy inside. This aspect of the killer is hidden from Mills, but is reserved for Somerset’s studied eye. He’s the connoisseur the killer has been waiting for. This scene also has a painting that basically is the color scheme of Se7en.
In between all these scenes we go back to the precinct and other locations, and they’re all warm and blue, ground the film for the next pop of color.
It comes in the form of Sloth. In this scene the standout color chosen is green. Darius Khondji has gone on record to say he was after a “moist, fungal look.” The house has been under siege for a year, so green would sort of represent the moss that would grow on neglected walls.
To achieve this he used cool green gels on daylight-balanced lights, and it gave the scene a sickly, deathly pallor that wasn’t present earlier.
The next color is obviously red, which is used in Lust. Red has been traditionally associated with the color of lust and love in many cultures. The entire scene is bathed in light, literally red-light district. It’s pretty self evident. Today you get this rich red with RGB LED lights like the Arri Skypanel. Colors have become a lot easier with RGB lights in general. Earlier you lost a lot of light with color gels. In Se7en that wasn’t that much of a problem, since they shot wide open most of the time, mostly T2.5 or T2.8. Why? Check out my video on the best aperture for filmmaking:
For the Pride set Khondji wanted a creamy look. It has almost shadowless light that is even across the room, even though there are two windows. It contrasts with the other shots of similar rooms in Se7en, by looking different even though it has similar fixtures and architecture. That’s how it stays separated from the rest.
The scene is also bright. It probably reflects the vanity and superficiality associated with pride. There’s nowhere to hide in this room.
Then we have Envy, which really isn’t shown. Or is it?
Envy is shown indirectly, because whenever there are people or situations that the killer touches, we have red production elements. Right from the beginning Mills’ home is marked for death with red accents.
The small red lamps, the record player, the wine. It was all foreshadowed.
The killer leaves red in crime scenes as well. It always hangs like a pall over Somerset and Mills. When they break into the Killer’s home, the door is red, the cross is a neon red, the photographs are bathed in red light. The connection is unmistakable.
Even if you’re not connecting the dots while watching the film, subconsciously it’s playing its part towards the ultimate goal of this movie, which is when David Fincher decides to use golden hour, or warm orange light, for the climactic scene that is also the set for Wrath, the final sin.
This doesn’t really track with the color scheme formula, or does it? The answer to this question is a level three color story.
The third color story of Se7en
Warm has been already established as the color of safety and security. It’s present inside homes and the police station. It’s when people are supposed to feel safe and secure. In the climactic scene, David Fincher wanted us, the audience, to feel the scene was safe and secure, like a typical Hollywood scene.
It’s a story told through deception. John Doe demands to be driven away from the city. There’s SWAT teams everywhere. John Doe is handcuffed in the back seat of a car. There are no ambushes. It is important for us to have a false sense of comfort. We have been subconsciously trained from the beginning to feel this comfort in the interiors. But now we are in the exterior, and we automatically feel this comfort.
The killer wears a red jumpsuit. Even though there are tons of small clues as to what is about to come, we, or at least most of the audience, will not connect the dots due to this deception. We’ll never consider it. If the scene had taken place in a downpour in the same location, maybe our paranoid selves would have taken over and made the connection. But then, David Fincher wouldn’t be David Fincher would he?
Warm lighting also works on another level. It’s a stark contrast to the rest of the film, symbolizing revelation and truth, and marking a departure from the obscured morality depicted throughout the film. John Doe wants to die in the open, away from the city he is sick of living in, It’s sort of a breath of fresh air. But even down this path, it’s still a red herring setting. We are being lured in for horrific revelation, just as Mills and Somerset are.
The warm and blue look forms the first level. The color stories for each dead body form the second level, and the third level is when all these rules are used to deceive us.
In a way it’s similar to the score of Jaws. Every time the shark appears, the score follows, except once, when we least expect it. It requires restraint. In this case David Fincher took a great risk. Everything rested on the success of the final scene. If it didn’t work all the work would have been undone. It’s extremely difficult storytelling. This is why Se7en is my favorite Fincher film, just over The Social Network, which is great for other reasons.
But, the cinematography of The Social Network, or any other Fincher film, does not come remotely close to the richness and beauty of Se7en, even though it really is a film about despair, like walking with your lover, hand in hand, over a sea of dead bodies.
Camera Angles analysis of the final scene in Se7en
Let’s go over the camera angles of the last scene now that we’re here.
There are a lot of close ups in Se7en. When you have great actors and a compelling story, close ups are probably all you need.
The scene begins with wide angles from the top and bottom. It’s unmistakable it’s a sunny warm day, at six o’clock in the evening. Golden hour time.
John Doe is centered in the frame behind a mesh. Somerset is shot from the side, only eyes visible. Clearly he’s not in control here.
The main two characters in the car are Mills and John Doe. Mills has a wider shot from the side. We feel what he’s saying is not that important or relevant, and the looks given by John Doe and Somerset underline that thought. When Somerset opens his mouth, he, too, gets a medium shot. John Doe doesn’t change.
When he gets on Mills’ nerves, the shot changes to a close up shot where Mills turns around to look. The action shows John Doe can make Mills do his bidding, but Somerset keeps his composure.
They step out of the car in a telephoto lens shot. Most of the shots after this point are telephoto shots. The space is extremely compressed and everything looks larger and more claustrophobic than it is. When Somerset opens the box his reaction is in a tight close up. The others, too, revert to close ups. John Doe is shot from the bottom, giving him mythical status.
Just like in the car, Mills doesn’t get a close up, but a mid shot while John Doe delivers his revelation in close up. Fincher uses at least two cameras here to catch all the action, and the lighting isn’t completely consistent. Not that we’ll ever notice it on first viewing.
When Somerset arrives we move to long shots where the relationships between the three are reestablished. The camera starts to get handheld and shaky on Mills, but rock solid on John Doe.
After the first shock the camera starts moving in John Doe’s closeup, creating a parallax between him and the tower behind. This is stage two of getting Mills hysterical. When the second shock arrives we finally jump to a close up of Mills unlike nothing we’ve ever seen before.
John Doe has penetrated his defenses. The camera has stopped moving on the others, and it only follows Mills now. The music, too, plays an amazing role here in heightening the suspense to an eleven here. It ends in a beautiful two shot where they’re not seeing eye to eye anymore.
I’m not a big fan of the acting by Brad Pitt at this point, but he’s up against two giants. But he’s really found his groove with Once Upon a Time in Hollywood and Babylon.
Anyway, our really long scene comes to a close, and the sun is still in the exact same place it was at the beginning. Not that anyone cares.
What do you think?
Thank you very much for your hard work to draw out the use of color in this film. While I don’t know very much about the science or use of color to tell a story, I still found this article to be understandable, and I’m now off to find more writings of yours to learn more!
You’re welcome!