Intertextuality

Intertextuality is when films take certain aspects from other films which can be recognised by camera angles, mise en scene, sound or methods of editing in being similar.

The film we watched in class, 'The Stepfather', uses this method, with inspiration mainly from the film 'Psycho'. This can be seen when the main character, David, falls in the shower, breaking the railings. The same is shown in 'Psycho', where the shower railings are broken with a high angle of the shower. Both include the sound of water, from 'Psycho' the sound of the shower carries on while in 'The Stepfather' it is constantly raining outside. At the end of both scenes, both characters end up wrapped in the shower curtain.

Succubus, a Thriller made by students in which a girl who has a strange fascination with a boy also has influences from 'Psycho'. These include the same sound of water throughout and both have sounds for the knife movement when the characters stab their victims. A shot it also uses is of the shower head, which was used in 'The Stepfather'.

References can also be made to the film 'Fatal Attraction', in the scene where there is a chase between the two characters. It includes knife blocks, knife (rather large in size) shots with a hand over the victim and the same shot of strangling at a high angle which can be seen in 'The Stepfather'. Also these two films include events in which the glass in the bathroom smashes and the same shot of the glass is used.

'What Lies Beneath' has the same shot of a spiral staircase at a high angle, also in 'The Stepfather'. It has a high angle of a shower and non-diegtic water sounds used in 'Psycho' which the same sound is featured in 'The Stepfather'.

The main discovery is that in 'What Lies Beneath', 'Fatal Attraction' and 'The Stepfather', they all have the same location which is the bathroom. They are all similar in decoration including it being white themed with white curtains. In 'Fatal Attraction', it can be suggested the glass with white decoration can symbolise the white shower curtains.