Analysis of documentary style film: TYSON (first 12 minutes)

The film : Tyson, is a documentary style film about the life of the great fighter, Mike Tyson, in which he talks us through his life.

At the start, there is a black screen with dramatic, non-diagetic music, building up to the opening shot, an establishing master shot, set above the boxing ring looking down on the fighters.In the following shots, the titles and the video footage of Tyson's fights share the screen in quite an abstract way, almost jumbled and cluttered as was Tyson's career and life. Also, the titles are very colourful, fading in and out, perhaps hinting at how colourful Tyson's life has been.

The video footage, sharing the screen with the titles, and shot in a non linear style, is slightly blurry archive footage of Tysons fights, which is edited in a way that the same punch is often repeated two times with the volume of the punch increased to increase the emphasis on them and portray a huge amount of power coming from Mike Tyson.

In the last moments of the archive footage, Mike Tysons hand is held up, celebrating his victory, with the commentater of the fight being heard to say : " he could reign for a long, long time" eluding to Mike Tyson's potentially amazing life and career. This has a slight sense of irony as we later discover how Mike Tyson's life and career fell to pieces, the  bell then rings, signaling the end of the archive footage.

The fiery title "TYSON" is then shown on the screen, in strong, masculine text, characteristically similar to boxers themselves. Also, the fiery style of text signals pain, suffering and anger, perhaps showing how out of control Mike Tyson got in his later days as a boxer.

The first dialouge from Mike Tyson overlaps from the titles to the opening, panning shots of him walking along a beach, showing a change in Tysons attitude, as he seems a much calmer person, with the sun setting, perhaps signifying the sun setting on his professional career as a boxer. Also, Tyson is on his own, making him look lonely, as he looks upon the ocean, leading us to believe that he is reflecting on his lost career.

The camera then cuts to a close up of the recent Mike Tyson's face, showing that it is battered and old, with a maury tattoo on his face, this portrays everything he has been through in boxing, and the tattoo shows Mike Tyson's inner anger and fiery temprement. We find Tyson sitting on his sofa in an apartment, which is fairly posh and modern looking, showing he must have made good money from boxing and clearly still has money. This idea is further inforced by what he is wearing, which is posh looking trousers, a shirt, with cufflinks and an expensive looking watch.

There is then a shot of some archive footage of brooklyn, an anchoring shot, giving the audience and idea and a picture in their head for when brooklyn is mentioned, followed by a still image of Mike Tyson in his glory days.