How WILLOW's Camera Angles Demonstrate Kit's Character Arc
Willow's direction clearly considers character journeys, start to finish.
h/t to ludm of Rewatched and Revisited whose detailed observations sparked this; block quotes theirs unless noted
Set Her Up to Knock Her Down
Willow opens on Kit flying down from the sky: filling the frame, masked and cocky, in a position of power, a conqueror.
As I (Mel) have written about elsewhere, Willow sets Kit up as high-flying protagonist and winsome conqueror for the audience to empathise with . . . all the better to pull the rug from under Kit and us.
The opening shot neatly encapsulates Kit’s season arc; starting high, coming down, a winning pose which will be recontextualised over time by the show, especially by Jade, and throughout this post.
Setup and downfall start with writing, but directing and cinematography (and other elements especially but not limited to acting, wardrobe, and colour) are key to demonstrating arcs over time.
Upon returning to the castle, Kit is back in a situation she despises and over which she has no control; here she’s often placed low and/or shot from high or mid angles. At the banquet she’s seated on the bottom of the hall, while her mother, Graydon, and Ballantine are on the dais. Shots look down on or levelly at her:
During this scene Sorsha basically calls Kit a placeholder, “til that day when the true Empress, Elora Danan, returns.”
Ouch.
In other words: As Kit takes the first blow and starts to fall, the story also moves her down visually.
‘Level’ and ‘looking down’ angles on Kit continue through as the group goes questing and finds Willow, especially when Kit’s framed on her own and not amongst the group. As Kit loses arguments and Elora’s true heritage is revealed, Kit continues to be lowered in standing, as well as location and blocking. (I can hear some of you shouting exceptions at the screen; don’t worry, we’ll get to them!)
Many smaller blows in episodes 2 and 3 happen underground, but the most personal blow where Jade breaks it to Kit aaaaactually, Jade let her win most of those sparring sessions takes place in nature — the same as their opening scene.
Here Jade has the high ground, until . . .
Well, let’s back up a bit.
Attempts at High Ground
Kit has never stopped striving for upper hand, whether with Jade
discussing the quest, where Kit starts sitting on the steps (lowest) before standing to declare she’ll go (co-highest), and lording over Graydon (with help from Jade)
or arguing against Elora joining their party in Episode 1; as Kit steps closer to Elora, she must move lower and lower, literally losing ground as she loses the argument.
And now, back to Kit’s tiff with Jade, which is no exception.
As she processes what Jade said, Kit works to regain the high ground with her sarcastic words as well as physical location. As Kit climbs up the hill to look down on Jade, the camera angles drive home what Kit’s attempting.
Slow Growth and More Equal Footing
Kit has major internal and external conflict with Elora, who both literally usurps her, and brings out Kit’s insecurity over her father’s abandonment.
In Episode 4, Kit takes a big step by telling Elora something Kit’s been hiding — when she reveals Elora’s powers do work, Kit has to acknowledge she’s been hiding that knowledge due to jealousy, and she was wrong to push abandoning Graydon.
While at first thought a character humbling themselves may bring to mind putting them low, in Kit’s arc this is growth, so the conversation takes place in an elevated position of the high tower of Nockmaar, and puts her on equal ground with Elora.
Kit and Elora go back and forth literally and figuratively quite a bit. In their first scene (above) Kit starts high but cedes ground; thereafter a pattern emerges: Elora starts on the high ground, as Kit recognises and confesses her foibles, they come towards each other to find literal equal ground.
In Episode 5, Elora stands on a rock as she enlightens Kit you absolute dope you’re in love with Jade and it’s ridiculous to pretend you’re not.
Then when they work together to escape, they’re standing on even ground.
Later, when Elora approaches Kit to discuss her general Kit-ishness, Kit is slouched against a tree to enable hi/low blocking and framing, camera looking up at Elora as adoringly as Kit is.
Kit admits she likes Elora finealittlewhateverdon’tmakeitabigdeal, acknowledges her own shortcomings, and awkwardly asks for advice.
Elora coaches Kit through apologising to Jade: “Tell her that you understand. That you wanna get better.”
As this goes, the blocking shifts them so they’re standing as equals again.
When Kit nigh-immediately takes Elora’s advice to talk / ramble to Jade, she starts trepidatious and slightly lower. As Kit progresses, she stands level with Jade.
Look at all that progress Kit has made! Guess it’ll be smooth walking from here . . .
Wait, that’s not how it works, in life or television?
Further to Fall
People don’t change in straight lines, and growth is not a one-time step but work and struggle and sometimes backsliding to a lower point than you even started. Willow depicts these zig zags, thus the camera is not constantly looking up or down at Kit, but shifts as she does.
In Episode 6, tiny things like character barbs, visual/auditory hallucinations, and supernatural events, culminate to bring Kit’s still-festering jealousy and pain to a boil.
Visually, Kit reaches this lowest point not only in the Troll-Mines (again, lower underground than the Nelwyn and also much lower than in the vale). But after Alagash tells her, that Elora Danan is what matters most, she literally falls to the very bottom of these endlessly deep mines. And as if that wasn’t enough, the mines literally collapse in on themselves (as Kit is) because of Elora – with Elora seemingly unable to do or even knowing anything about it.
(Aside: One could literally dissect episode 6 and how with every blow to Kit they reach a deeper level of the mines. . . .
Kit’s nadir is obvious as a writer can make it: she falls through the ground into endless nothingness.
The camera takes several vantage points including the group’s POV far above, but most are from an ‘objective’ POV far below.
Though this angle is technically similar to the angle in which we are introduced to Kit, here she is not triumphant and facing us while flying in a position of power, but falling away from everything she needs. She’s also tiny in frame as opposed to filling it, and washed in red as opposed to surrounded by blue skies.
Back To Common Ground
Kit is rescued from this low, lower, lowest point at the start of Episode 7.
And here, the camerawork is impeccable: As Kit sees Airk and tries to reach for him, the camera is turning, visualizing a myriad of things, one amongst them is showing us the turn in Kit’s character motivation to come. It also signals that there is no way for Kit going forward, but that she must change her course.
The Camerawork:
You could write a story where ‘the changes Kit has made and relationships she’s built culminate in being lifted by her friends (literally hoisted onto Boorman’s broad shoulders) to common/higher ground, and accepting her found family.’
But this still isn’t the end of her arc.
Kit has not only apologised but done things which cost her pride, effort, physical risk, and emotional vulnerability. She’s listened to what Elora told her, accepted what Jade has done for her, humbled herself, worked through issues, pledged her life to protect Elora, and now committed to jumping into purgatory to rescue her brother — all much more daunting than the adventure she signed up for in Episode 1. Through not merely risking her life but acknowledging her wrongs and working to rectify them, Kit has cemented friendships and earned the place she thought she was entitled to in the opening scene.
So now how does the camera see her?
Episode 7’s final scenes put Kit and Elora in equal framing, show them rise together —
and then they jump off the edge of the world.
Earned High Ground
Finally Kit has earned higher ground than Elora . . . but she doesn’t use it to lord over her, instead uses her vantage to reach down and pull Elora up, back to equal standing.
But this isn’t the end of Kit’s arc, either.
Kit has made herself worthy through effort, accepting critique, listening to counsel, making herself vulnerable, and serving others.
Even when she’s embattled or seems overcome, the final episode looks at Kit as conquerer, culminating with her donning and activating the Cuirass, which requires a worthy wearer.
And boi does the camera love and venerate her as she does.
The End
From looking up at the start, to showing Kit’s attempts to snatch the high ground, to falling and rising and falling again, to actually gaining the high ground and being willing to share it, to truly looking up at her, Willow beautifully demonstrates Kit’s arc in its visuals.
IMDB
Directed by: Philippa Lowthorpe, Debs Paterson, Stephen Woolfenden, Jamie Childs (2 episodes each)
Cinematography by: Joel Devlin, James Friend, Stijn Van der Veken, Will Baldy (2 episodes each - looks like Joel lensed extra footage for “Behind the Magic” so is credited for 3 episodes)