Within the five-minute clip of The Devil's Advocate (1997) that was shown we see an increase in tension that builds throughout. Themes of religion and the supernatural, power, responsibility and inability as well as jealousy can be found overlapping during the two scenes. All of these themes are helping to intensify this section of film into a crescendo. Textual strategies are intrinsically used to aid the prominence of the themes and the intensity of the scene resulting in the nervousness of the audience. This continues up until the culminating climax where the character of Eddie Barzoon is attacked by homeless men. Theses strategies then quickly switch levels so as to bring the audience back down to a calmer sense of stability.
The section began with an establishing shot of a busy New York street. The main theme in this scene is jealousy, found in Eddy Barzoon's jealousy of Keanu Reeves" character, Kevin Lomax. This jealousy creates intensity in the scene. We see Lomax coming out from a store dressed in casual clothing and smoking a cigarette so we instantly see him in a relaxed state. Barzoon then jogs over and his initial "hello" is friendly. To maintain this friendly atmosphere, as they begin to walk and talk the camera dolly's along beside them in a calm fashion which reflects the sociable scene. Then as Barzoon becomes angry the dolly is juxtaposed with a fast cut to a medium close-up of Lomax's reaction. From this point the conversation continues with over the shoulder shots, resulting in medium close-ups of each character. These close-ups create a tenser atmosphere as it allows us to see both the anger on Barzoon's face and Lomax's surprise and then retaliation. It also blocks out most of what could be seen before in the background. By doing this the audience loses any visual distractions of the street and pushes the argument in to the face of the audience. The cuts also become quicker, flashing between the two faces, making the scene more frantic and more intense.
