Sherlock: "A Study in Pink" (Pt 2) - The Scene at the Flat

In order to refresh and orient myself, I'll just quickly recap with the (few) salient things I've said already. John is shot fairly typically, oriented fairly typically to the viewer. He is sympathetic and grounded. Something I forgot to say earlier was that from the start he's located in spaces he does not feel at home in -- the place he is staying in at the start does not feel lived in (it may possibly be a hotel), and his wander through the park cements his homeless vibe. He is Guy Normal, though lost, having no real home in his head (as we can construe from his nightmares and his shrink appointment) or in London (which is where he wants to be, according to Stumford). Sherlock by contrast is immediately presented as someone who is not grounded at all. His eccentricity is underscored by the energy with which he moves through sets and the way that he orients himself toward the camera. At Bart's, he is at home, but he's at home in his head as much as he is in the space, and he doesn't really care to share his energy with anyone -- not with Molly, and not with the viewer. We know this because through roughly four minutes and several changes in setting, Sherlock never once stops to connect with the viewer by slowing down to face us openly. Sherlock's world is also considerably more sterile than John's, filled with steel and white and beakers and fluorescent lights. This becomes even more evident when John enters it, who looks considerably out of place. By the end of Sherlock and John's first encounter, as Sherlock leaves the room, the viewer has learned everything they need to know about John to understand (and thus sympathesize with) him, but has learned next to nothing about Sherlock, beyond the fact that he's a curiosity. And with all that, I will finally move forward. (this is starting to seem like a lot for only having gone about 14 minutes in)

Character Establishment, Post-Introduction

The Scene at the Flat

We next see Sherlock when he meets John at the apartment, arriving by cab (I almost feel like him showing up in this way, as John hobbles toward the apartment on foot, starts what will be a building theme for him -- his tendency to just appear and disappear from out of nowhere, and with ease). As the scene progresses, we meet Mrs. Hudson and Lestrade (more personally), and we get a look at Sherlock's personal habits. What's interesting here is that despite the change in setting, Sherlock is still very much in his head, and, by consequence, continues to present the barrier to relation that he did in his first scenes -- both for John and for us. This feeling is pronounced through the presence of other characters: the friendly, matronly Mrs. Hudson, who obviously views Sherlock with a great measure of affection, and the frazzled Lestrade, who seems to be in Sherlock's presence only barely voluntarily, out of desperation rather than legitimate desire. All this in the flat that Sherlock has already moved into, and John has only just seen. To me, the scene reads like John, by walking into that flat, arrived straight into the eye of a hurricane without him realizing it, and because he did, we did too. By the end of the scene, he's helplessly sucked into it, and it carries him (and us) through the scene at Brixton, only to disappear as abruptly as it appeared, when Sherlock exits the row house. For the moment I'll drop this hurricane metaphor, so I can discuss distance, but I'll be back to it in a bit.

So what makes Sherlock read as distant and unreachable in the apartment scene, and what does it matter that he's like this? To answer the latter question first, I believe it matters because scenes taking place within a character's dwelling are almost always telling, especially the first time another character enters that space. The best example besides Sherlock I can recall from recent memory was from Castle, the first time Beckett goes to Castle's apartment (1.05: "A Chill Runs Through Her Veins," 24:17). I'm not going to analyze that scene, but I provided the episode and time code in case you would like to see immediately what I'm talking about (also, if you haven't seen it in awhile, as I hadn't, it's friggin' hilarious, so there's that). The thing about scenes like this is that they're generally used to deepen the viewer's knowledge and perception of the characters involved by removing them from the context we had grown used to seeing them in. In the case of Sherlock, both John and the viewer are exposed to Sherlock's personal space almost immediately, without much of anything about him having been revealed previously. On entering his space, we would expect to then start building a connection with him (as John seems to think), but Sherlock doesn't give us the chance, because it's obvious that that isn't something that interests him. Despite the change in environmental context, he's just as planted within his mind as before, and neither the presence of John nor the maternal Mrs. Hudson can serve to pull him out.

John looking to Sherlock to see if it bothers him that Mrs. Hudson just implied that they were a couple, and Sherlock doesn't even appear to have heard
Additionally, just look at all that head-space Sherlock has; standard framing says not to cut off at the knees or other joints, and to keep head-space limited, yet look at this composition. I think this is fully intentional: the fact that he isn't framed conventionally helps to increase the distance between him and the viewer. In this same vein, we've been placed relatively far from him, without a clear view of his face, which is a compositional choice that recurs throughout this scene

When John walks into the apartment and offhandedly refers to the excesses of Sherlock's life as "rubbish," we see Sherlock spurred into an embarrassed, rapid cleaning spree. The viewer is left to observe him rather than join him -- we watch him flit about, curiously glancing at things as he shoves them away, without knowing either what he's doing or what end he's truly working toward. Through this scene, from the meeting on the street to the exit into the cab, Sherlock's movement is of most paramount notice, as he rarely seems to occupy one space long before shifting to another. This helps to further the perception of Sherlock as more of a force than a person. In contrast, John, upon his entrance to the apartment, more or less makes a straight line from door to chair, and there he settles.

These are basically just the key frames of this scene, from the time the door opens to the time they leave. Note how much ground Sherlock is covering in what is, to some degree, a small space and a short amount of time. John remains fairly consistent here, once again anchoring the scene by virtue of his stability, while Sherlock is free to disappear from screen twice (once in tile 2, and again in 17), move through three rooms (living area, kitchen, entrance hall), spin all the way around (12-14), and be seen from extreme close-up (when he walks through the camera, between 20 and 21) to relatively far away (such as 16 and 22); this very closely resembles his movements in the first meeting scene between John and Sherlock, which further reinforces his eccentricity

Here is a closer look at tile 5, in which the choice was made to have Sherlock's face almost entirely unlit, as both John and the viewer are left to interpret what he means by his little utterance "Well, when I say friend..."

I look back over these images, I rewatch the episode, and I find myself smiling at the charm I've found in Sherlock's energy, but I remember that on first viewing, I found it all to be completely off-putting. It frustrated me that he never seemed to just stop moving, so I could build a connection with him. I strongly suspect that this was meant to be the take away, so that we can understand what it's like to be John in that moment. The genius in it is that we feel as left behind and ignored as John does, but just as swept up in his intensity. What's interesting is that we are allowed one moment in which we do see him both still and present, but the nature of that moment only serves to further distance us from him (or, at least, it did the first time; now I just think it's hilarious).

"Found your website..."
"What'd you think?"

When John mentions his website, Sherlock immediately turns and opens himself to both him and the camera, suddenly outside his thoughts. This is really the first time that he's been open to us conventionally -- in the way that characters tend to be filmed, especially in conversation. The end result of this is that one of his first traits (beyond distraction) revealed to us is his vanity, and we see it stressed again shortly, during his "the police don't consult amateurs" spiel, as well as his refusal to don coveralls in Brixton. This decision to hold off viewer sympathy for him (and it is held off, for quite awhile) is an interesting one.

In response to John's implication that he is, as it were, full of crap, Sherlock immediately recedes again, breaking that brief moment of intimacy we shared with him. That break is achieved not just through the look on his face, and the little speech he launches into, but through us physically taking a step back from him.

note: Sherlock has managed to switch sides of the camera without actually moving by virtue of this framing, creating slight disorientation

It may be reaching, but I'd venture to theorize that one possible reason we were given that tantalizingly short moment with him was as a further tactic of disorientation -- because in setting up that conversation, it seemed as if we were about to get our first real connection with Sherlock on a personal level (which would be expected, given this is now our third scene with him and we are in his home), but instead all we saw was that he has feathers and John has just ruffled them. On delivering his rebuttal, Sherlock's feathers resettle, and he holds onto his coolness through Lestrade's arrival.

note how much space Sherlock has on all sides; this emphasizes his general air of aloofness, especially given he's talking to Lestrade, whose background is cluttered by lots of shapes; note also the difference in perspective from which these two are filmed -- Lestrade head-on, Sherlock from the side

Additionally, though during this conversation we once again are brought close to Sherlock's face, lighting, composition, and body language strip this physical closeness of any intimacy.

left, Sherlock talking to John; right, Sherlock talking to Lestrade
lighting on the left is soft, bringing out his whole face, and the background is brightly lit; in contrast, the lighting on the right creates harsh shadows on his face, making it hard to see much of it, and the background is dark; of these two images, it's obvious which one is easier to relate to

Once Lestrade exits, we see Sherlock's energy release like a crossbow bolt, and he rapidly makes his way from the flat (or so we first are led to think). The moment he leaves, we are (or, at least, I am) struck by the stillness left in his wake. John is transformed in an instant from anchor to lead agent, and his brief exchange with Mrs. Hudson seems more banal than it otherwise would have been had it not so immediately followed Sherlock's exuberant departure. From John's demeanor, it seems as if he has much the same feeling.

the length of the kitchen in the background really helps to increase the sense of emptiness here; the fact that it's filled with Sherlock's stuff almost seems to suggest the cause of that emptiness

When Sherlock returns, so does his energy, albeit at a lower simmer, and as he walks back into the room, we can feel it begin to boil again. We know John feels it too because he gets to his feet (something he did not feel the need to do for Mrs. Hudson or Lestrade, though it's possible his decision to rise was also influenced by Mrs. Hudson's "rest your leg"). Sherlock's presence becomes intense very rapidly not only because of the leading nature of his questions, but because of how quickly he comes to fill the screen -- he is first shown in the doorway occupying about a fifth the screen, then moves to occupy almost half of John's screen space and over two thirds his own (the obstruction from John's head in fact serves to suggest a smaller screen space, and he fills all of it) within just a few seconds.

Sherlock, open again, though not necessarily relatable

Both John and the viewer are swept with him out the door because of the intensity of his energy, and the enormous, almost boundless freedom with which he moves through space, one of my favorite examples of which occurs directly following, when Sherlock swings almost like a pendulum from the doorway, to Mrs. Hudson, and back to and out through the door.

What's interesting here is that Sherlock has managed to charm both John and the viewer without offering anything solid with which we can connect. John follows because he's been caught in the hurricane, knowing next to nothing about the where and the why (which is a testament to the largeness of Sherlock's personality, given how many other people would be able to convince a relative stranger to go out with him and view a corpse?), and we want him to go with him, because we are equally as intrigued to know more of Sherlock Holmes and what exactly is making him so happy (in the hopes that maybe then we'll be able to understand him). It's not until John's been sitting in a cab with Sherlock until nightfall that the excitement wears off enough for him to bother to ask the most basic of questions: Who are you, and Where are we going?

Next time, I'll look at that scene, and hopefully get to Brixton, so I can move a bit faster through this episode.