Shot/Reverse Shot - TV Tropes

• Delicious in Dungeon: "Red Dragon I'' ends on one of these: Laios looks down upon his sister Falin's skull as he cradles it in his hands, followed by a shot of him as viewed through said skull's eyeholes.

• The Coen Brothers : Discussed in Joel & Ethan Coen - Shot | Reverse Shot, specifically how they make theirs interesting. On top of precise, near-invisible timing, they usually frame the camera in between the characters, making the audience feel more involved and somewhat "trapped" with them, building an awkward yet amusing sympathy. They also manage to get the surroundings around them within frame, usually providing information about even minor characters involved.

• Turning Red uses this for the scene where Mei's friends try to convince her to go karaokeing with them, and the following scene where Mei talks to her mother, thus comparing and contrasting the dynamic Mei has with her friends vs. her mother.

By Creator:

• Japanese director Yasujiro Ozu filmed conversations in shot-reverse shot sequences where each person in the conversation was centered and looking straight at the camera, rather than the over-the-shoulder style that is seen far more often.
• The prevalence of this approach in '30s-'40s film noir movies made it possible for Steve Martin to "act" with Bette Davis, Humphrey Bogart, Charles Laughton, etc. in Dead Men Don't Wear Plaid.

By Work:

• Blackbird (2014): During a conversation between Randy and his father, each speaker is viewed through the other's eyes.
• The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring gets across Galadriel's ability to see into the Fellowship's mind by cutting between an Extreme Close-Up of her eyes and then a member of the Fellowship. This goes on for each of them until we cut back to her from Frodo's face when we hear her speaking telepathically into her mind.
• Mulholland Dr.: Unlike most movies, the camera is not stationary on a tripod, but ever so slowly floats eerily up and down through space, as if the film itself is slowly becoming entirely detached from reality.
• Spider-Man: No Way Home: Preventing leaks by filming Tobey Maguire's Spider-Man separately is probably why he was shot from this P.O.V. He is never seen in a wide shot of the house he's supposed to have walked into.
• Star Wars:
  • The Last Jedi: Used to illustrate the Psychic Link between Rey and Kylo Ren. Each is filmed as though talking to the other in the same location, even when separated by vast distances.

• Buffy the Vampire Slayer:
  • The episode "Lie to Me" from the second season features this ad nauseam in the outside-the-school discussion between Buffy and Ford.
  • Angel's appearance in the series finale was filmed that way because David Boreanaz was only available for a short time.
  • There was a Buffy/Giles graveyard scene that used Sarah Michelle Gellar's stunt double accompanied by looped lines for the shots that were over Buffy's shoulder.
• The Daily Show with Jon Stewart: The field interviews are usually filmed this way.
• House of the Dragon: In "Driftmark", two groups face each other—one composed of Rhaenyra, Luke, and Daemon, and the other comprising Alicent, Aemond, and Criston. After almost coming to blows and Viserys ending the trial, the camera briefly alternates on each trio. Furthermore, their positions are paralleled (son at the center, angry mother on one side, and father figure standing protectively).
• Lost: Michael and Hurley's conversation in season 6 was filmed this way, presumably because they only had Harold Perrineau for a short time.
• Masters of the Air: In "Part Four", both the interrogation scene and Rosie's second conversation with Buck and Bucky are done this way, with neither scene featuring all of the characters in the same shot. This goes to show that the more experienced pilots of the 100th aren't fully comfortable with the new crews replacing their fallen comrades, much as the Belgian Resistance isn't willing to trust the American airmen who come to them for help without first testing to see if they are German infiltrators.
• Screenwipe: Examined by Charlie Brooker, where he showed how much Manipulative Editing can be accomplished by interposing otherwise pointless shots of the interviewer nodding to cover the edits in the subject's answers.
• Severance (2022): The creators extensively utilize this technique, rarely featuring two characters in the same shot while conversing, which heightens the focus on their individual reactions and emotions.
• Veronica Mars had to improvise an exchange between Veronica and a musician when the actor playing the musician couldn't come in to re-do the take. They hashed together the version where they were together with the one where Kristen Bell was delivering her lines to no-one.

• Mr. Plinkett Reviews: An extensive deconstruction of this technique forms a pillar of Plinkett's criticism against the cinematography of Revenge of the Sith, as well as that of the Prequel Trilogy at large. To summarize a ten minute discourse: it's a workmanlike technique whose overuse makes for boring cinema, it doesn't mesh well with the dynamic and free-form camera angles found in entirely computer-generated action scenes, and it takes the viewer out of the film by making it abundantly clear that dialogue is always taking place while characters are sitting or are languidly walking back and forth on a greenscreen runway.

• ANNO: Mutationem: At The Consortium's inner facility, as G confronts C, who is in the midst of a Villainous Breakdown, their conversation has the camera change perspectives from shifting behind the two as they converse with each other.