‘Mixed Tape’, written and directed by Luke Snellin, is a short film adapted into the genre of social realism, and is evolved around the connection between a neighbouring girl and boy. It is clear the genre is social realism due to some of the conventions used which creates the ‘illusion of reality‘, such as the realistic settings - a neighbouring house/flat in a urbanised area/children’s bedrooms, unobtrusive mise en scene and camerawork and use of naturalistic lighting and digetic/non digetic sound. The main character is a young boy in his early teens, and alongside there are only two other small part characters - the girl and her mother - so overall the characterisation is minimal.
This short film uses the style conventions of social realism in a number of unique ways. The mixed tape he gives to the girl seems to be an important symbolism for his affection, and is shown to be significant through the obvious
fact that it is the title, and the opening shot of a running mixed tape.
Another unique element to this short film is how little dialogue is used and how they use the music, body language and expressions to represent the characters actions, feelings and personality instead. A few ways of how they do this so well is through the slow motion and loud non digetic music during the ‘daunting walk’ to the house. This shot shows and emphasises his nervous expression well, but also portrays a quiet confidence through the overwhelming music playing. Another distinctive aspect of the film used to create uniqueness is both the long shot used to establish the neighbouring characters as he walks to her house and the end shot of their adjacent rooms with the wall division, with both the children parallel to each other and showing both their emotions and contentment. All these unique components have been very inspiring and will be hopefully somehow incorporated into our short film.
The film uses the short film format very well, as it uses a very basic scenario with no particularly amazing storyline, but manages to use a range of techniques to make it interesting and worth watching. It doesn’t leave much for the audience to guess, as it establishes factors such as characters personas quite directly, for example it is obvious that the girl’s mum is the girl’s mother, just through her very ‘mumsy’ stereotypical role, clothing and polite manners.
The use of sound in this short film may be one of the most important elements which makes the film, as the story is pretty much told through the music. The switching between the music being non digetic and digetic seem to divide fantasy from reality. For example, the change from the non digetic loud music played during the walk up to the house as he dreams about the girl, to the sudden switch as they dance to the same music but shown as digetic in their adjacent bedrooms. Furthermore, the lyrics of the music seem to transfer messages to each other, almost like a replacement for dialogue.
The theme of the film is realistic - young love. Although realistic, you could argue it is not such a common occurrence in the modern world, as it uses the old school innocent exchange of a mixed tape. Therefore it may be going against the stereotyped norms of what happens between relationships in today’s society. Furthermore, young teenagers are known to have bad reputations and negative stereotypical traits, but in this film it breaks this representation and focuses on the positive and innocent factors of childhood. It is a situation the audience can easily relate and empathise with, and manages to position the audience into taking a positive and appealing view towards the children through the innocent and naive portrayal of them both in both entertaining and ‘cute’ ways. Therefore creating a interesting and high-quality short film.
Research Task;
I found a very interesting short film through searching around on Youtube, that I thought was very cleverly crafted with a unique storyline. Directed by Mathieu Katthe, ‘Lovefield’ is a thought to be horror film but with a twisted ending. The basic storyline involves the audience believing that the man has murdered a woman in a middle of a wheat field in a remote area, and how he reacts and runs to his car to retrieve a bag/blanket, as if to bury her, when in fact she has actually just given birth to a child.
Many conventions of a horror are involved and the related atmosphere is created in a number of ways. In the beginning, through the subtle but important, usually singular non digetic music notes and the added digetic sound of the wisps of wind create the basis of the horror atmosphere ambience. Low key lighting is used, emphasising the overcast bleak climate. The emblematic components of the settings, such as the location of a field, which is a common location associated with murders/horrors, gives the audience a sense of what genre the film is also.
Symbolism is used, as a black crow appears throughout the film repeatedly – usually as close ups - and seems to symbolise death/negative activity. There is a mid shot at a slight high angle of the long stretch of road, with the sign swinging back and forth. This shot is very typical of a horror film and has occurred in some before; it stresses how deserted the area is and the lack of civilisation/activity. There is a slow build up of montages of the same wheat field location, which if you analysis carefully you see the camera is gradually tilting down to ground level. Representations of characters are a key element to this film. The male character, first thought to be an antagonist, has many features to suggest he is a bad person. Such as his big build, skull tattoo, dark eyes and guilty expressions. You would be confused and surprised to see either - for example - a little boy or a teenaged girl stand up from the incident instead of this man.
This short film highlights just how much importance and significance all the elements of film have in how the audience perceives the situation and relations to characters etc. It can distort the wrong impression and the real meaning into what’s occurring in a clever and unique way.
An example of how this film altered the perception of the situation is through the low key lighting, eerie music and the way the camera moved at a ground level showing the objects (dead phone, crushed wheat, blooded material, fallen handbag etc) and finally the struggling dirty/injured foot, and the sudden placement of the blooded knife in the ground. An example some of the ways elements of film contributed to the distortion of the judgement of character is the shadows and lighting cast upon the man’s face which portrayed an evil and angry expression, and furthermore the way the camera tilted up slowly showing his whole body posture and language, highlighting his status and actions. The sudden turn around of both lighting (turned into natural light to show good weather), music (transformed into most uplifting music) and mise en scene at the end scene twisted the story to show a positive and happy occasion of his wife giving birth, allowing the audience to understand he is actually a protagonist and his actions were in fact, caring and constructive.I really liked the way this film constructed there storyline and unique twist and if our group decide to create a horror, this would be very good inspiration to create something with a similar effective ending, and would give us a range of ideas in order to craft many techniques to establish the correct specific atmosphere and genre.
Saltmark, Robin Haig.
‘Saltmark’ is a social realist drama created by Robin Haig focusing on love, courage and growing up. The film reveals the connection between a old fragile man and his teenaged granddaughter, which he seems to be dependent on.
The narrative has little dialogue throughout, and seems to be told more through their body language, face expressions and reactions to situations.
The title ‘Saltmark’ doesn’t give much away, and it isn’t until a minute into the film that a second character is established. Through the first minute you are introduced to the teenaged girl as she enters her Grandfather’s house. Clue’s are given to suggest either an elderly and unwell person lives there, through the shots of her handling pills, medication and swinging around in a wheelchair. You already get a feel for her feelings and mood towards being their through her facial expressions in a couple of shots. For example the close up her entering the house, with a worried look and head positioning to suggest she’s checking to make sure nobody sees her enter, perhaps indicating embarrassment of being there? Again another example is when the camera follows her movement when she swings around in the chair, with her head upwards, with a blank but slight unhappy expression.
In the scene when they are both in the living room drinking their tea, aspects of their relationship is established. The grandfather asking “How you getting on at your school?” is a thought to be stereotypical question a relative would ask. The girl may be seen as a stereotypical teenager with her reaction being to getting fish and chips a negative one, as it is apparently “so unhealthy and fattening”. This also enhances the growing up representation of the film, as the grandfather confirms that she used to love getting fish and chips when younger. The girl seems to have quite a frustrated hostility towards him, as there seems to be a tense ambience between them. Again, the fact that he is weak and reliant is established through the long shot of the room, showing his wheelchair and other supports surrounding him. Furthermore, through him not being able to hear properly as the girl is having to repeat what she says.
Another main scene which shows her anger and reluctance to help is when he is needing help to empty his urine bottle. Close up’s of her negative and hateful face expression is regularly shown and although the grandfather apologises many times, you can still sympathise with the situation she’s in, but at the same time feel very sorry for the disabled grandfather.
As she pours away her coke, it may be interpreted as a symbol of her pouring away her dignity.The long shot showing the three teenaged female characters in the background show all of the characters reactions to the circumstances. As the three girls laugh, stare and film her you see the girl’s reaction and sense a build up of frustration, up to the point where she blows and throws the bottle at them and screams abuse at them.
It is established as a social realism film as it uses only naturalistic lighting, simple shots and angles (mainly medium close ups and long shots) and only digetic sounds, such as the sea waves, seagulls, hearing aid etc. The locations are also very basic and familiar places such as the sea coast and railway line.
Throughout the whole short film, you sense a lot of feelings of resentment coming from the girl towards her grandfather, for being so helpless and dependent on her. It positions the audience to feel a range of views towards the female character, from feeling dislike towards her with the way she treats her grandfather, to feeling sorry for her and the situation, to feeling proud of her standing up for herself. The normal stereotypes and views on teenagers are negative, but this film brings out the positives and innocence of many, showing that many do actually care. The audience are seemed to be positioned to like and sympathise with the grandfather through the whole film, which is a common association with elderly people.
The film shows their close relationship separate but then be drawn back together again in subtle ways, such as the way they are first on the bench at either side (emphasises by a behind long shot of the distance between them) and then when she returns from calming down she sits a lot closer to him. The way in which they don’t discuss what just happened and carry on like before show they have a special enough bond to understand each others feelings and can move on. The last few seconds of the film, where the grandfather exclaims “You know, they never put enough salt on”, and then the close up of her face smiling, has a underlying meaning and marks the beginning of their better caring connection; it also brings everything together and shows the relevancy of the title “Saltmark”.
Through analysing this short film there are many things I think our group can use and expand on into our short production. Such as again, like the short film “Mixed Tape”, not use a lot of dialogue. But this time not use music to establish emotions, but use body language and close ups of expressions and long shots to express atmospheres. I also liked the way in which they used the symbolism of the coke bottle. Furthermore, I like the way this film has used a ambiguous title, which is later recognized to fit with the film at the end.
School of Life;
School of life, directed and produced by Jake Polonsky, is a drama based short film, with not so much a twisted ending, but a hidden message, about life. Drama film’s enclose a lot of elements found in social realism films, which is evidential in this short film.
Features included which are linked to social realist films is the common location - a school, common stereotypes - a calm natural teacher and a ruthless bully and common situations that the audience may be able to relate to, such as being bullied and peer pressure.
Research task;
A feature not so common in social realism films but is apparent in this drama, is their range of shots, angles and camera positioning/movement, for example the beginning sequence with the low but paced dolly along the school playground. The settings are established immediately as you hear the stereotypical sound of screaming/playing/talking school children - which is often associated with schools. Furthermore, it is obvious it is a school through the mise en scene, of the children’s costumes, the settings and even the facial expressions/body language.
This short film is interesting, as it seems to use a lot of fade outs to cut to different scenes and establish a time shift. The lighting isn’t very realistic and seems quite low key, almost looking like the lighting ’sepia’ in some scenes (such as the outside scene when the bell rings to go inside) perhaps to play upon the unenthusiastic and bleak atmosphere of the film.
The film also plays with irony in many subtle ways, for example, when the schoolboy who’s trying to be persuaded to bunk off refuses and says “it might be an important class” and “we might actually learn something”, is ironic as the lesson is about “the most important lesson of your life”. But the most ironic thing is the ending, in which it allows the audience to relate to and interpret for themselves, depending on their outlooks on life.
The film uses the short film format as each scene is rather short and quirky, with no real explanation to it.
Stereotypes are emphasised a lot. The bully “Garth”, is a representation of the thought to be ‘look’ bullies portray. Big built, poor language/vocabulary, drowsy body posture with a lazy walk, and the actions of a bully - hitting other children and being cruel and selfish. His actions are very emphasised, such as the close up of him stabbing the compass into the desk and the close up of him drawing his ‘line of territory’, to show how much influence and power he has over others, because if that was done using a long shot at a high angle, it wouldn’t of looked as controlling and severe. This could be a technique we could incorporate into our short film, using close ups of certain actions to emphasise there purpose and authority/dominance. Furthermore, another subtle way in which they have established stereotypes (intentionally or not) is I noticed the bully has dark clothing on whereas the innocent boy has a pure white shirt on, possibly to verify protagonists and antagonists, which also occurs in the short film ‘Joyride’.
A technique I noticed that they tend to use also to increase the time for something to happen (in this case, the teacher give the main male school boy character the ‘book of life’) is use a range of shots in sequence to show every angle and position of the room. They used a lot of long shots of the room and then a couple of slow pans of the teacher giving out the handouts.
The main music sequence occurs when the school boy runs out of the classroom. This builds up as his emotions and actions build up as he increases from a walk to a run and a slow evaluation of the situation to a outburst of panic. Throughout this scene of running through the school, I noticed the corridors and rooms seem to get darker and darker, possibly to emphasise his realisation of the situation.
The final scene shows him knocking at the staff room door, the music comes to an end and the female teacher approaches him, you see all this from a medium shot at eye level, as if you’re standing right next to them. Her final sentence “That Stanley … that is life” - is the most significant occurrence in the film, as it links the whole purpose of the film - maybe which is not too clear - all together and leaves the audience to think and wonder about what it all meant. We could maybe do something similar within our film, through having a hidden meaning.
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