NEA evaluation

1. Evaluation Dominic Griffiths 4047 Alleyn’s School 10802
According to the OSCARs, a short film is ‘an original motion picture that has a running time
of 40 minutes or less, including all credits.’ Short films, however, can be defined by other
parameters. They often mirror the concise and tailored tone of poetry and short stories in
literature, unafraid to have no great over-arching message. If a statement is being made, it
is often stripped down, blossoming from a simple idea. For example, Operator concerns a
single intense 999 call. However, it is commenting on the extremely intense and mentally
draining job of a 999 operator. In my own short, Lost, my central focus was for the spectator
to gain a better understanding of the experience of those suffering from Dementia. Short
films are especially important today, with everyone’s attention being pulled in different
directions as they allow for an idea or message to be
expressed quickly and succinctly. For example, within
the first minute of Slap there is a clear contradiction
made between the protagonist putting on makeup
and sexualised images of women on the wall (see Fig.
1). The intense impact of a short means it will often
stick in a spectator’s mind longer than that of a full
feature film, in which a message can get lost or
diluted.
Lost follows the life of my protagonist being thrown into confusion when his wife, Laura,
goes missing. As the story unfolds, the spectator comes to realise that it is not the
protagonist’s wife who is lost but actually his memories. He is in fact an elderly man coping
with the daily struggle of Dementia, repeatedly having to come to the realisation that his
wife has passed. Comparing Lost to the set short films,
the summary appears similar to Echo in its focus on
memories. As with Echo, my character repeats the
same phone call multiple times, although for different
reasons (see Fig. 2). My film is titled Lost to deceive
the spectator further. Watching the film on first
viewing and knowing the title, the spectator is led to
believe that the short is about the man’s wife going
missing. As the story unfolds the spectator realises the
title references his loss of memories. Similar to the shorts from the set list, my title is a
single word that represents an important theme or moment, such as Over, Slap, Echo,
Operator.
Genres are defined ‘by their narratives or their
themes, but also by their iconography, characters and
certain stylistic elements.’ I aimed to create a film that
highlighted the lack of understanding of Dementia in
modern society, even as the widespread and crippling
illness it is. The focus on this real issue places my film
in the social-realism genre. However, it differs in its
poetic use of microelements and this is part of what
people enjoy about genres. ‘As audiences, we enjoy
Fig. 1
Fig. 2
Fig. 3 ‘Why do you think I’m only
eating the chips’ Insinuating that
the kebab is human flesh.

2. Evaluation Dominic Griffiths 4047 Alleyn’s School 10802
the repetition of the familiar, but also the injection of novelty and change to familiar forms.’
In this way, my film is similar to The Ellington Kid, also in the social-realism genre. The
Ellington Kid approaches the issue of knife crime in the UK using dark comedy (see Fig. 3).
One of my inspirations to make a social-realism film was Ken Loach’s I, Daniel Blake. The
amazing depiction of the debilitating effect our flawed unemployment and benefits system
can have motivated me to approach a similarly important topic.
The aesthetic of a film is the overall style and ‘feel’ of the film. I aimed to have a Kafkaesque
style, a feeling of being swept up in the story. I did this through continually linking
transitions with a variety of microelements, this resulted in a sense of the narrative jumping
through time, similar to a dream, and also assisted with the pace of my film. For example,
when the protagonist is in the attic, an increasing bus horn begins to sound as a bright light
comes towards his face and as this comes to climax, it cuts to a bus passing by him at a bus
stop.
Making a film about the collapse of memory gave me the opportunity to reflect this in the
narrative structure. This led me to challenge the three-part narrative structure by providing
exposition for a story that is not real. Alongside the manipulation of the hierarchy of
knowledge resulting in the spectator having a better grasp on the man’s memories than he
does himself. Narratively I also wanted there to be a clear shift of alignment. The short
begins with the spectator aligned with the man, thinking life is normal. As it continues the
dramatic irony develops and you become aligned with the daughter. The man is an
unreliable narrator both in the film and in his own life. I had an important differentiation
between story and plot that was important for the writing of my screenplay. The story is
about an elderly man living alone with dementia. The plot, however, is of a younger man
coming to this realisation. These parallel storylines were elements I had to keep in control.
Differing from the set short films, my screenplay has parallel storylines designed to reflect
the fragmented nature of his memory; creating a
constant fluctuation between who he has been and
who he is now, merging together literally in the
second disruption of the story. He looks into the
mirror and images of his young and old self are
superimposed over each other (see Fig. 4). This is
the first moment in which there is a clear reference
to the later plot twist. The second storyline is what
he experiences, thinking his wife has gone missing.
This moment is designed to mislead the spectator, thinking this is the central story of the
film. Linking back to alignment, the spectator being focused on the second story line was a
purposeful decision to assist my intention of the short, to make the spectator understand
the crippling nature of Dementia.
I wanted my film to be a different experience for each spectator and for them to notice new
things on a second or even third viewing. The main way I did this is by foreshadowing the
twist multiple times through the use of mise-en-scene and a changed meaning of scenes
upon knowing the twist. For example; having the camera hold on a photo of an elderly man
and his daughter on the stairs, blurring Laura out in the shots she’s in, the shocked friend at
Fig. 4

3. Evaluation Dominic Griffiths 4047 Alleyn’s School 10802
the supermarket to hear him mention Laura as still alive. I also aimed for viewers that re-
watch the short to notice the first conversation remains sensical without any of Laura’s
dialogue, as in reality Laura was just a memory.
My short follows a strictly chronological timeline. I did not want to rely on any flashbacks to
differentiate the storylines, therefore, the distortion of time is presented through the mise-
en-scene and editing. The younger man wears a slightly older man’s outfit, boxes are shown
labelled in the attic ‘out of his lifetime’. My distortion
within editing focused on the flowing transitions
between scenes, created by pairing the cuts with
graphic matches and sound bridges. Additionally, I
would have cuts within scenes accompanied by a
short burst of ‘Wish Someone Would Care’ by Irma
Thomas creating a glitch effect. This highlighted the
frequent ‘gaps’ in his memory and introduced the
song to the spectator so when it is played fully at the end there is a sense of nostalgia. The
use of the flowing transitions assists in the regulation of the building pace and contrasts the
lingering last shot. The elderly and young man sit together on the sofa, allowing the
spectator to ‘breathe’ and reflect on the message of the film. The pace of my film is similar
to Operator in this way. An extremely intense film continuously building with tension for
mother and son, then juxtaposed by silence at the end before
beginning again, ‘Hello, Fire Service. Can you tell me your address
please?’ (see Fig. 5)
Looking back at my screenplay, I have found it follows Barthes’
‘enigma code’, a mode of film in which small puzzles are set up to be
solved by the spectator. The spectator’s viewing experience will
change depending on when or if these puzzles are solved. Although I
include the classic short film ‘plot twist’ in the final shot in which the
camera pans behind a card to reveal both the older and younger
man sitting on the sofa (see Fig. 6) my use of the enigma code allows
for the twist to come at different points during the short.
These moments of confusion and realisation mirror the experiences of the man himself. His
own life is a series of unsolved puzzles. Unlike the man, however, the spectator is able to
shed this state of confusion when the film comes to an end.
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Fig. 5
Fig. 6