Evaluation

My films follow a character called Daisy, who is trapped and a lost individual being held back by her past. With her mother being a performance artist daisy was encouraged to help her mother use her younger sister as a prop in her world famous performances, encouraging her to not take her prescribed epileptic medicine and to be exposed to strobe lighting in front of an audience.

The conventions I used from the genre were found due to research and by analysing films within this genre. Films which I gained inspiration from were ‘Revolutionary Road’ (2008 Dir. Sam Mendes), Thirteen (2002 Dir. Catherine Hardwicke), Babel and The Burning Plain (2007, Guillermo Arrigaga). From strong research, it came clear to me the conventions used I felt all needed to be included and used in my piece. My film was aimed at the specific audience who have been education within the arts therefore I felt I could make my piece as creative and abstract as possible as strong convention within Drama was the use of different/ creative styled directing, as people who are educated within the arts I felt would understand the artistic suggestions. I feel the creative and different editing which I used within my film would be understood by this specific audience and would understand how all of these effects reflect the character.

The narrative of my film is non-linear, as I filmed the equilibrium which is the beginning of a film in which is used to establish the protagonist which is the main character. I needed this scene to reflect her overall personality however give some insight into the issues she has, how the past has effected her in her coming-of-age. After the equilibrium my film would then follow on establishing her day to day life, by using documentary style, hand held camera to create realism as well as reflect the idea of Daisy being unstable. Every so often there are flash backs of Daisy’s past memory and from then onwards we begin to slowly connect with Daisy emotionally as a character due to beginning to understand about her past.

In the Mise-en-scene within my piece, one important explicit set idea I had was to place the scripts and newspapers all over the table, I did this to suggest the idea everything Daisy say and does is scripted and not real. It reflects the character as the actress which she is, and also how my influence was how the news seems more entertainment then factual whilst provoking the question: is what the public are hearing or reading entirely true? Within the piece, I felt a strong importance to explicitly inform the audience on the door being closed within the background to suggest entrapment of the character.

Within the scenes in the sitting room, I didn’t want to use any artificial lighting, I loved the lighting from the sun set, and I wanted to use this as a reflection of Daisy believes her time is nearly up, she believes there is no more time to run away from her past. I felt the darkness from the sun setting, left the room looking isolating, cold and lonely. It really reflected how Daisy feels emotionally inside which is why is was important. Also, within the sitting room, I felt it a strong idea to keep the curtains wide open, to suggest how Daisy is looking for help, she is out in the open, just waiting for someone to come to her with help.


I researched in the specific type of actress I wanted, from watching films within the same genre I was able to identify the key characteristics of which coming-of-age characters have. These characteristics included an attitude, quite harsh featured and usually had an aggressive tone and a wild personality usually within the fields of self-expressionism with fashion sex and drugs. However, after realising these character conventions, I identified how I want my character to be different, I want her to be quite repressive and harshly featured however also has a surprisingly soft and eloquent, young, girly voice as this reflected the innocence and vulnerability. Therefore I felt I cast my actress perfectly. I used the technique of ‘Hot Seating’ to really bring a strong character out of my actress, informing her of ‘what ifs’ and telling my actress about Daisy’s background. I wanted her costume to be contemporary British indie, as I felt this reflected the average British eighteen year old teenager which is what I wanted to represent as the character is materialistically and physically just an average teenage girl, by analysing the female characters from teenage dramas such as skins, this reinstated my idea of the stereotypical British teen which I wanted to use. I wanted her to have her hair down to represent her as repressive and shy personality. With my actress being an art and photography student, she was able to deliver creativity to my piece, which was extremely helpful and interesting.

In terms of cinematography, the extreme close up of my characters mouths worked very well, I needed to reflect how perhaps helping someone over the phone was very limiting as they don’t gain that personal relationship as one possibly would if seen face to face. I chose to edit the extreme close ups in monochrome as it represented a realism it also physically brought the audience closer to the character and also closer and draws to you into the story. I also used extreme close ups on news paper stories to introduce my film, I wanted to reflect how the main stories within a newspaper as I was fascinated with again, this idea of the truth within global media, is what we see, hear and read the truth? It also reflects my main idea behind the product that being how easy it is to just switch off the news, or put down the newspaper and ignorantly block charity and global news out from affecting you. I used a mixture of shots of her monologue from hand help, to medium profile; to high angle medium close up. I wanted the audience to really come familiar with the character so an emotional connection could begin. I felt the various cinematography represented the idea of a documentary which created realism.

The sound within my piece I feel is really effective, I feel the song choice was a brilliant song choice as the isolating hollow piano chords I feel really reflected Daisy’s loneliness. The opening lines state ‘Cold Water surrounds me now’ which I feel was so strong to suggest how daisy sees the world, being unpleasant, confusing and cold. Apart from this certain non-diagetic piece of music, the rest I used was natural diagetic sound as Daisy spoke her monologue. This kept the piece more naturalistic and the audience where able to have all attention upon Daisy rather than a song being played in the background. I also liked the acoustics of the dining room, the echo effect I feel reflects, the idea of isolation, emptiness and the chill of coldness as echo only occurs when rooms are large, but empty inside. I also loved the colours of the stain glass; this strongly reflected the world Daisy wished to be in, away from the dark, cold rooms with echo, in a world full of colour, where she can live once again.

The editing was the creative part of the film, here; I was able to edit certain colours which would strongly reflect the character. Influenced by the confrontation scene within Jennifer Hardwicke’s 2002, Thirteen, colour was a very important element within my product as this was when I could fully suggest to my audience slight key elements about my character. Using monochrome, I felt created realism with the idea of it seeming like a interview/ documentary feel. I also loved the colours through the stain glass, this was an important part of my film as it was to suggest how she craves a colourful world past this mental prison, full of colour and life and that the idea I wanted to show explicitly to the audience, the idea of her life being dull, drained and empty where as outside the windows is this amazing fantasy world, hence the use of brightly contrasted and highly hue edited shots. I also loved the really sharp contrasted medium close up where she is stood against the wall; I felt this suggested to the audience how she has a mask of harsh features, to repress her past and her emotions. The abrupt ending I placed there, mainly due to the influence of how easy it was to turn off people begging for help on the news, this idea came about whilst watching a ‘breaking news report on Haiti earthquake,’ and halfway through my father got up of the settee and switched off the news report half way through the people of Haiti where pleading for support from other nations. The idea of it being so easy to abruptly ignore and cut something out of your life through the use of a button, whilst they are begging help from the audience at home to donate some money to help save them and their children’s life’s astounded me.

In conclusion, I felt my finished product was a success. One main problem with my piece is the sound. The speech quality is not as strong as I hoped it would be, however I love the colours within my piece I really feel they suggest the qualities in my character which I wanted them to. I wanted the abrupt ending to be a shock to the audience, and I definitely feel I have accomplished this aim with the abrupt and random ending during Daisy’s speech. If I was to do this project again, I would have used a sound booth to record the monologue again or even used a clip on microphone, as I don’t feel the sound quality is that good and I also would have maybe used a variety of different settings as perhaps there’s chance of the film becoming tedious with the same locations, perhaps I could have attempted to film outside however, I don’t think this would have given the isolated, cold and lonely feelings in which I wanted to suggest.