Analysis of a short film

The short film that I have chosen to analyze is one called 'The Fall' by Michael Chandler. I found this film on the BBC Film Network, and thought it was suitable to analyze as it is about brothers and something weird happens to them.

The film starts off with standard text stating the title of the film. This then fades into an establishing panning shot of a London setting. This then fades into a close up of a young mans face looking out over the setting. Slow music begins to play, but gets slightly faster as a close up of the young man holding a cup is shown. The music is not sad but is hardly cheerful. As a sigh is let out by the young man, it cuts to a seemingly older man, asleep on a sofa. Already, we are led to believe that the young man is fed up, and the elder man may be the reason for this. The music continues to play as the young man enters through the door frame, after cleaning up what seems to be his father, a close up of a photo frame is shown of two kids. The two kids smiling has connotations of that the family used to be happy, and something significant has changed recently. The next shot, shows another young man, in a huddle on his bed and leads us to question whether it was the same young boy in the photograph. The messiness of the setting leads us to believe that this character is in some distress. Dialogue is key when it comes to the next part and plays a part in the final twist of the film. Jason's brother Darren, clearly in some distress, asks why Jason is still here. To which Jason replies that he's just about to go to work, to which Darren replies that is not what he meant. Although this dialogue seems pretty meaningless at the time, it becomes quite key to later on in the film where he is told to leave and enjoy his own life rather than caring about others. After it has become apparent that Darren has gone missing, Jason goes to the street to search for his brother. A series of different shots are then cut together to show Jason searching the streets. Due to them being cut together quickly it shows the franticness of the situation and how desperate Jason is to find his mentally ill brother. Of these shots are long shots, low angle shots, and on most of the shots, Jason is a silhouette showing how in the dark he is, with the situation.

Not so much an interesting shot, but an interesting concept is used within the film. In the below shot, it seems like a standard long shot, however the graffiti in the background is sat in the exact same position as the main protagonist. This gives us an early indication into the importance of graffiti within this film and how it's going to help Jason in finding his brother.

After this shot we see a medium shot as Jason walks down an alley. His constant looking behind him gives us the suspiscion that somebody might be following him, yet nothing comes to light. After a bit of walking, Jason turns the corner and to his surprise there is his brother Darren, spraying green paint onto a wall. Jason begins to chase after Darren, as Darren runs off in the opposite direction. A close up of Jason is shown as he turns around a corner looking down the street at where his brother just ran. The fact that it focuses mainly on Jason and doesn't show us a POV shot to show what Jason is actually look at, adds suspense to the scene. As he gives up hope, he notices the graffiti on the wall that he saw previously on the council house wall. A hand held shot, shows him touching and rubbing the green between his thumb and index finger. The symbology of the green could be reference to the green eyed monster which refers to jealousy and could be a small hint to that he is jealous of his brother's artistic skills.

After seeing the above graffiti, more graffiti is present on the walls, and this time the graffiti is there to help him. The green monster is the same that was drawn on the council house wall earlier in the movie and leads him to his brother. There is also significant importance of the comic relief used in this section. Despite being quite an intense film with an eerie setting, the graffiti of a chicken in a tin can labelled 'Cock Soup' provided with me a wry smile. This was clearly just added in to break up the seriousness of the situation, and this could be something that we incorporate into our film.

As Jason returns home, he begins to pack his things, signaling his intent to leave his family and to stop looking after them. He then enters the front room where an establishing shot shows his Dad asleep on the sofa, if it wasn't for the sound effects of snoring then he could quite easily be perceived to be dead. A close-up of of Jason holding his dads hand is a touching close-up to show that despite him sick of cleaning up after his dad, he's still going to miss him. A medium shot then establishes that Jason has left the apartment without his Dad ever knowing. A panning shot is then shown on the corridor, as a silhouetted Jason leaves his old life forever.

This shot, really caught my eye in the film, and the extreme low angle shot of the aeroplane flying over the apartment shows us connotations of a journey. Despite only being on for a couple of seconds this, combined with the final shot shows us that Jason is about to embark on a journey and may refer to the holiday that his colleagues mentioned earlier in the film, and shows that Jason is about to start enjoying himself, rather than worrying over family.

A long shot of Jason walking off into the distance, then appears to fade as the sun embarks over the rooftops. As the shot finally fades to white, the credits appear and tells us that Jason has gone off to do this other thing, like his brother wanted him to do. The white of the sunset then transitioned into the purity of white suggests happiness and that Jason to have a good time wherever he is heading. The credits ensue, and soft music continues to play.

In this film, it is evident that the director is trying to portray a bond between the brothers despite their differences and this is what we want to achieve with our film. A great variety of shots, and tense music add to the overall product of the film and these are some things that we will take into account when filming for Entwined.