5.1       Review and critique at least one short film production

Film Title, Director, Country, Year.

2.20, Jason Wingard, UK, 2011

Story outline (1 or 2 sentence summary)

Dave is given a strange pair of glasses that show him people’s death date

What is the film about, is there a theme or message?

The film is about mortality and how precious and finite it is for everybody, as well as the curse of knowledge and how there can be such things as too much information and how overwhelming and terrifying that can be.  

Describe the genre (if fiction film), or style (if documentary).

Sci-fi 

How was sound used?

To begin with there are mostly realistic and digetic sounds used to show to the audience that the film is located in an ordinary street from ‘our’ world. However when Dave is being overwhelmed by the information and starts to realize his imminent death, non-digetic sounds such as a woman’s singing is played to build up the tension as well as give the sense of there being something special and almost mystical or holy about the glasses.

How were camera techniques used?

The Woman who gives Dave the glasses is initially shot as fairly far away from Dave, yet by the end of the short when Dave finally understands his fate and what the glasses mean the woman is filmed with intense close ups, showing the audience how Dave has now entered her world, with her no longer appearing so alien.  

What was the editing style?

Describe the setting/ location/ mise-en-scene.

A restaurant with an outside area, located on a standard little commercial road that could be from any British city, giving it a sense of familiarity, giving the audience instant access to the film.

Who is the film aimed at?

Sci-fi fans, although it is very accessible to anyone.

How did the film make you feel? Did it work well?

Intrigued at first and quite shocked and taken aback by the suddenness of the bus hitting Dave and the cut to credits, which shows that the film was clearly effective at getting me to feel what it seemed to want to get me to feel.

Would you recommend it?

Sure