Amelie Spin-off: First Treatment of the YEAR!

What's up! Long time no pitch. Whose ready for the first treatment of the year?!

Well, ready or not, here it comes! Let's check out the assignment:

So now that we have analyzed Amelie, we've identified stylistic choices in the film that we are going to attempt to included in our films. Here are some possible directions for your treatment for a 3-5 minute short:
1. Romantic comedy between a protagonist and ....object, person, animal, etc.
2. A character study of a quirky character that antagonizes others only to receive poetic justice in the end?
3. A Do-Gooder that gets rewarded for their sacrifice.
4. A comedic coming of age story that follows a character through their 1st  romantic encounter.
5. A dream sequence that allows the protagonist to escape a life of drudgery.

In my case, we're going for option 3: Do-Gooder Redemption

Log-Line: A girl with a fondness of photography is sort of a lone wolf. One day, a guy takes her camera and takes pictures of her in her most candid moments, with questions written on the back of the pictures. It basically turns into a scavenger hunt for this lonely girls beloved camera, leading up to a blooming romance between her and her mysterious thief.

Setting: School, city, misc. places a teenage girl would go to.

Imagine if you will, the lens of a digital camera. snap you hear the shutter sound. Now you see the rest of the camera. snap off goes the shutter sound flash you're blinded by the flash. From the whiteness comes the wide shot: the behind-side view of a girl with her camera pointed to the sky through a window.

Now we see her face blocked by her beloved camera. She pulls it down and walks off, in to the hallways of her classroom. Misc. pictures of people around her are taken, and the last picture we see is of a boy, a secret picture while he's talking to his friends. It's freeze framed, and we see it materialize as a picture, being placed into an album in the girl's room. We then see the girl close the album in great satisfaction. We follow her as she puts the album away, where we see a potted plant on her windowsill. Seasons pass, and the camera goes back to where she put the album away, only she's taking it out this time.

A friend is over, a boy--but you can't really tell who it is. She's happy and showing him the album. She places the album on the bed and flips through the pages, where we see their hands point and turn the pages of pictures. We then see the girl, smiling, whip out a picture of a divided classroom, with various groups hanging about. We see the boy's smile, but not his face. She places the picture into the album and the camera zooms in on the picture, we're actually there, and the girl puts down her camera and takes her seat in the center--alone. The school day has ended.

We eventually see the groups go home, as the girl packs up and heads out the door. She bumps into the boy from the picture in the hallway and drops her folder of pictures, where tons of pictures of everything drop. The boy is amazed as he helps her pick them up. He tries to make friends with her but she's shy. He notices none of the pictures have her in them, so he asks why.

"Because I don't want to ruin that perfect kodak moment." (or something more inspiring)

 The boy essentially falls in love with her and her passion for photography, but she leaves quickly because she's so shy. He wants to get closer to her.

The next day, it's class time. The boy keeps looking over to the girl and is obviously wanting to talk to her. The bell rings, and everyone goes to get lunch. Just as he was about to go talk to her she disappears into the crowd. He's left at her desk, where her camera peeks out from her desk. He hatches an idea.

It's the end of lunch and the girl finds her camera missing. She hears the snap of her camera's shutter sound and looks around. Everyone is flooding into the classroom, and the noise of her camera is gone. School has ended and she looks around her desk and bag for clues to her disappearing camera. One note.

I have your camera, let's go on an adventure.

She's puzzled. The next day after school a picture of her camera on a science table is placed in her desk with the caption

Adventure Time. Are you ready? Where was this picture taken? Go there.

The girl goes to the location the picture was taken, where she discovers a picture of herself in math class. Do you like photography? The pattern repeats, and pictures of her at various locations are shown one by one with questions on the back.

When did you take your first picture? Favorite color? What's a food you can't handle? Who's your best friend? Do you wear contacts? Do you like the weather today? What's your favorite season? Do you have someone you like? When's your birthday? Something you're scared of? Are you lonely?

And the last question Why don't you ever take pictures of yourself? It leads her back to her desk where her camera sits with a post-it note on top.

Turn me on.

She turns the camera on, and see the boy form before holding a sign that says "Press Left" Pictures of the girl with other people are shown continuously until finally, a picture of the boy and girl are shown, where it looks like they are sitting back to back, like they've known each other for years, with a sign that says "Have Fun?"

We see her smile, but not her face. A tear trickles down.

The next day the boy discovers a picture on his desk. It's the picture she took of him long ago with a note on the back

Adventure Time. Are you ready? You know what to do.

The boy enters the empty auditorium, taking a few cautious steps in.

"I love photography." A voice can be heard but we don't know where it's from.

"My first picture was taken when I was 5 with a Barney Camera." step the girl is on the stage.

"My favorite color is green" snap the sound of the shutter of her camera.

"I can't handle spicy curry." Snap as she takes a step off stage into the audience.

"My best friend is Lily, this camera." snap another step

"I don't wear contacts." Snap "I loved the weather that day, because the rain calms me down." Snap "My favorite season is Spring" Snap "I do have someone I like." Snap "My birthday is August 12th, 1992" snap "I'm scared of the dark" snap "I'm sometimes lonely." snap she's right in front of him.

"I don't take pictures of myself, so you can take them." She smiles, and raises up her camera. flash

From within the whiteness we see a picture develop--the picture of boy smiling. The picture materializes and is placed into the album. The album is close, and the girl, smiling, places the album on the shelf. The camera follows her, and goes back to the potted plant as we hear the door close. The camera moves away from the potted plant and to a certain picture in a frame: the girl and the boy together smiling happily. Through the window we can see through blurred visions the girl and boy getting into a car and driving off.

 

Amelie: Possibly one of the most brilliant movies ever made!

The Assignment:

Using the textual analysis questions from class, write a blog post that identifies 4 stylistic devices the Director of Amelie uses in the production of his film. For each device, you must include:
1. A "screen shot" as evidence for each of the stylistic devices.
2. A written description of the device and how it functions in the film.
3. An interpretation of what you feel is the director's intent and effect of the device on the film as a whole.
The textual analysis questions will allow you to clarify how the devices is being used. For screen shots, you can find the film online at Youtube.

The Work:

The scene that really stuck out to me was this Blubber's suicidal attempt scene. I tell you, and excuse my french, it was so frickin funny! xD But I'm not mentioning this purely because it entertained me, I'm mentioning this because the camera work was innovative and helped that comedy move up another level!

Here's the break down. The scene follows one simple pattern: Amelie screaming, Mom Appears, Amelie screams more, Mom tries saving Blubber, Amelie still screams, Mom's attempt #2, Amelies screams some more, Mom's attempt #3, Amelie Screaming some MORE, Dad saves the day, Then cut to CU of Blubber(saved) panning out from Dad and Amelie to a CU of MOM screaming(anyone notice the rack focus?! :D). Basically, the scene cuts back to Amelie screaming over and over again in repetition to probably show the huge impact this suicidal attempt had on little Amelie.

So let's break this baby open and tear it up!

Amelie's scream cuts aren't just simply the same cut over and over again, no--not even close. The cuts are varies on various perspectives, Full frontal WS, dollying in to a CU of her face, Angled shot looking up, Angled shot looking down, and the most dynamic,

A pan from one side of Amelie, to the other!

     ----------->  

This is really unique, because it not only serves as a repetitive tool, but also utilizes the various perspectives one can use to hype up the screaming, to make things a little less boring, and a little more something new. With this technique, you don't get bored of the screaming, nor do you find it annoyingly long. With the various cuts and differing perspectives you a get a little extra surprise in every cut, with the screaming as the only thing that actually links everything together!

Let's get down to the nitty gritty and let the cinematographer show off a bit more: I'm telling you, this scene is all about perspective, perspective, perspective! This guy switches it so many times to actually create a new space, putting repetition on a new twist of surprise! You know what's going to be repeated: The attempts to save Blubber and Amelie's screaming; but you don't know how they're gonna do it, cuz it ALWAYS changes! The way he introduces the Mom and Dad into the scene also puts a twist on new things:

 

I really like how he uses dollying and panning whilst changing the perspectives to amplify the weight of the situation. 

Now, for the creme de resistance!

 

I really like this dolly out and rack focus effect, showing how the ordeal finally ended, and Amelie and her father are happy about it, then going to show the underlying effect it had on the mom: Insanity.

Pure brilliance I tell you! Brilliance!