PORTRAYING AN ILLNESS IN OUR SHORT FILMEMILY CAPON

THE NURSE

We chose to include a character that would represent not only a nurse (to add to the mis en scene) of Ellie’s situation but also act as a maternal figure, with the absence of Ellie’s mother.In this scene, Ellie is being having a weekly check up with her nurse, who also gives her an injection. The most crucial part of this scene is seeing the way Ellie converses with the nurse and how this differs from her father. Seen here is Ellie wearing a scarf around her head this symbolises that’s she’s covering her hair for a reason and in fact supporting the representation of her dealing with cancer, most female cancer patients as I found used scarfs to cover their hair from the side effects of chemo therapy this is all adding to cinematography to our short film PROMISE.

MEDICAL EQUIPMENT

To add to the mis- en- scene , we took short shots like this one of all the medical equipment to add a sense of realism to Ellie’s state. As part of our asset list we ensured we had access to medical supplies to create this look as it’s important to look further into the finer details which may not be established by the audience which is how its successful as Jo Watkinson said that everything in the shot has to have purpose for example a characters bedroom needs to show their personality or age this could be done by placing a school tie in the room to connote that the character is a student. This is incredibly important during film work even if you cant exactly see certain objects its what makes the shot dynamic to display a real world within the production.

INJECTION

It was important to Rukayyah and I that we included a shot showing Ellie having an injection. In many other films this is used to signify a point of severe illness and therefore it helps us achieve this portrayal in such a short period of time. We used 2 different injection bodies within this shot a clear empty one without a needle and a needle attached to the body containing a brightly coloured liquid, this helps to achieve the shot without actually having to use the needle. We are then going to cut to a shot of Ellie’s in-between the 2 shots to show pain on her face but also to hide the fact that needle isn't actually being used.

INTERNET

As one of our first few shots we decided to capture Ellie searching for ways of ‘dealing with cancer’ this is the first sign the audience establishes that Ellie is ill as well as her father saying he’ll back for her injection in half an hour. This also portrays the destination of our film as it isn’t anything that can be searched or bought , it is simply the closeness of Sam, which we have decided we shall use bubbles to display the text on screen rather than having a close up shot of text messages exchanged between each character. This element is only recently become popular however we thought it would be effective to engage with the audience and popular culture e.g. Apple technology meaning the audience can relate to Ellie and empathise to her situation more so .

MEDICAL RECORDS

Next to Ellie’s dad in the first few establishing shots are medical forms and other data sheets attached to the fridge. This would not only show Ellie’s illness to be important to him but also that he has no other priorities than to help his daughter. This is an easy way to show representations of the illness without using close up shots that would not fit right or into the production or look to obvious helping to portray a real world within our production.

FLOWERS

This shot is of Sam after being told to leave Ellie alone by her father. The significance of this shot is as people in everyday society will bring flowers to the ill, this portrays the way same is almost visiting Ellie in what her father thinks is her safe haven. It is common within film to for the ‘boyfriend/ hero’ figure within film to give flowers to the ‘princess’ either to remind them how he feels about her, as an apology, a symbol of gratitude or simply a get well wish which is what we are portraying within this shot. Flowers also have a meaning as well which is why we chose light coloured ones representing purity but also a symbol of love and romance.