Tuesday 24 November 2015

Post It - Short film - Analysis

The short film posted on YouTube titled ‘Post It’ was released in 2014, directed and both written by Michael Evans. Produced by ‘Go For Broke Films’, this independent short film gained a lot of recognition on social networking sites which had made it gain attention to distributors around the world to be released in various countries, most notably Japan by the distributor ‘Pacific Voice Inc.’ To add to the film’s success, this film also won the third best place for the title of ‘Best Screenplay’ at the UNLV Spring Flicks film festival. The short film is a comedy followed along with the directors aim to make the audience laugh coming from a rather saddening opening to the film to the introduction of the post-it notes to act as a purpose for the two protagonists Elroy and Clare to interact together and spread their happiness to other strangers who look like they need it or deserve it. The narrative also follows a simplistic linear narrative storyline seamlessly as the plot avoids confusion.

The film also incorporates themes and sub-genres of romance, backed up through the cinematography techniques such as the two shot of the two protagonists of the film conversing on the bench to generate a interest in each other along with the non-diegetic background music to create a mutual mood between the two that the director wants to convey through both the performance and sound delivered through the visual and audio codes. The title sequence at the beginning of the film that’s used to present who the production company is, the editing used to display the production companies ident is written on a post it note using visual effects which connote what the narrative is going to be about before the film has even started.

The use of lighting is well employed by the director in this film because it is used in a way where it helps the audience understand what mood or state of mind the protagonist is in or coming out from. A scene where this is presented is in the first scene where Elroy is exiting a building from the main entrance. His back is turned coming through the door facing the opposite view of the camera, exiting a darkly lit building. This could mean that Elroy is being troubled by something or is facing a harsh time in his life which is emphasized through the technical codes for example Elroy carrying a heavy object as to bear these burdens that acts as a metaphor in the film. The sound used here adds to the depressing mood of the shot. As Elroy walks out of the shot towards the camera, the light brightens on him to suggest the escape from


Elroy’s character is performed superbly as it feels natural viewing the film from an audience standpoint, however I feel that Claire’s performance is too forced as the director makes her seem unnatural the way she keeps intriguing on Elroy’s personal life and invading his personal space while creating an unrealistic attempt of interacting with the protagonist which in turn makes myself and the audience deviate from the film as the performance of the actor is undeniably too ‘acted’ out. 

-- Finish

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