HopkinsCinemAddicts

John Hughes and the "Silent" Scene (Charlotte)

John Hughes is widely regarded as one of the greatest filmmakers of the 1980s and arguably of the 20^th century. He was one of the first filmmakers to honestly depict the experiences of adolescents and really make them feel seen, understood, and reflected. He is well known for his dialogue, but the real power of his films lies in scenes with no dialogue at all.

Two of his most well-known works, The Breakfast Club (1985) and Ferris Bueller’s Day Off (1986), contain expressionistic scenes completely devoid of dialogue that do a great deal of heavy lifting for their respective films: the dance scene in The Breakfast Club and the museum scene in Ferris Bueller’s Day Off. They both use strong imagery and actor physicality to get at the heart of what these movies are about.

The dance scene in The Breakfast Club comes toward the end of the film, immediately after all five characters have engaged in a long and emotionally intimate conversation about how they ended up in detention. During that conversation, the characters sit still throughout, and the camera remains static. These characters who all began the morning as strangers have let each other in. They have been vulnerable with each other emotionally. The following dance scene is a physical, visual expression of that emotional release and that emotional intimacy.

It can even be read as a metaphor for the trajectory of the group’s dynamic. At the start of the scene, the characters are all separate, isolated from one another and on various hierarchical planes that seem to correspond with their social statuses. Brian begins in the A/V booth, isolated and most connected to the school. Claire and Andrew dance up in the mezzanine, the highest up in the bunch. Allison dances across the floor while Bender sits, head banging, on a statue in the center of the library (a statue he most certainly should not be climbing), a rebel that has more street cred than Brian and Allison, but not as much as Claire and Andrew.

For almost all of first several cuts, each character is seen alone in the frame. But, quickly, the characters seem to fight against the constraints of their separate frames. Brian dances in the doorframe—a liminal space, a crucial border—that separates him from the group. He crosses it and, metaphorically, crosses the social lines dividing him from the rest of the group.

There are several shots of people’s dancing feet. Their feet seem to stomp at the edges of the frame, willing it to widen. Also, the frame which used to contain the entirety of these character’s bodies now can only contain their feet—the frame is too small. And, although all their shoes are different, they are united in dance, a form of human connection and communication so ancient, so physical, and so foundational that it can transcend these artificial borders set up to divide them.

These shots are intercut with medium shots of the characters. Once again, the frame is too small to contain their entire bodies. One particular shot of Allison shows her face and hair swinging in and out of view, literally not contained within the frame.

Finally, we see the characters dancing together. First, Allison and Bender, the two lowest on the metaphorical totem pole, followed by the three boys, and then the two girls. The moment between the two girls is significant in that they represent the top and bottom of the social hierarchy and yet, in this moment, they are equals.

The final shot of the sequence shows Allison engaging in a flailing, wild dance that ends with her crumpled on the floor, exhausted. This moment has been a release for these characters, a release from their social bonds and expectations, a cleaving together of them on a deeply human and physical level. The music backing the scene says it all: We Are Not Alone.

The museum scene in Ferris Bueller’s Day Off functions similarly within a distinctly different narrative. In this case, the scene represents a revelatory release, but involves a splitting apart rather than a cleaving together. Ferris, his girlfriend Sloane, and his best friend Cameron have cut class and taken off for Chicago. Throughout the day, Ferris and Sloane are carefree, but Cameron is riddled with anxiety. His outlook on the world is different from theirs, and, more than any of the other characters this moment seems pivotal in his understanding of himself.

The scene also seems to mirror the process of their coming of age—appropriate given that graduation is looming for all these characters. They start by infiltrating an elementary school’s field trip, a kind of regress back into childhood, with, of course, Ferris leading Cameron, the two divided by Sloane. Then we see Edward Hopper’s Nighthawks, a painting depicting one man on his own, representing Cameron, along with a couple, Ferris and Sloane. Another noteworthy painting is Mary Cassatt’s The Child’s Bath, in which a mother lovingly bathes her child. This again represents childhood and dependency upon parents.

We see several abstract paintings followed by a striking, head-on shot of Rodin’s Portrait of Balzac, a statue with crossed arms. Then we have a reverse shot of the three characters mirroring the statue’s pose back to it. This kind of imitation represents the start of adolescence, the point at which all one does is mimic “grown-up” behavior. The characters seem to be arranged hierarchically, with Ferris at the front, followed by Sloane and then Cameron. Sloane again divides the two.

We then immediately get a shot of the three of them lined up, this time with Ferris in the middle, mirroring three abstract, late career Picassos. All three depict people, but fragmented, scattered people. This represents the adolescent period of self-discovery and confusion, a period that might not ever fully end.

Then, we see Cameron on his own before A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte by Georges Seurat, a pointillist piece. He looks into the face of a young girl, the only figure facing out toward the viewer from the piece. Several shots of the young girl’s face are cut together, each one progressively tighter in until the face is unrecognizable as a face. Cameron’s expression is fearful, confused, and revelatory. He seems to be looking in a mirror, seeing himself disappear. After this scene Cameron is never the same. He seems almost comatose for a while and then his attitude completely changes. He realizes that he cannot live his life in fear—of his father or of anyone.

Intercut with this scene is a shot of Ferris and Sloane kissing in front of panes of stained glass, a church-like piece. They seem to be engaged in a pseudo-marriage. They seem to be leaving Cameron behind.

Both of these scenes are the crown jewels of their respective movies. They capture the essence of their films without saying a word (quite literally). They are unexpected, expressionistic, and truly artful. They follow the emotional arcs of these movies and we get to watch the dynamics between these characters play out physically. They touch the viewer emotionally in a way that simply cannot be done with words.

Humanizing Animals: How Nature Documentaries Tell Stories (Katie)

Imagine you’re on location in the Namib Desert in Africa. The sun is melting your skin, and you’ve only got a few hours every day to shoot, with the heat being what it is. Or perhaps you’re somewhere in the Arctic Circle, following polar bears by boat in frigid temperatures. It is impossible, of course, to hand a script to any of your subjects and ask them to follow your directions. Therefore, if you need to film a dramatic fight over territory between two alpha males, or record a father bringing long-sought food home to his hungry family, how can you get the perfect footage for your ideal narrative in time?

The probable answer to that question is you don’t.

The key to making nature documentary storylines coherent and compelling lies in post-production—in particular editing and sound design. To demonstrate the power of editing in creating a meaningful storyline—especially in regards to non-human characters—I will be discussing the well-known nature documentary by BBC, Planet Earth II. By analyzing a scene from its pilot, “Islands,” we can determine how certain shots can be stitched together to create a smooth and intricate storyline.

One of the narratives in “Islands” is that of the marine iguanas’. In this segment, newly-hatched marine iguanas find themselves far away from their adult guardians basking by the coast. In order to join their brethren, they must travel across the inlands they woke up in—and avoid every predator lying in wait for them.

How do elements of traditional editing and frame-crafting impact our feelings and get us to invest in the small, scaly characters on-screen? Even if we completely disregard David Attenborough’s engaging voiceovers, which tell us all we need to know, every story element is in the shots for us to recognize.

Our very first introduction to a newly-hatched marine iguana brings us to an extreme close-up of dark, shifting gravel and large, blinking eyes. This closeness immediately identifies us with the critter. As the camera slowly withdraws and cuts to further close-ups, we hear nothing but shaking gravel as the iguana pulls its body out of the sand. (Yes, every sound effect is probably foley, but that is almost certainly for our benefit.) The iguana takes slow first steps, and no one comes to accompany it in its journey to the shoreline. As shots pull even further back, we get establishing shots of the iguana and its environment. Now we can tell how small the iguana really is. All these moments accumulate to present the total solitude of this iguana… and it is a threatening solitude, as our iguana walks from right of frame past a large corpse of another iguana.

Here is a particularly magical edit: a parallel cut shows the adult iguanas basking in the shoreline, snorting water from their nostrils and looking in the direction of the camera. It is almost as if they are watching the small iguana make its way to them, or as if the small iguana is thinking of getting to its brethren by the shore. This small cut, potentially even a cut made to hide a lack of any other proper transition footage, brings an emotional relationship between our iguana and his community. The cut brings motivation to the iguana.

This new depth to our iguana makes the next cut more alarming, as we see a long shot with the iguana slowly moving to the left of the frame… followed by a trio of racer snakes emerging from the right of the frame. When our iguana realizes he is being hunted, he sprints (on two legs) for his life. Now, the sudden sound of a harsh drumbeat and a high-tempo, high-intensity soundtrack add to the skyrocketing tension.

Establishing shots show snakes pouring from every crack in the black, sharp rocks that line the micro-landscape, and they even capture the small form of our iguana leaping up rocks to escape his slithering predators. In a matter of seconds, the establishing shots continuously characterize both the iguana as small and precious—the “underdog” of our story—and the landscape as menacing and unknowable, with either total silence and deceptive solitude, or distressing music and swarms of snakes emerging out of hiding.

In the end, this particular marine iguana makes it out alive, according to Planet Earth II’s story. We see a victorious close-up of our iguana atop a rock, and a reverse long shot of several snakes slithering on the gravel below. The threat is vanquished for our first marine iguana.

Now that we have seen what editing can do for a short and simple animal narrative, we can look at the more famous chase between one marine iguana and a mass of racer snakes, which takes place shortly after our first iguana scene in “Islands.” This two-minute section is arguably the most tense of all iguana and snake chases in the episode.

The scene begins with some very clever cuts. We see a close-up of a hatchling hiding in the sand, his wide eyes blinking—and then a reverse shot shows a close-up of several racer snakes wrapped around the unmoving body of another iguana hatchling. The cut back to our hatchling has him jerking back, as if in fear. Even if we have no way to know if the iguana was really reacting to seeing other iguanas being captured, the cut serves its purpose magnificently well. We now understand that this hatchling is watching and learning, somehow… and that it feels fear, and a desire to live.

Thus begins that spectacular chase. Our iguana pulls himself slowly out of the sand, walking backwards to keep his gaze on something. An eyeline match cut shows the snakes continuing to wrap themselves around another iguana, and our iguana moves carefully away. This lets us project onto our iguana a careful awareness of his surroundings, whether it was truly there to begin with or not.

Further cuts change our point of view. We see the iguana from the snakes’ side of things; our foreground is in focus with the bodies of slithering snakes, and behind a rock, the heads of snakes peek out to watch the moving iguana in the background. These shots further establish just how hunted the iguana is—and then, a snake lunges for him.

Here is where the soundtrack really puts in work. There is intense, thrilling string music to accompany our iguana sprinting across sand and rock, with cuts focusing on establishing continuous action as the snake lunges for the iguana. As our iguana leaps over a boulder and lands on sand, losing the snake, silence ensues. Then, one soft step of his foot upon the gravel, and strings blare out once more to a cut of several snakes’ heads perking up at the sound.

A close-up of the iguana shows him looking around. Various eyeline matches show snakes waiting for their chance at him. (Again, this is clever editing; shots of the iguana looking around could have been recorded at any time, but they were noticed and used for this perfect moment of suspense in the chase storyline.) The soundtrack is slow and suspenseful, using an ambient noise to create tension during this downtime. It is akin to what a horror film soundtrack may sound like: David Attenborough tells us in this moment that, if the hatchling can keep its nerve and stay still, it can remain undetected from the circling snake—a classic hiding-from-the-monster scenario.

But as the snake slithers over the iguana, the latter knows it has to run. It sprints off to the sound of fast, heavy-hitting music, and several long takes follow the iguana’s sprint towards the shore, showing off with remarkable horror the myriad of snakes that emerge from the landscape to add themselves to the chase. This island is characterized as a place of trials for our iguana, and the coastline with his community as the light at the end of the tunnel. It is both literally and figuratively true that our iguana hopes to ascend, as safety lies in the top of the rocks by the shore.

As the chase comes to a climactic end, sound continues to put in work—perhaps even more work than the cutting itself. The iguana runs into the jaws of several snakes, and as silence ensues, it seems all is lost. But quietly, the iguana shakes his way out of the constrictions, and continues sprinting to the sound of a full orchestra behind him.

As the camera cuts close to the iguana and views his journey from a low-angle point of view up a wall of black rocks, we see snakes lunging for him and falling against the stone, unsuccessful in their hunt. The slow-mo applied to these cuts ups the ante even further. The soundtrack reaches a tense climax with the visuals, and the two elements work together to create an intense and distressing narrative. The resolution comes with relieving silence once our iguana joins his community by the coast, atop the large seashore rocks.

But what does it mean, really, that I can describe a nature documentary with traditional shooting and framing terms? Why does it matter that a lizard can seem like a human character in a horror movie, running from an innumerable amount of foes, and fighting against nearly impossible odds? I believe that the power of post-production, especially editing and sound design, can make any inanimate object or inhuman character feel human and relatable. With footage that could have been cobbled together from various different locations and times of day, editors of Planet Earth II excelled at creating a coherent, tense narrative with a notable arc of action and resolution using merely framing, shot relationships, and relevant soundtracks. Thanks to human films and their soundtracks, we recognize the cues to feel or project when certain cuts and sounds come to our senses; Planet Earth II was able to take advantage of our inherent reads on these cuts and use them to create a brilliant narrative based on non-human creatures.

The too long; didn’t read of this article may certainly be this: given the correct sound design and cutting, any animal can be personified and humanly relatable; any storyline can be projected upon any creature or object with the right techniques. If there’s a will, there’s a way, thanks to the magic of post-production.

Works cited in this text:

“Islands.” Planet Earth II. BBC Earth. November 6, 2016. Netflix; Television. 20:43 - 26:25.

Lights, Camera, Logistics (Vanessa)

Filmmaking (or documentary web series-making in the case of HOUSE) is a lot about looking for answers. How do you get from point A to point B with all the equipment? Who do you cast? Who will be part of the crew?

As the reality for creating a documentary web series shot in three different cities set in, some of those answers became relatively simple. “However you can (within the means of the budget)” and “whoever is willing to do so” quickly became the answers to a lot of questions starting with “how” and “who”.

The Chicago and Detroit episodes of HOUSE were shot over the course of six days: four days in Chicago, two days in Detroit. The crew (for these two episodes) consisted of the following: me, my friend and fellow film major Giovanna (HOUSE's fantastic cinematographer), my brother, my dad, and my mom.  My dad and brother accompanied Giovanna and me to Chicago and my mom and brother accompanied us to Detroit. So, for the summer at least, the crew was truly “whoever is willing to do so”.

Figuring out who was going to do what roles was an adventure in and of itself. Giovanna graciously volunteered to be director of photography, which was fantastic. I told myself I could direct, produce, and do sound mixing, which by some miracle sort of worked out, at least for a few days. In short, having an actual (and excellent!) crew in Baltimore gave me a completely new sense of appreciation for actually having enough people to do everything—that way you can avoid simultaneously asking interviewees questions, mixing sound, holding a boom pole, nervously watching the battery levels on the sound recording device die, communicating with your DP, and telling the part of your brain that keeps asking “WHAT ARE YOU EVEN DOING?” to quiet down all at the same time.

My brother helping me with the slate.

Casting was also an adventure, seeing as I had no idea how casting for a documentary worked prior to starting to work on HOUSE. The same “whoever is willing to do so” philosophy applied: phone calls, emails, and Facebook messages were sent to friends, family friends, friends of family friends, and friends of friends of family friends. Thus, the cast (aside from the tons of friendly strangers willing to talk to Giovanna and me at the Chosen Few Picnic) was created. Honestly, one of my favorite things about HOUSE and about all of the experiences I have had with filmmaking, and especially documentary filmmaking is all the kind strangers you meet along the way.

Somehow, it all worked out. And looking back, I couldn’t be prouder (and slightly in awe) that it did. Pre-production was, without a doubt, hard. I know I must have given the production chair for Studio North (JHU’s student run production company from which I received the grant to make HOUSE) at least one near heart-attack when we we’re working through how we were going to stretch the budget enough to get through all three cities.

Car travel between cities: 2,540 miles. Not including driving within/around the cities and Giovanna’s flight to Chicago, which was about another 790 miles.

 

As you can probably tell, shooting the Baltimore episode in the fall was a completely different game altogether: substantially less driving (all of the equipment for Chicago and Detroit came from Baltimore because that's where the JHU-MICA Film Center is located, which provides access to equipment rentals for JHU students), larger crew (shout out once again!), and cooler temperatures. Overall, still a great time with great people.

In short: the logistics of HOUSE felt a little on the wild side at times, but I couldn't be happier with the experience. One of my favorite things about HOUSE is that it has been such a learning experience from the very beginning, and getting to see how it all has started to come together throughout post-production (post about post coming soon!) is ridiculously exciting. 

Some more house music until the next post:

Like This, Chip E. Feat. K. Joy

You Make Me Feel (Mighty Real), Byron Stingily

Deep Inside, Hardrive

 

To Be or Not To Be: The Question of What to Depict in Documentary Film (Mireille)

Documentary filmmaker Trinh Minh-ha has repeatedly suggested that the documentary film should encompass the practice that “what [one] sees is life looking at [them].” This belief, which is shared by other documentary filmmakers, stresses that the documentary film should serve only as observer, capturing solely what the camera lens reveals without any manipulation. Furthermore, neither the film director nor the audience should “impose meaning on every sign [in a film].”

The intent of David and Albert Maysles’ documentary Grey Gardens (1975) is to capture the raw, unedited elements of what is taking place in front of the camera without offering any additional auteurian input. As such, it respects the parameters that Trinh Minh-ha sets forth. In contrast, although Lucien Castaing-Taylor’s Leviathan (2012) also falls within the genre of documentary film, Castaing-Taylor approaches the subject with preconception. Although he allows the camera to capture all that which is perceivable at the location, he does utilize cinematography and editing to distort what has been captured, ultimately creating what can almost be described as a dystopic reality.  

The Maysles brothers crafted Grey Gardens in the style of cinéma vérité; where they wanted the only witness to the action to be the camera. They allow the actions within the Bouvier Beale household to depict the everyday lifestyle and mentality of Edie and her mother Edith, which unfold as they simply record the unedited and unhindered experience. This determination to be faithful only to what is occurring in front of the camera is exemplified in one scene that captures Edie Bouvier Beale’s unedited dancing around the house. The depiction of the decrepit household and Edie’s bizarre behavior create a dystopic moment that arguably pushes the audience to stray away from the experience of “pure” documentary practice and cinéma vérité. Nonetheless, if this action is one that Edie would do even when there is no camera present, then it can only be a study in truth or “vérité”. The fixation to stay “true” to documentary is further noted when the directors capture a moment when both Edie and Edith are arguing. Though it is obvious that the two women do not want to be recorded, the Maysles brothers nevertheless continue filming. In this way, the film fulfills Trinh Minh-ha’s requisites for documentary film that every element is simply captured to create a film without a particular agenda, but one that is even unwilling to edit in response to the subject, and which would otherwise unintentionally make the content false.

In contrast to Grey Gardens stands anthropologist and filmmaker Lucien Castaing-Taylor’s Leviathan. Similar to Grey Gardens, Castaing-Taylor’s film unobtrusively and continually films what is occurring at his location, in this case a commercial fishing boat at sea. The long takes and lengthy sequences that linger on the details of the location are not unlike the cinematography in Grey Gardens; however, the similarity ends there. Castaing-Taylor chooses a filming approach that when paired with his chaotic and disorienting sound design at times confounds the audience. For the first several minutes of the film, it is not clear what is being pictured or what is occurring. Castaing-Taylor shows a collection of abstract images that do not immediately seem to portray anything that is pertinent to the subject of the film, but creates the sense of a removed and dystopic reality. It then becomes slowly apparent to the audience that the filmmaker is on some sort of marine vessel. In this way, this film is different from Grey Gardens as Leviathan offers a swayed perspective. It is apparent that the camera is being utilized to promote the idea that there is someone filming and observing, and that a particular audience is must be present. In fact, the audience seems to be behind the eyes of the observer, lending its unique perception and perspective. In this way, though the film seems to be capturing what is occurring at the location, the personification of the camera wreaks havoc on perception and adds an agenda to the film that arguably breaks the conventions of documentary filmmaking.

The comparison between Grey Gardens and Leviathan begs the question of whether or not it is ever possible for a filmmaker not to impose some sort of auteurian input when depicting a particular subject in a documentary film even when he or she includes every detail of the location and the subject. On one hand, decisions can be made that ignore the will of the subject of the film that ultimately lends a feeling of violation. On the other hand, the film maker can open up the content to allow for personal perspective to shape what is being shown.  What is clear is that in either case, it could be argued that each of these documentary films has, nevertheless, adhered to Trinh Minh-ha’s stipulations with respect to documentary film making. That is, each depicts images that are presented without the filmmaker himself imposing meaning or deducting context. Rather, the images are presented for the audience to perceive as rudimentary elements that they have to reconstruct for meaning without judgment. The means are different, but the ends can be said to be same. To be present in a location after a filmmaker has provided the details of the context as in Grey Gardens might be considered easier; however, it is still possible to recreate the context of a location even when all the details of the context seem not to be visually present as in Leviathan.

Mr. Robot and The Governance of Consumerism (Katie)

Mr. Robot, a critically acclaimed drama thriller television series authored by Sam Esmail, focuses on the lonely and troubled Elliot Alderson. Elliot is introduced to us as an eccentric cybersecurity engineer, and he becomes an enigmatic vigilante hacker as time goes on, one whose motives are unclear even to us. To complement its labyrinthine narrative, Mr. Robot has a distinct visual style which reinforces the isolation and oppression every character faces, and this artistic approach will be the main focus of my discussion. (However, there is no need to fear for spoilers—I will only be analyzing the first episode of the series.)

Within the show, one of the main antagonizing forces is society itself; Esmail demonstrates how consumerist culture can drive people apart from one another, especially in Elliot’s case.

Consider the following exchange from Mr. Robot’s pilot, "eps1.0_hellofriend.mov,” in which Elliot delivers a fervent speech on the evils of our modern world to his therapist:

                                 KRISTA
What is is about society that disappoints you so much?

                                 ELLIOT
Oh, I don’t know. Is it that we collectively thought that Steve Jobs was a great man, even when we knew he made billions off the backs of children? Or maybe it’s that it feels like all of our heroes are counterfeit. The world itself's just one big hoax. Spamming each other with our burning commentary bullshit masquerading as insight, our social media faking as intimacy.  Or is it that we voted for this? Not with our rigged elections, but with our things, our property, our money. I’m not saying anything new. We all know why we do this. Not because Hunger Games books makes us happy but because we wanna be sedated. Because it’s painful not to pretend, because we’re cowards. Fuck society.

                                 KRISTA (O.S.)
                               (echoing)
Elliot.
                                 (beat)
Elliot. You’re not saying anything. What’s wrong?

                                 ELLIOT
                         (smiling slightly)
Nothing.

(0:12:15 - 0:13:26, formatting and emphases mine.)

In this exchange, Elliot’s estrangement from those he should communicate honestly with is already made clear, and his anger is directed explicitly towards society. Throughout the scene, Krista and Elliot are practically never in the same frame. The only time we see them together is in an establishing shot, one which pits Krista and Elliot on opposite sides of the office, with Elliot’s completely black outfit contrasting heavily with the cream-colored sofa and curtains. However, his outfit is only one aspect which makes Elliot seem out of place. The rest of the time, the two are always in their own close-ups, making both characters seem as visually in their separate headspaces as they are mentally—this being coupled with disorienting cuts to different close-up angles of their faces.

Elliot’s frequent voiceover of his thoughts over this scene only further cement his distance from his therapist, and his monologue on society’s evils is intercut with real-life footage of factory workers, fallen celebrities, and social media feeds. Elliot is not tied down to the visuals of his therapist’s office—that is, not tied down to Krista. It can be said that everything we see and hear about Elliot in the first fifteen minutes of the series has to do with his pained and total aloneness.

Esmail continues to showcase his startling visuals throughout the episode. Later on, when the company Elliot’s cybersecurity firm protects, E-Corp, visits Elliot’s workplace for a briefing on a recent hack, our protagonist meets Tyrell Wellick. Tyrell is a pivotal character later in the season, and the way he is introduced is rife with importance. Our first clear visual of Tyrell places him in a low depth of field close-up, his visage in the far right quarter of the frame as the rest of the shot hovers out of focus. To be clear, when I write “far right quarter,” I mean it:

Elliot’s reaction shot to Tyrell is not unlike this one.

(The actual shots themselves were not included due to copyright reasons.)

Elliot and Tyrell are opposing forces. Both of them occupy spaces in which they are as far as possible from one another, showing their mutual isolation in the world they will eventually unite to combat against. However, even their aforementioned eventual unity is hinted at in these shots. Every background figure and object is out of focus, and Elliot and Tyrell can only clearly see one another. They are destined for a special bond, even if they are both first totally alone when they are introduced to one another. Their future is also foreshadowed in their dialogue; when Elliot’s mental voiceover starts to think an incredulous sentence about Tyrell, Tyrell finishes it for him in open speech. This unites their identities for a single moment. Incidentally, Tyrell finishing Elliot’s sentence also leads to them being in the same frame together for just a second, before extremely distanced close-ups take over once more. (This style of framing is so common in Mr. Robot that Saturday Night Live (SNL) has even remarked on it in a parody of Mr. Robot.)

Esmail’s decisions to frame characters in these ways can be seen in other interactions and scenes of the first episode—as well as for the rest of the series. So far, we have discussed how these visuals portray characters in relation to each other, but Esmail also portrays characters in relation to bodiless presences or omnipresent forces in the world. One of the most telling displays of an abstract force becoming a menacing presence in relation to Elliot comes at the end of the pilot episode.

Elliot is going through a triumphant moment. He strides through Times Square—the setting of Mr. Robot being New York City—as something he has worked for finally comes to fruition. (A spoiler coming for the end of the first episode, now.) A huge first step in his grand plan as an official vigilante hacker is completed when Terry Colby, the CEO of an all-powerful corporation suspected of committing inhumane crimes for profit, is arrested due to Elliot’s hacking.

When we see Times Square with Elliot, nearly every building with a screen is reporting the news, and beneath the gargantuan, towering skyscrapers, Elliot walks into the center of the frame. He changes from being a small figure at the side of the screen into being the dominant visual in its center. The camera even slides into a low-angle position. A huge screen takes up the majority of the background behind Elliot, and the screen displays a news report on Colby’s arrest. It looks like Elliot is in control, and he is, both in the narrative and in the frame.

Elliot slowly pulls down his hood, turns his face up to the light of the screens, and looks around. But there is a subtle shift in the visuals. As he turns, the camera cuts to a different shot of Times Square. Elliot is now level with the camera, and the glaring ads of McDonald’s and Coca-Cola cut off Elliot at both sides of the frame. We can see now that it was only due to our perspective that every building appeared to be broadcasting the news of Colby’s arrest. Even the wide, massive screen that had taken up the majority of the last shot—the screen that reported Elliot’s victory—has become dwarfed by the innumerable amount of advertisements still present in Times Square. Now that the crowd of tourists and city folk is visible, we can see that all of them are indifferent to Elliot’s heroic act.

As the final insult to injury, the camera returns to the first shot of Times Square, where Elliot is seen from a low-angle camera and beneath the enormous screen that reports on Colby’s arrest. That is the shot where he was in control. Elliot throws up his hands and smiles in the genuine joy… and finds out that he has no control at all. Not in the frame, and not in the narrative, because ominous men in black approach the blissful Elliot from behind and threaten him into getting into their car. As this happens, the camera also cuts back to being level with Elliot; this is the Elliot that is bombarded by advertisements. The camera even breaks the 180-degree rule as the men in black accost him, cutting between different men in black circling him, and Elliot has no choice but to comply with his white-collar captors. This disorienting sequence shows how Elliot, even when believing himself to have power, actually has none when combating the force of society.

It is almost as if no act of justice can stop the force of consumerism, the slave-driver that is capitalism; it is almost as if no amount of saving the people from corporate greed will save them from themselves. Elliot tries to be a hero, and he is punished for it. But those are stories for the rest of Mr. Robot to tackle, especially with the neurotic and complicated Elliot as its protagonist. If not for the compelling, twisting, and achingly incisive narrative, one could very easily watch the show simply for its beautiful and dynamic shots, which tell stories and explain relationships without a single spoken word.

 

Works cited in this text:

“eps1.0_hellofriend.mov.” Mr. Robot. USA Network. June 24, 2015. Amazon Prime; Television.

What is HOUSE (and house music)? (Vanessa)

This web series would not be possible without my parents, who have always raised me and my siblings to love and respect music both as solace and as art.

My dad is a Navy man, which resulted in me living in eight states and attending a combined total of seven elementary, middle, and high schools before I attended college. The things that were stable in my childhood as a result: family road trips and discussions about music, a deep love for my parents and siblings, and a fascination with how people interact with the world around them.

HOUSE, in particular, comes from the stories of my dad. My parents attended undergrad and met at the University of Illinois at Chicago during the late 80s and early 90s. The Chicago house music scene has its roots in the early and mid-80s as radio personalities and club DJs mixed elements of disco, electro-pop, synthesizers and drum machines (such as the Roland TR-808, the Korg Poly-61 synthesizer, and the Roland TB-303 bass synthesizer) and eventually hip-hop to create new sounds that were danceable and innovative. Thus, came the emergence of house music. By the time my parents would arrive in Chicago, house music had expanded to an international audience, included several sub-genres, and became a unique community with a plethora of stories about who exactly made up various house music scenes.

Never one to shy from a good story, my dad would both play house music and tell me stories of what it was like to witness the house scene as a young person living in Chicago during the late-80s. And from that, the inspiration for HOUSE was born as I wondered “what must it have been like to be immersed in something that sounds so vibrant?” and “what must have it felt like to create something like house music?”

If you are a beginner to the world of house music or even to the realm of film production (especially documentary film production), there are three things that I think are important to know for a better grasp on both of these worlds: (1) house music and film production are all about community and being supported by a community, (2) house music and film production are all about passion (for others, music, movies, art, etc.), and (3) house music and film production are all about expression.

Film and house music are both blends of other mediums from which a certain “language” has emerged. At least in my experience, the language of video media (film especially) and of house music is reliant on emotion and experience. With this in mind, I like to think that a documentary web-series about house music, and documentary storytelling of all kinds, is some sort of weird blend of the subjective and objective. You capture someone’s truth while acknowledging that yes, “truth” itself is sometimes informed by emotion, experience, and expression. What is a good story, really, aside from someone communicating what it means to embody an identity, be part of a community, or simply exist as someone experiencing the strangeness that is life?

HOUSE at its simplest, is a story of community and connection within the house music fan bases in Chicago, Detroit, and Baltimore, told through the voices of fans and creators alike. It goes through all three cities and features interviews with those who consider themselves “house heads” or part of the house music community. HOUSE explores how a genre of music can be a sound and a feeling.

Just as importantly, HOUSE’s production is also a story of community and connection between people who love storytelling. Those people have ranged from my dad and my professors who have supported me and helped me create this project (shout outs especially to Meredith Ward, Matt Porterfield, and Lawrence Jackson!!!) to my friends and fellow students who have been a part of the production team, individuals who have been interviewed (and people who have offered tremendous amounts of help in pursuing people to interview), and everyone else who got roped into this ride. One of my friends (another film major) and I constantly joke about how any sort of film/tv/web-series/visual media effort is really just a massive group project. BECAUSE IT IS! And hopefully, to anyone reading this, you’ll get to see that through this blog!

Picture from Chosen Few Picnic and Festival, July 2018 (where we shot part of the Chicago episode!)

Next time: “Casting" a Documentary, Producing and Logistics, and Directing

Until then, some house music:

In The Beginning (There Was Jack)

Move Your Body

Hot Stuff (Ralphi Rosario And Erick Ibiza 2018 Rework)