"Paper or Plastic" By Lisa Walden

“Paper or Plastic” a Short Film By Doug Smith

A student for their college assignment created this film, and I came across it on their youtube channel. This is a romantic comedy about a girl who wears a bag on her head- she claims that both herself and her family enclose a rare deformity, which makes them unbearable to look at by the public. The film possesses such creativity and with an innovative story line, I possibly couldn’t defy watching this remarkable scholar production.

Representation

·       This film represents the hardship some people encounter due to outward appearances, showing the audience the complicated daily doings that this regular teenager comes across. For example we see that without her vision, she mistakes the milk for coca cola and furthermore we see how problematic her day is: she is oblivious to what she rights during class, and cannot distinguish the books she needs to acquire. 

·      It is not apparent to the spectators as to which social class the main characters are from, although via their surroundings and locale we can identify that they are perhaps middle class. Additionally mise en scene allows us to distinguish their family life and wealth, due to the effortless simple attire and their home- evidently this was made on a students budget, so therefore not much, or any, would have been spent to create the narrative.

·      The film commences with a voice-over introduction from the lead female character- here she introduces herself and her life, explaining that she is a ‘normal teenager’ who wears slippers. Noticeably, the modern society is led to deem upon the stereotypical image of a present teenager, thinking that parties, drugs and drink take up their lives; this film shows differently. 

·      The issues dealt with in this short film, can somewhat be related to by other young people, such as: youth can often find themselves feeling like they are hiding under a paper bag, and don’t fit in with others around them. Just like the female character, they need to be loved by someone who isn’t troubled by outward appearance. Even though this film includes comedy and romance, it gives an insight into someone’s world, annihilating any clichéd views on teenager’s lives.

Narrative: Bordwell and Thompson (Plot and Story)

      

·      The story is all the hidden information behind what is viewed on screen. Therefore all the veiled information on the family and when the children were born remains the story. If the viewers were to see all the years of the family it would be an unattainable film to produce, which is why the plot shows the spectators all the relevant scenes in order to piece together what has formerly happened.

·      The director will use the story to select his scenes for the plot and show any relevant cuts that give the audience an insight into their lives. The events of the story are plotted to create the narrative. 

During this shot we establish a miniature insight into her family background: her entire family has this rare deformity. This gives the audience a look into the story behind the plot, making it effortless to realize that they all wear bags.

·      Once you explore into the story hidden behind the plot, you become aware of the characters world and not just what you see on screen.

·      Although we are uninformed of the characters personality we begin to see elements of her hobbies, interests and abilities because of the plot we see on screen- for example we find the main character engrossed into a book (even though it’s questionable as to how she can essentially read) and as we indentify she study’s at college we know she is of superior intellect.

·      Essentially we as viewers are unaware of what has happened during her life, so we attempt to piece together any information we receive from the film to broaden our knowledge regarding the characters lives.

Genre

·      The genre in this short film could be defined as comedy romance- humour lies within the story regarding a family whose expressions are neatly portrayed on a paper bag. Towards the end of the film we begin to see the romance in the film when her young friend too puts on a paper bag to win her heart.

·      This cleverly thought-out film created a chuckle inside of me, by reason of how the bag-hidden girl still thrives throughout the day even though her vision is restrained. 

·      Short films are an opportunity to experiment with your imagination and push boundaries in your story telling. Every short film ought to be a unique vision and doesn’t have to necessarily gyrate around a certain genre- short films allow directors to experiment with an array of genres. This relates to Buckingham’s theory, in which he argued that genre is never fixed.

·      Genres are commonly harder to identify in a film lasting only 20 minutes, whereas in a feature length blockbuster the audience are given hours, which in they can agree on the possible genre. It’s therefore crucial the maker of the short film, allows it to be clear to the spectators their choice of genre; in ‘Paper or Plastic’ it is apparent that the style of film is a humorous romantic production.

      Audience

         Finding this remarkable short film on youtube, which was posted by young students, was evidentially aimed at people of a similar age. This could be because they may well have wanted to share film production tips- for example; us students research on the web for inspirational short films to further inspire us in our own diminutive college production.

·      This mini production may possibly have pleased the audience with their creativity and individuality, which no one else could mirror. When researching various short films online, it’s easy frequently occurs that you may come across films similar to one another, which is why it’s so relieving to find a film with such innovation and originality.

·      Underneath the youtube video stated “this film was shot on the HVX200 using to Letus Extreme and Nikon prime lenses. I did some color correction, but most the images are raw”- this enables the viewers to see how hard the young students worked to formulate ‘Paper or Plastic’ without an outsized budget or team of practiced professionals. This is primarily the reason I wanted to take a look at this short film: because it lets me envision what we could achieve at no cost and of little cast.

As this is a students coursework the film has unfortunately not received any chief awards, however with 87,262 views on youtube portrays that the popularity and distinctiveness of the film shows to be admired.

Media Language

·      At the beginning of the short film the audience are not apparent with the fact that the young girl wears a bag on her face until 1.10 into the 6 minutes into the film. This is particularly creative as creates a feeling of the unknown, as the audience are left wondering what is next to take place.

·      There is a slight use of enigma here as the start is somewhat of a mystery to the audience, and then once the secret is reveled we see how bizarre and out of the ordinary it is, yet so carefully considered. Even though enigma is mainly used in thriller films, placing in the feeling of the unknown works effectively here as it pioneers the film in the right way. 

Here, the audience are only presented with the back of the character, so they are left unaware of the fact that she always wears a bag to hide her face.

In this shot (0.43) we see her sleeping without the bag but are still not confronted with her distorted face- as you first begin to watch this you have no expectation that she would wear a bag; this is what makes the film so surprising and innovative.

·      Using secret codes such as: not allowing the audience to view her face, suggests that there may be a disproportion with her appearance- it allows the viewers to speculate as to what may occur soon after.