The opening credits finish and went to introductions about the lives of her 2 parents. This talked about their likes and dislikes in a comedic way. Both seemed quite similar people but in female and male terms. It then followed to a very important part which was the connection between Amelie and her parents. Her father wasn’t very close to her and the only time they had physical contact was when she had a monthly check up. This showed how small things like a hug and a sign of love from parents can affect a child. Due to this Amelie had a high heart beat when her dad touched her. So over time I think this could build up into something else which would affect someone as an adult. This was a very important idea as it linked to earlier work. Her mother was very close to her and even home schooled Amelie. As I had previously imagined because she did not have friends at school she had a wild imagination which entertained her at all times. She imagined her comatose neighbor as someone sleeping for fun and being a doctor. Most kids have imaginary friends but Amelie had a fish for a friend. She loved the fish and one day when her mother threw it into the river. This became a defining moment in Amelie’s life and changed her. She is deeply devastated like all children even older people are after losing something precious. But as a child a simple thing please her and she quickly forgets after getting a camera. This is why kids go through so many toys I reckon after seeing this. They are fascinated by anything new. She is tricked by her neighbor but ends up getting revenge on him in the way she thinks best. I think the reason for this is because the trick made her feel so bad and after losing her fish she changed a bit and became that tiny bit more spiteful. This got me thinking about key events in my own life and how they changed me. Finally the defining moment which the whole opening sequence was leading up to. This was when someone committing suicide killed Amelie’s mother. This would have been the last stroke and changed her completely from a playful and loud child to being very quiet and still. Yet still her dad was now obsessed with her mother and wasn’t still giving Amelie attention. I think its few things like this which define a person personality from childhood and effect their actions.
We had class discussions about this. We talked about the effectiveness of the short little intro with the soundtrack playing to it. It was a very quick way of getting a point across as I have already stated and keeps to the theme of childhood. We also discussed about the imagination of a child. This was a building base for a lot of role play ideas. If a role play was constructed in this way it could be as wacky and crazy as possible. We also talked about marking the moment. There were moments in the sequence which defined the whole movie and the character. These were the losing of the fish and the death of the mother. We were told to keep this in mind as it would be an effective technique to use and we would use it in future work.
After working on the baby suit in a class room discussion we were then split up into groups of 3. We were supposed to make a non-naturalistic role play of a before and after scene. These were only meant to be 2 scenes. The before scene was a few weeks before the baby was to be born. The after scene was supposed to be one year down the line or another time e.g. 6 months. We chose to do one year down the line because after this long period of time everything the parents think and know about the baby would be confirmed. Any shorter and the baby might just be acting up a bit and the parents might miss-assume his real character so they would have a different response. Any later and any problems the parents would have had about the child would generally be subsided and the reality of living with a child would have gone through their minds a long time ago. We started developing our piece by first brainstorming various ideas of what we could do. I decided it would be a good idea if everyone in the group said something which changed them if slightly or maybe a lot in their lives. We all came up with various ideas but when they were all weighed up together they sounded virtually the same. All ideas about the parents being both very pleased about the addition to their family of a new baby before it is born but after end in a stresses and hate the baby. Another was the parents not being very happy about the baby coming then when it does come they love the baby. They were all generally ideas which we came up with in our class discussions. Then I got the idea of trying something new. We decided for two roles who wanted to be the father and who wanted to be the mother. Once we had these roles. We used a technique named hot-seating. We did this by sitting the two parents both and seats and firing questions at them. We asked them to imagine they were actual parents. The questions we asked them were all based on what their hopes would be for having a child. Another was what their fears would be of having a child. We got plenty of ideas through this and it was very successful. The idea we got was of an idea of conflict between the parents and not the baby. The conflict would be caused by the baby but none of it towards him. This conflict’s main fuel would be hiding things from each other as parents. The two parents before the baby is born would act really happy but deep inside they would think differently. This same thing would happen in the after scene except they show their emotions instead. Our play was based on a family friend throwing the couple having the baby a baby shower and 1 year down the line he meets them arguing in the park.
The drama techniques we used for this piece were:
- Flash back- We used this in our play when the parents were remembering what life was like before the baby was born.
- Freeze-framing- We used this at the end of every scene or when a pause was needed for a monologue.
- Monologues- We used this to show the characters inner thoughts. This was especially important as their inner thoughts were in complete contrast of what they expressed on the outside.
- Though tracking- We used this to show the characters inner thoughts.
- Hot-seating- We used this during the developing stages of our play to get ideas.
- Marking the moment- We did this by freezing the climax at the end of out play.
We then added to this a naturalistic piece. This was based on the effects of the baby as a whole. The role play had 3 scenes. Once again we started developing our piece by first brainstorming various ideas of what we could do. Everyone took part in the discussion and contributed. In the end we decided to refer back to the technique which had worked so well earlier for us, the hot-seating. We had plenty of ideas and all of them linked to the same idea of 3 scenes, the scenes were basically of the baby’s birth, its effect a few months later and the longer term effects it would cause on the family. The shame about all of this is we did not get to finish or really get into our new though role-play as there was a lack of time and we need to move on. So we left this piece there.
From the black and white photograph of the crying baby we started developing the idea of past experiences as children into a more developed idea. We were all put in groups and given the picture once again. This time we had to devise a piece based on memory of past events such as these. In the end we were supposed to have a role-play made up of 2 scenes which were before and after. Our character was supposed to have been effected by an event in his past which changed him in his later life.
We started developing our piece by first brainstorming various ideas of what we could do. I decided it would be a good idea if everyone in the group said something which changed them if slightly or maybe a lot in their lives. 3 of us including me said how when no one pays attention to you in life at a young age especially it can really change your personality and when you grow older you can really crave attention. So we chose this idea. To make it more interesting we decided instead of doing a flash forward we were going to do a flash back. From here we decided to make 2 pictures in the before and after scenes, 1 in each. The picture in the first scene:
This was when the character was in his older life and he reacts to what affected him as a child. The picture was of him standing away from a group of his co-workers whilst they were all in a huddle discussing business. I thought this was good because it showed how he wasn’t involved in anything due to no one paying attention to him.
The second picture was the scene of the event which affected him:
This was a picture of him pulling at his parents trousers near their ankles because the boy wanted to be heard but the parents are taking no notice of him. I think this was good because it was a non-naturalistic way of showing our point.
Eventually our played was based on the story line of. The man named Jeffery Williams going to a board meeting and having a really good idea and no one paying attention to it for a long time. Eventually he looses his cool and gets mad. Everyone leaves the room and someone comes to talk to him. He then has a flash back of what happened which made him loose his temper like this. In his past his parents won’t pay attention to him or help him with his homework so he gets in trouble at school. When he gets back he gets into a really bad argument with his mom and finds out how his parents don’t know anything about him. This drives him wild.
The drama techniques we used for this piece were:
- Flash back- We used this when the man in our play was talking to a friend and thought back to what happened to him in his past.
- Slow motion- We used this in the climax of the last scene when Jeffery as a child throws a chair at his mother.
- Freeze-framing- We used this at the end of every scene or when a pause was needed for a monologue.
- Monologues- We used this to show the characters inner thoughts.
- Though tracking- We used this to show the characters inner thoughts.
- Hot-seating- We used this during the developing stages of our play to get ideas.
- Marking the moment- We did this by freezing the climax at the end of out play.
- Split screen- We showed this when the boy was walking back home on his own and his parents got a call back from his teacher.
The idea which we focused on out of all the ideas we came up with during class discussions and picked up from the film was very comedic like snapshot quality the opening sequence of Amelie had. The almost flashes of the baby born, Amelie playing as a child, Amelie’s parents, Amelie’s friends and family and the 2 moments which changed her life. Also the main focus was also to have a narrator. We wanted to make sure we created a sequence as short as that and maybe even sorter but in all its shortness to have a very big impact on the audience. In the groups we had already been put into for these we had to come up with a way of expressing all of this in a short sequence. We decided the best thing to do was decide on the defining moment of the person’s life first so during the role-play we could build up towards it. We decided to sit in a circle and each go round saying any events that as children we remember that changed us for the better or for the worse. A lot of ideas were very good but the best two which were said by people was one
- When their dog died when they were still young.
- When their dad left them.
The idea we chose was because it had the most impact I thought. Once again we decided to develop up to the role-play with freeze-frame images to gives us a good idea of what was going to happen in each scene. All the images were very helpful and were:
- The baby being born.
- The child playing games.
- The child constantly smiling and greeting other people.
- The child’s first day at school and him being tricked at school.
- The child’s dad leaving.
- The child becoming wild and breaking everything.
We developed a narrated role-play out of all these ideas. The basic story line of this short role-play was a child named Harry bigot is born and taken care of by his parents. He’s a playful child who enjoys games like hop-scotch, throwing stones etc… and is especially friendly to everyone he meets and gets known as the friendliest child around. He enjoys his first day at school but is sold something faulty by a bully at school. There is a decision in the family and the dad has to leave to go to war as he is part of the army. Harry doesn’t understand this and thinks he is being abandoned. So this changes him and he becomes a violent, unfriendly and disrespectful child.
We then had to further this idea by creating another role-play which wasn’t exactly in the same style as Amelie but was focused on the idea of marking the moment. This had to be a moment like we had previously which is life changing.
We kept the same idea of the dad leaving the family to go join the army in another country. We decided once again that this had great impact before and if we emphasized it even more it would be even more effective.
We watched a play by Sixth Sense Theatre Company and in their play they emphasized their idea by showing it twice in a role-play. Once at the start when no one else understood what the whole idea was about and what was going on. Then again at the end when people finally realize what this idea meant and it will stay in their minds even after the finish watching the role-play.
We did this with the scene when the dad is leaving the family and he has packed all of his bags. What happens here is he puts all his bags on and says bye to his wife and his gives her a hug. Then he tries to explain to the child who is devastated why this happening and asks for a goodbye but the boy is too furious to say it or give the dad a hug so the dad leaves. Then after this scene bad news is sent to the mother through a letter and she reads the letter and the child realizes but is not told what it is about. He then sneaks around and finds it. After he reads it out loud and talks to his mother there is a freeze and the start scene is shown again. But this time there is one difference. The child realizes what had happened and monologues about it. All the techniques in red are from the 2nd role-play I developed. The techniques we used to develop both these drama pieces were:
- Flash forward – We used this when the baby was growing up but in very quick stages and just cutting through the most important and meaningful times. We did this so the so the role-play was short and powerful but also covered important areas.
- Flash back- This was when Harry Bigot realized his father was dead after reading the letter, he then had a flash back of the conversation him, his dad and his mother had just before the dad left. We used this because it was a very powerful way of emphasizing the point to the audience and showing it twice.
- Slow motion- We used this when the child was playing all of his little games like hop-scotch, football, stone throwing and he would make a funny face and do it slowly. We did this to make the scene a very funny one and this links to what life for children is all about.
- Slow motion- We used this when Harry Bigot first read the letter about the death of his father. The reaction and what he said was in slow motion. We did this to make that point focused on and very tense.
- Freeze-framing- We used this when we were developing ideas for our role-play. As I have stated earlier we created images of the main points which were going to be included in the role-play and focused the sequence we did on these images.
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Freeze-framing- We used this during stops we had when one scene was finished and at any pint where we were trying to mark the moment.
- Monologues- We used this when the child’s father left him and he had started coming to terms with it and decided to change and show everyone else how he really felt inside.
- Monologues- We did this in the end scene after Harry had a flashback about when he would say good bye to his father and he monologues about what he has done and how bad it is.
- Though tracking/ Voices inside the head- We did this when the mother and Harry read the letter about the death of the father. We did this like this because we felt it was simply more interesting.
- Marking the moment- We did this slightly when the father left the family but it was not really explained too well and others may have missed it.
- Marking the moment- We did this during both scenes of the father leaving the family for the army. We did this twice because it emphasized the point to the audience.
- Narrating- We did this throughout the whole play describing the events happening and at times interacting with the characters at the same time. We did this because this made the sequence short and we were trying to focus on the same impact Amelie gave.
- Narrating- We used a slight bit of this but most things explained themselves and needed speech.
- Repetition- We used this when we did the same scene twice for added effect.
- Miming- We used this when there was narrator and the characters mimed what the narrator was saying through out and reacted on accord. We did this with out faces, gestures, movement. We did this because it gave a very comedic style and feel to the role-play.
This was the blocking in the stage craft of the play which we did from the stimuli of the crying baby in the black and white photo. This was the role play involving the character Jeffrey who’s past experience greatly influenced his future. The blocking is of the first and last scene. The first scene is to the left and the last scene is to the right. As you can see in the first scene the movement of all the other characters besides Jeffrey is very simple and is going towards leaving the stage except for one who comes back. But Jeffrey on the other hand is moving all over the stage, very quickly and is very agitated. He is doing all this movement to show the tension between him and the character he is talking to. He is also very angry and can’t keep still.
In the last scene the movement of the two parents was minimal whilst Jeffrey’s was large and covered the whole stage but not quite so stop and start. This shows how distraught he is but the parents who don’t care are barely showing any care and not even moving, whilst Jeffrey is going mad all over the place. The audience is the same for both scenes and in the same place. The arrows coming from all the characters show their movement.
This was the blocking in the stage craft of the play which we did from the stimuli of Amelie. This was the role play involving the character Harry Bigot, with an opening sequence of his life as a baby up to childhood. The blocking is of the whole scene. As you can see through out the entire sequence the involvement and movement of the parents is kept to a minimum. This makes sure all of the focus is on the child. The child is moving all over the stage while he plays various games, goes through stages of his life, goes to school etc… The narrator covers a lot of ground as well because he is involved through out the entire scene. The movement is good as it keeps the narrator interesting and also there is a high use of gestures once again to make sure the audience is not bored of listening to him. He also takes part in some of the scenes as characters so he has a lot of movement.
Jeffrey is an anxious and nervous person, He regularly craves attention from everyone he meets and is fascinated by the relationship between other parents and their children. He is like this because of the experiences he had with his parents who never paid any attention to him what so ever. Here, he shares how this all affects him.
I would have killed myself for my parents; easily. I would have eaten even rubbish. I would have jumped off a building if they had asked me to. But seriously... They weren’t too fond of me. And you know, I played it very casually, because, all right, I've had times when I tried to be very friendly and talk, talk, talk and then talk some more! But when I’m done all I would hear is “Sorry what was that dear, I wasn’t listening”. All I wanted was to be loved, to be given a hug once in a whole; is that so wrong? Is that not allowed anymore? (Pause.) It feels like I’m always by myself, I'm by myself I feel like I'm going out of my mind, I do. I sit there, I'm thinking, I'm not gonna make it through the next ten seconds. I just can't stand it. But I do, somehow, I get through the ten seconds, but then I have to do it all over again, cause they just keep coming. Just once I would like to maybe get a girl friend but I can’t. If my parents didn’t want to pay attention to me why would another girl to any different.
For the work we did in this unit my role in the group was mostly to come up with ideas, brain storm, work with the group in any helpful ways and a lot of the time to be a leader and point the way forward. My choices of character to play were decided by me and the group based on the information we had to work with, which was the picture. My difficulties were with the photo of the baby, I have problems figuring out whether the baby’s emotions were sad, getting better, getting worse etc… I overcame them by trying out different alternatives and eventually I found an alternative which worked well. If I had more time I would do more group discussions and finish unfinished work. The effect we achieved was the imprint of the importance of the mistreatment, good treatment and overall impact of the baby on the bay’s life and the parent’s life. I learned a lot about childhood. I learnt how a child’s past can affect his present dramatically, I learnt about how a child entertains themselves. I also learnt abut the affect of a child abused at home can have on his school performance also on how and why children argue with their parents.
During this Unit we were also required to watch and write a play review from a play which we watched live. The play review will be part of my coursework.