Short Film Analysis- About a girl

About a girl-





About a girl was created in 2001, it was written by Julie Butterford and cinematography by Geoff Boyle. The budget for the 9 minute,50 second short film was 33,000. There are 102 shots and 92 flashbacks. I enjoyed the content of this short film and the way it was shot, the build up of tension is clever and the ending is sharp and hits the audience straight away.

The title of the film is a play on the 'About a Boy' title, this is opposing a blockbuster movie as there is a massive contrast between the two films. The text is appealing to a youth audience as the design of the text is like an sms message, this draws in the target audience immediately.

The framing of the first shot is a silhouette on of a girl on the right hand side of the screen dancing in a field, this is maybe showing the type of life she dreams of having, her standing on top of the hill makes her feel superior as there is a low angle shot of her.

The pretty greenery in the background shows escapism but the dark clouds are pathetic fallacy as something bad may happen. The Britney Spears song she is singing is ironic as she grew up to fast, from a pure innocent girl to a sexy image. She sings about people thinking she is young and innocent but really shes 'rebelling'. As an audience we have immediate laughter and smile as we identify with the character.

The next shot is in an urban looking estate, with walks and bricks giving of a feeling of her being trapped. She is a 'chav' looking girl wearing hoop earring's trying to look older. Her character is a 13 year old girl from a broken family. She has a strong accent and she is working class, she hasn't got much to say when she is with her family as she is silent in the scene with her mother but she always talks to herself which shows that she may be lonely and not get attention.

Camera movement in the film focuses of the main character, it zooms in and out of her and is handheld showing her feelings and how we don't know what is coming next. When she is left on the bench outside the pub, the camera pans away and leaves her looking small next to an adult world showing she is lonely but sings to herself which keeps her happy. The pace always changes and there is silent shots of her alone that are really powerful.

At the end of the film the colours change to greys and blues giving off a cold feeling, she becomes silent and then the dead baby floats out of the bag in the water. The camera then pans out of the bag and then the water, then she walks on and then we see a low angle shot of her singing the Britney Spears song.

At the end the it makes the audience want to think deeper about the situation it makes us feel guilty as we don't notice her situation and we were oblivious to it the whole way through.

Short films can be exhibited in a very broad variety of places for example, Youtube, Vimeo, Channel 4 and the 'Short films' channel.

"The less effort and cost required to produce a film, the less the economic pressure & financial risk. Economic freedom for experimentation & innovation. That is the strength of short film." Short Film.DE