Research Tasks - "Cherries" - Gareth Allen

Cherries

This short film's genre seems to be a mixture of social realism and drama. I think that it uses social realism in this film by the way that it shows how the boys are at break, when they are chatting with mates and then a fight starts. This is possibly what happens on a day to day basis at this school. You see the classroom as well, where they are all talking away at the start of the lesson and being oblivious to the teacher being there. The genre for this film also seems to be drama. I think that this is the case because, you see one of the boys, James, and his emotions get the better of him when they are signing up to go into the army training and he starts to cry. You also have another one of the boys, Clint, who runs away from it all, presumably trying to get away from the fact that they are trying to get him to possibly go to war.

This short film I think uses the two genres of social realism and drama well in this piece. I think this because, you see how they are all affected differently with their emotions and how they deal with these by the fact that they may be in the war, Clint runs away from it all whilst James crys about it. I think that these two genres were mixed best in the classroom scene during the middle of this short film. I think this because, you see how they normally act during lessons at the start where they don't pay much attention to the teacher. Once they have read their letters though, their emotions take over them and they are curious to want to know if this is true or not and if they are having to go out and fight in the war. You also see how their teacher doesn't want to tell his students this information as he possibly will know how some of them might react to being told this information. He tells the headteacher that he can't do it, and you see at the start of the classroom scene, he is sitting their contemplating how he is going to tell them this news.

This film uses the short film format by using a lot of quick cuts during specific scenes. This I think works well as it increases the pace of the film and makes the audience sit on the edge of their seat wondering what is going to happen. They use quick cuts when the students have opened their letters and are showing the audience what information there is on the letters. You can see that they use quick cuts to show them the important parts of the letter to show how it isn't a joke, the address of the student and the army number. You also see quick cuts while they are watching the film. This will have been done to show how they are all feeling emotionally as you see close ups of their facial expressions. You also see the camera shaking while Clint is running on the grass outside of the school. He is on the run so they might have made the camera shake so that you feel you are seeing him there and are running along with him.
The sounds in this film are mostly diegetic. This is to show the realism that there is in this situation. Throughout the film you hear things that can normally be heard at schools, school bell, swearing, fighting etc. You hear the boys speaking in a lot of slang throughout this film so this suggests that the film could be set in an urban area in London. You do hear some non diegetic sounds however at the beggining of the film and the ending of the film. You hear the soundtrack at the start, which has words in it about running late for school (this is probably done because you see Clint running around in school uniform, presumably to his school). The non diegetic sounds that you hear at the end of the film are piano keys that are getting played. They are at first played quite quickly and close to each other. But as the scene moves on, they get further and further apart, and they are being played in a sad tone. This will be because they are signing themselves up to the army training, when most of them don't actually want to do it.
The themes and issues of this film are quite clear. The main theme is about the war that is happening at this time. The storyline is set on the war, and it is a key part of the film. Most of the talk in the film has something to do with the war and fighting. This film shows the current affairs that are happening across the world, giving it a lot of social realistic points. The students at this school all seem to be willing to get into fights however. This is in contrast with how they feel about fighting people the other side of the world, and possibly being killed fighting them. I think that this is a good contrast in the film as it shows at the start they are willing to fight each other on the playground, but when it comes to death being involved, none of them want to take that risk.

I think that the target audience for this short film is boys between 15 and 18. The reason that they will have targeted this age group is because, this could happen in the real world of today. This will have been why they have used boys from school who are 16, to show them how serious the war is. This will make the boys that are watching this as the audience realise what is happening, and that they could go through the same experience as these boys are. This will make them think and possibly be grateful for the life they have at the moment, and make them realise how lucky they are to not be fighting at the moment. Thye have done this well in the film I believe because, you can see the shock on the boys faces when they read their letters, which is presumably what the audience feels like as well, especially if they are the same age as these boys.

I think that there are parts of this film that are interesting in the way they have created the atmosphere in the scene. I think they have done this with the class all watching a film at the same time. They have done this scene well I think because, you see close ups of all of the students in the class, and see how they are reacting to this film they are being shown. They use the transition of a cut to go between shots, but they use quick cuts, so you see more of the students faces at this time. This I think would go well in our short film. The reason I think that quick cuts would look good in our short film is because, it can change the pace of the film and make the audience wonder what is happening, depending on what you are showing them.

Crew
* Director - Tom Harper
* Producer - Lisa Williams
* Writer - Fiona Kissane
* Editor - Mark Eckersley
* Director Of Photoography - Jakob Ihre
* Music - Jack Arnold
Cast
* Mr O'Brien - Niel Dudgeon
* Robin - Benjamin Smith
* James - Alfie Allen
* Clint - Omari Carter
* Headmaster - Sam Spruell
Funded By
Film London and UK Film Council Digital Shorts Plus
Related Links
UK Film Council site
Film London site

Gareth Allen