This is my first film project, created as part of my first year submission of my Film studies. I was responsible for editing, set design, cotumes, and make up.
It is lovely to see how I have improved my skills since 2016.
Please read on for an analysis of the film’s theme of mistmatch.
Contrast is one of the best techniques to point out a meaning in all art forms. When human senses browse through expanse of similarity in music composition or painting, they pass over it quickly without a notice. With contrast, however, the senses get excited and held by it. In a short student film Flying High, the mismatch depicted in narrative is visually accompanied by every element of style. It is a story, which shows a man, later identified as Mr. Jones, who wakes up in a cubicle in public bathroom, lying next to vomit and empty beer cans. As he tries to put himself together, his mind is crossed by flashbacks – memories of his drunken adventures in a bar from the night before. With the realisation of reality, he starts to clean himself up, sniffs coke to silence the pain in the head, changes his dirty T-shirt to a fresh white shirt, packs his belongings into a suitcase and leaves the toilets as a new man. Doors open in front of him as he enters an airport in a pilot uniform, uncovering the fact, that this drugged unreliable man is about to fly a plane.
There is already a mismatch when Mr. Jones wakes up in the cubicle as toilets are no place to sleep in. The interior is covered in white surface with hints of grey and black. Tiles, sinks, toilets in combination with cold unnatural light create an effect of coldness, isolation, emptiness and sterile inorganic environment. This sterility is violated by mess – the crunched cans, bottles, vomits, his human body – and in this mess he cleans himself up.
Mise-en-scène in the toilet shots offers a possibility to use the lines created by tiles and cubicles in a Stanley Kubrick’s style. His shots are known for perfect symmetry and balance achieved in composition. In Flying High this perfection is disrupted to serve the purpose of creating a mismatch. The drunk and drugged pilot does not fit into the socially accepted standards in the same way the lines are decentralised and do not follow the framing parallelly.
The second portion of the film is filmed in a very different environment. Large public airport is in contrast with relatively small and private space of toilets. Big glass walls allow natural light to come through and illuminate the place. The set still keeps white, grey and black in but in much warmer tones and mixed with yellow, and not only in the lighting but in the floor and details like leaf stickers on the glass, as well. Breakable and vulnerable materials like rubber on the floor and ceramics of sinks and tiles, representing the bathroom space, are in disagreement with strong and sturdy walls, marble floor and steel, which represents almost robot-like professionalism. The muted palette offers a canvas on which the occasional usage of other colours looks more expressive.
Setting of flashback scenes is in opposition to both. Bold red lighting dominates the whole picture. It is combined with lights and reflective colourful props that make the whole place look much more vivid than the plain arrangements of the bathroom and airport. This is also the only place where there are other people besides Mr. Jones.
Red is a symbol of temper and emotions, which Mr. Jones lets to take over him when drinking, and of the war he is in with himself and his desperate rebellion against rules of his other life. With the wounds, blood stains, flashbacks, and the Coke can, we get the last taste of his other, dark life. The yellow and golden tones included on his uniform indicate the sunshine, optimism and idealisation, through which he is portrayed later as trustworthy, elegant and confident professional. But like in Quentin Taranatino’s Kill Bill (2003), Uma Truman’s character’s personality of madness and instability matches with Mr. Jones too. The black and yellow stripes of bees and wasps indicate hazard and danger.
Usage of reflective materials, mostly mirrors is typical for all three locations. Mirrors are the essential element in the production design of Black Swan (Aronofsky, 2010). As the director claims, ʹthe film is about doubles and identity and loosing identity and not knowing who you are.ʹ Mr. Jones is going through a transformation of his nature. The two opposing personalities, both living within him, somehow cannot coexist together in a healthy balance and the socially accepted persona takes control over the wicked one.
Usage of all these elements contributes greatly to the film theme of contrast and proves that in film even complex psychological issues can be portrayed without a need to use a single word. They successfully support the central mismatch, described in the narrative and create captivating a visually interesting film to watch and observe.
