9/11: Sean Penn

In Sean Penn’s ‘11’ 09’ 11’’ short film, he says that after 9/11, America was finally able to see reality. That perhaps it wasn’t so great and unbeatable and that it wasn’t able to fool itself under a shroud of ‘memories’ of it’s past.

We are told the story of an old widower played by Ernest Borgnine. As he gets up one morning he complains about the lack of light in his flat. Penn is playing no games with us here; he is talking light and dark, vision and blindness, knowledge and ignorance. During his day he looks back over old photos, notably his wife and also a military picture of, presumably, a family member, presumably his son. The man, like America, says Penn, has an affection for the past and perhaps even ‘lives’ off the past, the man doesn’t seem to do much else but look over his photos and, perhaps more importantly, and obviously, talk to his deceased wife. He lays her dresses out on the bed, dances with them and wishes them goodnight on an evening as if his wife was in the dress. I think what Penn is driving at here is that America is still living off it’s (so called) ‘glory’ days and not living in the present, addressing the real issues affecting itself currently. Imagining the man as America isn’t hard when he’s being played by American heavyweight Borgnine. Dead, or wilted, flowers on the man’s window sill, a once beauty, now decayed, perhaps show that Penn at least doesn’t think that the memories America is living on are just myths. This metaphor becomes painfully obvious when it is revealed that one of the Twin Towers was the reason for the lack of light in the man’s flat. When it falls down, light enters the flat and the man, at first jubilant over the fact his flowers can now grow, sees, really sees, that his wife is not here to enjoy this with him, just as America realizes that it’s ‘glory’ times have gone and are not here to help it now. Personally I find it, or think it could be, confusing that Penn has the man become jubilant after the event but before the realization, however, I think that this may just be the circumstance through which Penn has chosen to relay his message. 

Dialogue/Sound in the the 'non-talking' experimental scenes

Dialogue in the experimental film was a topic of hot debate between group members and the course tutor. The problem was that some people felt that the scenes that were focusing on a form such as lighting. colour and composition (i.e. ones without dialogue) needed some sound, the reason for this I am unsure of, if there was one at all. I felt the scenes did need need sound however, because why should they? sound is not intrinsic to film meaning and is just another element of film production, like costume or gesture. The idea of the film is to rotate the importance of all these elements throughout the film to understand their importance.

editing the experimental film

Our Experimental and the Kabuki

Much of the idea for the experimental film was taken from the a small extract in the Sergei Eisenstein section of  J. Dudley Andrew's 'The Major Film Theories' book. Specifically the section on how Eisenstein took influence from the Russian Kabuki theatre, "The meaning of a kabuki play could never be understood be a recounting of the plot or gestures. It is the form of the ensemble which contains the meaning and this form, in Eisenstein's view, is as abstract and as powerful as a musical or painterly form." This translated into the idea for the experimental film by EXPERIMENTING with the ways in which each individual film form (i.e. lighting, sound, colour etc) contributed to the meaning of a scene or a film as a whole.

Experimental Risk Assess

EXPERIMENTAL FILM job roles

We have distributed the various form themed scenes among the group members:

Alex (Sound recordist/editor) - Sound & colour

Lucy (Camera) - Edit/Montage, lighting & score

Ben (Director/producer) - Composition, costume/props/set & gesture

EXPERIMENTAL FILM early scripts

Woman is getting dressed and fixing her hair. she is looking over a script disdainfully.

Man enters.

Man:

          Hi

Woman:

          Hi

Man:

          Listen, we need to talk.

Woman:

          ok, but I have to get to set in a couple                      minutes.

Man:

          ok, here's the thing-

Woman:

          It's just so stressful. The director is            taking this whole thing in a terrible                   direction.  He just never listens to me…

Man:

          Sweetie, listen

Woman:

          What is it?

Man:

          I don’t think I can do this anymore

Woman:

          what do you mean?

Man:

          I'm sorry, it's over.

Woman:

          how can you say that?

Man:

          I just don’t feel the same as I used to.

Woman:

          is it me? I can change!

Man:

          look, don't take it personally.  We just                      don't want the same things.

Woman:

          I can't believe this is happening

Man:

          You want to focus on your career and I                       want to settle down.

Woman:

          Oh typical! You have never supported me!

Man:

          That's not true!

Woman:

          it is! you only care about yourself! like                     right now, I tell you that I'm having a hard             time at work and you break up with me.

Man:

          well that’s hardly fair

Woman:

          ugh, fine. You're right. I'm done.

Man:

          oh don't be like this!

Woman:

          fuck you.

Scene opens in a dressing bedroom/dressing room in black and white. A girl center shot is looking upset and restless. She is surrounded by pictures of the countryside and objects like a map, a guitar, plants and pans. She is wearing casual un-fancy, almost peasant-esque (but clean and neat) clothes. There is a window in the background.

Cut to a man, he is very smartly dressed in a suit. Books surround him. He is confined in the room to a corner, in a square chair. He is annoyed, but trying to look cool and collected.

Woman: there is nothing left to say

Man: (laughs and pulls out a book from his shelf) you don’t understand

Woman: no, you don’t understand, I want to get out and do things

Man: we do do things

Woman: but for myself

Man: what?

Woman: I don’t want to rely on this things now (pushes away books) looks out of window and closes the curtains on industrial building)

Man: (cutches book)

Woman: (looks out the window, this time at a grassy field) I’m going to things in my own time, off my own back

Man: (uses inhaler)

Woman: storm out the room

Cut to corridor section.

1. INT. PRODUCERS OFFICE

Producer is sitting in a chair reading a newspaper.  Director enters, he is stressed.

Producer:

          Ah, Director.  How's things?

Director:

          oh not bad

Producer:

          good, good. How's production going? We still on               schedule?

Director:

          um, yep. Everything's going great! Except-

Producer:

          except?

Director:

          well the leading actress is a bit… moody

Producer:

          moody?

Director:

          yeah…

Producer:

          How so?

Director:

          well…

swoosh transition

2. INT. DRESSING ROOM

Dressing Room

Actors are doing their hair and makeup.  Runner pokes head round corner.

Runner:

          five minutes miss

Actor:

          So, you doing anything after shooting today?

Actress:

          (Noticing subtext) … yes.

Actor:

          Oh. I was wondering if you wanted to get a drink or           something but-

Actress:

          ok thanks

pause

Director enters with new script

Director:

          hey guys, just letting you know I've made a few adjustments to the                script, nothing major, just pages 10-36, ok see ya in five

Actress picks up script and silently fumes as she flicks through it.

Actress:

          oh my god, I can't work like this

Actor:

          what's wrong?

Actress:

          have you read this?

Actress holds up script, close up reveals it is the script for the film.

          it's awful

Actor:

     oh it's not too bad

Actress:

     yes it is! the man is a total wimp, and the woman is an over opinionated bitch!

Actor:

     he's not that wimpish

Actress:

     he's unbelievably wimpish! Look in this scene she literally towers over him

Actor:

     … well, it's only a job in the end

Actress:

     what?

Actor:

     I mean we're getting paid, why the fuss?

Actress:

     fuss?? Because I am an artist! I will not be stifled by this melodramatic,   over stylised, lazily written, half baked, and conflicted-

Runner pokes head round the corner

Runner:

     two minutes miss

Actress turns to runner and screams a torrent of abuse at them. The runner slips out of the door. The actress turns around, the actor flinches.  She picks up the script and rolls it up.

Actor:

     What are you doing? You can't do this

Actress turns to the camera and stares dead on. She storms out.

3. INT. CORRIDOR

Actress storms out of dressing room.  She

4. INT. SET

5. INT. PODUCERS OFFICE

woosh transition

Producer:

          So not too bad

Director:

          No, not too bad

END.