Short Film Pitch

Holly Sims

Logline

“A day in the life of a ten pound note”

“My money is as good as yours”

A film depicting the various ways in which a ten pound note is

transferred from one person to the next; passing through different

ages, classes and genders.

Brief Narrative

Shot from the subjective, with mostly only hands shown, the noteBegins in the hands of a middle-class business man; he gives it

to a black cab driver for his fare; the cab driver goes into a

Corner shop to do the lottery; the shop owner lends some money

to his son from the till for ‘school supplies’; the son goes to pay

back the money he owes a drug dealer etc. The ten pound notewinds up in a birthday card of a little girl, after opening it, gives it

to her father to keep safe. The father is the business man from the

beginning, creating a full circle.

GenreThe genre of the short film is British drama; depicting all

the various social groups specific to Britain -

London in particular.

The generic conventions in the short film will be

employed through the character’s dialogue; due to

the camera focusing on the body language of hands

rather than faces, the off screen speech is going to be clear

in depicting each specific gender, class, culture or age.

Also adding to this will be the look of each character’s

hands and arms; displayed through aspects like

jewellery, tattoos, clothing, skin colour etc.

I want to keep the film reasonably fast-paced for excitement.

Incorporating influences into

the short film ‘Winter’, made by the Central Film School London, has the visuallook I want to achieve with the scenes of the lower classes in myshort film. The audience would be able to tell the social status of

the main character, a homeless man called Ian, just by the lookof his hands, as they are very dirty and holding a bottle of whisky.The shallow focus and low contrast gives it a very real, grey feel

which is something I want to achieve visually.

In terms of this narrative in context of social/British drama, itcontradicts the frequently negative stereotype given to black

youths as Adewale is friendly, polite and likes to study; in my film Iwant to meet as many stereotypes of British people as possible,

whether they’re negative or positive, to give the audiencefamiliar representations and clearer contrasts between each

character.

Incorporating influences into the

short film Other influences I hope to incorporate in terms of genre and character are

feature films like ‘Harry Brown’, ‘Offender’, ‘Nil by Mouth’ and other short films

like ‘This is Vanity’.

‘Nil by Mouth’ has the consistent close up shots that I want to use, as well as that

fast paced conversation that emphasises realism and social drama.

These films are very clear in representing many different social groups within one

small area; rich/poor, young/old, good/bad black/white etc.

Incorporating influences into the

short film

In terms of cinematography, I’d like to incorporate the style of the ‘bullet’s eye view’

seen in the 2006 feature film ‘Lords of War’. It shows the journey of a bullet, from

creation to destruction – it travels through the hands of factory workers, military, and

finally gunmen. I think this particular style is visually very interesting. I will be depicting a

similar journey with a ten pound note instead.

How my work will develop from

my influencesBy thinking carefully about all aspects of mise-en-scene, I hope to do

what these films have done, which is establish each character

quickly through dialogue, costume, body language and so on.

I now realise how much representation is carried in an accent, or

just a short phrase; the audience can determine the social class of a

character in seconds.

These films frequently use binary opposites to give even more contrast to

the characters. By placing the characters with the greatest contrasts

in scenes directly after one another in my short film, these

representations become more obvious to the audience.

My Role

Working individually means I will be writing, filming and

editing the majority of the film myself.

I hope to develop my skills in cinematography, as I

haven’t had much experience in this area, and I know

it will be vital in creating the desired effect for my short

film.

I also hope to develop my skills as a writer, and that the dialogue

comes across well in the film and holds up the narrative; this is

particularly important as the actor’s faces won’t be seen most

of the time.