Representation

 Adding on to the mis-en-scene discussed last week, I have one final prop that is important to the representation of the mother in the narrative. Before I get into that, I realized that I haven't been using the character's names in my blogs. I am officially introducing you to Olivia the daughter, Rebecca the mother, and Jonothan the father. The names we chose don't have meaning, we just wanted simple names to keep it easy. In the scenes of the narrative the characters don't really refer to each other with names, they use dad and mom instead, so we didn't think too much on these names.

Going back to the prop, we decided to add this element to show the relationship between Olivia and Rebecca, since it's limited to the photos seen in the credits. The prop will be placed in Olivia's room, on either her desk or nightstand. It will be a small and antique photo frame with a photo of Rebecca in it. This frame is generational and has been in the family for a while. As Olivia was growing up, Rebecca would put things aside for her to eventually inherit. Olivia found this stash shortly after Rebecca passed away, the fame caught her eye. This would be shown to the audience in the film (not the opening) through a flashback of Olivia going through the things Rebecca left behind for her. 

To create this prop, we will take an antique photo frame, from either Goodwill or online like Amazon, and place a photo of Rebecca smiling in it. To get this photo we will use my partners mom, since my partner is the actor for Olvia it makes sense for her mother to play and pose as Rebecca. 

(Some vintage frame examples from Amazon)

As seen in the storyboard, the frame will be zoomed into after we see a mid-shot of Olivia crying in her mirror after fighting with her dad. The zoom in allows the time spent looking at the photo to increase, and for the feelings to sink into the viewer, as the plot of Rebeccas death is still being established. The sequence of the scenes shows that Olivia often looks to her mom's photo for strength, and recently with the arguments worsening between her and her father she has been longing for her mom more than ever. Without the frame, the mother-daughter connection Rebecca and Olivia had wouldn't be seen, as the frame allows us to travel back in time away from the current narrative and explore their relationship.