Over

Over, directed by Jörn Threlfall, is a 14-minute short film about someone falling out of a plane and landing in a quiet neighbourhood in London, based on a true story. 

This film has a unconventional and unique narrative structure with the events being in reverse chronological order. This makes the spectator feel slightly disoriented, and leaves the big event to happen at end of the of the film, rather than at the beginning or the middle like a conventional narrative structure. This created tension as we never know when the big event will happen, and we are just observing every detail to try and figure it out. Leaving the death to happen at the end means that there is a lot of ambiguity as to what has actually happened, and the evidence makes us believe it could be anything, from a murder to a car crash. 

  

The first shot is very ominous and eerie establishing shot set at night, and it gave me the impression this was going to be about a murder. The camera slowly trucks across a hedge, ending up facing where the incident happens. The first time stamp is shown, creating the idea in our heads that this story happens late at night, however it suddenly cuts to the next shot, which is set at daytime, using another time stamp. The film has been very quiet up until this point, but in this shot a car drives in and parks on the street. The sound of this car slowly gets quite loud, emphasising the quietness of the shot before. The streets are very empty and quiet, showing that this neighbourhood is not busy, making it easier for things to not be noticed, such as a dead body.

In this wide shot, two people get out of the car, and the woman goes to kneel by flowers on the pavement and read a card, creating the idea that they are connected to whoever died. As they are the first characters we see, we assume we are going to be following these characters, however this is the only time we see them. We then get a mid shot of the flowers the woman was looking at, again making us think there is a connection between them and the flowers

In the next shot, we see a man cleaning the street, then we get a close up of the blood. The film follows this pattern of doing a static wide shot for a minute and a bit and then close ups or mid shots of something related to the shot, for example the man cleaning the street and then the blood.

We get shown the evidence from the scene of the crime, and the shots are very still (might be pictures instead of video), very quiet chatter in the background and sounds of around an office, probably a police station. These shots of all the victims personal belongings connects the audience with him, and makes it easier for the spectator to sympathise with him. Also, having glimpses of the victims personal items makes us more curious as to who the victim is and how he died.

The death of the victim happens so suddenly that it makes the spectator immediately jump. The volume of the body hitting the car is so loud that it contributes to the shock factor. It is also not explained to us what happened, we only see a corpse drop to the ground from above, but we can piece it together because right after he falls we hear the sound of a plane passing above, and a few seconds later we see the plane go by. 

The cinematography in this film is very simplistic, so as not to take away from the story it is telling. The film is made up of 9 static wide shots and a few close ups and mid shots in between. Each wide shot was shot at a different angle, to give new perspectives and examine each angle of the scene. The director Jörn Threlfall said "I make the viewer be the detective", and this is done well through filming the same area in different angles, as if we are searching for clues and different possibilities. I thought the filming of this short film was very voyeuristic, having the camera so far away from the action, and being so still, just observing. A few of the close-ups used were very startling, for example, when we first see pieces of evidence, it was very quiet and static, and suddenly there was this extreme close up of the body bag passing the camera, with loud diegetic sound. This keeps the spectator focused on the story.

The lighting is key to the reverse chronological order it was filmed in. A sense of realism is created by the day slowly getting brighter as the hours go back, and the mise-en-scene and setting was very simple as to not take away from the main story, as well as create a sense of realism. There is no soundtrack, the film uses diegetic sound to tell the story, and it is very simplistic and realistic. 

A key quote from Threlfall is "I didn't want to tell it in a conventional way. This story was so sad and desperate it needed a different way of telling... It's like shards and fragments, it was quite and intense way of making sure the viewer stayed with it", and I think it is evident in this film that he achieved what he wanted to.