Film Title: The Selfish Giant (2013) Trailer Length: 2:30 Director: Clio Barnard Release Date: 25th October 2013 Certificate: 15 Genre: Drama Production company: BFI Film Fund & Film4 Distribution Company: Cineart & Sundance Selects Opening Weekend: $2,589 Gross: $10,531
‘The Selfish Giant’ was released in 2013 and was directed by Clio Barnard, director of ‘The Arbor’ (2010) and ‘Flood’ (2003). When interviewed about the film Barnard said that she had wanted to create a realist fairy tail based on Oscar Wilde’s children’s story of the same name. She has focused on the forgotten children of Britain, the demonised youth who are banished from society, because childhood is often idealised. The film also focuses on the struggles of motherhood on the Arbor estate, as well as throughout the poorest parts of Britain, this is shown within the interaction between Arbor's Mother and himself after the police officer's visit. The trailer presents these struggles effectively through Mise-en-scene, sound and camera.
At the start of the trailer, a close up is used to show two boys holding hands. This firstly creates a narrative enigma as audience members have not yet been introduced to the characters, they may wonder who’s hands these are, where they are etc, as the close up prevents any sense of setting and location to be seen, the only engagement is on the two hands. Creating this enigma may lead to the audience continue watching the trailer in order to find out who’s hands, where they are etc, engaging a sider audience. The two hands are clearly male hands, and so subverts the gender stereotype of boys being un-emotional, and in many ways shows them as emotionally weak, needing the support of holding hands, again subverting male stereotype of men being brave and strong, rarely in need of emotional support and holding hands. It could also signify Propps character type of the hero, whereby the protagonist is offering this support and trying to help his friend who is clearly upset / distressed, acting as though the hero. Many trailers also try to symbolize character types such as these as the trailer’s are typically around 2 minutes long, there is not enough time to introduce every individual character, and so using character types means the audience can become familiar with characters a lot quicker, which Tessa Parks believes occurs in all drama genre’s. The sense of support connoted through the close up also suggets the theme of friendship / brotherhood, which is a re-occuring theme throughout the rest of the trailer, and a code of the drama genre. Therefore this shot could foreshadow the future themes the audience will expect to see in the rest of the trailer and throughout the narrative, as well as making it clear to the audience that the genre is drama.
A montage is then used to show the close relationship between the protagonists, this relationship is not stereotypical for boys of their age or class. An interesting choice within the three shot montage is lighting. Using available lighting Arbor is cast in shadow, with only a dark silhouette under his bed, whilst Swifty is in the light pouring in through the window. This use of light tells us something of the characters and the narrative; it is Arbor who will struggle with greed and Swifty who will have most redeeming qualities. Swifty’s watchful eye is in the centre of the frame, foregrounding him in this way does suggest a guardian angel figure. All of this takes place without the production company logo entering the screen. If this was a production of a big six company the logo would likely be the first thing you would know about the film, they would use their name to bring in an audience, but as this is a British Social realist movie produced by the BFI, Film 4 and Moonspun films they cannot rely on a global audience. In addition, this supports conventions of a film trailer as all trailers tend to show their audience the production logos.
An establishing shot of horses in a field and a horse grazing near industrial buildings. Not only does this breed of horse stereotypically connote the working class or traveller communities but the setting is bleak, with muted colours and a barren landscape, reinforcing the struggle of a lower class citizen as black connotes pain and struggle. Already Barnard is setting the tone of the film and tying together the stark setting with the boy’s fate. Perhaps the horses are foregrounded in the trailer because they are a symbol of Swifty’s caring nature, a virtue Arbor lacks and because of this they drive a wedge between the protagonists later on in the film. The horses in this scene are roaming the field and the pace of the scene is very slow, paired with the non-diegetic soundtrack the pace and sound act to isolate the audience from the action in order for them to empathise with Arbor, who seems isolated from everything around him.
Medium shot is used to show Swifty holding a crying sibling whilst he watches his family, a family which is very stereotypical because the usual roles of caring mother and father are subverted and because it is a very large family, with Swifty caring for the children in his parent’s stead. The relationships between Swifty’s mother and father appears broken and abusive, another working class stereotype.
Towards the end of the trailer, a non-diegetic scream of aggression is heard, along with the diegetic sound of a fist punching, which is later revealed as the boy punching his bed in anger. The scream builds suspense and the audience really begin feeling the raw emotion of the young boy, beginning to emptahise for his situation, a broken family. As the scream and fit punching increases in pace, the shot lengths decrease, increasing speed of cut transitions. This resembles the emotions increasing and rising, reflecting the drama genre which often is full of emotion.
Within this trailer we see a school, clean, modern and completely ignorant to the struggles of the working class boys. Choosing this setting in comparison to the boy’s estate is a perfect contrast. Perhaps the school is a symbol of a society that is blind to the forgotten children Barnard described in her interview. The contrast between the school and the estate is not the only example of the characters being closely tied to their environment; during the disequilibrium pathetic fallacy is used to emphasise Arbor's emotions. A theme often explored in social realist films is bullying/discrimination. In the trailer we see Arbor’s defence of his friend be punished. School should be a safe environment for every child, but here we see that for some children When Arbor learns of his exclusion from the school he cheers, but an adult audience would understand the grim prospects Arbor faces without any education and the scene of the boys playing on a trampoline at the start of the trailer tells us that they are both still only children. There are many awards and good reviews within this trailer, obviously this film cannot rely heavily on famous actors or high distribution budget, so it draws in an audience via good ratings. The scene cuts to a review quote about the movie; ‘jaggedly moving’. This could be a representation of the chaos within this trailer, or the plot of the entire film. This sense of chaos is also further reinforced through the use of the non-diegetic scream and diegetic fist punching, as mentioned previously.
At the end of the trailer, the film name, release date and social media links are shown, such as ‘TheSelfishGiantFilm.com’ and the Facebook logo, all of which are common information found at the end of a film trailer, and the social media links are a common way trailer’s advertise their films, and so is an attempt to possible increase box office sales. All of this information is displayed on a purple background, a colour often associated with power and ambition, as the working class family all desire a better life, both financially and emotionally, and so are two themes throughout the narrative; and common codes of the drama genre.