Collection
Color sheme
Location
The waiting room
What kind of spaces to psywards, therapy clinics and rehabilitation centres have ?
What are the actions? what is the main event?
From this derives the location focal point.
Actions / Plot
Girl interrupted
It's kind of a funny story
About Kate
Unsane
Berlin Calling
( Sucker punch )
A cure for wellness
Shutter Island
the AO season 2
Einer Flug übers Kukuks nest
To the Bone ( Netflix serie)
4 Könige
Movies or media with Clinics
What kind of settings or actions can I derive from this?
Do I need it to be a clinic because the Lobster is the main inspiration and not even a clinic although it has that feel and meaning of a clinic + resort.
People scouting: -
Tony Twister
+ she has braces !
Parody of beauty ideals
Styling inspiration -
the straight the perfect blond hair
clipped onto the natural hair in an obvious fake-ness /embracing the synthetic
This could be a visualisation of the treatment. But: To see or not to see the treatment?
Therapy / Consultation?
Organised, neatly straight and white > the perfect smile > the perfect smile of as a symbol for status and beauty.
My research is built on study of dentists and the history of undergarments. I also started to explore beauty ideals, through looking into braces and corsets. This made me realize everything sterile, white and neatly straight is a sort of status symbol. All this is summarized in the name of the collection ”smile or die”.
My fabric choises come quite literally from my research. I was interested in the contrast between white medical gauze fabrics and rustling plasticky materials you can observe at the dentist. I tried to mimic this disposable plastic material in my suits and jackets. I love how the traditional man worn pantsuit that resonates an idea of power, is suddenly made from trash.
Cinematic inspiration
The Lobster
Analysis:
Unnatural situations > people acting and reacting to each other that seems to 'make no sense' - general storyline of turning people into animals > absurd > surreal > yet mirroring very real truths about society
' spell it out scripts' > being extremely literal in the translation of an underlying truth of society > e.g. people being together because of 'compatibility' exaggerated to e.g. having nose bleeds or wearing glasses
'aggressively flat performances' > unnatural, very cold, emotionless, roboting acting, tone of voice
entire package is distancing > because the emotionless ness feels unnatural, the 'matter of fact' way of inter-human relationship feels alien. But because the world is in itself cohesive it feels like we as an audience are missing something because to us it seems too strange, to the characters it is 'the norm' and nothing is explained.
"Deals with extremes of human emotion by factoring most of the emotion out of the equation. All three films progress as though Lanthimos wants to isolate human behavior from the feelings that drive it, the better to analyze people's choices. He creates unnatural situations to question what's natural ...His aggressively flat performances and spell-it-all-out scripts are distancing, but he operates as though the only way to see a situation's absurdity is from a distance."
Maybe a blue flower is awarded to the healed ?
A blue flower is an unnatural sight. It feels synthetic and fake. Thus, a perfect symbol for a completed therapy.
Blue flower as symbol: -
Maybe we follow one girl's treatment?
Starting with entering the building - going to the waiting room - waiting ...
This linear - movie like - course of events is what we where taught in AMFI visual culture - is it the way to go?
From the 'Mandatory Update' video I have bad experience with this kind of linear course of events from room to room..
Also something felt off about the 'Wooden it be nice' video that was built up like this.
Is it the format or the execution that lead to this result/dissatisfaction?
I find that the Pipin video has an interesting variation between spaces and this also worked better for our Pleasantvalley video.
Or Ninamounah's fashion clips - not showing a movie like course of events but juxtaposing several actions, creating a mood.
Maybe this is the question of story vs. mood as focal point?
Also all of Adam's clips favour mood and a collage of settings over a linear story. Even e.g. the Gucci campaigns (Detroit Acid) told a story but not in the linearity from frame to frame but as a whole. This was kind of a mixture between mood + storyline.
INSIGHT: Maybe because we are so used to having parallel events and multitasking visual inputs we feel irritated or 'underwhelmed' when a short clip (of maybe not 1000% professional quality) runs in a linear way.
Storytelling format ?
A non consecutive narrative style will also make it easier to e.g. include a shot of people 'thrown out as trash' without having to carry them or show the transitory action; can only show the result of people already in bags
To make it not look like they are dead, they could be sitting emotionless / bored covered by a tarp.
Might have to ask Mirjami if she would be ok with this?
Shots of people behaving in strange ways in the 'Rec(reation) room'?
* People all should be sitting perfectly straight.
I would like to have an older women as authoritative figure and head of therapy.
and maybe a more well built girl as secretary or nurse figure.
Luisa ?
She's tall, bold, thin and has proven to be a very uncomplaining, willing and funny model
The spatial vibe
A mixture between mood and linear course of events: -
Something about it doesn't really work ? Maybe it's really just the sound????
Because from the models, acting , location, art direction , image /camera quality, fashionable close ups and storyline it all works.
It's also working with a more general concept ( that of Objectophilia) and not an entire 'other world' you have to try to understand
But a therapy for smiling is just as exaggerated but likely as this kind of Objectophilia AA meeting.
Or the way Kim did her's
One space - different rooms - showing different actions in parallel - with voiceover - flying through the scenes.
After treatment:
Extreme close-up face grimaces into a pained smile of perfectly white teeth.
Side effects of the treatment - the cost of beauty in the eye of the beholder. In hallway or Rec-room.
The Rec(reation) room
Re - creation
word pun
Decorated with Blue flowers?
That increase the more patients there are ?
Cinematic - Shot - inspiration
The 'authority' / head of the clinic could be drinking a blue flower-lotus tea. Signifying that she has internalised the symbol of synthetic beauty. * Drinking the Kool Aid so to speak.
As final shot be could see the symbol of synthetic beauty, either outside in a puddle of rain being rained on.
Or as a Vase tipped over and the water dripping onto the floor.
Symbolically signifying the failure of this beauty.
Or the girl receives flowers once out of treatment and we see them dangling down and dripping onto the floor as she holds them.
Carpet
Symmetry
Mixture of dining + Rec room
Both inspiration images have televisions - coincidence?
Or inspirational nudge to use the Television as the prophet of 'ideal beauty'- using audio sound bits
or as Kim did as her credits reel?
I like the idea of using the camera to move from person to person as I had envision in the Alien-Gucci-Classroom scenario;
where somebody comes in and is shown with a panning close-up slow motion style and at each table their is somebody sitting who somehow represents a stereotype or has some strange action.
Mixture of Wooden it be nice, Twilight Biology scene and The Knife 'pass this on'.
> Here showing people's side effects
styling: -
Either consultation - or treatment?
In 'the Lobster' the procedure itself also remains a mystery.
& there is something intriguing about a closed door.
This reminds me of the Money Exchange is St. Petersburg; A Hallway with many doors, all close to each other.
Maybe it could be David Lynch in Mullholland Drive style where we see things from a first-person-walking perspective and look into a room where a procedure is taking place?
Or walking past a room while being guided to 'our room' to see a door open and peak into door? (This setup requires ALOT of people)
Or have a completely empty room that this is taking place in and focus first just on close-ups of hands and the collection.
This could be cross-cut with scenes of others with side effects.
Apathy .
Mixed location that combines Rec + Dining room + waiting room all into one
1-3 : young girls
old women: head nurse
well built women: other nurse
Zwischenmenschliche Awkwardness
trist
subdued - muted - suppressed - lifeless
Maybe a blue flower is awarded to the healed ?
A blue flower is an unnatural sight. It feels synthetic and fake. Thus, a perfect symbol for a completed therapy.
What is it about 'The Lobster' that creates this feeling?
Can substitute dialogue for gibberish sound when talking
How many spaces are essential for the action?
To show the treatment or not?
Decision: no
We are aiming for a one minute clip and there is already a lot we are trying to communicate
we can refrain from showing the procedure itself because these types of therapies usually take place behind closed doors anyways.
They are the 'taboo', the hidden away, the unspeakable , pushed away to a corner. Thereby by not showing the treatment we further emphasise how it is stigmatised and hidden away in our society.
* also Nymphomaniac
Taking Nymphomaniac scene as inspiration the whole thing could really take place just in one room !
Being sent out like the girl that got her Lollipop but with flowers after the treatment.
Dead flower as symbol; here we could use the blue flowers.
A forced grimacing smile - wearing the head strap
While they wait we see a bunch of blue trash bags being carried out - or wheeled out on carts stacked to the top.
Returning to the same waiting room
I like the idea of the chapter and the 'gong' as used in Kelsey Lu's Shades of Blue video to indicate passing time
When the girl is asked in the David Lynch style 'gibberish' could be used.
The scene is a bit too dark - would like something lighter and less underground - more legitimate - also so that collection is visible.
Different scenarios of weirdness, bazar behaviour as side effects of the treatment. Going from table to table watching each individuals strangeness.
This effect is cool would be nice to find a door for similar effect
Ricarda?
Friend of Naomi Lou was in Berghain with
Mon Ami theatre ? maybe even yellow curtain room ?
Storyboard
Cinematic Moodboard
Document List
Script
Cinematic Moodboard
Storyboard
Shotlist
Layoutfilm
Art direction
Location
Scene / Set design
Styling
Casting
Division of Labor / Crew
Type of room required:
Waiting room
Recreation room
Outside trash area
This very clean and crisp feel is also a possible direction
for set and atmosphere.
Adam's videos are a good example that cutting away to 'weird scenes' actually works quite well and adds to the mood. + breaks up the linearity
Could be just cradling and rocking with a pillow.
Linolium floor.
Optional: nurse checking on patients
Action:
drawing in the water of the flowers
plucking off the pedals of the blue flower
Styling: after treatment - a pale sick-ly look
Apathy + wild child like jumping and dancing in a circle.
Potentially also with turning in a circle with the camera.
Trash could be standing to add to awkward weirdness, like waiting for nothing and not giving the indication of death but rather 'weird'.
Playing with food.
Social Kaufhaus Hof?
Mülldepot
Something like Jens Schwenk in Berlin or just a spot with containers or big trash bins..
Alena's roommate - blond, pale and sickly looking
Bars on the windows.
The type ; eyebags - no eyebrows
Caretakers - therapist - nurse - (Krankenschwestern)
White clean suit - symbol of clarity, purity and power
In treatment outfit
Main outfit, organic, body fitting, natural
Outcast's - unsuccessful therapy
no longer natural, with traces of perfect white but not quite
Rec-room
Waiting room
Poster documents
Cinematic Moodboard
Art direction - Location
Art direction - Styling / collection
Casting
Division of Labor / Crew
Division of Labor / Crew
Co-Directors: Alena & Kristin
Director of acting on set: Kristin
Director of set (production flow & coordination: Alena
Production: Alena & Kristin
Art Direction Set: Alena & Kristin
Stylist on set: ?( helping models get dressed) Jenny?
Eye on set: Alena (focus on set design)
Animal keeper:?
Extra Runner: ? Yasir?
Transportation: ?
Hair and Makeup - need min. 2 (for up to 10 looks):?
DOP: Adam
Lights: Adam?
Assistant DOP: Ivan
Editing: ?
Colour grading: ?
Sound design: Tim? Alexandra Av?
(Font design: Myri?)
Magda?
What we need:
Models
(Location)
Catering
Dresser
Runner
Hair and Makeup
Postproduction
Sounddesign
_Building suspense, creating a feeling of anxiety and dread
_ mix of classical music elements with electronic sound (this is too dramatic and classic)
_electronic sound mixed with classical elements and this circular vibrating sound; has a hypnotic element we could try to pick up for 'smile or die'
_the alien - Twin Peaks type voice distortion at 00:34 - 00:40 ( and again 2:44)
we want to use in smile or die as well
>> in smile or die head nurse speaks 00:09-00:11
Important: alien voice
_At 2:19 a haunting voice starts to come in which is an element we could imagine including
_ also the hypnotic quality could be a direction to explore
Suspiria as a main film Reference for interesting Camera angels
Additional inspiration
for waiting room
for movement direction
The process
Make-up inspiration