Difficult Scene For Ferrand example essay topic

By M. Gabriel DAY FOR NIGHT is a film about a movie making team shooting a film called MEET PAMELA. The story is about the film director called Ferrand, the artists and the production crew of "MEET PAMELA" as they embark on this journey to shoot this film and how they achieve their goal in spite of the many conflicts they experience during the shooting. This narrative analysis essay attempts to examine the development of the pivotal character, Ferrand, from the start to the end of DAY FOR NIGHT. DAY FOR NIGHT opens with a scene of a pleasing, busy Parisian square until a young man slaps another older man. The shock of this action compounded by a shout of 'cut' conveys all at once that we are being shown a cinema shooting, with the Director calling at the right moment to stop the camera. With this single scene, of hundreds of extra actors, props, sets, camera on crane and the single & powerful dialog "Cut", Ferrand's character is introduced.

This scene shows the enormous burden of responsibility and the associated strength or power of a movie director. We are introduced to Ferrand's personal background further when we hear the conversation between Alphonse, the young man and his girl friend & script apprentice, Lilian e. They talk about Ferrand's deafness due to serving in the artillery. On the first outset, this appears as indulgence on part of Truffaut to bring this characterization to Ferrand. As we start to know more about Ferrand, we see the relevance of this scene. Ferrand is shown as one of those humane movie directors who shoulders and shares the burdens of his actors and the crew when they experience their conflicts.

Service in the armed forces gives one the opportunity to develop the Characteristic of E spirit De Corps and camaraderie. Ferrand is shown to exhibit them in later part of the movie, when he faces the many conflicts of others in the set. We are shown a scene across the studio back-lot with hand held camera and excellent use of voice-over of Ferrand as he compares movie making to a perilous journey across the old west. This scene, with the effective of voice-over style, shows the anxieties of the director, due to the uncertainties in any production.

The above scene is followed by another scene when Ferrand is shown to make a choice of a car for a later stunt scene. This scene shows Ferrand's determination of not to compromise but to improvise. Ferrand does not hesitate to choose a car belonging to a member of the crew as that matches his requirement for the prop. Again this action shows a characteristic of a good director who believe that the story should decide the style. The next scene is a further exposition of the character of Ferrand as he tells the art director to avoid unnecessary work and cost of building the interior of a bungalow as he want to shoot only the outside. This scene shows the traits of a director who has a moral responsibility to the producers in not wasting the money, the resources and the time.

Ferrand is shown to share the burden and the pain of actors in the fairly long scene when Severine, playing the mother, cannot remember her dialogs, is confused about the exit door and makes the acting mistake of opening the wrong door a number of times. Ferrand is shown to comfort, cajole and at the same time not to agree with Severine's proposal to do the dialog the Fellini way. Here is a character exposition of a director who feels the pain and the joy of his actors and at the same time is consciously aware of his responsibilities. It is important to note that Ferrand does not cut the shot when mistakes are made as he knows that the rest of the shot is so well acted. He knows that he could make use of this shot in the edit. This above difficult scene for Ferrand of directing Severine, coupled with the amusing scene of meeting a talent agent with two actress girls wanting to do erotic and political movies leads to the scene when Ferrand has those dream sequences bordering on nightmares.

This shows the tensions and problems affecting a director that he / she does not get sound sleep. It appears that the director's mind is active all the time, and at times, even during sleep. The next character exposition is subtle and is excellent when, dealing with Stacey's pregnancy with the producer, we are shown Ferrand opening a packet containing books on Bergman, Godard, Rossellini, Howard Hawks, Hitchcock and other great directors. Truffaut makes a statement here that directors, as artists, learn from other directors and artists.

This is an important characteristic for a director and, for that matter, for any professional. There are many scenes, further introducing the character of Ferrand, but the scenes of interaction with his actors exhibit further dimension to his character and are most interesting. We are shown the firmness of a humane person in Ferrand, when dealing with the self pitying Alphonse coming out of his room in a long white night shirt. Ferrand tell Alphonse firmly, as he leads Alphonse to his room, of the director's belief that films are more harmonious than life and that people like Alphonse become truly happy when they give their focus to work. (instead of self pitying themselves). This is perhaps a true statement of conviction of character from Truffaut himself.

The news of the death of Alexandre comes during the shoot of Julie and Alphonse. The next scene or a subsequent one shows Ferrand driving around the set as he ponders the death of an actor close to him. The characterization is not direct. However, the voice-over brings out the sadness of losing a fellow artist. It brings out the fear in him of seeing an era of actors, sets and scripts which he loves becoming bygone. The voice-over brings subtly the fear and anxiety of this director, of losing the cherished past to an unknown future.

The director's ability to listen, to absorb and to believe that it can be done when changes and to improvisations are required is shown in the scene when the team gets together to deal with the absence of Alexandre. For the details and for the final decisions, the team looks to Ferrand for guidance. Again, this is an excellent characterization of the requirements of a good director to mobilize the team effectively to improvise when forced to do so. There is the final characterization when Ferrand says the final cut with some relief and continues to say something to the effect of "an immense thank you all". In summary, this movie is strong in bringing out the character of a director and is effectively done by Truffaut as he knows what a director should be.