Australian
Screen

Teacher’s notes

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This clip shows Meryl (Justine Clarke) travelling home, beset by images of her death, while elsewhere Nick (William McInnes) is given a diagnosis of cancer. The opening sequence reveals Meryl’s feelings as she returns from her father’s funeral through the use of amplified sound effects, no dialogue, numerous close-ups and graphic animations of death. This sequence is followed by one in a doctor’s surgery where Nick’s feelings of mortality are revealed as his life flashes before him in a stylised and constructed photographic montage.

Educational value points

• The contrasting colour palettes employed in the scenes portraying Meryl and Nick convey their different dilemmas and mind-sets. The scenes showing Meryl’s journey are dominated by intense rusty browns and greys that suggest her bleak state of mind. Conversely, the scenes depicting Nick’s visit to the doctor are shot in cold muted colours reflecting the cold atmosphere of the room, the coldness of death and his composed attitude to the doctor’s negative report.

• The opening shots of the train together with the heightened sound effects draw the viewer into the inner world of Meryl’s anxiety. The series of uncomfortably close panning and tilting shots of the speeding train, coupled with exaggerated sound effects, combine to create the sense of an unsettled and unpredictable world where dangers may exist in what appear to be relatively innocuous situations.

• Animation is used to graphically portray the depth of Meryl’s grief and disturbance. Using animation to reveal a character’s thoughts has numerous benefits: it separates the real (shown in live action) from the imaginings of the character’s inner world; it shows scenarios that would be difficult to stage in live action, especially on a limited budget, such as the train crushing Meryl. Finally, the childlike quality of the images may indicate the fragility of her mind.

• The scene that abruptly cuts from Meryl throwing her head back to the shot of the birds wheeling away may indicate Meryl’s desire to escape the oppressive images she conjures of her own death. The edit between the two images links them in a cause-and-effect relationship – Meryl’s internal world and the birds’ flight planting the idea of an enormous release without directly demonstrating it visually or audibly.

• The choice to shoot Meryl in close-up on the train serves to create meaning in a number of ways. It is a common filmic device to use a close-up from the shoulders up to suggest to the audience that the character being introduced is the main character in the story; here it is Meryl. Additionally, a close-up is commonly used to establish a point of view, and here the viewer is being invited to view the world through Meryl’s eyes.

• The shots of Nick’s X-ray and the rapid montage of photographs edited in a wordless sequence reveal the extent of his condition. The film’s director, Sarah Watt, has visually conveyed the information concerning Nick’s medical diagnosis. The montage of photos and accompanying sounds that follow the shot of an X-ray unmistakably represent his life flashing before his eyes, an event often associated with death.

Meryl is daydreaming out the window of a train. She imagines a tunnel collapsing on top of the train she’s in. She returns to reality, watching the scenery from her window — a woman in a pink dress pats a dog through a mesh fence and speaks to a man wearing a yellow shirt on the other side.

The train pulls into the station. Meryl wheels her luggage down the ramp. She walks next to the train track, which is high above her head, suspended by large concrete pillars. Meryl, again, disconnects with reality. She imagines the train derailing and taking her out before it crashes into the ground.

She continues on. Crossing a road, she pictures a car colliding into her, with her body and luggage thrown high into the air and landing violently.

She walks on and then stops at a scrap yard. She peers in. Nobody is there. She continues on. Meryl notices movement in the shadow of a tree. She images the man with the yellow shirt racing forward from the shadows to strangle her. She is brought back to her surroundings by a flock of birds circling in the sky above her.

An x-ray fills the screen. Nick turns away from it, but the image is still burnt in his mind. His life flashes before his eyes. He reels.
Nick So, uh, so what are my chances?
The doctor turns around in his chair to face Nick.
Doctor Look, I really don’t think there’s any point in speculating in that sort of way. The specialist will tell you more on Monday.