I will be analysing the short film…LOVEFIELD by Mathieu Ratthe

The title suggests a romantic film but the clouds and the music and the settings portray the film to be of a thriller genre.

Story + How The Opening Sets It Up

The short film Love Field by Mathieu Ratthe is a very manipulative film to the audience. It has elements of horror, suspense and drama.

The narrative of this film is that a women is in a field and she is in labour, a man who was working on the farm is portrayed to be a murderer and makes the audience think that he has killed her when in reality he is helping her.

There is a theory by Todorov which suggests that all films are the same and start of with an equilibrium then a disruption occurs and then a new equilibrium will occur.

This short film supports the theory although the equilibrium does not last a long time it is still there and it is making audiences think that a disruption is about to occur and in the end a new equilibrium begins when she has her new born baby.

Camera Work

The shot of him in the field creates a feel of isolation.

Establishing shot of the field also creates isolation and it is a typical horror setting.

This POV shot is making it look like he is about to cover up the women's body and dispose of it. It is also high angle shot which makes him look very powerful.

The use of the low angle camera movement makes the audience feel the women’s vulnerability.

Everything about the camerawork suggested at the start that the man was committing a crime. The way the camera panned up to slowly reveal him suggested he was a villain, and the way they didn't reveal much about him at the start just tattoos and his scruffy clothes, they also didn't reveal the women just showed parts of her which could suggest she is just one of the many victims. In the end they showed a number of close ups of him holding the baby which shows he was helping her.

Mise en scene

The skull tattoo represents death and toxic and also makes him look like the villain.

The way he is urging to open his boot and is holding his keys makes him look tough, scary and big and like he’s frightened to get caught.

The still foot of the women and the cloth covered in blood portrays the women to be dead

The rest of the film is more lighter once she gives birth to show happiness and the mans kindness.

Everything in the mise en scene suggested that the film was of horror/thriller settings. The lighting and locations and the crow were typical elements of horror.

Sound

The sound of the crow lasts throughout the film. It is also an element of horror and it creates isolation because there is no dialogue in the film. It is a diegetic sound because the characters in the film can hear the crow. The sound of the sign moving in the wind is also a convention of horror and creates thrills.

The sound of the phone starts of being as an off screen sound then it comes on screen and it makes the audience think she tried to contact help but couldn’t reach anyone and slowly fades out and becomes off screen sound again. This makes the audience feel like there is more of the world in the film then we are seeing and gives us a sense of life.

The crow banging on the roof of the car starts off as off screen sound as well and it makes the audience think that he has been caught but then we see that it is the crow, watching the man and makes the audience feel like the crow witnessed the whole crime.

Editing

The back and forth camera movements between the field and the crow creates uneasiness.

This is sort of like a POV shot from the boot before he opens it. It creates suspense because we don’t know what’s inside or what we will be seeing next.

In this shot the man is in the foreground but is blurred out and the crow in the background. This shot makes it seem like two villains are about to go head to head and it is quite scary because it looks as if they are staring at each other.

If you look and compare these two shots you see that once we realize the women is alive and well and she has had her baby and the man is not a murderer the scene is more lights and happy whereas before it was dark and gloomy. This was done to make the audience think they were watching a horror/thriller movie and done to play around with the audiences emotions.

Costumes/Props/Locations

Before the baby

After the baby

This prop suggests that this is the weapon he used to murder her, but he used it to help her.

Her belongings were abandoned on the floor, might suggest she was trying to escape or get to some place because there is a lot of money.

His costume portrayed him to look like the villain because he looks like a typical redneck with tattoos and looks scruffy.

He is the only sense of life we are seeing. The location is very deserted and in the middle of nowhere with fields everywhere and a road. Horror element.

The location has seemed to gotten lighter after the birth of the baby. Before it was a typical convention of a horror with no sense of life whereas after we see that the man was working on the fields and stumbled upon the pregnant women and helped her and now the scene looks lighter and happier with more sense of life.

Characters

We don’t really get to know the women in the film but she is a key character because we think she was the victim of a crime when really she was stuck in a field in labour and the man was helping her.

This man was portrayed as a murderer through the use of costumes and camerawork because he was made to look like he murdered the women when in reality he was working on the field when he happened to come across the lady who needed help.

The crow is a bad omen and is a symbol of bad luck and superstitions, it appears all throughout the film even when we cant see it we can hear it so it becomes a character in the sense that it is always there watching what happens.