Reframing Languages

Reframing Languages:Short films for MFL

Mark ReidBFI Education

Mark.reid@bfi.org.ukwww.bfi.org.uk

About the B

FI..

archive and library

cinematheque

festivals

film production and distribution

publishing

And BFI Education

from Reframing Literacy…

• EYFS - KS3• 61 LAs• 7 DVDs• Research and evaluation

(Moving Literacy On, Marsh and Bearne)

• Big impacts on literacy

… to Reframing Languages

• French shorts• Cineminis DVD in

October 2010• KS2/3• Esmee Fairbairn

research with IoE on Year 8 French

… to Screening Languages (2013-15)

• 6 schools/ 12 teachers

• Hounslow, Barking&Dagenham, Lambeth

• Year 8 • French and Spanish

• 20 schools/ 30 teachers

• 5 LAs, Teaching School Alliances, academy chains

• KS3• French, Spanish,

German, Mandarin

Year 1 Year 2

Why film?

Why film?

• ‘Comprehensible input’ and ‘forms of life’

• Culturally rich language context

• Engagement for children

Why shorts?

• New to children

• Manageability

• High quality - cinematic

Shorts pedagogy

• ‘Tell Me’ grids - in target language

• Hiding and revealing

• Stopping and starting

character setting

StoryQu’est-ce qu’il se passe

Mood

ambience

Qui? Ou? Quand?

‘Tell Me’ grids

Aidan Chambers/ CLPE

(Hide the screen and play the DVD, Mark)

puzzles patterns

surprises predictions

Value for teachers • Develops new pedagogical knowledge and

approaches• Develops their knowledge of and confidence in

exploring film as a cultural medium• Changes their expectations of pupils in terms of

attainment• Enables them to integrate more effectively cultural

awareness into their teaching• Confidence to take risks - experimentation• Imagination and originality• Motivation and professional development

Value for pupils

• Improves motivation towards learning another language

• Improves attainment in listening, speaking, reading and writing

• Develops cultural knowledge and interest in film as a cultural form

• Encourages them to continue learning a language at Key Stage 4

Speaking skillsduring viewing

• Learners report phrases with or without help of teacher/sub-title e.g. on poster or PP

• ‘Predictive speech’ - what is he/she going to say/do?

• Learner originated questions• Descriptions and summaries while the

film is running (no sound)

Speaking skillsafter viewing

• Discussion of film – likes/dislikes re characters, aspects of film

• Information gap activities and role play• Storyboard - continuing the story, alternative

endings• Guessing games: describing characters/events• Re-sequencing mixed-up stills from film,

relating correct sequence

Writing

•Storyboarding•Sub-titles•Prediction•Alternative ending

http://screeninglanguages.wordpress.com

Film resources for MFL• Kirikou et la Sorciere (1998, Fr, West African, BFI

films; dir Michel Ocelot); also Azur and Azmar/ The Prince’s Quest by same director

• BFI shorts: Starting Stories 1&2 and Story Shorts 1&2

• Cine-minis DVD• DVD of Courts Metrages: Courts de Recre and

Enfantillages, Institut Francais - celine.cordier@diplomatie.gouv.fr

• ALL yahoo group on using film via Helen Myers• BFI Southbank and Sheffield Showroom cinema days

on using film with MFL at KS2-KS5• http://screeninglanguages.wordpress.com

Le Cinema, cent ans de jeunesse

A film programme around camera movement

Cinematheque Francaise/ BFI

Le cinema, cent ans de jeunesse

• Since 1995; 100th anniversary of cinema• Annual film-making programme• Exercises, film viewing, final ‘film essai’• Aspect of film language - light; composition;

colour; camera movement• 2010/11 ‘On/ Offscreen’ • 25 workshops: France, Spain, Portugal, Italy,

England

Shape of the programme

• Training in Paris in October/ November • Exercises carried out November - February• Review of exercises in March• Final films ready end May; Paris screening in June;

London in July• 1 or 2 hours a week workshops; optionally after

school or in curriculum (BTEC and GCSE)• Viewing as well as making (2xDVDs of clips)• Optional student mentors via AimHigher

Resources and support

• Training - 2 or 3 days• 2 DVDs of clips - extensive ‘typologie’

with for eg 15 variations on camera movement• Mentors - AimHigher• Blog:

http://100ans.cinematheque.fr/100ans20092010/• And BFI blog: http://markreid1895.wordpress.com

2009/ 2010

• Why move the camera? Pourquoi bouge le camera?

• How many types of camera movement are there?

Types of camera movement• Describing character:

– Sequences of characters– Establishing one character– Following– showing impuslive movement

• Describing space:– Travelling– Panoramic– changing spaces– ubiquity

Types of camera movement..

• Centring• Decentring• Poetic• Motifs - stairs

character mood

setting camera

Camera movement

• The Shining (Kubrick, 1980)• Everyone Says I Love You (Allen, 1996)• Project 1(Forbes, 2009)• Elephant (van Sant, 2003)• July (Omirbaev, 1988)

Camera movement project

• Exercise 1a travelling shot taken from a vehicle, less than a minute long, maybe with a mobile phone

• Exercise 2a static shot of a moving objecta moving shot of a static objecta static shot of a static objecta moving shot of a moving object

Camera movement programme.. Cont’d

• Exercise 3Subject A moves towards subject B, looking

agitated. He/she continues past subject B and meets subject C, while subject B moves away in the opposite direction. Less than 5 minutes long

• Final FilmA person is filmed coming to a sudden

realisation; the emotional impact of the realisation is communicated by shots from a moving camera

Exercises trailer

http://100ans.cinematheque.fr/100ans20092010/?p=639

Some films we made earlier..

London Nautical

• Vision• Disappear• Betrayal• The Job Thief

Lambeth Academy

• Rough and Tumble/ The worst day of my life

Wandsworth CLC

• Almost

Montrer/ cacher

BFI/ Cinematheque programme 2010/11

‘le secret’enigma

mysteryFilming the back

Offscreen/ onscreen

ellipsis

censorship

Hiding in the frame

Actors concealing emotion

Threat of the invisible

Dramatic irony

Shadows/ light

• Not showing implies something is being denied, something is lacking and needs to be filled

• Long shots deepen the element of mystery• Impact of filming specific characters with their backs turned, denying the

audience its view• The illicitness of a distorted, muffled, overheard conversation, a half closed

door. Balance of foreground / background interest• Surprise element/comedic value of a disembodied voice and the consequences

of an “off” action coming into view• Showing without showing – sound only, shrouding action with curtain, shadows,

limb of a body• Momentum and interest is maintained by strategically obscuring the naked body

with objects• One ‘running commentary’ scene replaces another that you ‘should’ be seeing• Fly-on-the-wall style filming, ‘hidden’ camera filming of the everyday, we are

privy to the apparent mundaneness of going up and down the stairs continually following the back of a character. Heavy door denies grandma the view of her grandchild, the gender of whom she rejects

Some notes from Paris..

• Camera void of ceiling is filled with sound and characters’ faces come to fill the void in closeup. Only glimpses of the birds, lots of clamourous sound (The Birds)

• Use of abstract sound and light to evoke mystery. “Off” action with the subsequent evidence of an unseen act of violence. Symbol of the bristling cat instead of “the thing” itself (Cat People)

• Obscuring of actors’ faces arouses doubt and uncertainty as to motivation

• Doubt and the evocation of the surreal through use of fog and mysteriously positioned bull (Amarcord)

• Shading in black and white, lighting, semi-darkness – fear of having one’s suspicions confirmed – semi-concealed monster, the hole in the bag. You want him to reveal himself but you don’t want to look. Horror genre. (Elephant Man)

• Ellipses. Murder action replaced by landscapes. Making the audience wait for the result. The long sweeping preamble before the dramatic revelation: ‘Rosemary’s Baby’ & ‘To Die For’

• Sound characterises a space, what you don’t hear is significant, sound can cut out to signify enclosed space

Cinema, cent ans de jeunesse 2010/2011Workshop Brief ‘Montrer/ Cacher’

Introductory exercises

Individual exercise (can be done at home)Make a portrait out of different facets of someone you know well: both/either between 3-6 photographs or filmed as a series of short shots (total 2 minutes duration). Each photo or shot should show only a partial characteristic of the person – both physically and from their personality (a part of the body; a familiar object, a shot from behind, use of light and shadow; blurring the image; different scales within the shot..). At the end, the person mustn’t be identifiable, but overall is evoked, suggested..

Collective exercises1 Film an action completely in close-up (total duration

no more than 3 minutes and 8 shots maximum). Indicative story line: ‘Person A moves from space into another adjacent space, then gives something to Person B. You choose what is given (a codeword; a kiss; a curse; a gift; a warning) and which spaces you use.

2 Film a complete short scene (maximum 3 minutes) where someone in shot reacts against something or someone outside the shot, which we never see but know of through sound, light, reaction shots and the direction of the gaze, or a reflection

The film essai (8 minutes maximum)

Indicative scenario: Two secrets, of which one is revealed, the other withheld.

The main rule, which shouldn’t be given to the students until after they have scripted their scenario:

Once the scenario has been written, students have to choose one of the key scenes that will not be shown. The scene should still play an important role in the story, but won’t be filmed, just suggested (through an ellipsis, or use of offscreen sound, reflections, camera movement which hides or reveals, or a substitution of action in the edit)

blogs

https://markreid1895.wordpress.com/

http://100ans.cinematheque.fr/100ans20092010/

Exercise from Lambeth

Films citedCat People (USA, Jacques Tourneur, 1942)The Circle (Iran, Jafar Panahi, 2000)He Dies at the End (Damian McCarthy, Youtube, added2008)Elephant Man (David Lynch, 1982)After Tomorrow (Emma Sullivan, 2009)Virus (Simon Hynd, 2002)Moonfleet (USA, Fritz Lang, 1955)Creature from the Black Lagoon (USA, Jack Arnold,1954)