Izzy A2 Film Coursework: 20 Keyframes

Keyframe 1

The first key frame includes a medium long shot of the setting for scene one. The frame is taken during the day and natural light pears through the window to portray Sapphire's contentment. The keyframes have been subtly edited with a red tone to link in with Tarantino's style and the background of Sapphire's name. In the texts that I have studied, Tarantino uses a subtle tone on his film to make the content look older. I decided to do this to my keyframes and to use a red tone when Sapphire is the dominant and a blue tone when she is most weak and dominated by Zi.

For example, we see the red tone in the opening scene of Death Proof.

Keyframe 2

The second keyframe consists of Sapphire turning the radio on with her foot. This explores many aspects that can be seen within the Tarantino texts I have studied. For example, in the beginning of Death Proof the male gaze is incorporated heavily by voyeuristic angles of the camera resulting in Jungle Julia being sexualised and objectified. I decided to incorporate this into my keyframes to show Sapphire's sexual dominance, similar to Mia Wallace in Pulp Fiction. The fact Sapphire is turning the radio on with her foot, and the rest of her cannot be seen is also relative throughout Tarantino films, as he uses the naked female foot as a sexualised fetish. I feel that this is a recognisable aspect used in the texts that I have studied, therefore the incorporation of this factor was important in order to make a creative artefact of the aspects studied in my chosen texts.

Keyframe 3

The third keyframe again is heavily influenced by the opening scene in Death Proof. As I previously mentioned, Jungle Julia is sexualised before the audience are met with her whole appearance and personality. The use of the high angle shot looking down on Sapphire incorporated the male gaze and voyeurism into my film, which I studied throughout the Tarantino texts. As I discovered throughout my textual analysis, Tarantino's Death Proof breaks from his norms as he portrays the female characters heavily through the voyeuristic male gaze. I wanted to incorporate this into my film whilst still creating Sapphire as a strong, dominant woman. This therefore links back to Stephanie Sutton's point about Tarantino compensating ‘for his masculine representations by creating hyper-sexualized female characters’.[i]

[i] http://firesunderground.wordpress.com/2010/07/10/the-male-gaze-now-then-false-empowerment-in-tarantinos-films/