The Scene Analysis of the TV Series Four Weddings and a Funeral
Four Weddings and a Funeral is an American romantic comedy TV series, which is the adaptation of the 1994 British film of the same name. It is about 4 American friends reunite and live in London, and they experience ups and downs of their love and friendship .This scene is about Maya and Kash, two main characters who have feelings with each other but parted in discord last time, happen to meet each other during the work. This scene is the turning point of their relationship.
This scene happens in a small theater in disrepair, which is the reason why MP comes to sponsor this theater. In order to show the bad condition of the theater, buckets for holding rainwater and road cones that around a hole in the floor are shown at the beginning of the scene. After all the people gather on the stage, the director gives the stage a wild shot, so the audience can notice the dirty stage floor, broken curtain, homemade backdrop, disfigured seats and so on.
When Bash is texting with his girlfriend, rather than taking a shot for Bash’s phone screen, the director just uses the sound of texting and the shot of Bash using his phone, which makes the plot of this scene more fast-paced and fluent, the audience also can know he is texting with someone only by the sound. Just like Robert Bresson said in his book Notes on the Cinematography, “when a sound can replace an image, cut the image or neutralize it.”
When the director takes a wide shot of Bash outside the lighting control room, his voice comes from stereo and echos in the theater, which is different from his voice when he is taken an over-the-should shot inside the room. The director wants to give the audience a different sense of spatial distance and location and creates an immersive experience for them.
To make the story attractive and dramatic, the director did a lot of work in lighting, editing and camera movement. At the beginning of the scene, Kash’s friend helps Kash to rehearse the lighting, but he is distracted from texting with his girlfriend and could not follow Kash. When he turns on the light, Maya and others happen to come on the stage, the red light falls on their faces when they see each other, which sets a dramatic mood for this scene. At the same time, the camera tracks in both of them so the audience can read their internal thought and feeling by their subtle facial expressions. The light that falls on the portrait of Maya and Kash also highlight their facial structure, which makes their subtle facial expression more obvious.
When MP designates Maya to look after this project, even though MP is the main character in this conversation, but the director shows over-the-shoulder shot of Maya and Kash for 4 times. He presents their facial reaction which is a part of the dramatic twist in this scene. The director also took two long takes when they are talking about the fund for the theater to show the space of the theater and create a dramatic effect.
What director has made in this scene in Four Weddings and a Funeral greatly sets a dramatic mood, arouses the audience’s passion for this TV series and curiosity about the story next.
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