Reel Unreel
Gavin Connors
February 24, 2021
Fundamentals of Video
In Reel/Unreel, two children push a reel of film through their town. One thing that struck me was the variety of shots in the film. the film opens with a wide shot of Kabul, Afghanistan. we then go to a tracking shot of a boy with a wheel. The film consists of tracking shots that follow kids pushing a reel of film that make you feel like you're right there with them. The film is edited in a way where you feel like you're following these kids even though there was a lot of distracting things, such as the helicopters, and the goats and the sheep, it's just so far from my life. The continuity feels like a documentary, where you feel like you're on the ground with these kids. The colors consisted mostly of monotone colors, except for the reels, which are red and blue, this draws your attention to the reels. It was a stark contrast to the daily life because daily life was monochrome. The street sounds are real and unedited and that added to the reality of the film. The sound of the helicopters smashed the natural sounds of the city and made me remember that it's a nation at war. The title of the film, Reel/Unreel, was true in both meaning of the words, real and unreal. It was a great piece of experimental documentary filmmaking that I enjoyed very much.
Good observations, Gavin, particularly the ways in which the sound design contributes to the sense of realism in the film, as though the viewer is right on the ground with the children. The supplemental shots—helicopter; goats—do a lot of work to offer the viewer context for the narrative. Your right that it is "so far from my [our] life," which motivates Alys's choice to add contextual establishing shots. Nice work!
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