Film as Art - Jonathan Grazers Birth - Essay Example

?Film as Art: Birth Jonathan Grazer’s “Birth” is a fairy tale wrapped in the coat of a psychological thriller. Ten years after being widowed, Anna, still in mourning, is preparing to marry her new fiance. She is finally coming to closure when, during her mother’s birthday celebration, a ten-year-old boy named Sean arrives and claims to be the reincarnation of Sean, her dead husband. At first, Anna is in disbelief and confronts the boy about playing such a cruel trick on her. However, after he reveals intimate information about Anna, she begins to accept his story. Much to the concern of Joseph, Anna’s fiance, and her mother and sister, Anna becomes obsessed and spends time with the young Sean. The twist in the story comes when Sean realizes that he could not be the reincarnation of Anna’s husband since he had loved another woman while he was in his previous life. Anna and Sean stop seeing each other, though they continued to write letters on occasion. Anna married Joseph, finally obtaining the closure that she desperately needed. The film opens with a black screen and a voice over of adult Sean explaining his disbelief in the concept of reincarnation. Despite this, he makes it known that if Anna died and were to come back as a bird, he would be accepting of it and continue to live with her. The scene that follows is a continuous long shot of Sean running through bleak and wintry Central Park. Sean’s face is never revealed to us, making him an abstract character regardless of his importance to the story. This lack of identity begins the mystery of who Sean really is. Nothing else is revealed about Sean except that he dies from a heart attack while jogging. Immediately after Sean’s death, the shot cuts abruptly to a clip of a baby being born, emerging from the water of a birthing tub. The following scene, after script reads Ten years later, Anna is shown standing at the grave of her late husband. The quick scene jumps reveal how all three events - Sean’s death, the baby’s birth, and Anna paying respect to her husband - are closely related to one another (Ebert, 2004). The shots, though clearly different from one another, are shown so quickly that they could have easily been one in the same, revealing the same message -- the never-ending cycle of life and death. Grazer uses only a few different camera angles and shots in the film, but his decision on what angles and shots to use and when helps to show the torment that Anna is experiencing as she continues to suffer from her husband’s death and as she tries to come to terms with the presence of young Sean. For example, the sex scene between Anna and Joseph begins as a medium close-up, but the slowly camera pulls back into a long shot as Anna discusses young Sean’s pleas for Anna not to marry Joseph. This sudden distance shows how far apart from Joseph that Anna is, even though they could not be any closer to one another. The physical distance between the camera and the couple reveals the mental and emotional distance that Anna is from Joseph. Another intense camera shot is the continuous close-up of Anna while she is at the orchestra. The music, similar to what is heard throughout the rest of the movie, picks up with intensity the longer that the camera rests on Anna, displaying the emotional changes that she goes through in the elongated scene. Anna’s features “run the full gamut of traumatized emotions, from barely suppressed terror, through claustrophobic anxiety, to heartbreaking acceptance (Kermode 45).” This is when Anna fully comes to accept that young Sean is who he claims to be. Grazer also plays on the meaning of color in the movie, implementing green in many scenes. The walls of Anna’s apartment kitchen are green, as are Sean’s sweatshirt, the blanket he uses while staying overnight at Anna’s, and the couch. The color green represents balance, life, and wellbeing (Ascher & Pincus 122), which are three important aspects seen constantly in the film. Green appears with Anna and Sean, separately, but also when they are together. As the other colors in the film are bland and dreary, the green really stands out. This especially holds true given the fact that the lighting is dim and, in many scenes, near blackness, and the green is the only color that remains to be noticeable. Anna’s physical appearance and wardrobe were tended to with great care as Grazer wanted to show the intensity of Anna’s depression. Anna’s hair is cropped short and her clothes are plain, which shows, as Grazer explains, “somebody who had sort of let all glamor go and sexuality go (Carroll, 2004).” The other characters are dressed according to their social status. Joseph and the rest of Anna’s family dress richly and young Sean dresses like the child of a lower middle-class family. Their clothing is set in contrast against that of Anna’s, which mirrors the internal struggles of someone who has lost a loved one and is about to give up completely on life. The soundtrack heard throughout the film truly brings to life both the fairy tale and psychological aspects of the film. The same score is used for the duration of the film. The score is composed and conducted by Alexandre Desplat and performed by Haberdasher Aske’s Orchestra and the London Symphony Orchestra. The score alternates between sounding like a lullaby and the soundtrack for a horror film, which reflects the conflict that is taking place in Anna and between Anna and Sean. The melody is both haunting and fanciful, reflecting the wavering insanity of the story. As the music becomes more intense, it becomes clear how desperate young Sean and Anna are for young Sean to be her late husband. Towards the end of the film, the director implements many symbols of life and death. When Sean is in the bath for the last time, he is covered in dirt, leaves, and clumps of mud. After he tells Anna that he is not the reincarnation of her husband, he submerges himself into the water, washing himself of the dirt. Water, a cleansing element, washes Sean of the dirt; in essence, the reincarnated Sean is returned to the grave where he belongs, bringing forth the innocent little boy that young Sean should have always been. Adult Sean goes back to being dead to Anna and she is left with a child taking a bath. Furthermore, the final scenes of the film show Anna at the beach, wading in the water in her wedding dress. The waves crashing over Anna reveals that she is letting go of what has taken place in the past between her husband and the young Sean. White, the color connected with purity and the color of Anna’s dress, also shows Anna returning to a state of beginning. The water and the presence of the color white show that Anna herself is going through a birth, or a rebirth. Jonathan Grazer had a difficult task in making a psychological thriller look like a fairy tale, and vice versa. Through the artistic elements of filmmaking, Grazer was able to make a successful film. Anna’s suffering and torment was brought to life, as was young Sean’s desperation to be somebody that both he and Anna wanted him to be. Just as the movie began with the death and rebirth of Sean, it ended with the rebirth of Anna. Grazer provided for the audience a story to keep their minds reeling, but he also painted a portrait of sorrow and despair with his camera. Works Cited Ascher, Steven, and Edward Pincus. The Filmmaker's Handbook. 3rd ed. New York: Plume, 2007. Print. Carroll, Larry. "Birth Control." IGN Movies. N.p., 29 Oct. 2004. Web. 25 Apr. 2011. . Ebert, Roger. "Birth." RogerEbert: SunTimes. N.p., 29 Oct. 2004. Web. 25 Apr. 2011. . Kermode, Mark. "Baby, Come Back." New Statesman 8 Nov. 2004: 45. Print. Read More