"The Girl Chewing Gum"

The film "The Girl Chewing Gum" is a 9 minute movie by John Smith.

The film is black and white and consists of the general public going about their everyday lives. Visually, there is a lot to see in this film but the lack of colour makes it a little less appealing. Aswell as people in this film, various vehicles and two buildings can be seen. The main building in the shot most of the time has a women sitting in the window, the other building is a cinema with a long queue of people waiting outside.The footage includes close ups of some people but not many. Throughout this film there are only two edits. One when the shot cuts from a busy road to a field, and the other when it cuts from the field to the end credits.

The main piece of audio in this film comes from the narrator who is not in the frame, but narrating what is happening. At first, it seems as though the man speaking is the director as he says what is happening on screen, slightly before it actually happens. Also, he comments on every detail in the frame. However, when he comments on things such as "pigeons flying" we now know that he is not directing as he wouldn't have been able to make this happen. We now come to realise that he is in fact narrating to the viewers what is happening on this busy road in London. It seems that the sounds on screen, such as traffic, are genuine so must be diegetic. However, when the man starts saying he is in a field and begins describing what is around him, we realise that he is not actually present on this road, at this time, so therefore the sounds must be non-diegetic and have been put in post-production. A final piece of audio in this film is the sound of an alarm going off. This happens for a long time but we do not actually notice it until the narrator says that a man, who has just walked past, has robbed a bank. Now we notice the alarm whereas before we just heard it as background noise. These noises, alarm and traffic, continue even after the shot has changed to a field. This makes the viewers question where the sounds are really coming from.

I think the premise of this film is to show people that whatever happens in reality, someone is always there to comment on us and our actions. This film is predominantly concept based as it produces the idea that we are always being watched and are never alone. At the start of the film the audience is led to believe that this man speaking has full control over the situation and what is going on when in fact, he doesn't have any control at all.

Overall, I think that this film is interesting in the idea behind it as sometimes it does feel like we are always being watched as there seems to be CCTV everywhere we go. This film is clever in highlighting what the audience may or may not be aware of.