In the opening scene of the movie we are introduced to the main character Eloise. From this scene we are able to draw a couple of assumptions: she has as interest in fashion and designing clothes as well as feels an intense sense of nostalgia and romanticization of the past, specifically London in the 1960’s. The scene has a hopeful tone with Eloise dancing around her room to 60’s music playing from her record player. Visually we receive some shots that are panned away and backlit making it so we can only see Eloise’s silhouette. Not unlike a fashion drawing or mannequin.
This scene marks the first time in the film that Eloise travels through her dreams to the sixties as the seemingly effortless confident and beautiful Sandie; who is everything Eloise dreams of. It is also were the motif of mirrors, reflections, and duality comes in.
Cinematographically this scene is interesting since it compared to the rest of the movie it is so desaturated and dull; demonstrating how Eloise find her real current life to be nothing but boring and drab compared to Sandie’s life in the sixties.
These stills capture the multicolored neon flashing lights present throughout the movie that are used to capture the once thought to be glamorous but actually grimy, seedy underbelly of London in the sixties. This lighting often creates an anxious unsettling feeling. They also help to establish the strong color palette of blue, pink, and purple.
These stills capture the multicolored neon flashing lights present throughout the movie that are used to capture the once thought to be glamorous but actually grimy, seedy underbelly of London in the sixties. This lighting often creates an anxious unsettling feeling. They also help to establish the strong color palette of blue, pink, and purple.
These stills capture the multicolored neon flashing lights present throughout the movie that are used to capture the once thought to be glamorous but actually grimy, seedy underbelly of London in the sixties. This lighting often creates an anxious unsettling feeling. They also help to establish the strong color palette of blue, pink, and purple.
These stills capture the multicolored neon flashing lights present throughout the movie that are used to capture the once thought to be glamorous but actually grimy, seedy underbelly of London in the sixties. This lighting often creates an anxious unsettling feeling. They also help to establish the strong color palette of blue, pink, and purple.
These stills show the continued use of lighting and mirrors/reflections that give an unsettling, surreal quality to the movie. This motif also blurs the line of identity and reality between Eloise and Sandy. They also provide strong examples of the graphic patterns/designs in the films costumes.
These stills show the continued use of lighting and mirrors/reflections that give an unsettling, surreal quality to the movie. This motif also blurs the line of identity and reality between Eloise and Sandy. They also provide strong examples of the graphic patterns/designs in the films costumes.
These stills show the continued use of lighting and mirrors/reflections that give an unsettling, surreal quality to the movie. This motif also blurs the line of identity and reality between Eloise and Sandy. They also provide strong examples of the graphic patterns/designs in the films costumes.
Here Eloise’s rose tinted glasses of the past have been destroyed. She sees that as confident and beautiful seemed she is still a young women who is scared and broken. Also we get more of the mirror motif.
While the tension has been mounting for a while, it is this seen where it starts to overflow. The movie’s tone shifting to fully dark, and psychological.
This scenes captures more of the movies work with lighting; how it is used to set the tone of the film.
This scenes captures more of the movies work with lighting; how it is used to set the tone of the film. Here the movie again gets even darker and cerebral once it is revealed that Sandie was not killed, but instead had killed her boyfriend/pimp as well as all the men who violated her and hid their bodies in the floor/walls of the room Eloise has been staying in.
In the films climax Sandie, who is now know to be old women Eloise rents from, chases Eloise up the stairs trying to stab and kill her. As this is taking place rather than seeing reality we see an illusion of a young Sandie. She is crazed and murderous. This scene is fraught with suspense. The film again plays with duality, identity, and reality here with the intense strobing lights and double exposure.
After getting accepted into fashion school Eloise Turner, Ellie, leaves her rural town for London. Having been raised by her grandmother, Ellie is drawn to the 1960’s. Specifically resonating with the counterculture of the swinging sixties that was incredibly popular in London. Between this and her humble upbringing, Ellie has a hard time fitting in with her peers at university; most of all with her bully of a dorm mate. Unhappy, she decides to leave the dorms for a dated bedsit owned by an elderly women. After moving in Ellie finds herself being transported back to the sixties every night to experience the seemingly glamorous life of the beautiful and confident Sandie Collins on her journey to become a singer. She appears to be on the way to reaching this dream after she meets the charming club manager Jack and he secures her an audition. However in turns out the audition he brought Sandie to was not for singing. Instead she ends up working as a dancer.; having to perform sexual dances in seductive costumes. This very quickly evolves into Jack pimping her out to different men every night. As this unfolds and continues to worsen, the film flashes between Ellie living her own life and her experiencing Sandie’s. Sandie’s life even begins to creep into As Ellie experiences the seedy underbelly of London and how it destroys Sandie her romanticized view of the sixties is shattered; which gets to the heart of the movie’s commentary about toxic nostalgia and the objectification of women.
This movie is ripe with motifs and symbolism that is furthered by the cinematography. For this movie I plan on honing in on two of these concepts. One of these being duality. The film’s narrative structure works to emphasize this. As stated previously, the majority of the story is told by flashing between Ellie’s own life as a fashion student in present day London and the life of Sandie in sixties London that Ellie experiences as she dreams. This structure serves to blur the line between Sandie/her life and Ellie/her life. This flashing is mimicked flashing lights (in the club Sandie works at, the sign outside Ellie’s window, etc.) They also helps to further the movies notion of duality as they start off appearing glamorous but end up creating an unsettled and heighten mood. In addition to the lights duality is also represented by the way Ellie is depicted when experiencing Sandie’s life. When Sandie’s life is being shown Ellie can only be seen in mirrors as Sandie’s reflection. This effect becomes even more uncanny as the movie progresses and Ellie changes her appearance in the likeness of Sandie. Another element present in the movie is the ever present sense of nostalgic sixties glamor. This is aesthetic is created by the colorful lighting, fashionable clothes covered in bold, retro prints and patterns, as well as luxuriously decorated clubs. This perceived glamour is part of the reason why Ellie romanticizes the sixties. Slowly throughout the movie though, this glamor is stripped away.
Retro, Duality/Nuanced, Psychological, Objectification, Glamor
Motion keywords: flashing, spinning, shifting, aggressive, mirroring, reflecting, morphing
Young fashion student Eloise Turner’s, romanticized view of London in the 1960’s is challenged when she begins mysteriously traveling back there every night to experience the life of the confident and beautiful aspiring star, Sandie Collins.
metamorphhsis
mirroring and lights
These smaller shapes will come appear in the same pattern that the first did
These smaller shapes will come appear in the same pattern that the first did
These dots will appear in a blinking pattern starting from the outside and moving inward then disappearing from the outside it.
