Short Film Textual Analysis !

The short film which I am about to analyze is called Offside which has been directed by Erez Tadmor and Guy Nattiv which also is the second short film trilogy after their last short film strangers, the short film is based upon the middle east conflicts between Israel and Palestine Authority at the security zone which separates these two countries . I managed to find a video which was directed by these two directors on youtube called “Strangers” the link is: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RpjHSiQLPmA. After realising the names of the directors I put their names into the google search bar and clicked on the second link which took me to a website about Erez Tadmor, the link is http://ereztadmor.tumblr.com/. The site contains information about him and trailers of films which he has directed also short films which again he has directed. The short film “Offside” won Manhattan international short film festival in 2006.

The story line of Offside is about 2 Israelian who are walking near the country security zone and are listening to a football game through a radio, due to the bad connection they are unable to hear the football match clearly and decide to keep on walking to gain better satellite signal to be able to hear the football game, but due to being right next to the security zone two Palestine soldiers realises their presence, this leads to 2 characters being on one side of the fence and the other two on the other side, with all four characters being at gun point whilst listening to a football match through the radio. In a way even though the game commentators and talking about the football game there is a comedy sense to this war genre film due to the fact that whatever the commentator is saying it relates to these four character who are split into two on each side, with guns pointing at the other team getting ready to shoot. Throughout the short film an equilibrium occurs where the storyline gets disrupted, this when the two characters which are listening to the radio realise there are two soldiers on the other side of the fence. Due to them being enemies they all are at gun point this results to one of the character being shot then guns shots just being fired and the end result is all four of them die.

All the way through the short film many different types of camera shots have been taken to emphasise on different situations. As the short film beginnings there is a medium shot of a fence which has a white board stuck on it with red righting, if you read the board it says warning, just by looking at this board, the fence, and a little bit of the background setting already the viewer is able to pick up this place is not secure, quickly t is followed by a dolly shot going to the left at the same time revealing a bit more about where this has been set, the dolly shot last for about 5 seconds where then suddenly you see the back of two character walking away from the camera, then it cuts to the title and cuts back to a close up shot of one of the characters face showing him trying to get signal on his radio, then a cut to the second character with a medium shot revealing him to the audience, the camera starts following them again tracking them as they walk to the left. After seeing the characters faces the camera cuts to the front of the characters with a long shot revealing them from head to toe where the viewer is able to see their clothing and a gun which each character has. Then it leads to another medium shot where you are able to see both characters faces and the radio, from the facial expression you are clearly able to tell they are getting frustrated due to the lack of satellite signal, then suddenly you get a over the shoulder shot of each character viewing on what they can see, a quick cut to each characters face to reveal their facial expressions with a extreme long shot which shows exactly where they are all positioned. In this scene right now the camera shots keep repeating and keep showing the tension of each characters face also with the extreme close up of the radio, suddenly as soon as one of the characters shoots the character on the opposite side of the fence the camera begins to cut quicker to a close up of their faces then a two shot which shows the guy who got shot and his mate, after that all there is really fast cuts and extreme close ups of the guns being fired, the bullets getting shot into the bodies, blood and once they are all dead a final extreme long shot which shows them all dead on the floor.

The short film has been edited quite a lot due to you get loads of cuts throughout the video and a slow motion has been edited twice once where the radio falls to the ground and second when they character shoots and for about 5 seconds slow motion is in play then as soon as they other character shoots it speeds up a bit. As for sound it is mainly non diegetic because you are constantly listening to the radio with the characters and only diegetic sounds are the birds tweeting in the background, the gun fire and them walking that about it. To add realism misce-en-scene has been used very well, for a start two characters are dressed up as soldiers with their guns and the other two are in dark coloured clothes one has a band across his forehead where as the other has a red and white scarf across his neck. As for the setting is emphasises on their situation and where they are behaving in the way they are, the fence helps give realism and adds to the story well also with the board saying warning adds details and thoughts to the audience and gets them more involved.

The style of acting done by this character is great for many reasons because from the beginning to the end there are no dialogues apart from the commentators which you can hear through the radio. The whole film is basically a mime, doing a mime scene is difficult as the story is told through the actors facial expressions which these characters have seen extremely well also by using their body figures to stand in different stances makes it more realistic for example with the guns pointing at each other they are not just standing up straight with their hand out infront of them holding the gun, they are crouching a bit have got the guns at their eye level aiming and also have their head tucked low .