For this assignment I chose to analyse a Korsakow film called ‘Dear Diary’ by makers Kai Ebato, Sherilyn Wong and Kyesha Keleher from the 2012 selection of films. The piece tells of a girl seemingly depicting her life both through narration and visuals which seemed to have been experienced by her based on the point of view shots which are employed.
I may have missed the lesson about not judging a book by its front cover in primary school but I gravitated to this Korsakow film based purely on aesthetics, as it features quite a beautiful anime like drawing in the background. However, I decided to pursue studying it as there is something about its progression and pace especially in the way it climaxes at the end that both intrigued and inspired me. Furthermore, I chose to delve into this film as I found it to be quite challenging in some aspects especially in the way it seemed to try and produce a loose narrative structure which I’m not quite sure works with Korsakov as exemplified in this film. This comes through in ‘Dear Diary’ with the visuals coming across as very jarring with the audio unless the viewer chooses the right path.
Whilst exploring this film the thing I found most challenging to determine was the pattern to which the film follows, but maybe that’s as a result of my complete lack of mathematical ability or maybe that’s just the confusing and unpredictable nature which defines Korsakow films.
Despite my struggle I did finally manage to establish a pattern in the way the films to choose from were presented, as they were grouped into four videos which bore a very obvious visual connection of ideas or iconography including religion, transport, graffiti, drawing sketches, cats, darkness and city streets. These groups seem to either appear in their entirety, for example all the videos pertaining to religion will show up together and will usually not be dismantled or appear without the accompanying videos of its category. Sometimes there are instances where there are 3 videos which have strong visual connections and then an odd one out. This is scene in a stage where there are three options which convey darkness and one about light.
Finally the pattern of the film also seems to determine the pace that would most probably be followed, as once the main video draws to an end and becomes a still stagnant image it seems to act as a provocateur to click on a new video.
The Korsakow film features a very striking interface which very much enables the cinematic techniques of mis-en-scene¹, with the background image emoting a very broody mood which definitely signifies the feelings of longing which appear in the film.
The videos are arranged around a dishevelled and weathered teddy bear holding a bouquet of balloons with each video forming the balloons in which the teddy is holding, with the current film which is being played enlarged to the side. When you scroll over the potential videos to choose from it allows you to watch a portion of film.
The interface changes in the finale video once the clip with the burning heart has been selected as once it is selected there are no more options as all the balloons have popped and the narration ends once the video is finished.
‘Dear Diary’ attempts to follow a narrative construct through the narration of the main character who talks of her life through her journal slowly revealing her relationship with her brother and the conflict they feel with their parents. At first the film seems to be an audio-visual self portrait of the protagonist’s life as she speaks of her day to day experiences; however you come to realise that it is actually her brother that she is most likely depicting through the visuals presented.
As a result of strong narrative elements throughout the film there are times that the image and audio are extremely jarring. This is most evident with clips like the tram handles which seem to convey absolutely no message, statement or emotion unless the viewer is lucky enough to temporally match the right moment of the narration which is discussing the handles of trams.
While the film does seem to fall apart through the inclusion of a narrative it is quite successful in forcing the audience to partake in a particular intended journey as long as the viewer is willing to go along with the film makers plan. This is achieved via the pattern of the film, which encourages clicking a new video when the current one finishes creating a pace in which you follow keeping the visual in sync with the trajectory of the audio, and because each group of videos are thematically linked it does force you to progress to the accompanying audio narration.
While it was quite interesting to digest this piece of work thoroughly; overall because there is a narrative construct present, the film does hope or rely that the viewer chooses a certain path and if this is not followed it can create an unorganised array of videos which seem to bare no greater meaning as no real statement or notion connects the videos, there is merely just a narrative connection which upon analysing does not seem to bode well for Korsakow film.
References
- Bordwell, David and Thompson, Kristin. ‘The Shot: Mise-en-Scene’. McGraw-Hill: New York. 2013, 112-150
- [Extract] Ryan, Marie-Laure. Avatars of Story. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2006.