I guess the thing that really struck me about this small clip we watched in class is how much meaning is expressed through mis-en-scene. This wasn’t really an epiphany but more of reminder. I was actually transported to my English classroom in high school. I could see my English teacher pausing the DVD of Edward Scissorhands on a seemingly meaningless shot of some wallpaper and yelling “Everything has been put there for a reason.” I mean, we all know about mis-en-scene but it’s so easy to just coast over it and get wrapped up in the plot, maybe only interpreting it subconsciously. But yes, the epiphany was more around how I can actively use mis-en-scene in my own filmmaking and how I can film in an expressive way.

Nostalgia for the Light (2010) reflects on the history of Chile with a focus on Atacama Desert, a place of astronomical and geological interest. While some search the skies for stella discoveries, others search the sand for the remnants of their loved ones, executed during the Chilean dictatorship.

The opening segment expresses this juxtaposition incredibly through it’s use of mis-en-scene. I want to discuss this further, as a means of expressing my epiphany over the importance such techniques as means of expression.

Here, the director Patricio Guzmán chose to film telescopes in an observatorium in a way that makes us think of the sky, but also the ground they appear to be pointing to.

Here Guzman has filmed the opening of the observatorium roof from below making us think of being underground looking up at an opening to the world above. The doors of the observatorium window are almost coffin like. The way the light floods in until the shot is over-exposed provides a very realistic sensation, similar to when you have been in the dark and step out into the sun.

Images of the Moon, perhaps reminding the viewer of the of the desert. The Atacama Desert is so space like in appearance that it has been used at the set for many Mars based films. Craters remind us of land unaffected by the tumult of nature, aka the desert.

This is an image of desert sand blowing through darkness, but it looks a lot like the night sky.

Again, this is dust blowing through an observatorium, but it looks like a super-imposed image of the sky.

I found these images had a lot to say. They expressed the themes of the documentary through juxtaposition and symbolism. This made me think about how I could think outside the box with my own making in a way that would be more expressive.