Character Analysis

Although to the untrained eye, the characters within Clara and I's film introduction may seem to lack depth and be more surface level. There is so much detail that I want to be sure won't go unnoticed when the time comes for our film opening to be released. So in this post, I will go into describing each of our three characters we created. 

Alex:

Alex was played by Mia Batista and is our films "bad cop". We wanted to character to translate on screen as more of a serious official. Very "by the book" and strict; no humour would be executed by her unless it was sarcasm or very deadpan. As stated in previous blog posts, we wanted the "bad cop", Alex, to be similar to characters such as Emily Prentiss or April Ludgate. Overall, we thought Mia would fit this roll pretty well since with her limited acting experience, this character type would be more natural for her to play. Clara and I decided upon the name Alex because we envision this name to fit our created character perfectly. The name Alex gives the serious, no nonsense, strict character that this character would be, at least to us. To match this very type A personality, we had Mia's hair straightened with very minimal natural looking makeup. For costuming, she wore a plain blue business shirt and a navy blue blazer and dark black jeans. The plain solid colors fit the seriousness of Alex's character, not allowing any form of distraction. 

Hallie: 

Hallie was our film's "good cop" and was played by me. Hallie was Alex's opposite, both on screen and literally in personality. I wanted Hallie to be portrayed as a much more lighthearted person in contrast to Alex's deadpan personality. Hallie is meant to be more on the nervous side but also very bubbly and bright, our film's comedic relief if you will. To compare her to other characters, Clara and I envisioned her to be similar to a Penelope Garcia or Leslie Knope. While Alex's hair was straightened, my hair was left more natural yet kept professionally maintained. In terms of my makeup, it was done pretty much the same was as Mia's character. When it came to Hallie's costume, I wore lighter, more approachable colors. Instead of dark black and blue, I wore a light grey blazer and light grey jeans. For my shirt, I wore more of a blousier shirt with more of a feminine pattern. From an untrained eye, it may look as though no thought had gone into costume design and mise-en-scene but Clara and I knew that these details would (hopefully) be noticed.  

Sabrina: 

Sabrina played our film's criminal who went by the name Sabrina. Although within our film's 2 minute introduction no character names were used, we felt it was important for not only to easily differentiate each character in the script but also for characterization purposes. Clara and I felt that each character's name strongly fit their intended personality. For Sabrina's costume design, we had her wear baggy clothes for that "criminal" appearance. We left her clothing colors very muted so the audience wouldn't be distracted by her wardrobe and pay closer attention to her personality. Her shoes switched between the adidas slides and old sneakers, to keep that "beat up" or "not put together" look. We had her wear no makeup and since we shot in the morning she also looked tired which was perfect. (LOL sorry sabrina!) Her hair was left unbrushed because, she was a criminal after all. Who has time to brush their hair when they just killed someone? For real though, we wanted Sabrina to look as messy and unorganized as possible because it perfectly corresponds with her chaotic personality. 

from left to right: Alex, Hallie, and Sabrina

I must say it was quite a challenge to establish the three very different personalities with very minimal dialogue in 2 minutes. However, with both our script writing and mis-en-scene choices, I feel that viewers will be able to successfully pick up on all of our intended details, getting a better understanding of these three characters and their relationship. 

 (Week 7: 3/21-3/27, post 1)