Analysis of a Short Film

Analysis of a Short Film

Arret Pipi is a short film made in 2015, the film is about Sarah and Bram’s road trip taking a horrifying turn when they stop for a bathroom break in the dark woods of Wallonia. This short film was found on www.shortoftheweek.com 

The film begins with a long shot, which is also a point of view shot of what the driver can also see, of a narrow country road which cuts from one shot to the other. The road shows green trees and vast countryside which is a peaceful setting. There are then jump cuts of a young girl dressed in a t-shirt and shorts relaxing in the back seat of the car with the window down and her hair flowing the the breeze. In these shots there is warm lighting from the sun which suggests that she is happy, the mood of this scene also makes the audience feel relaxed and peaceful. When the film starts there is a happy upbeat song playing which matches with the mood of the scene, the audience then learns that this music is diegetic sound as the music stops playing when the car engine is turned off when they pull up at an abandoned gas station, therefore the music is coming from the car stereo. The car isn’t modern as there is cream leather seating. A long shot is shown of the car pulling up outside the dark abandoned gas station, the girl’s boyfriend is wearing jeans and a leather bomber jacket which could suggest he is a jock or a sports fan. As the couple get out of the car to go to the bathroom there is a diegetic sound of crickets which emphasises just how remote the location is and how far into the countryside they have travelled. The screen then cuts to a point of view shot of the girl, we see her full body which suggests the person looking at her is keeping their distance, in the corners of the shots are branches and leaves which tells the audience that someone is watching her and she is unaware of it. 

The scene then cuts to an extreme close up of a grubby mop cleaning the bathroom floor, however only the floor is clean and not the rest of the bathroom. When the shot of the mop appeared there was non-diegetic sound of it slamming on the floor which was emphasised to make the audience jump, this could be suggesting foreshadowing. The shot then cuts to a close up of the old man’s face who is mopping the floor, the shot zooms in slowly on him suggesting that he has some importance to the film or this could make the audience suspect him of something. The cubicle doors are a deep red which foreshadows their death. The scene then cuts to a birds-eye view pan of the couple sat on the toilet in their separate cubicles, from this shot we see that the floor in the cubicles is green which is the only positive and bright colour seen in the bathroom. 

The shot now remains on a close up shot of the girl sat on the toilet, the audience can clearly see her facial reactions throughout this scene. As the couple realise that they are both out of toilet paper, the old man knocks on the boy’s cubicle first, he asks “toilet paper, red or blue?” Firstly, the audience is just as confused as the couple about this question which brings the audience closer. The boy then answers “Red” which then leads to his death. As the girl’s face begins to grow in fear, there is diegetic sound of the slash of a knife which then introduces a non-diegetic deep sound to add tense to the scene which hits the audience as well as the girl that this is really happening - both are shocked and feel at unease. The scene becomes more tense and uncomfortable for the audience when the character hears the banging and her boyfriend’s blood pouring, which tells the audience that an artery has been cut. This then becomes more clear when a close up shot is shown of his thick red blood is pouring into her cubicle. The dark red blood contrasts with the white toilet paper which she had dropped on the floor earlier, perhaps this adds a more personal touch to the scene as the last question he asked her was if she had any spare toilet paper. The shot then cuts to an extreme close up of the toilet paper soaking up the deep red blood, this shot is used to make the audience focus on the blood. The blood is quickly dominating the toilet paper which just hows how thick the blood is which suggests where the knife ended up cutting him. As the shots of the blood were shown, there was a non-diegetic sound of a deep bang which adds tension and puts the fear the character is feeling into the audience. 

A sound bridge is then introduced by brining in another non-diegetic high pitched sound as the shot shows a close up of the girl, this brings the focus to the audience that the girl is next. More fear is added to the scene when the man knocks on the girl’s cubicle. The knock is loud which makes the audience jump therefore adding the fear. The girl is then asked the same question “toilet paper, red or blue?” since she knows what would happen if she answered red, she answered blue - which is what the audience would be hoping and expecting she would answer. She has had no time to fully comprehend what has just happened and she hasn’t got enough time to get out and runaway so she is forced to answer the question as she panics in hope that none of this is real. The shot is still a close up of her face, the audience has seen her face progress from being relaxed and happy to being frightened for her life. After answering “blue” a door then slams and then just the sound of the toilet music is all she can hear. This suggests that the man has walked away and now she has hope that she has escaped death. A shallow focus shot is shown of the door handle of the cubicle the girl is in, this focus shot has been used to make the abidance focus on just that door handle, the audience sees that the girl quietly leaves her cubicle in one piece. The sound of her heavy breathing as she is leaving the cubicle dominates the sound of the toilet music that has been playing in the background. The scene is only calm for a few seconds when suddenly out of nowhere a man dressed in black appears and grabs her by her neck. This is shown through an over the shoulder shot, in this shot we can see the girl’s face looking up at the man who is attacking her but the audience doesn’t know what the man looks like so therefore the audience can only make a judgement on what he looks like based on her facial reactions but since she is being strangled and forced into a toilet to possibly drown, all the audience can gather is that she is panicking got her life and trying to fight back. Whilst she is being attacked there is non-diegetic but contrapuntal sound used of happy music playing which appears to be someone singing a positive song, this is used to confuse the audience. There are various high angle shots of the man forcing her head over the toilet which suggests that he is trying to drown her and the high angle shot shows the power and strength he has over there, this shot shows that she is in a very vulnerable position. 

The audience can then see her attacker’s face from a pov shot, his face isn’t a normal human face it’s swollen which suggests that he was either born with this facial disability or that he had a tragic accident. However, this non-human like face shocks the audience and plays on our fears of disfiguration. His face is only seen for a short time as the girl manages to break down the toilet tank which knocks him unconscious and leads to the contrapuntal happy music coming to a stop with a loud bang noise as the tank hits his head, the scene blacks out as the tank hits his head and a new shot opens up. This could portray the girl’s survival and a rebirth to her new life without her boyfriend who is now deceased. The scene opens up with a high angle shot of the girl getting up from the floor after her attack showing that she is still vulnerable. She proceeds to the cubicle her boyfriend was in to see him leaning against the wall with his throat pouring out blood which reveals a close up shot of her face so that the audience can see her reaction. A medium long shot is is then shown of her running away as his lifeless body falls to the floor, high pitched non-diegetic sound begins from the horror of seeing her boyfriend so lifeless which adds to the tense and now lonely situation she is in, it also suggests to the audience that something could happen and that the girl is going to get the escape she is hoping for. A pov shot from the girl is shown running to the car, however the angle of the camera isn’t straight it’s at a canted angle which are used add a sense of discomfort to the scene and to tell the audience that something is wrong. The footage isn’t smooth as she is running which tells the audience that she is panicking and this also makes the audience panic as it puts them in the character’s shoes, especially because a pov shot is being used. The car is parked next to a forest in the middle of the night in the middle of nowhere, straightaway this plays on the audiences fears of the unknown, the dark and the mysterious.

Her hand slams onto the car window as she tries to unlock the car and is shown through a shallow focus shot. This shot is used so that the audience focuses on her hand which is covered in blood. The deep red blood on her hand contrasts and stands out with he colours of the background. This bloody hand is used in this shot because it is an iconography of escaping an attack and of classic horror/thriller. Once she is in the car there are close up shots shown of her face and the gear box which is elliptical editing, to show the audience that she is driving away to safety and away from death. As soon as the headlights turn on a dark figure is shown which is achieved through low key lighting. This is also a typical technique used in horror, chirascuro. Still determined to escape, she drives into reverse which reveals the man who previously attacked her, this suggests that these men are determined to kill her just as much as she is determined to escape and live. The man who was cleaning the floor from the beginning of the film appears in the back seat behind her which proves that the close up shots of his face and the mop were foreshadowing. He begins to strangle her in a two person close up shot and the contrapuntal happy music from before begins to play again, the audience sees the lack of faith and hope in the girl’s eyes as she known she nearly escaped. A birds-eye shot of the car is shown as the car is shaking because the girl is being strangled and naturally her body would be trying to escape as a survival instinct we all have in us. This shot of the car gives the sense of being watched and that death can never be escaped as it is the only thing guaranteed in life whether you believe in a God or not, which links to a shot from the beginning of a pov shot of someone watching the girl walk into the bathroom from the bushes. The birds-eye shot of the car also gives the audience a wide view of the surroundings, the headlights of the car are on and are bright, so bright that they literally dominate half of the screen. One half is red and the other half is white. The red lights, which are at the back of the car portray that death will always catch up with you and since this is portrayed on a car it suggests that death can never be escaped. The white lights which are at the front of the car could portray “the light” you see when you die as many people believe that there is a light at the end of the tunnel when you die and that this light is white.  

This short film contains various narratives. One narrative this film has would be a linear narrative which is where the film has a simple start to end, there are no flashbacks or reversed scenes throughout the film. Another narrative would be a restrictive narrative, this is where the audience only knows and finds out things at the same time as the characters. This narrative is typically used a lot in horror films as it makes the audience relate more to the characters and makes the film more shocking and scary for them, if a horror film showed a monster to the audience before the characters it wouldn't have the same effect. It is also obvious that this film has a closed ended narrative as the audience knows what happens, the audience isn’t left wondering what would happen to the character. 

This short film also includes some film theories. One theory would be Todorov’s Equilibrium, this is where at the beginning of the film everything is normal and how it usually is and then there is a disruption which then makes the ending have a new normality. Another theory to consider would be the final girl theory, the female character in this short film has the traits of the final girl even though she is the only girl in this film. Her traits include escaping an attack on her own and fighting for herself and trying to escape.