Jialu Cheng
Rachel Heng
Zhi Qiu
Wei Shen
Fan Zhang
We imagine our project to be the final scene of a movie as it was based on the last part of Camus’ first novel ‘The Stranger’. The protagonist Meursault has reached the very last point of his life because he has been sentenced to death for shooting a man dead on a beach. The reason he gives is that “it was because the sun was too hot.” We have unfolded this scene by combining what is already in the book with our understanding of the last part of the novel.
Meursault is anti-social, indifferent, insensitive, uncaring and unmotivated. But his absolute passion for the truth is revealed during the second part of the book.
For one exercise, we propose to set it in an ambiguous, interior location which represents Meursault’s mental space. We intend to shoot it in one take after sunset. Throughout the scene, we may use three to two lights which may be occasionally visible in the shot. The actor will walk around in this space while the light on his face will change during his monologue. The background will be faintly lit. The light quality on his face could change from soft to hard. It depends on our final design. Our camera will follow the character during this. For the last frame, we imagine the actor to stand in front of one light so that it creates a silhouette while a bit of detail on his face can still be recognisable.
Another approach to film this monologue is a bit more realistic. We want to film it perhaps at the cemetery as the character is recalling his mother in the excerpt; or we could film it in Meursault’s apartment. We are still not quite sure about the exact type of location. We could be filming the character only from his back in one long take. Or we are also thinking to film it in separate shots, cutting between what the character is looking at. This more realistic approach is still underdeveloped.