The Politics of Art & Authenticity

Whether or not “Wasp” is based on the filmmaker, Andrea Arnold’s life, is indefinite. But her childhood years surely had some effect on the film. “Wasp” tells a highly realistic story which causes the viewer to sympathize with Zoe, the protagonist. Instead of being filmed in the customary fashion, steadily, using a tripod, it is filmed with a hand-held camera, ultimately making the footage shaky. This
creates a film which is almost tangible to the viewer, as if he is with the characters and in their situation. With the close-up and zoomed-in footage, the viewer actually feels like he is trapped and caught in the drama. I think this film is based on conflict and that’s what makes it so real. I’m ambivalent in my reaction towards Zoe. On the one hand, her actions are unreasonable, but on the other hand, they are completely understandable. Also, there were so many moments during the film that I thought something tragic was about to happen: the kids would be run over by a car in middle of the street, or the four seemingly-drunk teenagers would do something, etc., but nothing catastrophic happened, and the even ended on a positive note. Arnold probably put in these scenes to amplify the realism: there is potential here for something bad to occur and the viewer is in midst of all of it.

Would you ever waste your hard earned money on beer while your children were starving? Most of us would answer, “no.” But one mother would answer, “yes,” and her life is portrayed in the short film Wasp.

Wasp is a heart breaking short film about a poor single mother that neglects her four children so she can have a night out on the town with other men. Wasp belongs to the auteur genre, and parts of director Andrea Arnold’s life are portrayed in this film using her unique voice. According to her interview, Andrea Arnold had a poor single mother with four children. The use of part of her own life makes the film more personal because her authentic emotions are more palpable to the viewer. Camera angles make this film more personal like when Zoe is frantically running down the stairs and the shaking camera captures her frantic and uncertain behavior.A hand held camera is also used to capture Zoe’s anxiety and shakiness about the possibility of losing her children. Music plays an important role in this film. Music symbolizes the shift in tone through the film.  Music is played after the fight scene to signal the shift of Zoe bringing her children to the bar, and music is played at the end of the short film to suggest the children might have a slightly better future ahead. Zoe loves her children and this is shown when she runs to her baby’s rescue after hearing his stinging scream.

Sources:

image: http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_3PPSVIEZjQo/TKYQPEA3rxI/AAAAAAAAAC4/bqS_nY6wHXE/s1600/wasp.png

interview: http://www.scotsman.com/news/film-andrea-arnold-interview-1-1355790

http://www.waspx.co.uk/iStock_flip%20wasp.jpg

On Wikipedia.com I found that Andrea Arnold’s mother was 16 when she gave birth to the future Oscar winning director. She raised four children on her own much like Zoe did in Wasp. When Professor Davis mentioned that this film reflected her childhood I thought perhaps Arnold lived in poverty but I didn’t think much more of it. It’s chilling to think about how similar the film and real life was to Andrea Arnold. On Wikipedia.com I also read into the synopsis of some of her other productions I found that the poverty stricken, damaged mother daughter relationship was a common theme in many of her films.] In directing her films Andrea Arnolds seems to incorporate her childhood to some degree, which is one of the characteristics of her personal filming style.

Again, looking into a blog commenting on several of Arnold’s films I found that she also uses close ups frequently. The author of the blog, ‘Cinema of Andrea’ felt that these close ups allowed her to feel a closer connection to the characters being filmed and gives us, the viewers a greater insight into the complexity of the character. I completely agree with the author of the blog. There were several instances in Wasp in which those close ups helped us to understand Zoe. The close up on the sticker regarding Barbie as we mentioned in class shows us that Zoe might be a mother, but she is far from mature. The close up on her feet earlier in the film when she’s speaking to David and the moldy bread in her kitchen are used to highlight the poverty in which Zoe and her children live in. Although the author ‘The Cinema of Andrea’ focused on the importance of the close ups on characters’ faces, I felt that the close ups of the objects were equally significant because they too help us to uncover the story behind the characters.

“Andrea Arnold.” Wikipedia. Wikimedia Foundation, 18 Sept. 2012. Web. 20 Sept. 2012.

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andrea_Arnold>.

“The Cinema of Andrea Arnold.” JustAtad. N.p., n.d. Web. 20 Sept. 2012.

<http://justatad.wordpress.com/2012/01/11/the-cinema-of-andrea-arnold/>.

Watching “Wasp” seriously messed with my emotions. I went from crying, to gasping, to nervously laughing all within a few minutes. There were several aspects of the film that caused this and that made it feel unique. One was the shakiness of the camera. This made it feel immature and haphazard, much like the main character herself. It also made the film feel less polished and more real, which made me respond as if I was seeing an intimate home movie of the characters. Also, the music playing throughout “Wasp” – mostly upbeat pop songs – was an interesting choice for such serious subject matter. It gave it a hopeful feeling that underscored the film and provided greater room for personal interpretation of the events shown. I think Andrea Arnold really makes her film stand out by using these subtle touches which encourage her audience to take pause and wonder how they should be responding to her film.

NOTICE HOW THE LITTLE BLONDE GIRL
IS HOLDING UP THE WRONG FINGER  🙂

At the opening scene of Wasp, you see a barefooted mother carrying her baby boy with his bottom exposed and running down the stairs along with her children. You can see the shakiness of the handheld camera that follows them down the stairs. The first scene entices you to want to learn more about this woman and her family. As the camera shows a scene of their distraught house, its obvious that they live in poverty and she is unable to feed her family. Andrea Arnold’s short film is about real social issues, a very young woman who has made some bad decisions in her life that is trying to take care her children. This short film is just a glimpse of Zoe’s everyday life. I felt as though I was right in there in front of her observing her everyone move. Arnold wants us to see her perspective and sympathize her life because society normally judges and ostracizes someone who was a teenage mother that’s unable to financially provide for her children. Although she has made some bad decisions in this film, such as leaving her children outside of the bar as she tries to rekindle an old flame, in the end, she truly loves her children and wouldn’t want anything bad happen to them.

Andrea Arnold’s protagonist in Wasp proves to be more than a simple, one sided person. If she was only who she seemed to be, I’d probably still be seething and condemning the woman of how bad of a mother she is.

I mean, any woman who leaves her three young girls plus a baby outside of a bar for hours on end as she flirtatiously plays pool deserves to be smacked, yes? Not to mention enabling two of the girls to play bumper strollers (with a real baby in one) on a parking lot close to a busy road with no adult supervision in addition to the nonchalant cussing embedded in their daily vernacular and the violent example of how to solve problems by rushing to the enemy camp barefoot and pulling hair finished with a synchronized flip of the finger. I guess it’s obvious that this film angered me. But I also loved it.
Zoe is a woman whose background and motives are mysteries that one can only wonder about. She represents a sub-sect of society that we all know exist but only laugh at and shrug off. Most people are quick to judge these people, shoo them into a category called Trash, shake their heads and be off with their own lives. But if one really thinks about each person, Zoe for example, you can’t help but feel sympathy. Most of us do not know what it’s like to be alone and really have nothing and no one. Well that’s Zoe, times ten. She holds her children close despite her inability to properly take care of them because they are all she has. They are all who provide her the respect, love, and attachment she yearns. Furthermore, she lives in this lower class pocket of society where economic and social factors proliferate this type of lifestyle. In no way do I think her decisions are wise or right but I do acknowledge her reasons. She loves her kids and she’s raising them as well as she knows how.

I’ve watched another short film set in the same type of town and culture.  I highly recommend you watch this little boy named Frankie.

…with a much longer story.

This movie hit me very hard because just this morning, I was so upset and complaining about my life. I was thinking about how all my friends are going to fancy and expensive schools, how I can’t get everything my friends get, etc. And then a few hours later, I saw this film that put my life in perspective.

When Wasp first started, I first thought the family was getting evicted from their home. The raw, choppy footage, the dim lighting, and the grainy view all created the picture of a poor, somewhat broken family. When I’ve seen TV shows and movies on one of those giant-screen-HDTV televisions, I always felt like I was living in the movie. Although this footage was not a super high quality like an HDTV – it was the exact opposite – this videography made this movie also come alive, in a kind of different way.

I found so much symbolism in this film – namely, obviously, the wasp. At first we see the main character, watching the wasp on the window sill, and then she opens the window, and the wasp flies away. It is free. And she is watching, wistfully, I think, imagining what it would be like to just fly out that dirty window into the wide open world. And then, through the rest of the film, we see her running to start a fight with her neighbor, running to the bar, running to an old car to fool around with a guy. We see her trying to escape from the reality of her life. This is completely understandable, as her life is obviously terrible and any normal person would try to find a way to escape. Unlike the wasp, she is a person, and people can’t do that – we can’t just escape.

I think it’s so interesting that Andrea Arnold was the oldest of four when she was growing up – I think she chose the oldest daughter in the film to portray herself growing up. Because the film seemed to end on a somewhat uplifting note, I couldn’t really tell if Andrea was trying to spin a positive or negative perspective on the story. I came to the conclusion that Andrea was creating a neutral voice, not putting her opinion, in the movie. She was showing us the reality, painting for us the stark picture, of what that kind of life – her life – is. The perseverance to live in that world, the brutality and the horror, the effects it can have on people, the lengths people take to try to break free, the strength one learns to go on. And she lets the viewer decide what to make of it, what his opinion of that kind of life really is.

Andrea Arnold’s depiction of a poor, uneducated mother of four scared when Professor Davis said the short film was a combination of her own childhood and her imagination. If Andrea Arnold’s mother was the same as young Zoe then she had to grow up fast the same way the oldest girl did. Looking at what some of her other short films were, they involved some sort of mother-daughter relationship gone wrong. I’m sure this alludes to her own life also which makes the characters so real and believable. The characters are relatively poor or uneducated, get into fights and other troubles, and simply don’t seem to make the right decisions. I would guess the camera usage would also be a signature of Andrea Arnold’s style. The way the camera is focused up close on the character’s face during a moment of intense emotion and the walking feeling as if your walking with the character. It made me feel closer and more connected to the character rather than just watching her. Overall I do believe Arnold is a great film maker and shows a story of warning as well as love. Don’t make stupid decisions because you’ll just end up being some poor mother of a poor child who has no future, love and care for your family and care for yourself as well.

Family Fun
Source: http://iwff.net/images/films/wasp09.jpg