A Real Blind Date Camera Critique

I watched a short film called A Real Blind Date. This short film is directed by Rachel Clyde in 2009. The full length of the short film is seven minutes. Real Blind Date- Short film

This short film is a about 2 girls walking on the streets of San Francisco where they see a guy they like. The catch is that one of the girls is blind because she doesn't like to wear her glasses. The other girl would grab her arm as they follow the guy. The guy gets on the bus and they follow him, but they end up losing him. Then the girls try to find him by separating and the the blind girl has trouble. In the end the girls don't find the guy. In the short film the director did not give the characters any names.

Rack focus- establishing shot

low angle shot

 In the first scene the camera is blurry. The audience does not see the characters' faces. Then there is a rack focus from blurry vision to clear. The rack focus represents the girl that is blind. Since she didn't wear her glasses her vision is blurry. The first shot in the scene is a establishing shot (long shot). The audience sees foreground, mid-ground, and background. We see the cars, the girls, and then the houses and trees behind them. After the rack focus takes place, the audience does not see the characters' faces, instead they see their feet. This picture on the right is low angle shot. This is a normal lens because humans can see this view with the naked eye. The audience still doesn't see the girls.

CU- of the girl peeking at the guy

 As they walk there is a transition from place to place. The transition used was a bus. When that transition passed, we saw the girls in close up shots near a bus station. This signifies that the characters are in a new place, and the bus was the transition.

ECU- blind girl

Guy- camera movement was jerky

When the girl saw the guy the camera shots began to change. There was extreme close ups of their faces and eyes. When the girl looked through the the window to peek at the guy, the camera movement was shaky. This camera movement shows that the girl is moving her head a lot. When the blind girl asked her friend about what the guy was doing, the camera movement was a panning shot. When the girl was peeking at the guy, the camera movement was also shaky.

Girl holds the blind girl's hand

Then the guy goes into the bus and the girls follow him. During the bus ride the girls make eye contact with the guy and he does the same thing too. When the bus stopped, the guy got off and the girls followed him. The audience knows that the girl is blind from the  start of the film, but when the other girl holds her hand, it gives more evidence. This shot above is good shot because the audience can see foreground mid-ground and background.

Dutch Angle

ELS

The girls don't know where the guy went. The shot on the top is a extreme long shot because we could see foreground, mid-ground, and background. The picture on the top is a dutch angle. This shot is cool because the camera is tilted so that the frame is not parallel to the horizon.
Near the end of the film, the girls split up to find the guy. The blind girl can't see, so the camera is blurry. Then as the other girl walk toward her the camera shifts from blurry to clear.
There was lots of parallelism. Since the girl is blind, many of the camera shots were blurry. Every time there is a new scene, the angle of the camera would be titled. This is the style of the film. When there is a transition, the transition is parallel to the narrative story. The camera work was really good because in the bus the camera movement was shaky. So the camera movement connects with the narrative because when your on a bus, it is going to be a bumpy ride especially in San Francisco.