Break down of a Social Realism film

Half Nelson

Directed by Ryan Fleck
Written by Ryan Fleck and Anna Boden

In the introduction of the film “Half Nelson” the director manipulates the four elements, camera, sound, mise-en-scene and editing to create specific representations and convey certain themes and issues such as, substance abuse to the audience.

The film begins with the opening credits and the non-digetic sound of a humming music. This music is played to represent the character is in a dream world and links to the theme of isolation. He is broken away from the dream world by the digetic sound of the alarm clock, the sound grows louder in till we see a medium shot of a man sitting on the floor. The alarm clock is a metaphor for a call back to reality, as when the alarm clock rang, we saw the shot of the man. This shows us that he has awoken from the dream world he was in. This opening scene shows us the main themes of the film, the themes of substance abuse and depression.

We then start to see that he is restless, through the movement of the camera, the movement of the camera is static, this could be a reflection of his emotional state, how he feels from the hangover from the drugs.

We begin to see a change in the character when he leaves his home and is on his way to work. The lighting changes to bright and colourful, whereas whilst he was in his home the lighting was dark and dull, this shows us his feelings, that he comes to life when he is at his job. We see him in a medium shot, teaching a class of pupils, which brings a bit of irony to the scene as teachers are not usually associated with drugs and depression.

The directors rationale for this media text is to broadcast the fact of how people suffer from depression and use drugs to ease it. And how people who suffer in the way that the main character does, has their own remedies to cure it such as the main character as teaching. Also it is to show us how anyone can suffer in this way, even a teacher, a member of the public service who are not commonly associated with drugs and depression.