TASK 2: Short Film - Gasman (1998)

The academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences defines a short film as

"an original motion picture that has a running time of 40 minutes or less including credits"



Gasman is a short film directed by Scottish Director Lynne Ramsay. She began her career producing short films and her success lead her to begin working on feature length films such as Ratcatcher (1999) and Morvern Callar (2002).

The film, like the majority of Lynne Ramsay's short films, is set in Glasgow in the 1970's and the plot is about a father who has two families and shows how it affects one of the daughters, with jealousy a key theme.

The opening shots in the kitchen are very much from a child's point of view. We can see this because the camera is low down, and at the eye level of a child. The framing intentionally cuts of the head of the mother and this is done throughout the scene. This could symbolize maybe a disconnection between her and the girl.

This is also shown with this shot. There is only back light and this results only the silhouette of the mother visible in the foreground. This highlights how unimportant the Mother is in the story, and allows us to later on focus on just the kids and the father and focus on their relationship.

This shot on the train tracks shows danger as it almost represents the camera as being a train and, as it is going at such a fast pace, foreshadows that a disequilibrium is approaching in the story. The narrative in itself invokes danger by the fact that they make their way to the party through the train tracks. The fact that it is abandoned could show a representation of what Glasgow was like at this time and this makes the fact that the father has two families seem much more probable.

We can see with the entrance to the party again that it is from a child's point of view, as the camera is low down so it actually cuts off the heads of the adults. This could have a deeper meaning though, as it could show how oblivious the adults are to the emotions of the children, and how they are unaware of the jealousy within the girl.

To illustrate jealousy between the two little girls, Lynne Ramsay uses a close up of the girl. A narrow depth of field is used so that the viewer focuses on the emotion shown on the girls face. We know exactly what the girl is thinking because the previous shot was a point of view shot, showing the other girl sitting with her Dad.

Despite being quite far away, the shot zooms into the girl to show that it is not the need for attention that the girl has, but jealousy that she is not the only one her father cares for. The scene does not have any dialogue at this point and it shows Lynne Ramsay's style, which tends to focus on emotion. It also assists the viewer because when there is dialogue, it is often difficult to understand due to the strong Glaswegian accent.

I think the messages the film put across is maybe the impact that having multiple families have on one of the children. We see by the way the father reacts after the fight that he is quite oblivious to the emotions of his daughter and doesn't understand the impact that it has had on her.

What makes this film a good calling card for Lynne Ramsay is that it tells a story using cinematography and the emotions of the characters as opposed to dialogue, and this allows her to fit a narrative within the time constraints of a short film.