JOINT FIRST: Neeve Capaldo (GS) (Film) My Nonna's Story

Joint First Prize Creatives: Film

My Nonna’s Story

Neeve Capaldo Girls’ School

Neeve started her project titled, “How will we tell the stories of 2020?”, whilst we were very much still in the peak of the coronavirus pandemic. This was a traumatising time for many people and sparked in her a ‘need’ to record some of what was happening to us.

After researching literature and how phenomena such as this have been recorded in the past, Neeve discovered the idea of ‘fundamental truth.’ A fundamental truth is a feeling or emotion, for example, happiness, friendship, or loss, used to connect people to the story which is being told, whether that be through books, music, or films.

Fundamental truths are what have allowed many famous films such as ‘Toy Story’ to reach deep into many people’s hearts across the world, as people can relate and connect to the characters and their emotions. Neeve decided that this would be the way that she would tell the story of 2020. Therefore, in the film, she uses the fundamental truth of ‘loneliness’ to emote the audience and communicate the story.

However, from the story of the pandemic, there are thousands of stories to be told, and as we have seen from the past, the best way to communicate history is through personal, relatable stories. This is why she chose to tell the story of her Nonna, her dad’s mum, through one of her passions, film.

At university Neeve is excited to be going on to study Geography and Film.

The link to the film can be found here: https://youtu.be/DXNareTV8Sc

Part 1: Exploring ideas

At the start of my journey thinking about what I would do for my Aske level, we were still very much in the peak of the Coronavirus pandemic. The past year, which feels like it came straight out of a dystopian film, instilled in me a need or ‘want’ to record some of what we were experiencing, particularly my family. During the first lockdown, I started filming my family doing everyday tasks, and interviewing them asking how they were feeling each day. I didn’t manage to continue this film, as after everyday being the same, it became very mundane, and no family members were interested in being filmed anymore. However, I knew that there were still so many stories that I could tell from the experience of the past year. And as a result of this, I started to explore means and ways of storytelling, how stories have been told in the past, and how we might tell stories in the future.

A few months ago, I came across the Netflix Homemade Series. It is a collection of short films made by people at home during lockdown, across a variety of countries and individual stories. I found some of them extremely inspiring and beautiful. They were also definitely relatable, some were funny, and some had a slightly sadder tone. Here is a link to view some of the films that inspired me to make my feature film.

https://www.netflix.com/search?q=homemade&jbv=81285512

After feeling like I needed to make something with my inspiration, I thought about the reason why this may be. I started to research into why humans love to tell stories so much, and what it is about stories that makes them hold so much power that they are able to move people in a way that not many other things can. Behind almost everything in this world is a story, every book, every film, every bit of science, therefore it was very interesting for me to do some extra reading on this subject and write a literature review.

Part 2: Literature Review

Why are films so powerful? The function of storytelling in film.

Ever since the first film was made, the fascination of the moving screen has only continued to grow. As technology continues to advance, so do the films, and they become more powerful every year. But what makes a film have the potential to be so powerful, so moving, but often so simple? It seems that this question narrows down to one factor, a film's function to tell a story.

All filmmakers seem to agree on one concept; that storytelling is a fundamental part of our lives. The entire film making industry is built on the insatiable human desire to experience, tell and see stories from one another. The sole purpose of film is creating characters which engage the audience and make us care what is happening in the story, and therefore making us care about the message the film aims to send. Duncan Wardle writes for IDEATE, ‘Why is storytelling so important? Because it’s in our DNA. Storytelling is a tool as old as mankind itself. From ancient pantomime stories shared around caveman campfires, to the Egyptian hieroglyphics, to the written word of the bible thousands of years ago, storytelling has always been the tool of choice for humans to share its biggest, brightest and more important ideas. As such, we naturally 148 | Page

respond to the power of story. A great story can make us laugh, cry, smile, self-reflect and so much more.” This idea that storytelling is an integral part of human nature and is therefore what gives films the power to change us as people is shared by the major film production company, Pixel.

Pixel lives by the ideology that a story must connect to a fundamental truth. Pixel films are amongst the top 50 grossing box office films of all time, as well as the company being recipients of over 19 Academy Awards and 8 Golden Globes. They claim that their secret to this links to what Wardle says about storytelling being in our DNA. So many Pixel classics became top hits because of how they touched on so many fundamental truths, how they are designed to reach deep inside the viewer and find truths that resonate and bring about feeling, connecting the viewer to the story. The timeless childhood dream, the power of friendship, the fear of growing old and the pains of feeling insignificant. These are just some of the fundamental truths that Pixar use in their tetralogy of Toy Story. It is these home hitting feelings that make the audience connect with the story and is how Pixar have told some of the most loved stories from everyone’s childhood, whether that be Toy Story, Monsters Inc. or WALL-E for example. All of these films are littered with fundamental truths that captivate viewers into the world on the screen. However, is a connection with a fundamental truth an absolute must for a film to be powerful, make an impact and move the viewer?

Brian Dunnigan writes for his book, ‘Storytelling and Film. Fairy Tales, Myth and Happy Endings’, “We are story telling creatures who seek to report experience, clarify tangled emotion, define and amuse ourselves through narrative: jokes, anecdotes, myth, romance, parable, folktale, history and fiction.” He too agrees with Wardle on the concept that ‘storytelling is in our DNA’ as he argues that stories inspire, heal, inform and empower. He says that we as viewers identify with the protagonist, the one who struggles at the heart of the narrative to connect our past, present and future in a casual way that bridges our experiences and hopes together, and as we watch, her struggle becomes ours to make our lives meaningful and different in some way. However, in his book he also researches the idea of ‘Anti-stories’. Dunnigan writes about the filmmaker Godard, and how his feature film, ‘Eloge de l’Amour’ is supposedly less story telling than an essay, but more a collage of image and sound, music, still photos, interviews, found footage, documentary, quotations and voice over. He suggests that whilst there is the potential of story, there is no real memory or ideology, personal or political that builds that bridge between the viewer and film, and for that you always need a story. It is a must if you want to communicate anything at all.

An article titled,’ The Importance of Storytelling’ written by La Mariposa Films touches on the importance of stories in relation to giving films power. They believe that storytelling has been one of the most effectives sources of inspiration known to man, and that the value storytelling holds as a source of inspiration and as a teaching tool makes it the most important tradition for mankind to possess. Stories hold power. Every story contains a lesson to instruct the audience. Stories teach us to love, to forgive others, to be just and strive for better than what we have. The greatest stories ever told function as a reflection on the world we live in and of both the goodness and the evil present in our world.

Apart from a few people making artistic interpretation of their own ideas, such as Godard, it seems to be a shared belief that storytelling is the main function of what makes films so powerful. Everyone agrees that films are able to change people’s views and perceptions like nothing other than perhaps first-hand experience itself. This is why film has become such a powerful resource for teaching in the modern day. Film has the power to educate and spread awareness on a topic 149 | Page

from one side of the world to the other, and infuse that passion and genuine care in viewers which spreads and could even spark global peace movements. Telling stories going on 2020 is going to be more important than ever. Finding those fundamental truths that are able to connect the future generations to what we have experienced now is going to be a vital thing to share as we must teach them what we have been taught. And as film is able to enhance those stories with vision and hearing, creating narrative with perspective and emotion, what better way to do it.

Part 3: The Film

In my literature review I explored the ideas of 'the fundamental truth', the relatable emotion that many films base their stories on in order to connect to the audience. I also explored the concept that stories are the way that we as humans communicate with each other, warn and teach each other. I decided that I agree with both these two things, and I personally strongly connect to many fundamental truths. When watching a film and a character dies, the fundamental truths of loss is what makes us cry, even though we never knew that person. It is also the story built around these fundamental truths that holds the power to move us and teach us. Stories are how we teach young children what is right from wrong in the beginning, and how elderly people spend their last days in the end, recounting the stories from their lives. Then I got to thinking about the events of the past year, and how it feels as if they came straight out of a story book. 2020 was filled with so many fundamental truths, loss, death, loneliness, but also friendship, love and resilience. It occurred to me that the events of 2020, the stories that it held, are going to be some of the most important stories that we will ever have to tell. We will need to tell these stories, and pass their lessons on down for generations, to teach those to come what we have been taught. However, the question is, how will we tell these stories of 2020?

There are many ways in which 2020 has been recorded. Living in a digital age, and the countless lockdowns forcing everyone to resort their lives to being online, there has been a technology influx and a rise of new media platforms. The internet has been used to share information like never before as a result of this year, and as a result of that, we have become even more connected. Throughout the global pandemic, one way which we have helped each other to cope is by sharing stories. From sending memes back and forth on Instagram, to doing a livestream workout on YouTube, to watching the 2020 documentary on Netflix, social media and media stream platforms have been the most significant way that we have stayed connected and shared stories throughout the year. Moving into the future, we will have all the recorded news reports of the cases and factual information about the Pandemic to re-watch and learn from, but the news didn’t share those personal stories of peoples struggles or joys from 2020, which personally I think, are much more important when it comes to recounting the stories of 2020.

When thinking about how I am going to tell my stories from 2020 to my future generations, I think about all my photographs that I took in lockdown. Whilst this shows much of the new 'lockdown culture' that was created, it doesn’t tell my stories in very much detail, and it doesn’t tell the stories of those around me either. Another thing I did in the first lockdown was sending letters back and forth to my friends. I will keep these letters forever, as a memoir of what I went through, along with my friends, and how we managed to help each other through it. However, these messages are very much private to me, and are not something I want to share with the world. Whilst they do hold fundamental truths such as my loneliness, and my long to be with my friends, I didn’t feel they were the best way to share the stories of 2020. But then I thought about my Nonna.

My Nonna, my dad's mum, lives alone and has for over 12 years since my Nonno, her husband, passed away. Before the pandemic, she was coping fine, she had her friends, her family, and her freedom. The outbreak of the pandemic caused a lot of pain for my Nonna. For a year, she suffered from loneliness and depression, as well as fear. I thought about everything she went through, and the fundamental truths that her story holds, and I realised that they must have been the same for so many people, not just elderly but everyone living alone through the pandemic. I realised that telling the story of my Nonna would be a perfect way to communicate the story of the pandemic she lived through, but not just her story, but the story of all those who she represents too. This is why I chose to share the story of 2020 through my Nonna's perspective.

Part 3: Working Titles

Once I had finalised the main idea for my film, I played around with some potential titles that would suit and encompass the idea. I thought about the message I wanted to send, and here are some of the concepts I was contemplating when thinking about my literature review as well. Escapism And Art Can Art Be Medicine? Truthfulness : Fundamental Truths and Human Experience How Will We Tell These Stories Of 2020? I selected the last title, ‘How Will We Tell These Stories Of 2020?’, to be my final title as I thought it best fitted the question/message I wanted to impose on the viewers. The film I made is just one way that the thousands of stories of 2020 can be told.

Part 4: Plan of Action

Now that I knew what I wanted to do for the film, there were a number of components I had to organise. I decided that I didn’t want to write a script, and that instead I wanted to film my Nonna’s day as it was – raw. There also wouldn’t have been much point in writing a script as she is alone all day so there wouldn’t be any dialogue anyway. However, I did plan out some shots that I ideally wanted to get as I had a vision for them communicating parts of her story. For the rest I just followed her go about her day and filmed her. Shoot day with my Nonna was something special to me so I thought I would record my experience as a nice memoir as well as something else to add to the project. We shot this during the first lockdown, when the threat of corona virus was still very real, but it has already been something like 12 weeks of lockdown, and even longer for my Nonna, as she is venerable so had been shielding for weeks prior to the official lockdown announcement.

As my Nonna lives alone and is 88 years old with medical conditions which mean she can’t drive or see very well, we were legally allowed to form a support bubble with her which meant that I could go into her house. My dad was also there doing various chores for her that she is unable to do for herself e.g. food shopping, changing lightbulbs etc. Throughout the film I had to keep reminding my Nonna to act like I wasn’t there. She kept trying to talk to me and show me things, I of course had to cut these bit out of the film, as it is meant to show her suffering with the loneliness that lockdown brought, which she did really struggle with 98% of the time. She is lucky however, that she has family around her who visit her two if not three times a week. The main purpose of this film is to raise awareness of those who are not so lucky, and to make people be aware of their neighbours or any elderly people they know that are living alone during this pandemic. But also not just through this nightmare. It is important to raise awareness for elderly people in general, as it is a serious issue that many venerable elderly people have to battle very day.

Over all, my Nonna enjoyed the shoot day, as it was a nice activity for her to get out and do, and also to be entertained and spend some time with me. Although at the end when I was interviewing her, she did get very upset as although the film is just a film that we staged and 151 | Page

acted out together for the camera, the experience and the emotions are very very real to her, as what she is acting is what she has to fight against every day.

Reflecting back on it now, the shoot day went well although I did come across some difficulties. One main issue was continuity, as it was almost like I was live documentary shooting. I had to just capture my Nonna as she was, and cut out and add bits in later, as I wanted it to be real, I didn’t want her to ‘act’. As a result of this there are a few minor issues with tea cups appearing and disappearing and other small things like that. My Nonna also kept trying to talk to me while we filmed which was very sweet but also difficult, as in the film it is supposed to show her alone, not talking to me. You can see this in the third shot of her in the doorway, she asks me, “what are you doing?” in Italian, but I had to leave some dialogue in as I needed the shot. I think it works well in some places though because it seems like she is talking to herself which makes the loneliness even more dramatic and sad, which is the effect I wanted to create.

I did find shoot day very emotional, and it just further made me realise the pain my Nonna went through and is still going through. Her dementia is now worse than ever and is becoming a danger, and it just saddens me that she wasted a year of her good life locked away. However, this is even more so why I needed to find a way to share her story of 2020.

Post production was the longest process, as I reviewed many different edits of the film. I knew how I wanted it to end, but I struggles for a while on how to start it. The film is beautiful without any context, and the meaning is clearly communicated, however I felt for the purposes of this project, context would be best, so I added an introduction showing a contrast of how my Nonna’s life used to look like before I showed what it looked like in 2020. Whilst I would not include this when sending out to other film platforms or festivals, I do think it is successful in this project and makes it even more impactful. Music was also a big part of post production that I had to factor in as most of the film is silent. I needed to find the write balance between the shocking silence that I wanted the viewer to experience to really make them understand what it felt like to endure my Nonna’s day, however music is a big part of inducing emotion in film, so it was also important to pick the right moments to play music to get the right emotional reaction that I would want from an audience.

It was difficult to narrow down the footage in post production as I had captured so many touching moments, however I still needed to create a story arch so I created a storyboard to help me organise my thoughts and keep everything controlled whilst I was editing in post production. Here is my storyboard, however I created this before the final edit so it might be slightly different to the final film however this is good as it shows my work in progress.

Story Board – Key moments breakdown

Opening, introducing my Nonna, photos/videos of what her life used to be like, fun, busy, full of laughter, then explain how the pandemic left her. Cut to this shot, silent. Long shots of her lying alone in the living room. Break the silence with this shot of her washing her hands. Then a few more shots of her doing simple tasks like watering plants, watching TV ect.

Next shots, her talking on the phone in Italian, breaking the silence but not my much. Next, her looking out the window followed by the close up of her looking concerned/wishing to leave the house. Strong visual of her in her mask/hold this moment for a bit, let it sink in.

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Next the shots from the park, on the bench and maybe walking alone?

Making tea sequence and then shots of her in the dining room alone

This moment followed by the close up, she says something quietly under her breath

Bus stop shots and then cut to home

Show Nonna going back to sleep, maybe repeat some of the sequences again? Showing her days are just on repeat End with Nonna’s interview, cut some meaningful bits. Then end with my message.

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At the very end of the process, after I had finished the final edit, I decided to do one more change where I cut out the intro and the voice over and left it raw. I did this because I felt like it was much stronger and more powerful this way.

Overall, after finishing my film I am really happy with the result. This has been an ongoing process for me, and it means a lot of me to finally be able to finish it and screen it to an audience as it is a message close to my heart. I am very lucky to be able to have the change to share my story and to be able to experience the live reaction of an audience. This is a very valued experience for a film maker before they send their film out into the world as I will be able to see exactly which moments touch the audience and how they react to it. I am excited to extend my research in this idea, “How will we tell the stories of 2020” further and continue to make and share work. I would also like to enter my film into a film festival (except a shortened version) and use it to maybe partner with a campaign raising awareness for lonely elderly people like my Nonna, so whilst this is the end of this project, it is not the end of the film’s path.

Academy of Film, Theatre and Television, 2016. Why storytelling is so important as a film maker (online). Available at: https://www.aftt.edu.au/news/latest-news/why-storytelling-is-soimportant-as-a-film-maker IDEATE, 2019. What Pixel shows us about the power of storytelling (online). Available at: https://duncanwardle.com/the-power-of-storytelling/ Brian Dunnigan, 2011. Storytelling and film, fairy tales, myth and happy endings (online). Available at: https://pov.imv.au.dk/Issue_18/section_1/artc1A.html La Mariposa Films, 2017. The Importance of Storytelling (online). Available at: https://lamariposafilms.com/the-importance-of-storytelling/ Anna Higgs, The Guardian, 2014. The importance of storytelling in a digital age (online). Available at: https://www.theguardian.com/culture-professionals-network/2014/nov/17/-spstorytelling-digital-film-4