Silent Movie Reflection

I really enjoyed the experience of creating a silent movie. I thought that I was in a group with fellow optimistic, fun, and talented actors. What I really took away from my experience was learning how to incorporate a prop (the wheelchair) that required me to use my whole body, while at the same time I had to additionally focus my energy on my facial expression. At first, I found the chair difficult to learn how to use and restricting. While other actors, such as Lisa and Alexis could shake to show to audience that they were old, I was limited in my body movements. I found that I had to rely on shaking my hands, making over-exaggerated facial movements, and head movements to depict what I wanted to express. For a future film, I would like to work on resisting from laughing when we were filming and doing run throughs. I thought this was my main struggle and want to improve on being more serious.I thought that the other actors in my group did really well on this project. Even though at many times we would act extremely goofy in our costumes, we all devoted ourselves to being serious about the final result of our movie. We each wanted to produce a comedic piece, and by focusing when we had to, organizing a prop and costume list, and listen to each other, we were able to succeed. One important factor that my group excelled on was listening to each other. There was no frustration working with each other because everyone's opinions and ideas were listened to and adapted into our film. Lisa had the great idea of throwing her bingo card, which was an action that showed the audience her rage at Alexis while being funny. I really appreciated how much energy Alexis put into the film, all of her ideas helped it flow naturally and allowed the audience to stay entranced. Finally, Dayna was able to manipulate where each actor should be placed. By doing this, she made everyone in the film equal and made the filming process easier for Duncan and myself.

This project taught me many things, but what stands out is that collaboration is a key element when writing a scene, film, or other type of performance. Because I had so many great ideas to work with, our film turned out to be truly original. The collaboration from everyone in our group made the process of developing our plot and characters, forming a prop and costume list and choosing our music go very smoothly. It was also extremely helpful to me because when ever I was unsure of an action or idea; I either received helpful criticism or encouragement. I also learned that when you make silent films, energy is important for any type of scene. I think it is easy as an audience member to get bored if energy is lacking in a scene, especially because there is no spoken dialogue. I hope I get another opportunity to make a silent film; it was an experience that I really enjoyed every minute of.