Gasman is a sixteen minute short film written and directed in 1997 by Lynne Ramsay. The poignant story which won an Atlantic Film Festival and Cannes Film Festival award for Best Short Film, whilst also being nominated for a Bafta Award, shot Ramsay to fame and lead her to direct her feature film debut, ‘Morvern Callar,’ in 2002.
Looking from a child’s prospective the film focuses on issues such as neglect, jealously and monotony.
The opening shots of the film show the directors rational to have the audience intrigued from an early start. With many close up camera angles, we can only see certain body parts of the characters in the shots. This immediately makes us question who they are and allows us to wonder what they look like or who they are. The diegetic dialogue insinuates that the people who are present are a family in their home. This is also communicated to us by the mise-en-scene which is of a homely feel. The lighting and set design is extremely cold and dull which creates the mood of a depressing surrounding and suggests to us that these characters are underprivileged. Furniture and wall paper in the shot is of a 1970’s era, a time period also represented by the diegetic music; a Christmas song, also giving us an idea of the time of year.
In just the few opening shots, Ramsey sets the story so well for the audience and communicates so many important messages throughout; another one being the characters Scottish accents, which tells us where this poverty stricken family is from.
Although we are not fully shown the characters faces, we are able to understand their age and guess what role they might play in the household. We see a behind the shoulder shot of a man getting ready in front of the mirror. He is constantly puffing on a cigarette which he quickly finishes before looking for another one in an empty packet. With the children in the house being incredibly noisy in the background, and alongside his constant heavy breathing, this chain smoking would communicate to us that the man is either under stress or nervous about something. A woman is seen standing by his side the whole time that he is getting ready and we imagine her to be his wife. This is another intentional representation of the 70’s time period, as woman of that era, especially in countries like Scotland, would still have had a traditional role in the house of helping their husbands and curtailing to their needs.
The children characters are extremely important in this opening sequence as they help to create the frustration shown by the adults. Throughout many of the close up shots, we often hear the mother’s voice telling the children off and demanding them to do as she asks. Whilst this enables us to understand the mother’s moaning and frustration, many shots show the children’s boredom and tiredness of their surroundings. In another close up shot, we see the arm of a young boy playing with a toy car. As we hear an element of flatness in his dialogue, he entertains himself by pouring sugar over the toy car; creating a typical childish mess. We immediately understand his situation. Alongside this communication, the director is also using this shot to make us unconsciously create another code in our understanding of the film. The time of year, which is constantly being depicted by the diegetic Christmas song playing throughout this opening sequence, has now been exhibited to the audience extremely discreetly, whilst they understand the other representations in the film. The glistening white sugar being poured on the toy car resembles snow; a weather condition of the winter season which is also often used to depict Christmas. The boys’ playing is in fact a metaphor. This could also be interpreted as him day dreaming to differ from his bored mannerisms. A happy snow filled fun loving Christmas with merry festive songs is an incredibly appealing dream for any young boy; however this boy is obviously more likely to witness a British style gloomy winter in his deprived Scottish foundation.
The sound of the sugar scraping along the counter is created to help with the ongoing loudness and lack of temperament in the scene and we are often taken back to the shot throughout.
Alongside this family atmosphere we are also introduced to a young girl character. Again we only see part of her body; however we can clearly understand her behaviour. She begins to get dressed under her mother’s command, nevertheless much like the young boy, her body language and reluctance communicates her frustration. As she dons a pair of shoes, there is an intertextual link to the 1939 MGM classic, ‘The Wizard of Oz.’ The young girl stands up wearing her black shoes, taps her heels together and quotes, ‘there’s no place like home, there’s no place like home!’ This is a huge character code as it tells the audience how this girl is obviously happy in her home, despite its miserable feel and that she has an imagination; possibly something she has developed whilst making entertainment for herself as children would have to have done in the 1970’s. The black colour of her shoes in contrast to the famous red slippers of the Wizard of Oz grounds the audience’s imaginations and keeps her family surrounding the most important code of the shot.
As the camera angles begin to reveal more of this young girl we see her putting on a dress, being helped by her mother. The mother is hissed at by the girl as she accused her mum of hurting her. Her impatient temperament whilst her mother struggles to dress her shows the aggressive and abrupt atmosphere between everyone in the house.
As the dress is finally fitted the camera tilts upwards to reveal the young girls face in a close up shot. Being the first time that one of the characters faces is seen, this finally tells the audience that the girl is the main character of the piece.
When the protagonist young girl of the piece is finally dressed, she is joined by her father and brother, who are now also fully revealed to the audience, as they prepare to leave the house. In a wide angle shot her walk through the front door shows how dark and gloomy the house is in contrast to the outside. She has now entered the exciting world and left what is represented as a stingy cage. As the children and their father walk down the road we see the mother close the door before walking to the front window to watch them walking down the road. The window reflects the trees outside which blocks our full view of her face. We can see her slightly anxious expression; however the reflection covers this fully. This is a technique strategically incorporated into the shot to mask her persona and emotions away from the audience. Coinciding with the traditional wives role in the household as represented earlier while her husband was getting ready, this shot gives the audience the impression that her opinion is not worthy and she is simply seen and not heard. It also tells us that she is obviously not a main important character.
Following a simple fade out, we see a wide angle shot of the three walking along the road; the father swinging and playing with the young girl along the way, with her brother trailing behind a little more reluctantly, suggesting that he and the father do not get along so well as he insinuated earlier in the film. Every previous shot in the film was a up close frame, showing a close family bond, but with cold feeling which gave the depressing tone. Suddenly this shot changes the complete film language. Its wide openness gives a much more exuberant feel; while it’s lighting and bare set gives a happy sense of freedom among the characters whose figures are silhouetted in the shot. They soon come across an abandoned railway track which they use as a pathway to their destination. The track is metaphorical of their happiness, as train tracks are often considered never to end, suggesting that these characters are now so happy that they could walk to infinity. Another wide angle shot, which excludes the boy, shows the father giving the girl a piggyback. Much like in old movies, the corners of the shot are blackened out which helps us to appreciate the brighter colour in the middle surrounding the characters. With the happy father and daughter relationship, this shot shows a joyful and beautiful innocence of life.
Along the track, the three encounter a woman with two other children. In a close up of the children’s faces we see their reactions to each other, telling us that they do not know who they are. After having a secretively personal chat with the woman, the father takes her two children and walks away with them and his own. The two girls, who previously did not know each other, hold hands which gives a sense of acceptance and newly found friendship with each other.
After another fade out, the five of them arrive at their destination; a social club. The decorations and iconic Christmas party songs reminds us once again of the time of year. The father goes straight over to a table where he joins a group of men drinking alcohol. Simultaneously to his urge for cigarettes earlier in the film, his desire for alcohol is another character code, exposing to us his nerves and insecurity most probably caused by his depressing life. This act also shows a sign of neglect as he leaves the children to play on the dance floor alone, while he indulges himself. As the night progresses the men consume more alcohol and their perceptions become slower. Many wide angle shots show the children’s bad behaviour as their father figures, who are more interested in their beer, laxidasically watch over them. This is also shown as the film goes into a slow motion sequence with the camera panning around the room. It shows the group of dads becoming more intoxicated while the group of children get wilder. The director has used this technique to place the audience in the middle of the room, and allowing us to witness the chaos from our own point of view. The panning creates a dizzy feeling for the audience, whilst we witness the children’s disorientation as if we were one of them.
The two young girls, who are playing with each, hold hands again which links back to the beginning of the film. Although they initially seem to be getting along well, one of them begins to feel restless and starts bothering the protagonist girl’s father until he allows her to sits on his lap. The protagonist girl becomes jealous and begins to fight with her, scrambling for her fathers knee. It is at this moment that we find out that the two young girls are in fact half-sisters, as they both begin fighting over who they call both ‘their daddy.’ The father breaks them up and we can see that the protagonist feels betrayed by him.
As the family walk home after the party, the two young girls are holding hands again, as instructed by their father; however this time they are both applying pressure and trying to hurt one another. Many close up shots throughout the film show how hands are significant throughout. We are told a great deal through the body language of the two girls when they are touching palms. At first they hold hands in a friendly manner, but later in an angry way to show their jealousy.
In the final shots of the film a close up shows the father’s frustration and burden towards his children as his face shows signs of regret and stress. After using the protagonist children characters to convey her message, Lynne Ramsay ends the film by giving the audience a final moral; that you have to deal with the consequences of your actions.
