page-no.54--film-terminology_videos.mp4
My Sister’s Shoes
(From Children of Heaven (Bacheha-ye Aseman), directed by Majid Majidi)
Scene 1
Cobbler's Shop
Close up of a cobbler stitching a girls' shoe. Only the pink shoe and the cobbler's hands are in the frame. The camera moves back to middle distance to show Ali sitting on a low chair next to the cobbler and watching him work. The cobbler finishes stitching the shoe, picks up the other one of the pair and hands them both to Ali.
Cobbler :That'll be thirty Toumans
Ali: Thank you (gives money to the cobbler).
Cobbler: Here is your change (picks up coins from the money box to give to Ali).
Cut to the street outside
Seen from across the street. The cobbler’s shop where Ali and the cobbler are sitting can be seen. To the right of the cobbler's shop is a door with a curtain hanging on it which appears to open into a row house. Ali is leaving the shop.
Ali's voice: Thank you.
The cobbler's voice: You are welcome. Goodbye.
A man with a parcel under his arm walks up to the curtained door, lifts the curtain and goes in, as Ali comes out of the cobbler's shop, putting the shoes into a small black bag in his hand, walks down the street and moves out of the frame on the left.
Scene 1
Scene 2
Bakery
Inside the bakery, shots of bread being baked- Close up of a hand putting into the stove kneaded flour spread on a baking board and taking out the baked nan. The camera pans slightly to the right to show Ali picking up the nan dropped by the cook and stacking them on a cloth spread on a wooden plank. The camera moves back to show Ali and three cooks sitting around the stove, kneading, and putting it inside the stove. Ali finishes stacking the nan and ties up the cloth into a bundle.
Scene2
Scene 3
The Footpath Outside the Bakery
A small group of men are waiting in a queue outside the bakery to buy nan. The outline of buildings in the street is seen in the distance. Ali is seen coming out from the bakery into the footpath, the parcel of nan in his right hand and the parcel of shoes in his left. He crosses the pavement and walks into a vegetable store. He places the bundle of nan on top of a pile of boxes of vegetables stacked in front of the shop and the bag of shoes in the small gap between two boxes.
On the soundtrack a hawker's voice is heard: ‘Salt, salt for trade.’ The shopkeeper is seen standing behind the counter.
Ali (to the shopkeeper): Assalamu Alaikkum, Akbar Aqa I need some potatoes.
Akbar, the shopkeeper gives Ali a small black bag to put potatoes in. Ali starts picking the large, wholesome potatoes in a box at the top of the heap.
Akbar: Not those, kid. Pick some down there.
Ali moves to his right, squats down and fills the bag with smaller potatoes from a box on the floor. Close up of Ali picking the potatoes.
Cut to view of the shop from the pavement.
A man pushing a handcart filled with junk enters the frame from the right and stops in front of the shop.
The junk collector (loudly, to the shopkeeper):Assalamu Alaikkkum. With your permission.
The junk collector picks up bundles of used polythene bags lying scattered on the floor near the boxes of vegetables and throws them into the cart. He sees Ali's parcel of shoes. Taking it for junk, he picks it up and puts it in the cart.
The junk collector: Goodbye.
The junk collector leaves.
Cut to view from inside the shop.
Akbar is on the left edge of the frame counting money.
Cut to Ali filling his bag with potatoes.
Ali finishes filling the bag and hands it to Akbar for weighing. Akbar holds the bag in his hand to feel the weight for a moment and hands it back to Ali.
Akbar: Sixty Five Toumans.
Ali: My mom said to put it on our tab tab.
Akbar: Tell her your account has reached its limit. She should pay at least part of it.
Ali: All right
(Ali turns to go.)
Cut to view from outside the shop.
He goes to the pile of boxes in front of the shop and
picks the bundle of nan and then looks for the bag of
shoes. Unable to find it, he places the bag of nan atop
the vegetable boxes and begins to search underneath.
First he puts his hand and then his head in the gap
between the boxes of vegetables, which upsets them all.The vegetable boxes tumble and vegetables scatter on the ground. On hearing the sound, Akbar comes running from inside the shop and sees the vegetables strewn on the ground.
Akbar: (annoyed) What the hell are you doing? Why did
you spill these? Are you crazy?
Ali: (looking at him with guilt) My sister's shoes have
disappeared.
Akbar: Get lost. Beat it.
Ali: I left my sister's shoes here.
Akbar: I said get lost! (bangs his fist on the pile of boxes.)
Ali runs away, scared.
Scene 4
Ali's house
Middle distance shot of Ali and his sister Zahra reading their textbooks kneeling on the mattress. A baby's cry is heard faintly on the soundtrack. The camera closes in on Zahra who is writing in a notebook (mumbling the words
as she writes): ‘Ali, how am I going to school without shoes’. The camera moves back to middle distance. Now both Zahra and Ali are in the frame. Their parents' conversation on the other end of the room is heard on the soundtrack, interspersed with the sound of a hammer banging.
Mother (offscreen): Go to your company store, tomorrow.We don't have any formula left.
Zahra passes her notebook to Ali.
Father (offscreen): Don't worry.
Father (offscreen): Rahim Aqa's wife had a slipped disc. Surgery made it worse.
Alternate close ups of Ali and Zahra listening to their parents' conversation and looking at each other.
Cut to
Middle distance shot of Mother lying on a bed, towards the left of the frame, leaning back against two propped up pillows. Father is sitting on a chair beyond the bed near the wall, chopping wooden flints with a hammer on a block. Behind him are two ledges on which are seen some vessels and clothes.
Father: You should learn to live with it.
Cut to
Close up of Ali reading from the book Zahra has passed on to him.
Mother (offscreen): What do you want me to do? Do nothing all day?
Ali starts writing in the notebook.
Father (offscreen) : Well, the doctor has forbidden work.
Ali writes ‘you can go to school with slippers’ (mumbling the words as he writes) and passes the notebook to Zahra. Close up of the notebook.
Mother (offscreen): Kokab Khanom's sister had surgery, and she's fine.
Cut to close up of Zahra taking the notebook and reading what Ali has written in it.
Father (offscreen): Don't ever think about surgery. Alternate close ups of Zahra and Ali looking at each other.
Father (offscreen): I don't want you to become crippled.
Cut to close up of Zahra writing in the notebook.
(mumbling as she writes): Ali, you have some nerve. You lost my shoes. I'll tell Dad. Quick close up of Ali looking at Zahra. She passes the notebook to Ali. Close
up of the notebook.
The conversation of their parents continues on the soundtrack, now less audible, interspersed by the beat of the hammer on the block. Close up of Ali writing in
the notebook.
Two close ups of Father working on the other end of the room looking at the camera, interspersed with close ups of Ali and Zahra and a middle range shot showing them.
Ali writes in the notebook and passes it to Zahra.
Zahra reads what Ali has written in the notebook in a whisper: ‘Zahra, if you tell Dad, he'll beat both of us. Because he doesn't have money to buy you a pair of
shoes’
Zahra writes 'Then what should I do?' in the notebook and passes it to Ali. Ali writes 'You can wear my sneakers' and passes the notebook back.
Zahra writes 'I'll wear them when you are back from school' .
During the passing of the notebook back and forth, only the notebook in close up and hands are visible in the frame.
Close up of Zahra writing. The stub of her pencil breaks. Ali puts his pencil on the notebook for her to write. Zahra does not take the pencil. Close up of pencil lying
on the notebook.
My sister‟s shoe depicts four scenes of a family drama of the film "Children of heaven‟ by Majid Majidi. Prepare a review of the screen play.
Children of
Heaven is a 1997 Iranian family
drama
film written and directed by Majid
Majidi. It deals with a brother and sister and their adventures
over a lost pair of shoes. My sister’s shoe is an extract taken
from the screen play ‘Children of Heaven'.
The film starts with
the close up shot of a cobbler stitching a girls' shoe. From the very
beginning of the film, the camera is catching up the life of the
people from the lowest strata of the society. Ali is the
protagonist of the film. He is a school boy. He receives his sisters'
shoe from the cobbler and turns to a bakery . The visuals from the
bakery project the unhygienic conditions exist there.
Holding a bundle of
Nan and his sisters' shoe ,Ali crosses the street to enter into a
vegetable store .He places the bundle of nan on top of a pile of
boxes of vegetables stacked in front of the shop and the bag of shoes
in the small gap between two boxes.
When Ali picks up
some big tomatoes,the shop keeper asks him to pick up smaller ones
.At this time through a cut to view of the shop from the pavement, we
see a junk collector appears in front of the shop and takes away the
sister’s shoe as junk. Ali hands over the tomatoes to the shop
keeper but he does not put the tomatoes in the balance. Instead he
weighs it by his hand and says the price. The shop keeper responds
harshly as Ali requests him to put it on their tab.
Finding that the
shoe has been missed,he frantically searches it and the vegetable
boxes are tumbled down . The angry shop keeper abuses and frightens
the boy. Ali has no other way but to flee from the scene.
In the fourth scene
we see Ali and Zahra communicate each other through their notebooks,
Zahra want to inform her father that her shoe has been lost. Ali
tells her that their father will beat both of them as he has no money
to buy a new one. She was fully aware that buying shoes was beyond
their means. She agreed to go to school by wearing his sneakers. When
Ali and Zahra communicates by passing their note book ,the
conversation of their parents and the sound of a hammer banging are
played in the sound track.
The pathetic
condition of poverty stricken life of the family is portrayed
through appropriate sound tracks , marvelous shots and brilliant
camera angles.
Read the conversation between Ali and the junk collector and complete it suitably.
Ali : Uncle, you collect junk from the town every day, .........(a).............?
Junk collector: Yes, I do it every day.
Ali : ................(b).........................?
Junk collector: Yes, I collected some things from Akbar’s shop.
Ali : Was there a parcel of shoes in the junk? I lost my sister’s shoes at Akbar’s
shop yesterday.
Junk collector: I can’t say it exactly. I just dumped the entire junk in the company site.
If I get it, ...............(c)...................... .
Ali : ............(d)......................?
Junk collector: It’s very near.
Ali : Ok, uncle. Thank you. Bye.
Junk collector: Bye.
Answers:
a) don’t you? b) Did you collect anything from Akbar’s shop? c) I will inform you. /
I will give it back to Akbar. d) Where is your company site?
You have read the screenplay ‘My Sister’s Shoes’. Retell this as a story to one of your friends. Prepare the narrative.
Children of
Heaven is a 1997 Iranian family
drama
film written and directed by Majid
Majidi. It deals with a brother and sister and their adventures
over a lost pair of shoes.
Ali and Zahra were living in a very poor family with their parents. Their father was a labourer without much work and money. Their mother was sick and bed-ridden due to a slipped disc. One day Ali took his sister’s shoes to a cobbler to get them repaired. While returning home with them he entered a vegetable shop. He kept the bag of shoes in a small gap between two vegetable boxes. He wanted to buy some vegetable and he started collecting potatoes. Meanwhile a junk-collector came and took some garbage from the shop. Thinking the bag of shoes as junk he took it and went away. When Ali finished buying potatoes he searched for the bag of shoes. But he could find it nowhere there. In his frantic efforts to find them, he tumbled the boxes and vegetables scattered on the ground. Seeing this, the shop
owner Akbar frenzied with anger shouted at Ali to flee from there. In utmost disappointment the boy returned home. . He was afraid that if Zahra told his father about it, he would beat both of them. He suggested Zahra to wear his sneakers to school in the morning and return them to him at midday so that he could attend afternoon classes. She agreed and thus saved both of them from their father's anger.
Assignment
Imagine that you are the convener of the school
English club. The club has decided to conduct a
one day Movie fest in your school. Prepare a
notice to invite everyone to watch the movies.
ABC SCHOOL
Notice
FILM FESTIVAL
Dear friends.
The English club of ABC school is organising a film
festival on Monday, 12th march 2021 from 10.00 am to 5.00 pm
in the school auditorium The films ‘Children of heaven’,’Birds’,
‘The Kid’,’Pather Panchali will be screened. The famous film
director Sri. Shaji N Karun will inaugurate the film festival.
All are welcome,
Place sd/
Date The Secretary
English club, ABC School
Programme
Welcome speech : School leader
Presidential address : Head master
Inaugural address : Shaji N Karun
Felicitations : Staff secretary
: Senior Assistant
Vote of thanks : Club Secretary
