Modern Traditions
Short-Film | 5m | 2024
The Idea
Modern Traditions came from my understanding, as I made my way through the first year of Film School, that the polarization we see in society has also spread into the industry and audience's approach to art and entertainment.
When we were presented the chance of pitching for a silent film, as part of a Short Film Production module, I knew that I wanted to do something that would reflect my passion for the old school black and white comedies, as well as a project that actually said something about how I see the world around me.
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From this sentiment came Modern Traditions, a 5-minute slapstick comedy short film about to flat mates that can't choose what to watch together.
The Visuals
With the intention of approaching my favourite silent comedies with a newfound spirit, I thought that it would be interesting to use modern techniques, that sort of break the barrier of acknowledgment of fiction.
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Something that I've always felt about those comedies is that they were always honest and aware of being films. Since, at the time, the movies were such a novelty, the films themselves were almost too transparent. I wished to combine that, in the performative aspect, with cinematography that was closer to the modern fiction approach that enhances voyeurism.
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The posters on the right were made with stills from the actual film, and were a great oportunity for me to learn how to translate the tone and mood of a film into a single marketable snapshot.
Directing I
It being my first time Directing, I was very lucky to have a cast and crew that was fully on board with the spirit of how I wanted to conduct the set. As I've been on more sets, in any role, I've realized that my favourite crews are the ones that find efficiency and quality in being focused and relaxed. There needs to be space for laughing, for talking; filmmaking is a language, so the process of making a film can't flow against human communication and connection.
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This being said, I really enjoyed helping the actors, Monty and Tom, to reach their characters, especially in the physicality that we desired. We created a lot of the improvised physical comedy bits on rehearsals, and constructed a dynamic that I feel brought their characters more alive.​
Directing II
When it comes to actually materializing the shots I first envisioned with the DP, Jiayi Wu, we struggled a little bit with the dimensions of the set. Shooting on a stage that was made for one-way shooting, we had to cheat almost every single shot, playing with the depth of the room and the distances between objects. Although some of these tweaks are noticeable on screen, this certainly made the shoot more enriching, from a learning perspective, forcing me to change the way I approach pre-production.
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Regarding post-production, I had a really fun time with the Editor, Enzo Yeung, playing around with the pace and cutting rythms, as well as the coverage we had. Editing for comedy is certainly hard, but since we had already designed it in a middle-ground between old-school and new-school comedies, the cut just had to find the flow of the performances, capturing the comedy beats in the most visually appealing way.
