EMBERS
Overview
"Embers" is a british independent short film directed by Michael Ord, based on the award winning script by writer Miles Burchell.
The film centers a round a group of friends who, after a traumatic event try to rekindle their friendship on a camping trip in the woods. However, things don't go as planned...
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Capturing raw emotion - The look of Embers
Embers is a character focused, intimate drama that puts follows protagonist Gary through a time of grief, guilt and anger. He disconnects himself from his group of friends, trying to find redemption in seclusion, unable to confront his own guilt.
There is no middle ground in the camerawork: it either intrudes everyones comfort zone by being as close as possible or observes the events from quite far away.
It was important to keep the cinematography simple, to focus on the actors performances while also creating a visual world world around these performances that evolves and changes as the characters grow.
To achieve that, I split the cinematography into 2 styles: handheld camera with back and forth movements and floating, smooth wide shots that start to take over as the more supernatural elements come into play.
Handheld camera was primarily used for interactions between the group: they are angry, disconnected and the camera jumps from character to character, never really getting the whole group into one shot. It is searching for a connection, searching for warmth within the conflict, just to jump back again and start over. That is combined with wide shots that show the loneliness, the seclusion of the characters. They are a a group, but it can be seen and felt that each of them is in their own space, not even registering the others at times
Once things turn supernatural, the style changes. The camera starts to hover and float around, it takes a stance further away from the group, almost stalks them through the forest. It signals that there someone else observing these events, someone who watches them from outside their shaky conflicts. These floating shots continue and take over until the situation is finally resolved with a long flashback and the group is finally allowed to be together again, as friends.
Chaos after the crash - A look at the car crash sequence
One of Embers most complex scenes is showing the aftermath of a fatal car crash, following the main cast as they desperately try to deal with the situation.
Very early in production it was decided that the best way to capture the films most emotional moment would be to let it play out in one long take with the camera trying to keep up with the actors frantic and panicked movements.
In a way the camera movements mirror the eyes of an invisible bystander, looking between the characters and the car, trying to figure out what's going on in between the smoke and the panicked passengers.
In a way this fifth bystander could also be seen as the just deceased Shaun, playing in line with the overarching idea of the camera acting as a floating spirit, observing the actions of the remaining friends.
The shot of the crash aftermath also mirrors the very first shot of the film, which sees the characters getting into the car, only are the movements here reversed, completing the cycle of Shaun's demise.