Movies for TV - Early Television Foundation

PLANNING THE SCENE 263
Father should be a big, rough, strong-willed, but affectionate
man. Daughter should be small but with an equally strong will.
Her woman's nature compels the gentleness shown in the next
action where she kneels and pleads with him to agree.
After her show of spirit, her love for her father makes her submit
herself in effect by kneeling by him. The domination is now
complete. We have the huge, uncouth father standing and the
slight girl kneeling by him. He towers over her. Then the anticlimax.
. . . The powerful man gives in.
We now have a combination of broken lines which give a
feeling of informality and lack of tension and horizontal lines
which express peace and repose. After the storm of the scene is
over the shot of reconciliation is held for a few seconds. Then . . .
Daughter gets up and rushes to the window.
The quiet mood is fractured by the rush to the window
and we wonder what she is going to do now. Again there is the
grouping that presages opposition or action. She opens
Fred.
it and calls
Fred climbs in through the window and is framed in it while
the shot is taken down the table to impose a concentration of in-
terest on him and group the family around his figure as it appears.
The audience sees him as a somewhat small man who is not too
much at ease in the presence of Father and he walks across to a
seat.
This script shows a number of situations which were brought
in rapidly to demonstrate the various combinations of lines and
that it has ever
placement which are possible. It is not suggested
been used on television or ever will be (heaven prevent it!).
The placement of the characters and objects in the frame has
a most important bearing on the impact on the viewer and varies
according to the degree of emphasis desired from any particular
part of the scene. This includes consideration and intelligent use
of angle shots. Many aspects of adequate pictorial composition are
overlooked by producers in their anxiety to get on with the show.
This is often due to inadequate budgets and insufficient rehearsal
time.