BLOG ENTRY – Early Previs Work (February to March)

This previs was created during the February to March previs sessions, when I was still figuring out the basic behaviour of the characters and the emotional direction of the film. Nothing was painted yet and nothing had the stylistic weight it has now, but the foundations of the story were already forming here.

The previs opens with a man sitting on a couch. He is scratching at the sofa. Even in this very rough stage, I wanted the scratching to feel uncomfortable to watch. It was a simple gesture that hinted at irritation and a kind of inner friction that the character can’t contain. This moment stayed important, because even in the final film I rely heavily on hand movements to express emotion. Hands feel like an extension of a person’s will, and if you twist them or push them in the wrong direction, they can make the viewer feel uneasy. So even though this previs was basic, the soul of that idea was already present.

The next shot in this previs follows a belt on the ground. At the time, I liked the idea for what it suggested about the man. The belt was never meant to just be an object. It hinted at the father’s abusive nature, especially when paired with the alcohol and cigarette boxes scattered around. It says a lot about someone when their influence over a space only appears through objects, and it creates a feeling of weakness or cowardice too, because he relies on the belt to assert himself. It is environmental storytelling without having to show anything directly.

This long shot also worked as a place to introduce the title of the film. I always had an interest in bringing the title into the world rather than placing it as traditional text over a black screen. Even in the previs stage, I was thinking about how the title could appear inside the space the characters live in.

The derelict environment was another important part of this previs. The mess around him was there to show the state of his life, but later on it became more meaningful when I started contrasting this scene with flashbacks and other rooms in the house. Those later scenes are cleaner and more put together, which sharpens the sense of decline that the father has gone through. This early previs helped me realise that the contrast between spaces would become an important visual tool.

When I look back at this previs, I can see how it shaped my decisions later. I kept the long shot pacing, but once I committed to the painted world, I made all the shots static. Moving the camera would break the idea that every frame is a finished painting. This meant letting go of certain pans or tracking shots I originally liked, but the static framing supports the canvas-like style much better.

Even though this previs was rough, it played a huge role in the final film. It helped me understand the character, the environment, and what I needed the audience to feel from the very first moments. The scratching, the belt, the dereliction, the tension between objects and behaviour – all of these started here long before I settled on the painterly aesthetic.