The Forgotten

Therapist Scenes

The first sessionThere is no non-diegetic sounds in this scene, all it consists of is different camera shots and editing. I think this is done so we focus on what the therapist says and try and get an image of the woman and what she’s like and why she’s there. Its to build character profile in a serious way. They start the meeting normally where the therapist just asks her about her relationships with her husband and if everything is okay between them.

I think we should use this method when we film our therapist scene, having no music and using mid-shots so the audience focuses more on what the characters are saying thus helps them understand the narrative more clearly.

The next part is effective as it makes us question the woman and her state of mind. She seems confused and not of grip of reality. Dr: What’s wrongTelly: I had my coffeeDr: No not todayTelly: Noo I just had someDr: I offered but you said no this time, last time you had one… Memory slipsTelly: No I didn’t. I can still taste the coffee.

At this point you can see that she’s trying to persuade her therapist and herself that she has had a coffee. Obviously because we don’t know much about her we get the impression that her mind is elsewhere which is why her memory is not good. We start to question her as a character and I found this quite effective as we could use this idea to confuse the audience and have mixed idea’s about a character which will make them think more and not know who to trust which is vital in a psychological horror.

Dr: You erm, you smell my coffee, and you manufacture a memory, a taste that’s all. You do hang on hard. Sometimes the mind needs help in letting a thing go Terry: You expect me to let go of my son? Dr: You think you amplify some of these memories of Sam? Add to them?Terry: No, why would I?

On this scene we realise why Terry is in therapy, she’s missing her son. Although we don’t know what happened to her son we still sympathise with Terry. I thought the way the conversation shifts like this manipulates the audiences head and their views of Terry. It moves from the audience thinking that Terry is crazy to thinking that she’s just mourning

over the loss of her son. Again this makes the audience have mixed opinions on Terry which is exactly what we need to do in our film, create questions in the audiences head and manipulate the way they feel. Also the end question that the Dr asks makes the audience think and ask questions. What does the Dr mean? Why would he ask that? Is there something about Terry we need to know?

The second session After the photograph incident (explained on the post of The Forgotten Analysis) Terry has another session with the Dr. This is where the story starts to unfold and confuse the audience because Terry’s husband explains to her that she imagined all the pictures of Sam.

Terry: Do you know what he’s telling meDr: YesTerry: Is he psychotic Dr: NoTerry: My child, my SamDr: Telly, there was never a Sam Puretta, you never had a son

This is where we got our idea from, making a character who has had a family member or friend who they were close to, then suddenly everyone tells them that they’re delusional and that the person they knew never existed. To make this effective we needed to twist the audiences thoughts and confuse them. In ‘The Forgotten’ it is done well through what the Dr says to Terry during this scene. What we thought was effective was the way he explains what’s happened to her and what condition she’s in.

Terry: (Laughs) This is insaneDr: I’m so sorry I wanted to help you slowly, gently but I never thought that you-Terry: No, he erased the tape, replaced the book with an empty book. How can you believe him? Sam he grew up he was nine. NINE. I had NINE years of memories.Dr: Invented memories, Terry, it happens. People do this, it’s call paramnesia. You imagined a life-Terry: NO everyone remembers Sam. EVERYONE.

At this point the audience are unsure who to believe. At the beginning we were sure that she had a son due to going to her therapist and all the toys and photographs. Even when I first watched the film I was unsure of what to think and who to believe.

However the way she’s acting so desperate and explaining to him what her husband did without any proof is hard to believe, but we saw the photographs as well, she couldn’t have imagined them. Due to her husband being portrayed as a good man and gets uncomfortable when she talks about being psychotic makes us re-think.

Husband: Terry you had a miscarriage, your life was indanger, the baby was pre-mature, it was still born, you almost died. Dr: Post dramatic shock, it effects everyone differently, sometimes people actually invent entire alternate lives with imagined friends and lovers and children Terry: STOP IT. WHY ARE YOU DOING THIS. Why are you both trying to take him away from me. I made him up? I made him up? (Laughs) Dr and Husband look at each other uncomfortably Terry: Cries. This is so simple. There are photographs Dr: People with your condition, they can look at a photograph and see what their mind tells them to see, you used to see Sam. You’re recovering.

This again makes us re-think everything. The photographs especially, did we see them from her point of view? Did we see what she wanted to see or did we actually see the real photographs before someone actually erased them.