The UnspokenA close analysis

Overview• The film is a confronting look at

a filmmaker’s personal journey to reach out to his dying father, before he slips away from cancer.

• It is a eulogy expressed while his father is still able to hear the normally ‘unspoken’ words of love, reflective of the transition of life’s stages – from care giver to care receiver.

Overview• Key themes include the

transitional cycles of life, familial relationships, the expression of paternal love, the frailty of old age,and making the most of life – creatively and expressively.

OverviewThe voice is that of the everyday vernacular expressing the eulogistic reflections of a son to his father. Their relationship is foregrounded, through the nature and character of the father.

OverviewThe fragility and helplessness of illness and age are also foregrounded as is the enduring relationship between husband and wife ‘surviving life’s curve balls’.

The film starts with a rhetorical question and repetition that engages the audience to reflect on the idea that it is “crazy we can spend all our life with people really really close around us but never really expressing what they mean to us.”

• The reflection foreshadows the spoken eulogy – not one that is ‘forced and that they are never going to hear’.

• The side shot of the father with captions that flicker to emphasise the roles the father has played in life ‘husband, father, mate sculptor, builder, labourer”. • The narrator states simply “my

dad’s 83 and he has terminal lung cancer.” This is emphasized by the graphic ‘cancer warrior’.

The voiceover that states that “Dad, this film is all the things I NEED you to hear.”This is reinforced by the direct address and graphic ‘Unspoken’ which fades to ‘Spoken’.

The surprise that is felt when the effects of age and illness are wrought on parents is expressed in the hyperbolic admission that “I always thought you were completely indestructible”, illustrated by the demand gaze of the father.

Close up of eyes and hands reinforces the accumulation of the father’s skills, “build, fix or solve” - juxtaposed now to their ‘clutching an armchair every day”.

The narrator reflects on the ‘incredible mind just staring out of the window” contrasted to the “same mind that used to burst alive with all those quick quips and stories and dry jokes” which “now hold the key” to inspire the son to “tell stories of my own”.

Adjectives such as quick & incredible with a close-up of his father’s pinched mouth show, the effect of illness and age on the once vibrant story telling.

The paradox of that mind that was “too weak “to step outside the window yet too strong to not at least try” foreground that “time and cancer have wilted your frame.”

This is compared to the once broad shoulders that physically and metaphorically lifted the son up and showed him the world with completely new eyes.

This is highlighted by a low angle shot showing the fragile yet heroic frame of the old man, emphasized also by the zoom out to a mid-shot of the father’s now aged shoulders.

The transitional nature of life’s cycle is highlighted in the statement that it was “now my time to lift you up” – emphasised by the close up of the clock – symbolic code for the passing of time and its effect on relationships.

The POV, while still that of the son, shifts to reflections on the nature of being a father and the statement that “it takes a pretty special person to be a dad”.

Use of alliteration and listing accentuates the special nature of being a dad who can “write the rules and provide and protect”. The reply comes in the statement that “you always did that”. This is contrasted with a high angle shot that emphasizes the smallness of the man while paradoxically commenting on his extraordinary stature as a ‘special dad’.

• A perspective is offered on generational relationships and the way his father was “robbed of a family.”

• Yet new relationships and fatherhood can compensate by “giving love back”.

• Visually, we are given the father’s perspective of his own relationships as he sorts through old photographs.

• The narrator highlights the nature of fatherhood as a way of giving and gaining love – with the colloquial comment that “I love you in buckets”.

The wider relationship of husband and wife highlights also the richness of the father’s relationships – the close-up of the ‘couple in an embrace highlights, through facial expressions and gestures, the supportive relationship of “battling on together” in life.

• Juxtaposition of the embrace to a close up shot of the husband and the out of focus image of his ‘carer’ wife is symbolic the impact that terminal cancer has had on their relationship.

• The use of the sporting analogy “falling into each other is just beautiful, always managing to survive life’s little curve balls no matter where they come from” makes the point that this is yet another stage of life to be negotiated, emphasised by the overlay of images of their faces, a couple who have metaphorically become one over time, eyes looking into each other’s soul.

• Values of ‘curtsey, respect and ambition” have ‘filled my being’. •Understanding of the role of parent is presented in the use of the colloquialism ‘mate’ – highlighting the equality and understanding now achieved by the adult son who is ‘really, really thankful you said ‘no’ as many times as you said ‘yes’.

The narrator expresses his ‘awe’ of his father’s ‘creative spirit’ which is highlighted through a workshop scene of a man who, despite age, is still able to demonstrate that creativity which metaphorically ‘shapes’ the son into the person he is today.

• The stereotype of the inability of a father to “struggle to put into words” his love for his son is transformed through sculpture into “amazing’ pieces of art that spoke to me more than any language could”.

This highlights the way love can be expressed in other ways.

This is recognised by the narrator in the repetition of “you inspired me mate, you inspired me to see things differently”.

This is further expressed through oxymoron of “the solemn beauty and the tortured lines” of the creations.

This is visually is portrayed as an overlay of images, the artwork and the father – representing that the father expresses himself through his work.

“I heard you speak to me.”

• The quiet finality of the declaration that ‘if there is nothing more in time that I get to tell you, then these few words at least you’ll hear. I love you mate, thank you” is accompanied by the non-diagetic sound of the music ‘At the battle’s end’.

• This alludes to life’s ‘battle’ with its triumphs and tragedies yet, in this eulogy it is one of victory which again is reinforced by the solemn music, its tone supporting the eulogistic monologue.