Premise, Synopsis and storyboard

Premise

A ballet dancer trains rigorously for her craft through drudgery, pain and fatigue in preparation for a brief moment of perfection in the spot light.

Synopsis

The basis of my film is to represent the correlation between the life of a ballet dancer

and her pointe shoes. Both start off untrained and stiff and slowly soften to become

perfect until they are broken and thrown away as they cannot be used again.

At the beginning of the film the dancer is very stiff as are her ballet shoes, she sews

ribbons onto them and tries them on. It is uncomfortable at first as she works into a

rhythm of practice with her teacher tapping a cane to give her beat to keep time to.

During her training the ballerina repeats the same movements while her stern teacher

positions her harshly and uncomfortably. It is also during this period of drudgery and

repetition the ballerina bashes her shoes to the same beat as the teachers cane to

make them more comfortable.

During a break from her training, the viewer gets an insight at the toll that training is

taking on the ballerina when her feet are shown bruised and bandaged and her face is

shown tired and slightly aged. The ballerina takes a moment to rest and then puts her

shoes back onto her battered feet, stands, takes a breath and then continues with her

training.

The ballerina takes another moment to rest as she holds onto the practice barre whilst

squatting. The ballerina then prances back up and starts to pirouette across the room

practicing once more.

The ballerina decides as a last resort to fully break in her shoes by bending them until

the supporting part of the sole snaps and proceeds to cut out the inner sole. It is then that

the ballerina gets ready for her performance, doing her hair, putting on her tutu and putting

on her make up. She looks into the mirror and it is shown that she looks even more tired and

aged but that is covered up by make up. She pats out her tutu and readies herself for the

stage where she dances perfectly in the spot light. Her shoes are perfectly softened and

prepared and her training is complete. The film ends with her shoes being thrown away

as she limps away finished.

Story Board

I created a story board and after having a tutorial with Leonie was advised on what to change and this is the final result.(read from left to right). A few changes need to be made namely angles on certain shots need to be made more dynamic and the dance choreography at the end need more thought as it was slightly rushed and I'm quite simply not happy with it. At the end I have decided to have her shoes being thrown at a bin as it is not clear she is discarding them completely, it just looks like shes throwing them to the floor.

The ballerina takes her shoes from their box. Sews ribbons onto them, puts them on and goes onto pointe to test them out.


The ballerina goes straight down from being on pointe and it was clearly uncomfortable as she shakes her foot to rid her of the discomfort. She takes to the bar, positions herself, glances into the mirror showing her face to the viewer and starts her exercises. A certain tap tap, tap tap beat follows as she does her movements.

The ballerina carries on with her exercises and a shot of her stern teacher appears. He adds to the beat with a cane which he taps upon the floor in a steady pace to keep the dancer in a rythem.

She continues her training. She is shown in discomfort being pushed into the splits and adds to the beat with her bashing her shoe to get it more softened.

More awkward positioning from her tutor. She does pirouettes, the cane still taps.

More awkward positioning. More shoe bashing and more uncomfortable exercises. She slashes into the bottom of her ballet shoe.

She is shown slashing her ballet shoe and the camera shows her sat on the floor. Tired and her feet beaten and bruised. She looks in the mirror, shes aged and tired looking. She glances at her feet, puts her shoes back on and stands.

She stands, takes a deep breath and starts to dance again. She is shown tired again and is hanging onto the bar.

She hops up and begins to dance energetically again. The time has come for her to break the back of her shoes and to snap the support inside them. She then proceeds to yank it out.

Its show night and she is in her dressing room doing her hair. Her face in the mirror shows that she is more tired and aged and covers her face with make up. She stands, puffs up her tutu and the camera fades to her on stage.