Brief bio
My name is Sun, and I am a junior student. I like watching movies, especially action movies and horror movies, which could excite me. I am taking the course on ‘European Cinema’ this semester, and I had watched several art movies that our teacher recommended to us. I gradually find it interesting to watch art films. When I watch an action movie or horror movie, I just follow the main character through the story, while art movies could make me step away from the main character and think about the deeper meaning. Therefore, I create this blog to share my ideas, and I am looking forward to your comments.
The film Rosetta uses documentary-style shooting techniques to show the living conditions of marginalized characters in social transformation, and the shaking of the hand-held camera, the natural light and sound give the film a strong sense of reality. The directors of this movie, Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne also used many medium shots and close-up shots to show the character's inner struggle, and the camera is like the eyes of the audience, allowing the audience to enter Rosetta’s life.
What is more, the character performance in Rosetta is internalized, using a large number of close-up shots to observe the micro-expressions of the characters for a long time. At the same time, there are few dialogues in the film, which means that the film does not rely on character dialogue to promote the plot. I will analyze the last shot in Rosetta, which begins at 1:23:04 and ends at 1:28:12, and I will discuss how the above-mentioned factors are presented in this shot. Also, I will give my interpretation.
This is the last shot of Rosetta, in other words, it is the end of the movie. Before this shot, Rosetta returned her home in a trailer park and found her mother drinking again, these were the things she desperately wanted to avoid, and the reasons she was eager to work. Rosetta carried her mother home, and after cooking the eggs, she went out and called her boss to quit her job. Then she turned on the gas to commit suicide, but God made a joke for her, the gas was not enough.
The character of Rosetta has transformed, in the beginning, she was ‘unscrupulous’ to get a job, and she even betrayed Riquet, the only one who showed her kindness, so that she can take his place, while now she quitted her hard-won job, she did not give up her job until she decided to die. The last scene takes place in the trailer park where Rosetta wants to escape most.
Morgan (2008) finds that Rosetta is ashamed of living in the park, or rather unwilling to admit that she lives with other poor people who are excluded from society. However, she does not leave this encampment at the end of the movie. Rosetta realized that her hard work had made no difference, her mother was still a drinker, she had to live in the park, and the shame of betraying Riquet had so consumed her that she decided to commit suicide, but failed.
There is no background music in this shot, we can hear Rosetta’s heavy, labored, and unstable breathing. All Rosetta said was to ask the campground's manager for gas, and the rest of the time she was silent. In addition to the human voice, the buzz of the motorcycle is also the focus of this shot. The buzz of the motorcycle represents Riquet’s arrival, he came last time to bring Rosetta a new job, but this time he was there to interrogate her. Rosetta did not want to face him because when she saw him, she would think of abandoning her dignity to get a job. His presence reminded Rosetta of the bad things she had done to get a job. Now she did not want to live, and she was more afraid of the humiliation.
Nevertheless, Riquet did not denounce her in words, instead, he rode his motorbike around and around Rosetta to express his anger at being betrayed. As shown in figure 1, Riquet kept staring at Rosetta, but she was too ashamed to look up at him. She kept walking forward, trying to escape. When Riquet came to the park to find her for the first time, Rosetta immediately rushed forward to fight him, because Riquet knew her residence, and this is something she always wanted to hide. But this time, Rosetta just wanted to avoid him, not confront what she had done wrong. Rosetta held the gas canister in her arms, her eyes fixed on it, and when she returned she might or might not commit suicide, the gas canister seemed to make the difference between life and death.
Finally, as shown in figure 2, Rosetta's insistence seemed to crumble as she fell, and she wept uncontrollably, and this movie ends with the picture presented in figure 3. This shot can be recognized as a humiliation scene, however, ‘In Rosetta, humiliation is not its own end.’ (Mai, 2010, p.81). Figure 3 is a medium close-up shot, we can see Rosetta’s face and her expression.
After Riquet helped her up, she looked him in the eye for a rare moment, perhaps for the first time. The camera focuses on her face, we could find that instead of being so hostile to everything around her or cooped up in her little world, Rosetta seemed to soften. We can also feel her guilt, her need for friends. Until then Rosetta had been alone, living with her mother, who had lost her desire to live well, but she found that Riquet was with her now. This ending is not a humiliation but represents Rosetta's liberation. She realizes that she is not alone and is no longer controlled by work. She no longer needs to abandon her face and dignity to retain a humble job.
Mai (2010, p.81) claims that ‘the end of the film also presents a discrete act of social rebellion’. Rosetta was no longer the one who would give up anything for a job, and she chose not to conform to such social conventions. In summary, humiliation is not its own end, while liberation is.
Reference list
Mai, J. (2010). Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne. Illinois: University of Illinois Press.
Morgan, J. (2008). The Social Realism of Body Language in "Rosetta". The French Review, 81(6), 1187-1196.
