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The product represents the issue of mental illness. It shows what people can experience if they have schizophrenia. Like hearing voices that aren't there. Mental illness in media is normally portrayed as hurtful thing. As something that normally makes someone a villain when in reality they just need help. That stigma is insanely hurtful for people that deal with serious mental illness. As someone who has a parent that deals with schizophrenia, I've seen it first hand. The person can’t differentiate their reality from the false one. They’re both existing at the same time. They can’t trust their own eyes, brain, or ears. While mental illness is a scary thing to watch someone go through. You can only imagine how scary it is for the person who's experiencing it. Some people have to experience the side effects of mental illness for years before they’re eligible to be diagnosed. Like Borderline Personality Disorder is only able to be diagnosed after the age of 18. While other mental illnesses can randomly happen to the person when they are older. Like people normally have schizophrenic breaks in their 20s after they’re triggered. They live life quite normally but till then.
Mental illness is becoming more prevalent in our society, which is why the film sheds light on it. No matter what social class you are in. No matter how old you are. No matter where you live. Everyone will likely experience some symptoms of mental illness. It can be episodes of experiencing depression due to loss or heartbreak, or suffering long-term due to major depressive disorder. Everyone knows what it feels like, which is why people should have some idea of how majorly it can affect your everyday life. In Bedlam it greatly affects the main character Lucy’s everyday life. To the point where she must take medication. Which is common for people that experience mental illness.
There’s a constant questioning within the film of “did this actually happen?” or a “how did this end up like this?” . Which creates the branding of the film. You can constantly see Lucy questioning her reality. Her everyday life no longer makes sense. She’s losing it throughout the film. It goes from mishearing her mom speak to her, to possibly misplacing a cup, to fully imagining an interaction with her friend. The film is confusing to watch, but it’s purposely like that. It’s how people with schizophrenia live day to day. They're in a constant state of questioning their reality. Lucy is shown in the beginning of the film to “take” medication. She doesn’t take the medication then, it’s part of the false reality she’s experiencing. At the end of the film, she takes her medication. The short scene is crucial to the plot, but it’s not known till the end of the film. The name of the film Bedlam is also purposely confusing. It means a scene of chaos, madness or great confusion. Which is happening to Lucy in the film, The term also is the name of an Asylum for the mentally ill in London. It foreshadows the events in the film, and where Lucy is actually being housed.
The non-diegetic sound in the beginning sequence is also used at the end of the film also. It’s used to tie the scenes together. The film starts off in the first-person point-of-view. While the entire film isn’t shot in first person, it’s told in the first-person point of view. It sets up the entire film, and is the reason the events happen. At the end of the film, the entire film is quickly recapped. It's to show that it was all in her head. There’s no throwaway scenes in the film. It’s all purposeful
The product engages with the audience by being confusing. When watching the film the first time the audience will likely not understand what’s going on within it. They may be able to correctly assume that the main character is schizophrenic, but it’s not likely. The audience would have to watch the film several times to understand what really happened. That’s the entire reason of the film. The scenes of miscommunication between the friends leave the audience in the shoes of Lucy. They’re just as confused as she is. It makes you as a watcher question what happened in the film, as Lucy is questioning the same thing. You can clearly hear the mom yell goodbye to her as she leaves. Only to learn the mom has been gone for a while. But you clearly heard her yell. The audience knows what they heard and so does Lucy. But the proof of the note on the fridge shows that Lucy was just hearing things. It makes no sense and causes her to question her reality. Along with the entire hangout and the fight between the friends. Lucy not showing up to the hanout at the bookstore, makes sense after they fought the last time they hung out. But you then learn that the friend had been with her dad the day before and not with Lucy. Lucy’s reality makes sense till there’s other people’s inference and interaction within it. The name of the film is unusual. It’s likely that the audience will search up what the word Bedlam means. If the view does it first it will cause foreshadowing when they watch it, and when it ends, they’ll come to the epiphany of why the film is named as such. If the viewer searches it up after, they’ll quickly understand why the film was named Bedlam.
The product adheres and also challenges conventions. uses the common convention of a plot twist in short films. The plot twist creates a surprising ending for a film, and they can easily tie a film together. The product of bedlam uses the plot twist to make sense of the misunderstandings within the film. Such as hearing voices that weren’t there or having a whole interaction that didn’t happen. It creates a smooth ending and explanation for the confusing film. The plot is very quickly done, everything happens back-to-back. Which is a common convention of short films to a certain degree. A short film is a film that's under 40 minutes including all the credits. There was a 5-minute time limit for the film. So, there’s no time for any filler scenes, or a lot of character development. The film had to have a condensed plot, with quick plot devices. So it went slightly against that convention, while also adhering to it. While the plot was condensed, it was quite confusing, while most short films have a simple plot, because there's no time for complexity. The plot is quite complex when watching it, it’s hard to understand. The main character has schizophrenia and she believes that she is still out in the world but she’s actually in an Asylum and everything happened in her head. Nothing in the film actually happened. There were only 2 characters within the film, which is common in short films, because you don’t have the time to develop a lot of characters, and a small amount of time to develop the ones you have. The genre of the film is thriller, in thrillers there’s normally a lot of suspense. There’s not much suspense in the film, but that is mainly due to the time limit. The suspense is questioning what's wrong with the reality in the film, and why it’s not making sense.
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