What is being represented?
The things that are being represented in Life After Jim are: the feelings of loss, despair and depression that come with losing a loved one. I wanted to represent the perpetual circles that come with serious depression, and the notion that people in so much pain can never really move on from it. I wanted to portray a constant internal battle between Caroline’s want to move on with her life, but her inability to do so due to her ties with the past, ending up leaving her in the same place as she was before. She talks herself into thinking she is happy where she is, when she knows deep down she will fall back into depression once more.
The following questions are answered throughout this explanation of the film: How is it represented? Using what codes? Within what genre? How is the representation made to seem 'true', 'commonsense' or 'natural'?
Throughout the voiceover there is an obvious sense of Caroline battling with herself, and talking herself into happiness. There is a clear cycle in what she says and the way she says it. At the beginning she sounds tired and lethargic. The dialogue and pacing is slow, culminating in a very real imagining of Jim’s death, shown through sound, with a zoom into her eye and a car crash sound effect. A black screen follows to symbolise the quietness after Jim’s death, and the shift in mood.
When the image fades back on screen it is a flashback, with a close up of Caroline’s face, expressionless, as she explains this is a flashback to when she found out about Jim’s death. We already know she was told by a policeman and he died in a car crash. She sounds sad, nostalgic, pained, upset, distraught- this is her lowest moment in the film for her mental state.
She then pulls herself out of it, finding comfort in her everyday life, as she makes a cup of tea. She remembers how long ago it was since he died and it makes her sadder. Then she remembers how her daughter and her husband took her back to her hometown the other day, which makes her feel happier. We cut back to present day, where she looks through old photo albums, smiling. She is happier stuck in the past, evidently. This is the turning point in her falling back into old routine- where she begins to realise (or believe) she is happier as she is.
She then starts to talk about the house, and how sometimes it makes her feel good because of Jim, and how sometimes it makes her feel bad because of Jim. This directly presents the conflict to the audience- it shows the audience that her mood is sometimes up, sometimes down- but the important thing to notice is that she feels good when she thinks about the past- “It feels like he is still here, with me”. She has realised she feels better stuck in the past- as she is, and when she says “And I intend to live my life, for the both of us”, she means as the way they were- she has not had a ‘realisation’ or began a new life. She has chosen to remain how she is, which is shown through dialogue- what she is saying, sound- the music which was playing when she was feeling happier, has ended, and through shots- visually, we alternate between her in Ireland (symbolising freedom, a new start ((as mentioned in dialogue earlier)) and moving forward with her life) and her at home (symbolising immobility, depression, a circular lifestyle), ending on exactly the same shot as the first shot.
This clearly shows a circle in which she has travelled due to her serious depression of which she has never acknowledged or comes to terms with. The ending is a quiet understated representation of a woman who has not let go of the past, due to her own choices. She is happy for the moment, but she knows in her heart that she is not, and will fall back into despair in a very short space of time. She needs to break the cycle but does not want to. This complex psychological trauma is represented through almost every aspect of filmmaking.
The genre is realism drama, and so the idea is to make it as realistic as possible. This is done through dialogue, mise-en-scene and ideas raised in the production.
What is fore grounded and what is back grounded? Are there any notable absences?
Fore grounded is her conflict, despair, sadness, endless situation. Back grounded is the underlying issues that she either can’t or will not see- her depression, her inability to break the cycle, the fact that she is talking herself into happiness when she really needs medical help- there is almost an irony in the disjuncture in what she thinks is going on and what really is going on. As an intelligent audience, we can step back, and look at her from a third person point-of-view, but she is unable to do so. Those are the notable absences.
At whom is this representation targeted? How do you know?
The representation isn’t really targeted at anyone, it’s not a self help guide. The film is targeted at people from all walks of life who can relate or sympathise/empathise with Caroline’s situation.
What does the representation mean to you? What does the representation mean to others? How do you account for the differences?
To me the representation is just an example of the situations of thousands of people everyday who are trying to recover from lost loved ones, and those who are unaware of the very serious mental illness that is depression, especially post-natal depression, with bereavement complications. What needs to be understood is that Caroline had depression before Jim’s death, but Jim made her feel better.
This is explained in the very first scene where she says “Jim would always know how to cheer me up, when I was feeling like this [...] Of course it wouldn’t make me as happy as he always was, but the fact that he was there made me feel a little bit better”. Depression is not an illness that can be overcome simply by cheery loved ones, but they can certainly make you feel better. When Jim died, in the words of Caroline- “it felt as if all the hope and goodness had been drained from the world”- she had lost her only lifeline and the culmination of grief and depression has made it impossible for her to move on.
I have no idea what the representation of Caroline and the themes throughout ‘Life After Jim’ will mean to others. I would hope that they would get an emotional response from it- sadness, mainly, and also be able to empathise with the character. I would account for differences that may occur through perhaps my own fault, for not giving enough clues as to certain aspects of representation I wished to include. Also, depression is an extremely difficult illness for people to understand; unless they have experienced it first hand or seen it in a close relation- even then it is impossible to fully understand it. I have tried to present it as accurately as possible, through observation and research, but it is not always possible for others see. That may account for some misunderstandings in view of representation and the film as a whole.
How do people make sense of it? According to what codes?
People can make sense of it by listening to what she is saying and watching what is on screen- the dialogue and shots are almost directly linked in some way or another. The main concepts are fairly simple to grasp, but it may take a little bit of digging and thought to get them out. All of the codes/clues/signifiers are in there. The dialogue is thought through and linked- things she says earlier in the film are presented later through dialogue or shots and certain things are revealed through camera work that are not done so through dialogue. As I mentioned earlier, depression is an incredibly difficult thing to understand and sometimes it is hard for people to make sense of it at all.
With what alternative representations could it be compared? How does it differ?
I guess it could be compared to films such as The Death of Mr Lazarescu, whereby the theme of death is converted into dark comedy, or A Single Man, where George takes positive action in breaking the routine and deciding to commit suicide. Life After Jim does not present this representation of character as it is not a comedy and making fun/light of death and Caroline is unable to break the cycle due to underlying health issues.
A reflexive consideration - Why is the concept of representation problematic?
This doesn’t really relate to Life After Jim but I’ll try and answer nevertheless. In terms of reflexivity- or meta-fiction as in literature, representation of real groups or people in society can sometimes be problematic as we can see those characters represented, not as characters, but as real people. This is can be the intention in realism dramas, but they are characters nevertheless. Furthermore, in monologues, the creator is pretty much breaking the fourth wall- although it is never acknowledged; the character is speaking directly to the audience, even if it is, in fact, to themselves.
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