Thursday, May 29, 2008
posted by Chen at 8:41 PM
Date : 29th May 2008
Time : 8.41PM
Listening to : Billy Jean - David Cook
Where : Room - MC

This is my idea for Digital Photography class. I'll base my subject matter on the book by Gabriel Garcia Marquez entitled Chronicle of a Death Foretold.

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ThePlot (Skip the entire bunch of text if you have no intention to find out)


The narrative outlines the events surrounding the murder of Santiago Nasar, a young man who is thought to have taken the virginity of Angela Vicario. On her wedding night, after discovering that she was not a virgin, Angela's husband, Bayardo San Roman, returns her to her house. Angela's twin brothers, Pedro Vicario and Pablo Vicario, ask her who took her virginity, and she tells them that Santiago Nasar did. The brothers find Santiago and kill him.
The narrative is non-linear. The narrator begins the story by telling us about Santiago Nasar's household the morning he was murdered. In the course of the chapter, we learn that Santiago lived with his mother, Placida Linero; their cook, Victoria Guzman; and her daughter, Divina Flor. Santiago's father, Ibrahim Nasar, has died three years previously. After his father died, Santiago took over the family ranch, which has been very successful; the Nasars are wealthy in their community.

The day that Santiago is murdered was a significant day in town because the Bishop was coming by boat to bless the marriage of Angela Vicario and Bayardo San Roman. Many people were heading over to the dock to see the boats. Pedro and Pablo Vicario were sitting in the local milk-shop, which was en route to the dock, so that they could see Santiago Nasar either going or returning in order to track him down and kill him. The narrator's sister learns that Angela Vicario was returned home on the night of her wedding.

Bayardo San Roman had come to town to find a bride. After deciding on Angela, the courtship was short. Because Bayardo came from a prestigious, wealthy family, and the Vicarios were relatively poor, Angela did not really have a choice, even though she did not love Bayardo at the time they were wed. The night before the murder, there had been lots of wedding revelry that had continued into the early morning at a local whorehouse run by Maria Alejandrina Cervantes, where Santiago Nasar had been carousing with the twins and the narrator until early in the morning. After returning home and finding their sister in disgrace, the Vicario brothers set out to avenge her honor by murdering Santiago Nasar. Even though they repeatedly announced their intent to murder him, the butcher, the police officer, and the Colonel all thought that the Vicarios are largely bluffing. Clothilde Armenta, the proprietor of the milk shop, even told the local priest about what the Vicario twins were threatening to do. However, in the excitement surrounding the arrival of the bishop, he forgot about her warning.

After the murder, the entire Vicario family left town because of the disgrace the combination of events had brought upon their family. A week after the murder, Bayardo San Roman left with his family; they came and retrieved him by boat. The Vicario brothers were imprisoned for three years. After their release from prison, Pablo proceeded to marry his betrothed, Prudencia Cotes, and Pedro went back into the armed forces. After Bayardo returned Angela to her home on their wedding night, she fell in love with him. After she moved away from the town where she was disgraced, she wrote him letters every week for seventeen years, and eventually he returned to her.

For years after the crime, it was all anyone in the town spoke of. The narrator tells how his friend Cristo Bedoya searched frantically for Santiago the morning of the murder in order to warn him of the Vicario brothers' plan, but failed to find Santiago because he did not realize that Santiago had gone to the house of his fiance, Flora Miguel. Her father was the first to warn Santiago of the murder. At this point, there were crowds of people outside who had come to see the Bishop but had lingered because they had heard the rumor that Santiago was to be killed.
When he left Flora Miguel's house, Santiago was very confused. Clothilde Armenta yelled at him to run, and he ran the fifty yards to his front door. Due to miscommunication, Santiago's mother locked the front door just as he approached The Vicario brothers easily caught up with him, and stabbed him to death right outside of Santiago's front door.
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That's the plot. So my plan revolves around the idea of making a trailer or preview of this book using series of still photographs. Basically it will give some kind of short summary of the content of the book. I am doing Emotive Photography. I had no intention of model driven theme at the start of the class but somehow I was pretty intrigued by humans body language that could channel emotion without showing facial expression. I am not sure if I will include snippets of facial expression in this project. Most likely not. I am doing model hunting now. I have the visual in my head but it's quite difficult to get the location set up. Well, anyway, although I will be doing a trailer for this book, I am not going to set in a Latin town theme. I am going to make a local version of it. Dang...sound so cheap but hopefully it will work. I mean come on la... Where am I suppose to find Latin girls and Arabian guys la.

::Selective Scenes to shoot in chronological order::

1. The marriage
2. The missing stain of honor (virginity)
3. Return of the bride & beatings
4. Return of the twin brothers
5. Naming of the perpetrator (Santiago Nasar)
6. Santiago Nasar climbed out of bed
7. SN took some aspirins
8. The last talk with his mom
9. Preparation to kill Santiago
10. Whispering of the crowd
11. Spotting of Santiago
12. Chasing Santiago starts
13. Refraining action by bar mistress
14. Santiago running for home
15. Locking Santiago out & cornering
16. The murder
17. The conclusion

Basically that will be the few selected key frames I will be shooting. I did some location scouting a couple of days ago. I have yet to get a proper indoor location but I found some quiet spots behind the new Sunway Pyramid. I probably might use there. And I intended to use the parking rooftop right here in Mentari. I seriously in need of indoor location with proper bed with window. If anyone could offer me their place just for a day or two I will really be grateful.

For models, I managed to persuade James into this and he is fine with the schedule for now. I've gotten David for this shoot also. Zheng will be part of it but I may ask Francisca to be my main female character. I would prefer Zheng to help me in my technical part. I need at least 2 more male models to help me out preferably with similar height and built. Please (I am really pleading), do tell me if you could help me in any of the area at all.

The mood I am going for is probably black and white the depict the solemness of the entire setting.

Well, I guess that's all for now. Will be going down Malacca for location scouting for Digital Video class. And this week, there're at least 80 photographs to be taken for weekly assignment and another 10 or so for trial final project shots.

You tell me, die or not die?

-chen-
[9.39PM]


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