COMPLETED: premiering Sunday, June 22, at 3:00 pm

[project diary] [production stills] [movie clip]

Miguel Barreda Delgado
Eagle Vision
Berlin
Germany

project title: A Day in Life

producer: Miguel Barreda Delgado

director: Miguel Barreda Delgado

writer: Miguel Barreda Delgado

cast & crew:
Editor: Felipe Guerrero

tagline: A day in the life of Sofia, an American tourist guide in Roma, who discovers that her life is not what she thinks it is.

treatment:

Sofia is a tourist guide in Rome. She is 27 years old. She was born in the
USA, and she lives since many years in Rome. She doesn't want to
return to America and she has broken her private relationships with the
country. She knows and lives the city and its history. Although, she likes
to live in Rome, for a while she has been thinking about going to another
city, or perhaps another country. She doesn't know where. However,
she's begun to believe that something "special" awaits
for her in another place, something that life has in store only for her. I
order to bear with the repetitive routine of a tourist guide, she has found
out a series of stories and anecdotes about the private life of people
throughout the centuries to tell the tourists. At a certain moment, Sofia
begins to add elements of her own fantasy and starts to integrate her
experiences into those stories.

We accompany Sofia for a full day in her life. A day in which we'll
discover a secret about her.

Sofia is awake in bed before the alarm goes off. We see somebody has slept
in her bed. Sofia finds a note. She reads it and makes a phone call. Nobody
answers.

Sofia begins her daily routine. She takes a shower. She gets dressed. She
drinks orange juice that she herself makes. She reads her notes. The phone
rings, wrong number.

Sofia walks down to the bar. At the bar, the men greet her cordially. Sofia
gets happier. She has coffee with milk and a croissant standing at the bar.
Sofia takes the bus. Through the window, she observes some of Roma's
monuments. In her mind, she is repeating names and dates like a girl who
gets ready for an exam. In between the pre-fabricated phrases her thoughts
fall through. She thinks of her boyfriend, it catches her attention his
leaving without waking her up, without saying anything, just an
expressionless note. The bus continues on its way to the Roman Coliseum.
Sofia grabs a group of tourists. Her cell phone rings. Sofia has to hang up
because the group awaits for her. The tour starts at the Coliseum. Sofia
explain the tourists the history of the Coliseum and its architectural
data. She tells them about the "personal" anecdotes of the
people that lived back then.

Later, Sofia continues the tour with the tourists through the ruins of the
the Roman Forum. Among the dispersed rocks, Sofia reflects with the
tourists on the fleeting character of life. Sofia also exposes parallelisms
between the time of the Roman Empire and the present era.

Soon, Sofia lets the tourists embark on their own thoughts, on their own
reflections about the place and its history, on their own lives and dreams,
or simply on their state of mind at the moment.

The tour continues. Sofia takes the tourists to other important places of
the Roman Empire era; the Theater of Marcelo, the ceremonial zone of Largo
Argentina, the Pantheon.

While she guides the tourists, she spots a man that follows her at a
prudent distance. From time to time, she turns to see him. When she sees
him, he turns away.

At lunch time, Sofia leaves the tourists at a restaurant. She leaves them
by themselves for a moment. She calls someone, we don't hear what is
being said, but we see that she begins to act nervously.

After this incident Sofia's mood changes. She's not as elocuent
as in the morning. She decides to take the tourists to some churches, so
that they can see the paintings and appreciate the decoration. Sofia explains
everything to them from apragmatic point of view insisting on the economic
power of the Church andthe contradictions of the Christian message and the
practices of the Catholic Church.

The tour continues in the afternoon through the alleys and main squares of
downtown Roma. Sofia tells more anecdotes (some funny) about the various
generations of people in the "eternal city".

The strange man appears again on the streets. At first, Sofia does not
notice him. He observes her from far. Then, he shows up just a few meters
from her. He observes her at great length. He approaches her, then he steps
away without her noticing him. He dissapears.

Sofia arrives with the tourists at the main square. While the tourists take
pictures, the stranger appears and approaches Sofia. Sofia splits up from
the group. We see them from far, but we can't hear what they are
saying. But it is obvious that he is telling her something of great
importance. The man doesn't say anything else. He kisses her in the
forehead and leaves. Sofia looks for a place to seat. She lights up a
cigarrete and smokes calmly. All the sounds around her quite down.
Some of the tourists aproach Sofia. They wanna continue the tour. Sofia
does not react immediately, but soon she is gonna have to assume her role
again.

Sofia goes with the tourists. In some places, she starts telling them
stories, but then she keeps quite in the middle of the story. Or in some
cases, she starts adding to the stories what she had just experienced. She
tells them that she has plans to leave Roma with her boyfriend. The goal is
to go to Latin America. It will be a long trip of half a year.

The tourists begin to feel uncomfortable. Finally, the tourists walk away
leaving her alone. Sofia has arrived at the point of reunion, by the
Coliseum.

Sofia goes back to the Roman Forum. At dusk, she is alone. She smokes. She
sees the sunset. A few cats prowl around her.

Sofia stops by a market. She buys fresh vegetables, meat, oranges, and a
bottle of wine.

Sofia gets home. The phone rings, wrong number. She starts cooking. She
does it with great care endulging the details. It's a long and
careful operation.

Sofia changes her clothes and does her make up. She sets the table for two.
She lights up the candles. She plays music, a series of boleros from the
40s. She serves the food for two and opens the wine. She seats at the
table. Then she starts talking to an invisible guest, she pours wine for
him. She tells him some of the details about what she went through that
day. She doesn't eat, she just talks. She proposes a toast with the
guest's glass. She tries a bite of food. She feels nauseated. She
goes to the bathroom to vomit. She does it for a while.

Sofia is seating on the bathroom floor. The phone rings. She picks up the
phone, wrong number again. It was a man's voice.

Sofia gets up and does her make up again. She combs her hair in a different
way. She goes out.

It is already night. She takes the metro. She looks absent. She looks at
everyone, but she doesn't see anybody. She is standing. A man seating
in front of her stares at her. Sofia's look crosses the man's.

An interchange of looks begins. The man stands up to give up his seat to a
lady. He stands next to Sofia. Sofia turns around so that she ends up
behind the man. The man doesn't even try to turn around. With the
movement of the train, Sofia gets closer to the man. She leans her head
against the man’s back. The train arrives at the station. Sofia gets
away from the man. The man leaves the train. Sofia thinks for a moment and
starts walking behind the man.

Sofia follows the man through the streets of Trastevere. He picks up his
pace, though he hasn't realized that Sofia is following him. Sofia
takes a short cut and hopes to intercept the stranger. However, he has gone
another way. Sofia looks for him and finally she finds him seating in the
balcony of a bar. (San Calisto).

Sofia walks by him at a prudent distance without looking at him. The man
drinks a beer and looks at his watch. He smokes. Sofia doubts whether to
approach the man or not. She goes in circles and finally decides to
approach him. Suddenly, the man gets his cell phone and makes a phone call.
Sofia turns around and walks away quickly. Her cell phone rings. Sofia
answers. It's the stranger. The same voice that she heard at home.
Sofia says at first that he had called the wrong number, but the man
quickly reminds her about the situation in the train, and that if she turns
around she will see him calling her from the balcony of the bar. Sofia
turns around. The man isn't there any longer, neither is his beer on
the table. The voice stops talking on Sofia's phone.

Sofia walks alone on the streets in the semi-dark night along the walls of
the medieval, renaissance, and barroque houses. In her mind, she revisits
the historical facts.

Sofia walks now in silence through the empty streets. The hours pass by.
The sunrise is there. Sofia gets to her house door.

Sofia takes off her clothes and goes to bed. She doesn't sleep. The
hours pass by, the sun rises higher. Sofia is still awake.

The alarm goes off. Sofia gets up. She starts her routine. They are the
same images of the day before. This time, we see her in an accelerated
sequence. She takes a shower. She gets dressed. She drinks her orange
juice. She walks down to the bar. She has coffee with milk. She takes the
bus. The monuments appear through the bus window. She gets to the Coliseum.

Sofia looks for a group of tourists. From far, we see Sofia talking to
herself. People see Sofia and make comments about her. From Sofia's
perspective, we see the tourists whom she was with the day before. They are
the same images of the day before. From a more objective perspective, we
see Sofia alone. Sofia heads to the Roman Forum. She walks as if she were
guiding a group of tourists, she talks to them using hand signals.

She enters the Roman Forum, and she tells the tourists that she only sees
them reflecting for a moment on the lightness of life, on how fragile our
existence can be, even that of the empires. She pictures them thinking
about their own dreams, those dreams that have come true and those that are
about to come true...

The End

statement of style:
The style of the movie will be defined by the conditions in which it will
be filmed. It will be a very low budget movie captured in original
locations under conditions of available light. Only the protagonist will be
an actress, all other characters will be real people.

The recording format will be mini DV. The movie will be filmed using a
semi-professional camera with three chips (PAL). A hand held camera will be
used to avoid wasting time during the constant switching of camera
location.

The movie (of an aproximate duration of 75 minutes) will be captured in a
documentary style in most of the cases. Naturally, rehearsals will be
conducted with the protagonist prior to the shooting. However, during the
shooting itself, rehearsals will be avoided -except if these are
technically required- to guarantee the proper and spontaneous reactions of
the rest of the characters who will not be actors.

The sources of inspiration for this work are traced back to the italian
neorealism as well as the french "Cinema verité" and some
movies from the first era of the "Nouvelle Vague" like
"Breathless".

Also, it will be necessary to resort to a unique style of a certain type of
"happenings" in which the audience's participation (in
this case, all the extras) is unpredictable. This in turn will help capture
the spontaneous and improvised reactions of the protagonist.

The city of Roma, which accomodates the remains of more than 2000 years of
civilization, is another character in itself. Not only it will serve as
background but it will contribute to tell the story from the
protagonist's own perspective.

The locations chosen for the movie have the particularity of being
accessible in just a short time. Downtown Roma is not that big, in fact
some distances can even be crossed on foot. Having only one actress and a
samll group of extras (7 maximum) will help avoid many logistic problems.
To avoid a complicated breakdown, impossibe to film in a short time, the
scenes will be filmed in real time. In some cases, the camera's own
";interval-record" mode will be used to make a pre-montage in
the camera to avoid having to look for and to decide during the editing
process. In some other cases, sequence-shots will be captured in a
documentary style that will be compressed during the montage.

The crew will be conformed by the director / director of photography, an
assistant director, a sound technician, a production assistant, and an
editor.

From the first day of shooting, the material will be edited in a non-linear
editing suite in downtown Roma, so that the available time of 72 hours will
be taken advantage of. Post-production visual effects will be avoided if
possible, and some others like the one mentioned above will be done in the
camera. In addition to the original direct sound, the original locations background
sound and music will be used.

timeline:
Day One:
2 hours awake, breakfast and preparation
12 hours of shooting / Day Scenes(pauses, meals and transportation
included)
4 hours of preparation for second day of shooting and discussion with
editor
6 hours of sleep

Simultaneously / Editing crew:
12 hours of editing

Day Two:
2 hours awake, breakfast and preparation
5 hours of shooting / Day scenes (pauses, meals and transportation
included)
4 hours for preparation of Night scenes and discussion with editor
8 hours of shooting / Night scenes (pauses and meals included)
5 hours of sleep

Simultaneously / Editing crew:
12 hours editing

Day Three:
2 hours awake, breakfast and preparation
6 hours of shooting / Day scenes (pauses, meals and transportation
included)
up to 14 hours (maximum) of editing with editing crew, finishing
2 hours for digital cut on tape and for packaging preparation to be sent

Simultaneously / Editing crew:
12 hours editing

director bio:

Born 1967 in Lima, Peru.
Between 1983 and 1992 he wrote poems, short stories and articles for
Peruvian and Spanish magazines. 1987 he won the contest "El cuento de
las mil palabras" ("The 1000-Words-Story") of the
"Caretas" magazine (Lima).
He lives since 1984 in Germany.
From 1990 to 1997 he studied at the German Film & TV Academy Berlin (dffb).
He has worked as DoP and/or editor for many short films.
He lives in Berlin (Germany) and works as free lance director, screenwriter
and editor for film and TV.

score: 21 out of 30 possible points

[project diary] [production stills] [movie clip]

[close window]