Directions Unit - Loneliness Research

When I chose to do loneliness as a theme for my 4 minute dramatic film, I definitely wanted to look more into it to see how loneliness was used in different movies and books. First I wanted to get the basic outline on the meaning of Loneliness.

Meaning:

Loneliness: Sadness because one has no friends or company or the quality of being lonely and remote: isolation.
In depth meaning: Loneliness is a complex and usually unpleasant emotional response to isolation or lack of companionship. Loneliness typically includes anxious feel ins about a lack of connectedness or communality with other beings, both in the present and extending into the future.

Here are some different type of genre of movies that I picked that expressed Loneliness.

Loneliness Movies:

I am Legend (2007)

Years after a plague kills most of humanity 

and transforms the rest into monsters, its up 

to the sole survivor in New York City to find 

a cure.

127 Hours (2010)

A mountain climber becomes trapped under

a boulder while canyoneering along near Moab, 

utah and resorts to desperate measures in order 

to survive.

Wall-E (2008)

In the distant future, a small waste-collecting 

robot inadvertently embarks on a space journey 

that will ultimately decide the fate of mankind. 

                       

Castaway (2000)

A FedEx executive must transform 

himself physically and emotionally to 

survive a crash landing on a deserted island.

I am Legend is based around an immune survivor to a virus that has turned people into creatures like zombies. This apocalyptic film explains loneliness in a survival way, instead of someone isolating them self. Wall-E is from an animated character from disney and is very loved and favourited by people who have watched the film. He is a sweet character that wants to find friendship and when a surprise visitor arrives he is able to get the friend he always wanted. This was a great film to study the transition from loneliness to not being lonely anymore. Castaway is a great example of how loneliness can effect you, i.e. he ends up drawing a face on a volleyball, naming it and starts to speak to it often. This film shows the psychological way on how loneliness can effect you as a human but also gives you an idea on what it would actually be like if you was stuck on a deserted island.

Loneliness in books:

Here are some books that I found that were useful for loneliness, especially isolation.

Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck (Published 1937)

This story is George Milton and Lennie Small, 

who are two displaced migrant ranch workers, 

who move from place to place in search of new 

job opportunities during the Great Depression in 

California, USA.

The Perks of being a wallflower by Stephen Chbosky (Published 1999)

Charlie is a freshman and while he's not the 

biggest geek in the school, he is by no means 

popular. Shy, introspective, intelligent beyond 

his years yet socially awkward, he is a wallflower, 

caught between trying to live his life and trying 

to run from it.

Oliver Twist by Charles Dickens (Published 1837-1839 three volumes)

The story is about an orphan, Oliver Twist, who 

endures a miserable existence in a workhouse 

and then is placed with an undertaker. He escapes 

and travels to London where he meets the Artful 

Dodger, leader of a gang of juvenile pickpockets, 

naively unaware of their unlawful activities.

Frankenstein by Mary Shelley (Published 1818)

Frankenstein tells the story of a committed science student 

Victor Frankenstein. Obsessed with discovering the cause 

of generation and life and bestowing animation upon lifeless 

matter, Frankenstein assembles a human being from stolen body 

parts but; upon bringing it to life, he recoils in horror at the 

creature's hideousness. Tormented by isolation and loneliness, the 

once-innocent creature turns to evil and unleashes a campaign 

of murderous revenge against his creator, Frankenstein.

Frankenstein has a lot of isolation and loneliness to the story, especially to the monster character. Charles Dickens wrote many books that  quite depressing and contained a lot of isolated characters within them. I feel that Dickens novels would help me quite a lot with this task. Of mice and men is a book that I studied for in secondary school and has a great story, it shows the isolation of two outsiders that go place to place to find work. I feel this is the most subtle way of portraying loneliness in a story and is definitely something I would study into again for help.

By looking into these films and books I feel that I have more of an understanding on how to use loneliness in my script. Reading up on the meaning of loneliness in depth helped me create a mental image on a couple ideas that I could use to create characters and the outline of a story.