Short Film Treatment: Amelie

 REMINISCENCE

Logline: A memory about how a couple met in highschool

Establishing shots of neighborhood
Car outside house with man unloading the truck with boxes
An adult woman surveys a new master bedroom(new house)
Her eye catches onto an old polaroid on top of pile of crap in a cardboard box
She picks it up and smiles
Close up on polaroid
Flashback

Awkward looking girl is checking out a library book(academic/nerdy)
Follows through her classes as she is obviously socially awkward due to her nerdiness
   -bell is heard ringing and shots of students rushing to class
   -camera follows girl as she mopes to class
   -Walks into math class and sits down in the far corner
   -drops books and a bully stumbles pass, steps on papers/binder and doesn't help pick up (laughs)
   -picks up herself and cries

   -Walks into another class and sits in a corner
   -Bully is laughing and talking with friends
   -He throws a paper ball at the girl
   -Future interest(boy) sees this going on
   -the boy stands up and approaches the bullies
   -boy talks to bullies while bullies laugh
   -bell rings before anything can come to a conclusion
   -boy looks at girl and she stumbles past him out the door
  
At lunch girl is sitting by herself eating her food
Bullies comes and flips her food over
Boy sees this going on and pushes the bully leader out of the way
Friends of the boy back him up and outnumbers the bullies
Friends chase off the bullies
Boy asks if girl is okay and reassures her

Transition into talking
   -joke about how dumb the bullies are
   -pretends to be big and clunky like the bullies
   -girl laughs while he tells the jokes
He asks her to prom and of course she says yes
Both smile

Nighttime shots of the sky and romantic setting
Boy putting on formal wear in front of a mirror
Girl finishing putting on a dress in front of a mirror

Boy arrives at girl's house in a car
Steps out and walks up the porch and knocks on the door holding a bouquet of flowers
Girl(not nerdy anymore but gorgeous) answers wearing a dress and is overly happy to see him
Girl takes flowers and invites him in the house
Meets and greets mother
Mother compliments boy and suggests to take a picture
Goes to find camera
Boy and girl laugh and he compliments her on her dress
Mother comes back with camera

Mother takes a polaroid of the smiling couple
The picture ejects from the polaroid camera
Girl takes the polaroid and waves it and puts it into her purse (picture side facing away from the camera)

Flashforward

Man unloading is husband of adult woman(same boy)
He walks in the room and hugs her
She shows him the picture
They both laugh and finish unloading boxes
Tacks up the picture to a wall
Dolly to picture
Fade out

End credits

-Max Mak

The Fabolous Life of Amelie Poulain

Emphasis on sound
In this particular scene, Amelie is crossing out one the possible leads for who she thinks she can return the childhood box to. The sound of Amelie crossing out the name is especially emphasized as though the director is focusing the audience's attention to this action. This sound emphasis then transitions into the sound of a train passing by. It seems as though the sound editor and the director wanted to suggest that the crossing out of the name had the vigor and emotional value of a train passing by during a normal afternoon: as though it were monotonic.

Recurring motif
Throughout the movie Amelie picks up skipping stones and places them into her left jacket pocket. Since skipping stones is her coping mechanism, collecting stones to skip later suggests that she is preparing herself emotionally for anything that she may encounter within the scene. Usually she picks up a skipping stone during the establishing moments of the scene so that it suggests that the director is asking for the audience to pay attention to these key scenes in the film.

Using sound to support an image
In this certain scene Amelie is reading over multiple letters from the landlord's late husband trying to find out which snippets of the letters she can use in order to compose another letter. The sound changes as she reads different letters to emphasize that different letters are being read through. Sound is essential in this scene because it conveys an image of the landlord's husband going through various situations. It is the only method of conveying the idea that different letters are being used.

Sweeping camera angles
Also during this scene the cinematographer uses many different camera angles to convey a sense of variety.