Reverse Storyboard: Portrait of a Lady on Fire
In Céline Sciamma’s 2019 film Portrait of a Lady on Fire, it tells the story of a female artist, who was tasked with painting a portrait for a gentry’s daughter to marry her off, yet in which process the two young ladies fell in love. As a movie famous for its “manifesto on the female gaze”, Portrait of a Lady on Fire shed lights on women’s thoughts, love and power specifically in female perspectives.
The highlight scene famous among critics is the bonfire scene cut in half way through the movie-at night on an isolated island in eighteenth-century France, somewhere deep in the forest, a group of unnamed women in black gather around a bonfire. Without any more suggestion, they suddenly exchange excited looks and start a haunting a-cappella. It’s a particularly powerful scene throughout the movie or even the movie history, while it’s also kind of witchy somehow. By choosing the scene for my reverse storyboard assignment, I’d also like to look deeper into this one of my favorite scenes in the movie.
Before moving to the storyboard, you may want to enjoy the clip of that bonfire scene to grasp the general vibe:
My Reverse Storyboard
The camera setting throughout the scene rarely moves, mostly it uses a medium shot, which put more emphasis on the emotions conveyer by the characters, as well as the witchy and powerful vibe stressed in the women’s A-Capella.