Steff's Foundation Portfolio 2009/2010

The Royal Tenenbaums.
Analysis of Margot
In the opening sequence to the film, Margot is in fact the first character we see, but as this is a tracking shot we only see her for a split second. The fact that we see her first seems to me as though she has some importance in the film, this is clear as she has been made the viewpoint for the audience by being lit up compared to her surroundings, the only piece of personal information we can take from this moment is that she is reading which could be a hobby of hers. An instrumental of ‘Hey Jude,’ by The Beatles is asynchronously playing, and the instruments used give quite a strange effect on the whole introduction, in my opinion it reminds me of medieval music, which also made me pick up on the fact that when the tracking opening shot begins there is a flag waving on the steeple part of the house, that resembled that of a castle, it also carries through to when the three children are sat at a formal-looking table with medieval looking candle holders, this also connects with the title of the film The Royal Tenenbaum's.
On the mid shot of the children sat at the table, I notice firstly that Margot seems to camouflage into the mise-en-scene, her hair, skin tone and clothes include beige and burgundy tones that are the theme colours of the room they are in. This could be the directors way of showing a little of her life story in a simple way. I also notice that whilst the boys are sat comfortable with their arms on the table and heads held high, Margot’s body language looks timid and almost as though she has done something wrong, we can also see her discomfort as when the scene opens she slowly lifts her head up, whilst the boys are comfortably sat and ready. Also she seems to make little eye contact with the man that appears to be her father, unlike her brothers. This intrigues the audience and makes us wonder why she seems unwelcome in her surroundings, when her two brothers are the complete opposite. Also the colour theme (red) seems quite ironic to me, as the colour usually represents love but in fact there seems to be little of that emotion in the room.
The next scene including the woman we presume to be the children’s mother, we see Margot again looking very left out. Even though she is now wearing more contrasting clothes to her surroundings, she does not seem as involved with her mother as her brothers do, the thing that stands out to me is that there is actually a physical barrier between her and her mother, that being the doorway. Although this is not an extremely obvious thing, I feel as though it signifies a distance between them, also as Margot actually almost has her back towards her mother. Margot is also engrossed in a book by Anton Chekhov, a famous russian author and playwright, the fact that we can so clearly read the authors name may express a link between Margot and the author. We also see quite a cold side of Margot in this scene; when her brother asks for a large amount of money, she looks up from her book with an almost angry expression waiting for her mother to answer, when her mother says yes, without questioning Margot’s focus returns to her book, this short sequence gave me the impression that the boys seem to get a lot and maybe Margot doesn’t receive quite so much - this reinforced my idea of her being an outsider as well as that Margot is now wearing completely contrasting colours to her surroundings which again shows her being seperate from her family, also her two brothers have both wore the same outfits throughout the film so far which in a sense personifies their character but Margot has worn different things, so we don’t have a clothing connection to her so far.
The most important scene that introduces us to Margot is when we visit her bedroom. Straight off we see signs on her closed bedroom door including “Do not disturb,” “Keep door closed” and “Do not enter” and even a physical padlock. These are very forward warning off signs, which tell us that she is a very private person, but makes us wonder why as her brothers are completely different. We know Margot is different as we can see this in her mannerisms, and how she communicates but we as an audience are still intrigued to know the reason for this. Upon seeing Margot, she is sat on a very neat bed, with completely organised surroundings, but looks completely emotionless. She is listening to music through headphones which suggests she is in a ‘world of her own,’ allowing no one else in. The first thing the narrative voice says is that “she was adopted at age 2,” this instantly gives us information that we haden’t had before, I personally, instantly gave that fact the responsibility of being the reason she is an outsider. Like on her bedroom door, she has african decoration in her room, which seems quite unusual for a girl of her age, as most would enjoy pink, girly objects whilst the african object seems actually quite ugly and unwelcoming. When the camera has completely zoomed out we see curtains at the end of her sleeping area, I felt as though this is her way of closing herself off from her family even more. The short scene following her bedroom scene is strange in the way that Margot is looking dead straight into the camera lens whilst the action remains happening around her, as though in her mind she isn’t there, but in her body she is, this saddens me actually again as the only dialogue used is “This is my adopted daughter, Margot Tenenbaum,” it is as though her adoptive father has no pride of her and wants people to know that she isn’t his own flesh and blood, and this proves to me that this is what is hurting her. Incredibly on the next scene we are hit with her african style decoration as now it is very obvious and is everywhere, maybe this is a place she wants to be or something that really inspires her. I do feel that this is part of her inspiration as we see her frantically typing with a huge pile of paper documents beside her, this instantly makes me think of her obsession with reading, and makes us wonder what the link between the two is. Next we see consecutive clips of parts of her room, beginning with the library of her plays. This gives us a huge insight to her personality, we can now link the obsession of her books, and writing with her love for plays. Next we see Models of sets, which reinforces her love for plays to the audience, and really makes us realise how much of a passion she has for plays in general, the fact there has been a pencil left on the little set leads us to believe she has made these impeccable sets, which seems quite incredible to me. We then come across her ‘dark room,’ which actually looks like an en suite of some sort, the fact that she has renovated this into a dark room suprises me again, most young girls dream for en suites for vanity, and privacy the most unlikely thing i could imagine it being changed into, she has created. Margot already seems way beyond her years. Strangely, rather than creating a ‘Ballet’ part of her bedroom it seems she has just created a random space for when she wants it, as though she isn’t taking it as seriously as her other interests, again we are surrounded with african objects and then the narrator gives a very insightful piece of information, “her and her brother ran away from home one winter, and camped out in the african wing of the public archives.”
The first scene where we witness Margot and her brother hidden away in the public archives she is reading ‘The sharks of north american waters,’ i feel this is an importance as the director has made the book cover very visible, and then we realise that young girls are usually terrified or disgusted by things such as sharks but Margot appears to be quite interested in them. This again reminds us that Margot is not an ordinary girl. I also realise that Richie seems to have no interest in Africa, or anything to do with it (as he is asleep throughout the scene of them hiding) and I wonder why he has gone along with Margot rather than his brother, or why didn’t they all go together? The camera zooms out, tracks and then pans towards the door, and as this is happening Margot’s eyes meet her book again which suggests she was deep in thought whilst being narrated.
Soon after we are informed by the narrator that Margot had again attempted running away from home, this strikes me as an unhappiness but also her sense of adventure, we are shown a picture titled, ‘Alteration of glove,’ this glove is obviously something that is personified to her character, as we had already seen it before when we saw her model play set. When we are introduced to Richie’s room, we witness part of his room that he has a gallery of photo’s and strangely they all appear to be of Margot, this makes me feel like Margot has some significance to him, as there are almost an obsessive amount of portraits, and most of them see Margot with her books, which is how we’d imagine her ourselves anyway, this feels to me as though it connects to the fact that they ran away together, maybe they are more than just brother and sister. Also when we see Richie out with his father, and the fact that Margot or Chas aren’t invited along this by now doesn’t suprise us as we know Margot doesn’t have a strong relationship with her father anyway, and when we see Margot her expression isn’t suprised either at all, in fact her body language suggests she’s bored.
On Margot’s eleventh birthday her brothers and Eli Cash performed her first play, this is when I realise the connection with her african obsession, as the characters used in her play are animals that would typically be found in Africa. Whilst sat at the table I firstly realise that Margot is sitting furthest away from her father, even Eli Cash is sat closer than her, Margot’s father goes on to say that her play wasen’t believable which is extremely harsh to me, as this is a girl who has just turned 11 and has already written her own plays! When the shot turns to Margot, we find she seems angry, but her expression doesn’t show this very well, but if you look into the background of the shot you can see the masks of the animals which look as though they are roaring with anger, which seems to me as though the director has used this as a convention to show her hidden emotion, I feel as though Margot secretly is desperate for acceptance but her father is unwilling to give it. When her father speaks down again about her play she has had enough and leaves her own birthday party, just as the birthday cake arrives, (the most important part of a birthday party) she sees the cake but still leaves which shows us that this has really hurt her and in fact this is the only time we see such a reaction occur from her.
Overall I see Margot as a very mysterious character, from start to finish she has never shown much emotion or even spoken very much, her brothers seem a lot more down-to-earth which makes her stand out even more. It makes me feel quite sad as her father is so reluctant to be proud of her just because she is not his biological daughter, even though she has such an incredible talent. I feel that if I were to watch the rest of the film Margot would go on to be a very significant character, as she is the one who has more of a story than anyone else, I also feel that we would find out more about the connection between her and Richie.