Noni: Part One – Notes on a film

My intention when setting this up to film last summer was to record external audio of life going on outside ma’s window – cars, kids coming home from school, screaming kids, busses, birds singing. I recorded this separately with my zoom and at the same time of me filming mum in her daily routine and my routine – our life while life goes on outside. The camera is static and in the same position throughout. I was really interested in getting birds chirping and the chattering kids and hum of cars going by as the predominant sound over everything inside except when mum and I are talking, then it is background but always there. This is a art installation film, so it’s long and tedious and about the message, concept. It is not a narrative film, which I am making about mum also. The idea hit me because it was hot last summer and the windows were open and both of us stuck indoors and there’s nothing like summer in England and I wanted the sound of an English country summer, birds, children, laughing, cars, etc. It’s kind of a  – what goes on behind closed doors is this life of dementia in the heart of the beautiful English summer and countryside. All that bird calling and singing and calmness but behind it all is this dementia behind closed doors and the mundaneness. I wanted that also – the every day like the next with all life going on outside and every day inside repeated over and over – which is why it’s 1 hours 40 minutes long. GLIUPHOTO