After the interview, we were left in a bit of confusion. The most interesting topics she had discussed, weren’t related to the objects we had used. This meant that the plan for the film was in a muddled state. We had to restructure the film. Below is my revised synopsis and treatment for the film.
Synopsis
In 1968, within just two months of Jana’s birth, Czechoslovakia was invaded by Russia. For 21 years, she lived with her family and despite being trapped in a country forbidden to enjoy the books or music they wanted, they always found a way to enjoy their own little freedoms.
Treatment
The film fades in on a series of photographs of a house. The sun is bright and the grass is a beautiful shade of green. Over these images, we can hear a light breeze rustling through the leaves. We hear keys clink and unlock. We transition inside the house, however the rooms are empty and the walls bare. We hear floorboards creaking. We then see the house represented as a children’s dollhouse. We move closer to one room and cut to a photograph of an old radio. We are able to just about make out radio static. Suddenly, the sound of a presenter’s voice breaks through asking listeners to stay by their radios for a special announcement. A peaceful melody plays and fades out. This is when, through voice over, we hear Jana’s voice for the first time. She explains what the idea of home means to her personally. She says, “Home means music, food, smells and sounds, memories, people, mountains, walks.”
Next, Jana describes the interior of the house she grew up in. She reminisces about the types of furniture and textures she associates with home and childhood. Jana describes the bright colours found in every room. She alludes to how grim she felt things were through socialism; all the colours were faded and dull. This is why her house was always colourful. It cheered everyone up. She focuses on their kitchen. All the cupboards were orange. The room almost seemed to glow. This conjures up more memories. She remembers her mother’s cooking and how she helped out as a child. We see footage of her mother preparing a meal. We hear water gently simmering and cooling utensils rattle and clang. We get to hear Jana and her mother singing together gleefully, seemingly without a care in the world.
The sound of water simmering builds until it boils angrily. This transitions back into the static of the radio. The presenter’s voice returns, saying, “We ask everyone to stay home. It’s not safe on the streets. At this point, it’s the wisest thing to do. Russian tanks have crossed the borders of Hungary, Poland and Czechoslovakia…” The signal of the radio is lost and we are left with an unbearable silence.
The sound of running water returns and Jana says, “After preparing Sunday lunch, Czechoslovakian women would have a moment for themselves. They’d heat up some water, and wash their hair.” Throughout this, we see a set of hair curlers. These curlers sit on a photograph of a bathroom from Jana’s house. Through stop-motion animation, the hair curlers come to life, bursting into motion. Wet hair lies across the photograph and the curlers get to work curling it up. “After that,” Jana continues, “they’d take their hair curlers and curl up their hair. Covering their heads with scarves, they went out of the house to chat with neighbours and friends. This was a moment of relaxation. For many Czechoslovakian women, washing their hair and putting hair curlers on was a moment of freedom”.
Jana moves on and talks about certain songs and books that were banned. She says that she always associates some of these banned songs with her mother, because, in their own small and secretive act of rebellion, they would sing these to each other when they were alone. Jana tells us that when she was a teenager, she learned to play the guitar and would get a good thrill by sitting on their balcony and singing the songs at the top of her voice. Of course, no one heard her other than the mountains, but that thrilling feeling of rebellion always stuck with her. A small section of a forbidden song fades in saying, “Little brother don’t cry. It is not scary monsters. You are grown up now. It is only soldiers…” These lyrics echo and fade away, as if lost in time. One last time, we hear the presenter’s voice from the radio telling us that, “The Russian planes are circling over the station. They have cut several transmission cords. At this point we don’t know if anyone can hear us anymore–”.
Jana now looks back on when she was a young woman. She laughs, saying that when she was around 21, the oppressed people had finally had enough. She says, “People left their houses, taking their keys with them. On the squares, as a symbol of having enough, people would ring with their keys as if they were bells. Sometimes the only thing you would hear was silence and only the sound of keys ringing would resonate through the streets…” Jana’s voice fades away, her story continuing beyond what we can hear. We cut back to the children’s dollhouse. The walls slowly shut in, the interior disappearing from view as the house is closed. We now see a photograph of Jana’s family’s home again and we slowly fade to black. We hear the sound of a door creaking shut. A bunch of keys rattle. This rattling continues and fades out and the film finishes.
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