waterloo road

Hannah Matthews
Media studies
Waterloo Road. Star – six minutes.

In this sequence of ‘Waterloo Road’ series 4 episode 1, it starts with a blurred E.O.G shot of what looks like a hospital bed. You then see a person start to appear in the bed. The blurred effect of the room emphasises what frame of mind the person in the bed could be in. There is also very eerie, mysterious music which also emphasises this. The woman in the bed then sits up and there is a CU of her face which shows her confusion. This woman has clearly suffered some sort of injury as she has what looks like a burn mark on her chest. The woman then walks around the corridors of the hospital looking confused, like she doesn’t know where she is or how she got there. It then cuts to a shot of a hall full of people. And the colour then changes from very bright and light to a very blue, cold colour. The woman looks scared as the people which now look like students start to chant, ‘mason out’. It seems as though she feels she has done something wrong as she then tries to justify herself by repeatedly saying ‘let me explain’. There is still a blurred effect carried on from the last scene. The camera then focuses on one man, which suggests that he may be important to her. You can clearly hear his voice above everyone else’s while the camera is on him. The room then starts to spin which also shows her fragile mind frame. She is then put under a spotlight on the stage. This is like she is being interrogated. She then gets angry and starts to shout, trying to get her point across. The camera then moves away from her very quickly and is then back in the hospital room. This time it is clear, and it appears the woman is waking up form a dream. This implies that the representation the audience have just had of her is from her own perception. As she was dreaming it and it was her thoughts. She then cries and looks very scared.

Opening titles

We are then back onto the woman in the hospital and she is being examined. She doesn’t seem concerned about her injuries and her only question is about when she will be able to return back to work. The camera then cuts to a school playground. And there is a voice over, the voice of the doctor telling the woman that she is not ready to go back to work. The fact that this is done with a voice over implies to me that the woman had already made her mind about going back to work even before the doctor started talking. She comes across as a very strong minded woman. She knows what she wants and she won’t let anyone tell her what to do. You see the woman pull up in her car and she seems hesitant about opening the door and getting out. This suggests that maybe she knows she should be resting and not going back, but she is determined to do so. Everything around her is moving very quickly and she seems a bit uneasy about this. She walks into the building with her head high and then music starts playing. ‘Breakeven’ by the Script. The first line of this song is ‘I’m still alive but I’m barely breathing, I just prayed to a God that I don’t believe in’. This again shows that she is not well enough to be back at work. She stops and looks around and looks anxious. There is then a ghostly effect used, which makes people just fade past her and not pay any attention. She shrugs it off and the effect disappears. She stops to speak to someone and quickly moves the conversation away from him saying that she looks well. She puts on a front and acts strong and smiles and walks away. The woman walks into what I would assume to be her office and smiles. When offered her desk back she takes a deep breath, again suggesting maybe she knows that she shouldn’t be back at work. She then talks about how much work she has which implies she is a very hardworking person. She shrugs it off when the man says about her injuries with ‘whatever’ and quickly changes the subject. The man she is talking to is the same man that was emphasised in the chant at the beginning of the sequence in her dream. He seems very concerned about the woman’s well being. The woman is still trying to change the subject while the man is still trying to talk about her injuries. She pretends she’s okay and focuses the attention on other people.
They both then walk into the school hall where there are children singing ‘welcome home’. She looks very embarrassed by this, like she doesn’t want a fuss made of her. She is then up on the stage under the spotlight again, just like she was in her dream at the beginning but this time she looks happy instead of shouting. Everyone starts chanting and shouting, the woman seems angry by this and starts to shout to telling everyone ‘that’s enough’. At the end of the sequence she looks very overwhelmed.

I think that in this sequence the woman is represented as a very strong woman who does not like being told what to do. She likes to be in control and have a routine in place where she is in charge of what occurs. She has clearly incurred some sort of injury which threw her off balance and this didn’t please her. In my opinion she felt like she was doing something wrong by not being at work and being in hospital as at the beginning, in her dream, she tried to justify herself and explain. In this sequence the woman only converses with men with shows her strong sexuality and strong mind. The man that she talks to in the office is clearly important to her just as she is to him. He seems genuinely concerned about her which makes him come across as a very nice person, with other people’s best interests at heart.