Sofia Coppola is a director known for her feminine movies and a signature style. She extensively uses camera movement, composition, color, and lighting to create a striking, intimate atmosphere and communicate the emotional energy of every scene (Vernallis et al., 2015). Focused on female characters and the alluring images of beauty, her movies explore the themes of loneliness, isolation, youth, and femininity. The purpose of this paper is to analyze the mise-en-scène in Sofia Coppola’s movies The Virgin Suicides, Marie Antoinette, and Somewhere and discuss how it is used to portray the characters and develop the films’ ideas.
The Virgin Suicides
The film The Virgin Suicides follows the tragic life of five adolescent sisters living in home isolation imposed on them by their conservative and anxious parents after the youngest sister’s suicide attempt. The story is narrated by one of the neighbor boys who empathize with the girls and admire them as symbols of femininity and pureness. The movie is a charmingly rendered illustration of the themes of isolation, femininity, and naivety.
Through mise-en-scène, Sofia Coppola creates a beautiful, romantic, and dreamy atmosphere of ephemeral and eternal youth. The lighting of most scenes is soft and natural, and the shots seem to be put through a dreamy Instagram filter, conveying a bitter-sweet feeling of tenderness (Thomas, 2000). The lighting creates a feeling of unworldliness, emphasizing that the girls do not belong to the real material world, balancing on the edge between life and death (Stefanelli, 2015). The five sisters are portrayed as beautiful long-haired blondies dressed in soft pastel colors that capture their innocence. The girls are often shown together, staying close to each other, hugging and curling. It creates the feeling that they are essentially one person desperate and unable to grow up, feeling lonely and isolated, both striving and being unable to face the adult world.
Marie Antoinette
The movie Marie Antoinette tells the story of the notorious queen of France portraying her as a young Austrian girl marrying a French dauphin and moving to the Palace of Versailles. Marie Antoinette, played by Kirsten Dance, is a sweet and dreamy girl who tries to embrace her new life in the palace, finding it both hostile and amusing (Handyside, 2017). Feeling lonely in the palace’s rococo interiors and alienated from her husband, she strives to create her own world, filling it with fancy dresses, exquisite desserts, and costumed parties. Through the depiction of the growing alienation of the young queen from the material world, the movie reflects on the topics of loneliness, isolation, and self-expression.
In mise-en-scènes, the rococo interiors of the palace are contrasted with Marie Antoinette’s sweet and dreamy demeanor. It is particularly noticeable in the morning dressing scene, where the young dauphine stands naked in front of her court ladies while they hand the right to dress her into a robe from one to another. As Marie Antoinette embraces the court’s life, she starts to dress up and make elaborate hairdos, spending the court’s money on parties. However, having given birth to the princess and allured by Rousseau’s ideas, she moves to the country, changing her lifestyle, isolating herself from the court, and embracing the harmony of a simple and peaceful life. The scenes in the countryside provide a contrast to the scenes in the palace, with the pastel color palette emphasizing the gentle and feminine character of the young queen.
Somewhere
Somewhere tells the story of an A-list movie star who finds himself taking care of his teenage daughter. He is living the life of vane entertainments, moving from a hotel to a hotel without a purpose or enjoyment of it. The girl, played by Elle Fanning, brings into his life the happiness and harmony that he lacks, endowing him with a new appreciation for life.
In the movie, essentially nothing happens, with Sofia Coppola deliberately making the film that looks like a beautiful postcard and an almost static illustration of the man’s existential loneliness. The lighting is soft and natural, and there are a lot of long shots that depict the solitude and vagueness of the character’s existence (Gregory, 2011). The actor’s daughter is portrayed as a fresh blow of wind that brings life to her father’s vane existence and then goes away.
Sofia Coppola’s Directing Methods
In all three films directed by Sofia Coppola, certain similarities in mise-en-scène can be noticed. The first is the use of lighting to create a particular atmosphere. Sofia Coppola’s tends to use filters, soft and natural lighting, and pastel color palette to create a sensation of the beauty that is about to slip away. The second is the specific operator techniques used the emphasize the films’ main idea. In The Suicide Virgins, the girls are often shown together in one shot, clinging to one another. In Marie Antoinette, the main character’s gentle beauty is often contrasted with the rich interiors of the palace. In Somewhere, long shots emphasize the feeling of boredom and loneliness experienced by the main character. The third is the use of costumes to portray the characters (Rogers, 2018). In The Virgin Suicides, the girls are dressed in pastel colors to emphasize their innocence and youth, while in Marie Antoinette, the transformation of the queen’s fashion style shows the changes in her character.
Conclusion
Sofia Coppola’s directing method is based on creating the atmosphere through the use of color, light, and costumes. Her characters are mostly young girls who are confronted with the challenges of adult life, both striving and being unable to grow up, and finding harmony in the worlds that they create for themselves. Through the use of mise-en-scène, Sofia Coppola explores the themes of beauty, youth, loneliness, and isolation, developing her own signature style.
References
Gregory, A. (2011). Sofia Coppola’s Somewhere: A beautiful ride to nowhere. Thirteen.
Handyside, F. (2017). Sofia Coppola: A cinema of girlhood. Bloomsbury Publishing.
Rogers, A. (2018). Sofia Coppola: The politics of visual pleasure. Berghahn Books.
Stefanelli, M. A. (2015). Permanence and transience in Sofia Coppola’s The Virgin Suicides. RSA Journal, 26.
Thomas, K. (2000). The Virgin Suicides’ an affecting, somber tale of repressed lives. Los Angeles Times.
Vernallis, C., Rogers, H., & Perrott, L. (2019). Transmedia directors: Artistry, industry and new audiovisual aesthetics. Bloomsbury Publishing USA.