Me and Earl and the Dying Girl

MEST2: Existing product research

In this extract you can see it begins with a medium close up of the two characters entering the room, it then slowly pans to the left see we see the wall and whats on it. This last for about 10 seconds which when you watch it is long for a shot that isn't showing much. This can suggest this is a very calmed and relaxed scene and nothing exciting will happen. This can be further explained by the sound playing in the background. The non-diegetic sound which may come across as diegetic sound to confuse the audience, adds to and is parallel to the calming atmosphere that is being created along with the slow camera movement. The 180 degree rule was being used with the over the shoulder shots as they spoke to each other. What i noticed is that every time the camera switched to the other person it would get closer to the persons face. It began with and over the shoulder, medium long shot of the characters talking. This emphasised the fact that they are sitting very far from each other and the fact that at the bottom of the screen it said 'day 1 of doomed friendship' suggests that they aren't that close hence why there is a lot of space between them. It then becomes a medium shot of just one character which could show that they are starting to get comfortable with each other and there is also a bit more dialogue between them. Eventually, it is a medium close up on their faces which suggests that over time they will become close. This is also implied by how they are both at one ends of the screen and every time the camera straight cuts to the other character it is as if they are sitting next to each other. The fact that the editing pace is very slow makes it seem like the 'dying girl' isn't thinking about the fact that she is dying and is in no rush to do anything yet. The mise-en-scene makes it clear to us what kind of genre the film is, from the costume of the character you can understand that it is a drama film as they dress very casual and it is what the audience are used to seeing in their ever day lives. Also the setting is set around the school grounds. The lighting is used is high key lighting to show that it is a realistic film and that it is based on real life. There are no props used to make it clear that its any other genre other than drama.

This film is rated PG-13. I think this film is rated this because of the fact that it is based on people who are still in school and therefore they couldn't make the film very inappropriate as school kids are not meant to be involved with things like that. Also, the fact that the older generation would not particularly be interested in watching young kids in school however may watch it because their kids want to. I feel as though the age range would be abut 14- 20's mainly and that this would appeal more to a female audience.


Production: Independent film studios


The studio the produced this film is called Indian Paintbrush. Other films that this film studio produced are The Grande Budapest Hotel, Breathe In, Moonlight kingdom and Fantastic Mr. Fox. The film with the most notable success seems to be Me and Earl and the Dying Girl.



Distribution: Independent film distributors

This film was distributed by 20th Century fox, Fox Searchlight Pictures, Warner bros, Film1 etc. The film opened in 15 arthouse films and had a gradual theatrical increase to 350 screens. This film box officed at 9.1 million and the budget was 8 million.