Film commentary: Wings and Oars
A beautiful short film about memories. Watercolour and music intensify the melancholy and surrealism of the film.One of the few films in our selection that uses watercolour paintings.
Discover other creations of the director
The films of Vladimir LeschiovQuestioning the film: Wings and Oars
Understand the story, the theme, express your sensibility and exercise your critical mind.A second, more careful viewing allows you to get a good idea of the main features of the story, provided you are willing to grasp the metaphorical leads "on the fly". But in Wings and Oars there is less to understand the details of the character's journey than to feel the emotions that accompany them. One can concentrate on the development of the two worlds: the sky, the wind, the flowers, the birds, the freedom on one side, the shore, the water, the lighthouse, the fixity, the attachment on the other. And the point of view is always that of the aviator.
Certain references can be contextualised historically: the song, the radio, the small aerodrome and the mail plane, the sailor's clothes, the cargo ship, for example, which indicate an imagination of the 1930s to 1950s.
We can also look for transitions in the form of trompe l'oeil or paradoxical images, which always exploit a grammar of analogies: the plane taking off in the background seems to jostle the butterfly in the foreground as they pass each other, the same plane is caught with the butterfly in the net, the paper plane turns into a flight of crows or flying fish, the cigarette smoke disappears through the door window as a cloud passes over the horizon in the background... and so on. The reference to the images of the surrealists is relevant (painting but also cinema).
1 How many different characters are there in the film?
Two: the man and the woman, but at different times in their lives.
2 When isthe film set?
In the age of propeller-driven aviation.
3 What happens to the aviator when he is caught in the net?
He falls in love with the woman in the boat, leaves his job as an aviator for her.
4 Is the striped hut the same at the beginning and the end of the story?
It is not thesame.The first one is the airfield one, the other one is the boatman's one.They indicate two different places and times.
5 What is the beginning and what is the end of the "story"?
Beginning: the child in the hut next to the airfield dreaming about planes.
End: the man next to the boat hire hut.
6 How do we understand that time passes?
In the same places we see characters of different ages who look the same.
7 Which elements in the film are similar and which are opposite?
The sky and the sea, the birds and the fish, the insects and the plants, the aeroplanes and the boats, the cabin on wheels and the lighthouse...
8 Didthe aviator character realise his childhood dream?
Yes, because he was an aviator and travelled for a while, not because he later moved away from it by settling in the lighthouse with the woman.
9 What kind of sad feeling(s) can we associate this film with?
Regret, inactivity, torpor, nostalgia...
Download PDF of the film's educational activities
Created with the support of the Ministry of Education and the CNC.Viewing of the film with the family, educational activities with parents at home and with teachers in class.
Nostalgia (French) (Cycle 3)
Educational activities proposed by Bruno Pellier based on the film Wings and Oars.
Creatures of the winds (Questioning the world) (Cycle 2 and 3)
Educational activities proposed by Bruno Pellier based on the film Wings and Oars.
Discover other educational sheets created with the support of the French Ministry of Education and the CNC...
