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A biographical narration of a person can help in digging deep and having an understanding of a person’s life as it entails the details of a person since the time of birth, early life, career life as well as family, education, and achievements. Most of the people have had their biographies written in pamphlets while others have them translated into a film. “What Happened, Miss Simone” is a Netflix based documentary that was produced in the year 2015. It is a biographical film of Nina Simone. Nina Simone was an American singer who later became a civil rights activist moving to Liberia after the turbulence of the 1960s. The documentary combines archived footage that was previously unreleased, as well as the interviews, were done with Miss Simone’s daughter and friends. The documentary’s title was derived from a quote from Maya Angelou. The film was directed by Liz Garbus.
The filmmaker intended to bring out to the people and make them aware of the life of Nina Simone who lived the life of a singer, pianist as well as a civil activist as well as torture. To demonstrate this, the film uses footages of Nina as well as interviews with other people to account and act as witnesses of Miss Simone’s life narrating her journey as a singer and activist. Her father and mother did not show Nina Simone affection and this made her run away from home. She met Miss Mazzy, an English piano teacher who loved Nina as if she was her daughter preparing her for a future in music, as a classical concert pianist. Miss Mazzy even arranged for Nina’s funds allowing her to train at the Juilliard School in New York. Nina’s dream to become a classical pianist was thwarted as she failed to gain a scholarship to further her studies at the Curtis Institute. The main reason as to why she missed the scholarship is because she was poor and besides she was black, therefore rejected on a racial basis. Later her piano teacher Vladimir Sokoloff said that she was denied a chance because there were other better students other than her who needed the scholarship. Having been rejected both by her parents and for the scholarship, Nina developed a lifelong resentment that her talents were not greatly welcomed and continued to endure a life of racial bitterness.
The overall quality of the film is good in that the audios and video footages are in coordination, the actual action in the stage follows the words and as well the audio quality of the film is good. One such example is playing the piano whereby the action gets translated into the sound of the bars depending on the key being pressed. The video quality on the other side varies; some of the scenes have black and white video footages while some of them are colored. The black and white footages are a representation of a flashback or a narration of an event that happened sometimes back, a reminder of memories. Those in colored pictures are current footages that make the film look beautiful and modern. All these aspects in the video make the quality of the video to be of high quality.
The response from the audience that is elicited as a result of the mise-en-scene is that of pity being more emotional. The reason is because of how the story is narrated as well as the emotions triggered by Nina Simone as she performs on stage. She gets emotional especially the phrase ‘You know how I feel’ making the audience more emotional. Nina was a brave woman who was dedicated to her career as a singer, a pianist and an activist that saw her grow to a famous classical artist. The documentary is valid in the sense that the interviews provide a firsthand account of Nina’s life being provided by Nina herself as well as her daughter and this makes the leader believe the information since it is from reliable sources.
Reference
What Happened, Miss Simone. Retrieved from: https://youtu.be/mXtzjBxeJi0?t=11
