Charlotte's Web

I chose to examine the video clip from Charlotte’s Web. This was the scene where Fern, the daughter of a pig farmer, caught her father trying to kill the youngest pig or ‘runt’ in the middle of the night. Fern is distraught by her father’s actions and decided she would care for the pig if it’s mother could not. Fern raises the pig and calls him Wilbur.

The first drama element I would like to discuss is the use of character. This is described as the “active participants who animate the story” (Dinham, 2014, p190). The actress, who played Fern, has cleverly used character to create a relatable personality with the beliefs and attitudes that animals should not be killed for sport. Fern takes great offence to her father’s wishes to want to kill the piglet, just because he is the smallest and the youngest. This is an important device used as it has created a very intense character for someone who is so young.

Tension is defined as the energy of a setting and is developed through conflict, timing and effects such as lighting (Dinham, 2014). The tension is at the lowest point at the beginning of the scene when Fern enters the farmhouse and observes her father nurturing the piglets. It then approaches a climax or high point when Fern and her father are arguing about Wilbur’s fate. This high tension level is constructed through the conflict of opinions between Fern and her father regarding Wilbur’s pending death. The audience does not know whether Wilbur was going to be killed or if Fern was going to save him, creating a suspense. The energy was very tense between the two characters and the relationship was tested as they both had different views regarding Wilbur. The tension then enters a decline as Fern declares that she will take care of Wilbur, sparing him from being killed, and her father and her stop arguing. This timeline is often used in films and short clips to engage and interest the