Member-only story
Inside the Mind of a ‘Stutterer’
An analysis of Benjamin Cleary’s Oscar-winning short film
Benjamin Cleary’s short film Stutterer (2015) opens with the sound of a telephonic conversation as the screen lights up to reveal an extreme close up of a stuttering young man’s lips caught in a futile attempt to force the words out of his mouth. The operator on the other end hangs up, the shot widens to a close up and we see the protagonist’s face for the first time while simultaneously hearing the words (that he had failed to articulate coherently) run through his mind. Thus, at the very beginning the audience is given a deeply intimate glimpse into the nature and degree of difficulty that this character is having to grapple with in order to perform the most ordinary tasks of daily life. This is followed by a night shot of a high density, multi-storeyed apartment as the title of the film appears in large block letters right across the centre of the screen. Within a mere three-quarters of a minute the cold opening manages to establish that a drama about social anxiety and isolation is about to unfold with a young man at its centre.
The word “Stutter” is somewhat onomatopoeic because the repetition of the ‘t’ sound, to a certain degree, mimics the sound of a person stuttering. Interestingly, in the word “Stutterer” (meaning someone who stutters) this onomatopoeic…
