Thomas Needham

October 22, 2022

ENG 2400

Translation Paper

 

Why does All The Character Traits of Joseph give him more dept.

 

Joseph arrives, in both short story and film it is   abundantly clear of the clash of cultures.  Ultimately this is a story about fitting in outside ones comfort zone. There are no hidden messages in this story but more character traits of all the characters that builds on the message. Each character seems to have a job within the story and film that gives the story more dept. WE also get an insight to where Joseph is emotionally due to his past with his Father being his teacher as well back home.

Joseph himself has a radical change in the story, not only because he is the main character but when the film does flashbacks with Joseph in Africa it shows him as a very enthusiastic boy and very talkative to where he is in Ireland where he  is silent.  The narrative between the short story and short film is profound  mostly due to the hardships Joseph went through in where his father was killed. One of the most noteable differences of this story is that not only Joseph was enthusiastic with school back in Africa but all the children were, than we look at Josephs new school and see that all students  are disrespectful to their fellow students and the teacher as well. Joseph’s father seems in the flashback to have the children’s attention where the teacher in Ireland spends more time on discipline with all the children.  The director made a good choice in the editing of “New Boy”  with the somewhat smoother cut in to Joseph’s past and back to present time.  It feels like the director was taking a transition shot from the point of view of Joseph and his past to his time currently in Ireland and it was used as a key component in editing the film and because it is Josephs point of view rather than the narrator’s there are some point of view shots through out Josephs first day at this new school. We always have to keep in mind that this is all new to Joseph so the audience will get the feeling of a new experience just as Joseph is in the film. And mise-en-scene is done through out the film where there are sometimes full camera shots with the characters because the story includes confrontation sometimes and full shots of both actors is shown.

During the eleven minute film  we have an overall  amount of exchange concepts but in the end  forgiveness is the overall impression I received in the story. There are no apologies given  in any exchange of the story but in the end Joseph, Christian and Seth seem to have a mutual liking for one another when the teacher goes back in the classroom to  discipline Hazel. It is a silent apology  due to Josephs quietness and  being amused at Christians joke he says about the teacher. Josephs laughter sums up his attitude towards the other boys and they accept him. Forgiveness is  shown between the boys without hearing any apologies.

We learn through this story and film that everybody is going to feel like Joseph on their first day of a new school, it is universal on that Josephs experiences are the same for us but the background story of where Joseph came from and the trauma he went through might be different but the overall experience can be attributed to many people. It is a more traditional story because the way the story is told is actually more simple and less complicated it just has different aspects to the reasoning of why traits like Joseph being silent through the entire story  is a necessary part of “New Boy”. Without any dialogue from Joseph and the flashbacks from his time in Africa makes his story stronger.