The big shave

'The big shave' (Martin Scorscese, 1967) is a short film showing a young man in his bathroom shaving. however he does not stop shaving and ends up cutting all of his face/neck. In modern day culture this short represents people's obsession to look perfect and going to extreme lengths to do so. This is emphasised when the young man reapplies the shaving foam to his face. However in its time this short film was symbolic of the vietnam war in which 475,000 american soldiers were serving. This short film shows a young man wasting his life for no good reason, this represented what was actually happening with the war, lots of young men wasting their lives fighting for a no good cause.

The music in this short is very contrasting to the pictures shown. the score was upbeat, happy and jazzy. this represented the governments attitude to what was happening at the time, they acted as if everything was fine and what was happening was good. in this clip the music makes the clip feel less gruesome and makes it more bearable to watch. 

The use of editing in this short is also good as the cuts are relevant to the beats in the music. this again makes the whole scene feel upbeat. towards the end of the clip everything becomes extremely surreal and the camerawork shows this. there is lots of POV shots and extreme close ups. a shot of the mans chest as blood drips down and a POV of the sink as blood is dripping.