You can tell what confidence Powell and Driver
had in their narrative powers by the way that the entire first half of this
episode is given over to one scene played in continuous time.
It covers a multitude of changes of expectations and reversals of fortune - Manny's rich distant American cousin Lionel is coming to visit; Manny tells Patrick that he expects Lionel to expand the business with his funds; the flash Yankee cousin arrives and impresses the tailors; once Patrick is out of the room, Lionel tells Manny that he's lost his fortune and he expects him to fire Patrick and give him his job; Lionel goes, Patrick returns and Manny hasn't got the heart to fire his friend; Manny goes, Lionel returns and fires Patrick; Manny returns and Patrick is upset. Most comedy writers would have divided this story up into sections to create some ellipsis between the different stages, but it works rather well dramatically as a single scene.
In the second act the two colleagues are (of course) reconciled in a crisis, both climbing out on a sixth floor ledge, each mistakenly believing that a reported suicide risk is their friend. The ensuing vertiginous peril is hardly Harold Lloyd's Safety Last!, but it is enhanced by canny use of quick cutaways to film inserts and Chroma key. Shots of traffic on the street below (also used as a backdrop) have a strange Toytown model-like quality. When I first looked at them, I couldn't be sure that they were even real, but they are, just shot from a further distance away than you're used to seeing. This onscreen vista has that same miniature quality that you get looking at cars and houses out of an aeroplane window just after take-off, and the disconcerting sense of distance adds visual credibility to a very cheaply-realised scene.
It covers a multitude of changes of expectations and reversals of fortune - Manny's rich distant American cousin Lionel is coming to visit; Manny tells Patrick that he expects Lionel to expand the business with his funds; the flash Yankee cousin arrives and impresses the tailors; once Patrick is out of the room, Lionel tells Manny that he's lost his fortune and he expects him to fire Patrick and give him his job; Lionel goes, Patrick returns and Manny hasn't got the heart to fire his friend; Manny goes, Lionel returns and fires Patrick; Manny returns and Patrick is upset. Most comedy writers would have divided this story up into sections to create some ellipsis between the different stages, but it works rather well dramatically as a single scene.
In the second act the two colleagues are (of course) reconciled in a crisis, both climbing out on a sixth floor ledge, each mistakenly believing that a reported suicide risk is their friend. The ensuing vertiginous peril is hardly Harold Lloyd's Safety Last!, but it is enhanced by canny use of quick cutaways to film inserts and Chroma key. Shots of traffic on the street below (also used as a backdrop) have a strange Toytown model-like quality. When I first looked at them, I couldn't be sure that they were even real, but they are, just shot from a further distance away than you're used to seeing. This onscreen vista has that same miniature quality that you get looking at cars and houses out of an aeroplane window just after take-off, and the disconcerting sense of distance adds visual credibility to a very cheaply-realised scene.
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