Tube Tales: Steal Away

Directed by Charles McDougall, this film is about an attempted robbery that goes wrong.  The film starts off with fast paced James Bond style music.  Again, another bass guitar is used to add to its deep melodic tone.  We see a POV shot of someone in the car, driving over a bridge.  It then cuts to a close up of someone's hands, opening a suitcase that is revealed to be crammed with money.  They steadily stack the money in to piles.  On one band, the title 'Steal Away' is revealed (an appropriate way because stealing is associated with money, the titles come up on money) and the director, writer and main cast.  The POV shot of the man continues as we see him entering a tunnel which we think at first is an underground base, but the car comes out of the tunnel and turns in to a road.  The sequence cuts between the title sequence of the money being packet up and the unknown person, driving in different locations around London.

After the title sequence, we see a cross, hanging from the front window of the car that the person is driving in.  The cross could be a good luck charm because this seems like an action genre short-film, even though not many short-films are labelled in such ways.  The symbol also represents life after death, as most people associate the cross with the Christian symbol of Jesus hanging from the cross.

The non-diegetic music turns to diegetic music that we can see being played in a CD player in the car that the man is driving in.  The man's face is partially revealed when the camera de-focuses from the cross, pans up and focuses on the man.  The de-focus might have been intentionally used for that brief bit   with the panning up because the director wanted us only to focus on the cross and the man.  The man is wearing shades and the car is filled with shadows.  This makes the man look menacing because his eyes are hidden, so we can't relate to him.  As he stops at the second pair of red lights, someone comes over to wash his screen.  As this is still from the man's POV, we assume that this is a car-washer coming to wash his windows: we can only see one person.  However, this is a distraction as we see when an accomplice smashes the window and makes a grab for the suitcase with the money in.

The accomplice and the man in the car struggle, but the accomplice (a woman) gets away with the suitcase.  The man in the car aims a gun at her as she runs in to Bank tube station.  The director has deliberately filmed outside Bank tube station because the woman is stealing money and we all know that banks have money in them.  He shoots at the woman but she escapes unscathed.

We then see the robber's POV as he shouts "NO!" and chucks the bucket of water on the car bonnet; he must have a close relationship with his accomplice because he's very upset over this.  The man in the car is outraged and aims his pistol at the robber (man).  The man in the car seems to be pointing the gun at us - breaking the fourth wall in terms of film because it seems like he's actually going to shoot at us directly.

The film then narratively switches from the man in the car's point of view to the accomplice's point of view.  The tracking shot of the woman shows her desperation as she meanders her way through everyone in the crowd.  As the fatal gun shot is fired, the sound is echoed, the woman accomplice grinds to a halt, turns around and the camera zooms to a close-up of her, the zoom is in slow-motion in order to emphasis the realisation that her male accomplice has been left behind and shot.  The woman's breathing is emphasised upon as well, it is made louder and the noise of the crowd is made lower.  This tells us that the woman has panicked.

We think Michael's dead until he comes running around the corner and in to the frame.  The empty corridor is there for a few seconds to show us the loneliness that the woman feels, because it's from her point of view.  Michael runs to kiss her, the background music is brought back in because the background music is the action theme in this short film and Michael coming back represents the woman's life coming back in to action.  The camera tracks them as they run and we are brought to a dark passage that is barred off by a gate.  This tells us that this is a part of the underground station which they're not meant to be.  This is further emphasised by the red light that we see; it could also represent death.

The camera tracks their feet as they run through a puddle.  We can hear the sound of them breathing heavily.  By the end of this sequence, the audience are meant to feel out of energy, like the characters are - so that we can empathise with them.

They both attempt to open the suitcase that they stole, the camera tracks their hands as they do it, so that the audience can try and decipher where the opening is, with the main characters.  As the suitcase opens, an explosive sound is heard and a close-up of loads of bank notes in red dusty air is shown.  The director wants us to think that this is blood from an explosive suitcase.  The red air connotes the metaphorical blood that they have on their hands.  Reaction shots are used to show that they're surprised and tells us that we're meant to be surprised too.  They kiss - an extreme close-up - to show to us their emotions for each other: they're glad to see each other alive; meanwhile, a white train approaches.  The normal train that you see on the underground is red, blue and white, but this train is just white.  It denotes a passage to the afterlife.

The train approaches in silence, which seems menacing because it feels as if it's creeping up on them.  There's a continuity error: when we see the train from an external point of view, it's empty.  As the pair board the train, it has passengers on it.  Whilst this looks like a continuity error, it might not be; the director might have put it there intentionally to confuse us.

The camera pans inside the train as both of them board.  We hear someone speaking from the other end.  We learn that it's a preacher at the other end of the train.  We can tell he's a preacher by the way he's dressed: a black suite, his top hat and the prop he holds in his hand - the Bible.  The camera pulls from a shallow focus to a distant focus of the man at the far end of the carriage: we focus on Michael and his assistant as they look around the carriage, but our attention is drawn to the man, just as theirs is.  We try to locate the source of the voice, but we can't until the camera focuses on him.  The director wants us to think that the man is God, because at first we can't hear his voice.  He says "I have sinned, I have grown weary in the ways of the world.  I am beyond the reach of your eternal grace." and "He knows".  It cuts to a reaction shot of Michael, who looks scared as if he's been exposed.

As the preacher speaks, we see a hand washing peoples feet in water, this could denote holy water and the cleansing of sins.  People are filming the man who is washing peoples feet and giggling amongst themselves.  The camera pans down to the man washing the feet to show his lower position than everyone else.  There is a shot of the preacher, jesting his hand outwards to people as he says "he holds out his hand" this may be a gesture for people to come with him.  Some drunk people board the train too, but the preacher remains impassive about it.  He continues to preach his wisdom.  One of the drunk men accidentally hits the black male who is innocently washing peoples feet.  The drunken man guiltily hands over £20 compensation for the damage to the black man.  The preacher comes over and hands back the £20 note to the drunken man.  This represents the forgiving of sins too.

The preacher holds a cloth to the black man's nose whilst singing 'Steal Away'.  As he continues singing 'Steal Away', background music of the song comes in.  A spiritual air to the film is brought in.  It is uplifting to the scene.  As Michael sits down, the black man offers to wash his feet and cleanse him of sins.  However, Michael declines and instead, washes the black man's feet, thus cleansing both of them of their sins.  Michael is doing a good deed for the black man.  His accomplice looks disgusted by the gesture, but Michael cleans the man's foot anyway.  The black man leans forward to rub Michael's hand - as he does this, the lights flicker, along with the singing, this accentuates the theme of forgiveness.  The lights come back to normal - Michael has been relieved of his sins.

The transport Police come to arrest the Preacher and the black man because they think that they're begging: this is a chance for Michael and his accomplice to leave.  They depart the train and leave their stolen money with a tramp, in one last act of kindness.  The tramp shouts because he thinks that they've stolen, but they haven't.  It cuts to a close-up of the ticket barriers - they represent something very important that we don't realise at first.  Michael is allowed through the gate, but his accomplice isn't (the officer who denies her the access is Simon Pegg - the only famous actor in the film).  We realise that the barriers draw the line between heaven and hellish Earth as we hear a none-diegetic jingle (something special has happened) and we see Michael hold his hand on his heart as he remembers himself being shot.  He jilts slightly as he reminisces the sound of the gun shot.  His accomplice has been taken away from him so he feels like he's been shot again.  The suddenness of the gun shot shocks us as well, it feels like a blow to the head - surreal.

The music changes to the sound of church bells and violins being played in a dark depressing tone as the man ascends up the escalator.  This symbolises the transition from Earth to heaven - his soul is leaving.  The whole scene on the tube represents judgement day.  He's been judged based on what he did on the tube and because all his sins were cleansed, he's going to heaven.

The scene fades out to white - to a field where it's raining.  We feel gloomy, even though he's gone to heaven, he's gone from Earth.  The church bell chimes again, it fades to a shot of the dead trees, then a wide shot of the people, like they've been transported.  As we see people at the other end of the field marching towards those who've most recently come to heaven, we see a close-up of a woman amongst a very passive crowd.  She cries in disbelief "dad!".  We realise the other set of people are also dead and that everyone in the field is now in heaven.  We aren't enlightened as to why the people who were on the underground are now in a field, but it could be because their bodies are in a grave underneath a field and the soul goes wherever the body goes - like when Michael died by an underground station, so judgement day for him is in the underground.

Everyone can find their relatives apart from Michael, we see a tracking shot of him walking, trying to locate his relative.  We see a birds-eye view of everyone in the field so we don't get disorientated and so we know that everyone apart from Michael, has found their relatives.  We see a medium close-up of Michael.  Shallow focus is used because the director wants us to focus solely on his emotion: his disconsolate feeling as his eyes search in vein for someone.  The shot of Michael is used conjunctly with a medium close-up of a woman.  Both of them are medium close-ups so that we see their souls connect.  She calls "Michael".  Michael turns to see this woman and we realise she's his mum only when his voice tearfully pronounces the one syllable that constitutes the word 'mum'.  They embrace in a hug.  A close-up is used to show this so that we feel emotionally jerky too.

We then see the same black man as we saw on the tube, calling a name.  As he does this, it fades to a shot of him on Earth (back to the mortal world).  As he calls the name again and turns, the focus pulls from him to the distant focus of the emergency services at the scene of the crime that happened in the beginning.  We see Michael's physical counterpart is dead.  The camera pans out to the preacher and man who we saw on the tube.  As it continues to pan out, we see that time has moved on in the real world and it's now evening.  We hear multiple sources of sound: the preacher singing, the traffic, medical staff speaking to the witnesses.  It pans to the rest of the street, continuing as if nothing's happened: it was just another crime scene.

The film evokes an enormous amount of emotion out of us because it makes clever use of shots and symbolism.  It visually tricks us in to thinking something with its close-ups, shallow focuses and dark lighting that disorientate us as viewers and leaves space open for the visual background to be changed.
Narratively, it does something different than any mainstream film: it changes in POV from one character to the next; not only this, but it portrays the robbers as good people and the narrative sticks with the robbers for the whole film and allows us a chance to see all aspects of their character.  Mainstream films wouldn't allow us to relate to people who've done bad things.

We're tricked in to thinking that the spiritual word is reality because it's not manifest as much as it is in mainstream and from the narrative in mainstream, our expectation of heaven is that it's wonderful and shiny.  This film gives us a different feel and visual sense of the place - that it's like reality, but without the people.  It's not until the end that we get a sense structurally of what has actually happened.  This short-film does what most can't achieve in an hour - it sends across a clear message and makes you think deeply and reflect.  The title 'Steal Away' doesn't just tell us about the plot of the money being stolen - in the broader sense, it tells us to steal away from evil.