Well, this is damn interesting. Assuming this isn’t a bit of publicity for this gentleman and his production company (not that I’m a cynic, but such a ‘mock-up’ is something I might consider were I in his position and what I immediately suspected), and everything is as presented, then what is the ‘lady’ doing?
This being 1928, even “singing along to a little radio, or mimicking a sports commentary” would be wrong as the portable transistor radio was years off. Even walkie-talkies were big.
So, if it is genuine footage from 1928, what’s the lady doing that we are interpreting as somebody talking into a mobile phone?
Ok.
Are we ‘thinking’ it’s a mobile phone because that’s the ‘suggestion’ we’ve been given by the gentleman presenting us with the ‘evidence’?
Here’s the thing: Think about Twisted Lyrics. That’s when you sing maybe rude words or at least different words to those that are in a song where the lyrics are a bit unclear within the music. A classic example might be “The going gets tough” (Billy Ocean / Boyzone) can very easily be ‘heard’ as “Go and get stuffed”, especially if just before playing the song, the ‘suggestion’ has been firmly planted into the person listening.
So, are we ‘seeing’ a mobile phone because the suggestion has been put into our heads and this stops us considering other options?
Towards the very last frame, we see what appears to be her slightly lengthening some of her fingers. If she’s clutching a device, or anything, then she wouldn’t elongate her fingers as she moved her hand slightly away from her face, as that would naturally feel like she might drop the device. Instinctively we hold our ‘clutch’ onto devices regardless of whether they are against our ear or further away. The ‘clutch’ doesn’t change. Yet it does in the film.
I’d opt for her holding her hand in a way that casts a shadow (look at how strong the shadow is on the pavement) within it to give (us) the illusion that something is there. My guess would be there’s nothing there. She’s not actually holding anything at all. For some reason she’s clenched her hand in order to slightly obscure her face. Maybe from the sunlight or the camera lights (they were extremely bright back in those days) or maybe from the camera itself (they were big and certainly not discrete, so she’d have realised she was ‘on camera’).
As for the apparent speaking, was she talking to the gentleman ahead of her, thinking out loud or even talking to herself about the fact she was on camera, “Oh no, please don’t let those gentlemen be filming me, I look so damn ugly today!”
So, am I thinking in the better direction?
Discuss.
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