A heart-breaking tale that is sure to have you shedding a tear, this French film follows the findings of a journalist named Julia who is researching the story of a young Jewish girl named Sarah Starzynski. Sarah is on a quest to save her younger brother from the French police and concentration camps, hiding him in a secret door in the wall of her home and vows to come back to get him out. The unfortunate truth is by the time she is able to get back to him, he has starved to death and has passed for quite some time now. Sarah, unable to cope with feeling at fault for her brother’s death, is very much hanging by a thread in most of her life into adulthood, where she later commits suicide.
With such a tough topic, the colors remain neutral-toned. The title typography symbolizes Sarah’s deeply broken state of mind throughout the film, especially after her brother’s passing, connecting it back to the idea that she is hanging on by a thread. The imagery is composed of key symbols seen throughout the movie. The hand is thoughtfully positioned in such a way which shows preserverance, while holding a key as tightly as Sarah did in her pursuit to rescue her little brother. The hand in barbed-wire is not only depicting an important scene in the film, but also further enhances the symbol of perseverance–no matter the circumstance, no matter the pain, this key will not be let go.
Scope: Illustration, Typography
