Mime Movement Task

In this class, we researched the origins of Mime movement, and how it is still used and prevalent in modern works today. Mime is a theatrical form used to suggest actions, create characters, and tell stories, all without speaking. Mime focuses on body movement, and the power to convey a character by only using body definitions. In our Laban workshop, we learnt more about using body movement to represent a character. We explored the three key components of mime, also known as ‘the 3 Fs of mime’, Force, Face, and Focus. We experimented with different kinds of mime tasks, such as ‘pulling a rope, ‘climbing up stairs and ladders’, ‘lifting/using an object’, etc. Each having the ‘three Fs’ as key components to making the task look realistic. For example, in the ‘pulling a rope’ task, there was a large emphasis on force, as we need to look like we’re pulling really tightly on the imaginary rope. We want our focus to be on it, so it puts more emphasis on the rope and looks more realistic to the audience. Facial expressions are also extremely vital, depending on the character (struggling, finding it easy, etc.) to further place importance on the rope and create an overall tone and atmosphere for the mime character we are playing.