Mise-en-scène

the film card game

Goal
Get rid of all the cards in your hand. If play goes all around the circle and no one is able to
force you to pick up a card, you win.
You get rid of cards by…
Playing them into a set, where all the cards in the set have some visual feature in common.
You pick up cards when…
Someone plays into one of your sets. If someone “steals” your set, draw two cards.
Each player/team may own as many sets as they want. The more sets you create, the easier it is to
play your cards, but the more likely it is that your opponents can make you pick up a card.

On each turn
Each team starts with six cards. On your first turn, pick two cards that share a “visual feature” to
create your first set. If you can’t play, draw a card.
If possible, play one of your cards into an existing set, stating the visual feature that it has in
common with the others. If the set belongs to someone else, the player who owns it draws a card
from the pile.
• You can steal another player’s set by declaring a different visual feature that unites it (e.g.,
a set of “two people in profile” could become “there’s a portrait photograph in the center
of the frame”). If someone steals your set, draw two cards.
• If you can’t play into any existing set, draw a card from the deck, or pick up a card that
has already been played into a set (as long as there are at least three cards in the set, so
two will remain). If you pick up a card from a set, the player who owns the set exacts a toll
by giving you one card from their hand.

What is a “visual feature”?

Something that could be recognized even by someone unfamiliar with the film; nothing involving
the plot or characters.
Good examples: Bad examples:
• dividing the frame into two halves • the same person appears in both shots
• a two-shot of a conversation in profile • the scenes happen at about the same
time in the film
• a photo of a person’s face
• something bright red is in frame. This
• a character looking at the
could be an interesting visual feature in
camera/audience
lots of other films, but it’s ubiquitous in
• a blue background All About My Mother. People would
dump all their cards on you.

Designed by Peter Shultz for teaching All About My Mother in Encounters, 2015. Thanks to Jakobina Arch for her help
with testing and tuning.