We decided to start our planning by defining a genre for the media text, this is because by choosing a genre, we will have a clear idea on what location of filming will be best, so that the mise en scene does really contain all the generic conventions of that genre, and to make sure that the film is feasible to make, and won’t be too demanding in terms of cost and time and to avoid inconsistency in the narrative, as opposed to mushing the media text all up and turning it into some form of contextual amphiboly.
(The following is an extract from one of our preliminary films: Slightly altered)
Genre I’m interested in | Generic conventions of the genre | Verdict |
Comedy | An either very charismatic or very shy character, often male. The mise en scene is rather typical and down to Earth, as opposed to an alien environment. This is probably because Comedy texts are often based on the concept of character representation so the writer would want the audience to see themselves in the characters, which can only be achieved if the environment in which the character is contained is rather normal and similar to that the audience are in. They typically contain lots of funny punchlines, sarcasm or self mockery. Typically follows a Proppean narrative, however, the characters aren't based on serious notations, for example, there would be a princess, but she wouldn't need saving in serious terms, or there would be a prince, but he's not as physically appealing as the name might suggest... et cetera | I can film a comedy genre text, on the basis that it’s not very demanding as to where it can be filmed, what props it demands and the availability of a cast. Writing a script for it will be challenging. This is because the script in a comedy needs to appeal to the audience very specifically, as opposed to allowing me a little "Creativity and self expression" margin. I'd be particularly concerned about the audience reaction, since Comedy texts are a matter of you either really love it or really hate it. A bit like Jim Carrey. |
Action | Generic Action Conventions include, but are not limited to tons and tons of fast sequences. Bullets flying, exploding-everything and saving damsels. (Proppean narrative!) Guns and hand-to-hand encounters. Free-running and parkour. Fly-on-the-wall character: Some sort of boss. A very masculine character saving a damsel or retrieving an item of interest. | Since GCSE, we were taught that Proppean narratives are relatively easier to compose, this is probably because it costs nothing to be creative, and fantasise about saving the world with laser eyes, defying the laws of physics (Yet being unable to stand green rocks); Filming an action genre text on the other hand is a very different process. It's challenging considering the budget and the turn around time. Writing a script will be easy, but applying it won’t be! It’s too cold at the moment to film outdoors as well. Have I mentioned the fact that I don't have any spare cars/choppers to blow up for cinematic purposes? |
Drama | A very emotionally turbulent character is a common element in drama texts. Typical mise en scene: nothing unusual. This sets an 'average' equilibrium at the beginning of the plot, so that it can be disrupted and restored as according to Todorovian texts, For example, The film, Forrest Gump, starts in a normal day to day setting before moving on to the scenes in which there's fighting, struggle and battles, establishing Gump as the protagonist, so the audience will follow the process which he goes through to restore this equilibrium by the end of the narrative. Often, the main character has an acquaintance partner (Often a relationship, a crush or a shaky marriage). Involvement of a “family” is also common, in this case, Forrest Gump finds out that he has a son, halfway through the text. Wealth and Romance are often the subject of the plot. | I see drama to be very applicable. I can easily write a half decent script that contains all of the generic conventions of the genre, as well as being able to apply it, seeing as it's not particularly demanding in terms of budget, time, location or cast. Drama however, may be slightly 'bland' and to treat this, I will probably decide to go towards a more specific subgenre of it, since Drama is a very broad umbrella term. Examples include Romance Drama, Period Drama, Political Drama, Musical Drama, Urban Drama, Melodrama... so on and so forth. Should I decide to go towards a drama text, I will try and base my choice of subgenre on some audience research, like a questionnaire, in order to find which is the most common subgenre amongst my target audience. |
Textual analysis of films of the aforementioned genres
Comedy
For a comedy genre text, I've chosen to analyse the intro sequence of Hitch, starring Will Smith and directed by Andy Tennant.
First of all, before I forget: The very first shot in the film is quite interesting to me. It is a "Reverse" on-action shot, in the way that the camera starts from focusing on the object of the action, and then moves on onto the person. To be more specific, the camera starts out focusing on a clock, the clock alarm goes off, and then a female turns it off, and as she pulls her arm away, the camera pans accordingly onto her, as opposed to staying in focus on the clock.
I also love the way the film starts with a voice over that is irrelevant to the shot, and the shots build up until we pan onto the character with the voice. In this case, Will Smith.
The film is loaaaaaaded with the transition from Long shots to sudden close ups. This is because this specific transition really does help with emphasising reactions and emotions, which are a very large component of the structure of RomComs.
The final detail in terms of camera work is the sophisticated 180 degree rule: As there are a lot of conversations going in this film.
The music tends to suit the mood or the protagonist, starts off with he promising sunshine kinda' mood with Sam Cooke, and moves on to the Smiths for those sad moments. Et cetera.
Action
For an action genre text, I've chosen to analyse the intro sequence of Die Hard 4.0, starring Bruce Willis, directed by Len Wiseman.
Die Hard 4.0 is very similar to Die Hard one, two and three in the way that the protagonist John McClane does not actually die hard, in fact, he doesn’t die at all.
John’s character compromises of a male inspirational symbol. As it turns out men love going through vent shafts and shouting Yeppi Kai Eye Motherfucker, for reasons still unclear to psychologists.
The film itself as an action genre comprises of blowing up stuff and "terminating" the bad guys. The film follows a narrative structure similar to Propp’s in the way that each character has a specific function in the text. The twist to this is that the Princess’ father is the protagonist.
As with all action films, camera work is very speedy and is heavily cut. A lot of on-action shots, and shot reverse shots during the dialogues.
(Fists and bullets do most of the talking)
In terms of technical stuff, like any action film, there's a buttload of camera work, and a lot of on-action shot to emphasise the thickness of the plot et cetera.
The film begins like most action films, with a prelude of some kind. In this prelude, the camera pans down from "God level" onto street level, before any action at all takes place. This prooooobably gives the audience a more observant post, and does the exact opposite of what films should do, which is integrate the audience as much as possible into the text, but never-mind.
The text is not heavily opinionated, so I believe that the active audience theory can barely be demonstrated here, however, there are some Lucan and Freud conventional suggestions, in the way that the second protagonist (Self proclaimed hero, in terms of Proppean narratives) Matt Farrell is developed through-out the text to become more and more like McClane in attitude and personality.
Drama
For a drama genre text, I've chosen to analyse the intro sequence of Snatch starring Jason Statham and Brad Pitt, directed by Guy Ritchie.
‘Snatch’ is the story of ‘Turkish’ and ‘Tommy’, two boxing promoters who get
Image courtesy of IMDB
entangled in the midst of a gang war over a stolen 84 carat diamond. The film is based in 1970s-1980s London, which can be easily seen and interpreted by the audience via the mise en scene in the film: The vehicles and the outfits suggest that era. Also that the story revolves around the concept of heists and illegal sports, both which really did thrive in industrial places like London around that era.
The film, as a production is very simple in the way that it doesn’t contain any fancy FX, only a very decent narrative. The only notable editing feature in the film is a scene where a gypsy park is on fire. The audience can observe a slow-mo action as well as non-diegetic music that corresponds to the mode in which the scene is set.
Picking out on the narrative: We can see a lot of semiotics being used here which signify something that the audience can relate to. For example, the diamond stands for wealth, explaining why all the parties in the film are going after it, suggesting that everyone wants wealth.
The film in itself does not objectify females in any way, however, it does clarify that the theme of gang wars is quite male centric, in the way that all the females in the plot do not take part in it. In fact, the only partaking a female does in the war is via being victimised (Mickey’s mother’s caravan being set on fire as a warning to Mickey). This suggests a lot of male-gaze. Laura Mulvey would’ve loved this.
The film contains a whole bunch of two-shots and 180 degree rules et cetera. This is generally because throughout the film, there’s a lot of establishment between duets of characters, such as Tommy and Turkish or Sol and Vinny. The film has the occasional long shot that shows the audience the mise en scene to help integrate them into the ‘mood’ of the narrative.
And in conclusion...
Initially I had chosen to go forward with the concept of integrating comedy with drama in order to create a parody-like media text (As I did in my preliminary task). I had then altered this to become more dramatic as opposed to humorous, because the parody genre is very niche and picking out the generic conventions related to it as well as the target audience may be quite challenging, as I’ve learnt from my preliminary task text which wasn’t specifically successful for that reason.
Now, we’re focusing on creating a semi dramatic piece revolving around a 1980s police crew, inspired by films like ‘Pulp Fiction’. Also, from a technical production point of view, I found the film ‘Up in the Air” quite thought-intriguing as well.
Textual analysis of a film of a similar genre
Pulp Fiction
(With brief overviews at “Up in the Air” from the standpoint of production analysis, as opposed to textual analysis)
Images are courtesy of Wikimedia
What I particularly like about Pulp Fiction from the point of view of a Media Studies student and analyst is the way that characters have already been defined into certain roles in the film, as opposed to being subtly related to media theories, as this helps deliver a much clearer message to the audience. This is particularly clear in the Epilogue scene, where Jules quotes the bible passage 24:17, speaks of a good, an evil and a Sheppard protecting the good, and he then adds that he believes he is the Sheppard of the thief who is in a transitional point in his life, becoming good, and that the world is the evil bearing him. This character separation directly relates to audience theories, such as Rubikam and Youngs’ “Roles” theory, giving each personality a set of aspects to life, as opposed to one-time functions in the plot. This is emphasised in the juxtaposition between Vincent and Jules; that although they work side by side, they really do differ in terms of life aspects and outlook on the world, similarly between Alex Goran and Ryan Bingham from ‘Up in the Air’.
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| Controlled violence |
where characters who are seemingly expert and deal with this type of situations are in sane terms with it, and are very accepting of the consequences, this is particularly obvious in the way that Jules had repeated the same script each time he was about to “Pop a cap in someone’s Bleep*”, as opposed to giving it a particular interest. Another repeated element in the text was guns, guns, guns. Weaponry items are often associated with empowering certain characters over others. You will notice as you go along in the film that, one- the main character in the scene will always have a weapon, and the opponent won’t, for example, the scene at which Butch could’ve picked up a gun, but he didn’t, because in the following scene he was to be overtaken by Marsellus, who did have a gun. And two- At some scenes, the camera’s centre of action was actually the gun: You will find that the camera is tracking the gun, not the character holding it.
Now with more focus on characters, I admit that there’s a lot of female objectification in accordance to Laura Mulvey’s male gaze notion. However, I refuse to go into that with great detail because gender is quite frankly my least favourite topic to pick up on in terms of character analysis. However, it is worth noting that since the film is set in the 1960s, it is very common and orthodox for the male to be considered a dominant factor in terms of action and outlaw life, simply because this was reality at that time, so I would not make much of sexism in the film. What was more interesting to me than gender in the film was the juxtaposition between characters in each scene, and that the characters would have a different moral stance in each chapter, as opposed to having one set element according to Vladimir Propp’s narrative theory. For example, how Jules turned from the cold blooded executioner in the Prelude, to the God-Guided religious Jules in the Epilogue. The character of Vincent on the other hand was at a constant state, probably to emphasise the rate of change in Jules’ character.
Primary Research - Audience Preference
The following is a questionnaire that carries out some questions that will help me determine what needs to be included, or excluded from the production of the media text, in ways that will better-suit the audience.
I chose the questionnaire approach/method because I can aim it at the certain demographic that I intend on making my target audience, or/and filter through the results according to people's basic info, e.g. Gender.
The questionnaire method also has a short turn-around time which is just perfect considering that I have a short time-frame to work in!
The purpose of the questionnaire will be mainly for the script writing of the media text: Finding the most suitable composition for the audience to like.
"Good or bad. I'm the guy with the gun."
Partially because the script was simply too long, we cut the script down to the following:
Script:
Bearing the script in mind, there were three locations that'd be suitable that I could think of off the top of my head.
We went to Pucklechurch.
Maple Walk was the place to be, because it had quite a few alleyways. This is one of em:
Bearing the script in mind, and assuming we don't alter a good amount of it, we initially agreed that the film should be aimed at an audience of +15 year olds and for that reason the certificate should be 15 BBFC.
But then, having referred back to bbfc.co.uk, their 15 certificate guideline says:
As a conclusion of this, we decided to raise our age certificate to an 18.
This will allow us to have a lot more freedom with the content of the text, such as strong language and scenes of violent nature.
In conclusion, generic conventions are very important in terms of defining the genre, and therefore defining the target audience of a media text. I will be borrowing some of those conventions in Pulp fiction, including the revolvers, the cold blooded characters and most definitely the male gaze concept and possibly, if I could nail it during production, a juxtaposition between the antagonists. As for Up in the Air, I will be borrowing the production conventions from there, as I think the camera work and the overall production was more perfected than Pulp fiction. This includes the composition of the into sequence in the film, where the camera keeps jumping from one subject to another very rapidly, because I found it to be intriguing.
Public Enemies
Public Enemies is a crime-drama film starring Johnny Depp (Can't go wrong with a bit of Johnny) and Christian Bale, directed by Michael Mann.
Synopsis: Melvin Purvis is promoted to become chief of the first operation in US history that claimed "War on Crime" and to catch Public Enemy Number 1: John Dillinger (Factual character).
The film centres around the theme of bank robberies, a buttload of shooting and clever heist planning. On the other side of the coin, the generic conventions lead by Purvis's character included a "Scientific approach" on crime, including tapping phones and cataloguing fingerprints.
Technically, the film seems to have an odd approach in terms of camera work: The producer has chosen to use close-ups and longshots quite a bit, in superiority to any other type of shot. This is probably to give the audience that "God" POV, in which they feel that they're being presented to a factual story, which is quite handy seeing as the text is based on a real life event.
There's very little focus on faces. This is quite psychological, in the way that often when people describe memories, they mention how that they find faces difficult to remember. They remember the "important ones".
Aside from camera work, the production clearly showed severe focus on audio. There's always a diegetic sound, such as feet pounding or gunshots, and only about a fifth of the time that there's a non diegetic sound, in which case it'd be pure orchestral non-vocalist music.
Reservoir Dogs
Like Pulp Fiction, this is a beautiful piece of media by Quentin Tarantino.
In Reservoir Dogs, Tarantino follows the same "pattern" in his production, in the way that the consequence is shown before the action. I.e. The Epilogue is shown before the Prelude. This has really inspired me in the way I'd structure the full film if I was to produce it because I had found that this technique really does keep the audience sat in their chairs in the way that the consequence is often more interesting, definitely in action films at least.
Surprisingly, Wikipedia has delivered a technical notation on the intro segment:
I wouldn't say there's a great sophistication in the camera work. There are very few technical shots. The whole text is generally revolving around conversations based on Long Shots, despite the applicability of the 180 degree rule and all that... I don't think this has any particular impact on the audience, but I'm probably wrong.
Public Enemies
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| Image Courtesy of Wikimedia |
Synopsis: Melvin Purvis is promoted to become chief of the first operation in US history that claimed "War on Crime" and to catch Public Enemy Number 1: John Dillinger (Factual character).
The film centres around the theme of bank robberies, a buttload of shooting and clever heist planning. On the other side of the coin, the generic conventions lead by Purvis's character included a "Scientific approach" on crime, including tapping phones and cataloguing fingerprints.
Technically, the film seems to have an odd approach in terms of camera work: The producer has chosen to use close-ups and longshots quite a bit, in superiority to any other type of shot. This is probably to give the audience that "God" POV, in which they feel that they're being presented to a factual story, which is quite handy seeing as the text is based on a real life event.
There's very little focus on faces. This is quite psychological, in the way that often when people describe memories, they mention how that they find faces difficult to remember. They remember the "important ones".
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| Lots of closeups |
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| Lots of Longshots |
 |
| But generally, no faces! |
Aside from camera work, the production clearly showed severe focus on audio. There's always a diegetic sound, such as feet pounding or gunshots, and only about a fifth of the time that there's a non diegetic sound, in which case it'd be pure orchestral non-vocalist music.
Reservoir Dogs
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| Theatrical Poster |
In Reservoir Dogs, Tarantino follows the same "pattern" in his production, in the way that the consequence is shown before the action. I.e. The Epilogue is shown before the Prelude. This has really inspired me in the way I'd structure the full film if I was to produce it because I had found that this technique really does keep the audience sat in their chairs in the way that the consequence is often more interesting, definitely in action films at least.
Surprisingly, Wikipedia has delivered a technical notation on the intro segment:
The film opens to eight men eating breakfast at a diner. Six of them wear matching suits and are using aliases: Mr. Blonde (Michael Madsen), Mr. Blue (Eddie Bunker), Mr. Brown (Quentin Tarantino), Mr. Orange (Tim Roth), Mr. Pink (Steve Buscemi), and Mr. White (Harvey Keitel). Among them is Los Angeles gangster Joe Cabot (Lawrence Tierney) and his son, "Nice Guy" Eddie Cabot (Chris Penn). Mr. Brown discusses his comparative analysis on Madonna's "Like a Virgin", Joe's senior moments involving his address book rankle Mr. White, and Mr. Pink defends his anti-tipping policy until Joe forces him to leave a tip for the waitress.In my personal opinion, this is one messed up text. Like in any other Tarantino piece, he seems to assume that the average blood pressure of a human exceeds that of a giraffe, so there's blood squirting around like there's no tomorrow. Hence the film is 18 rated.
The opening credit sequence begins as the eight men leave the restaurant and walk down the street in iconic slow motion while the song "Little Green Bag" by The George Baker Selection plays on the soundtrack.
Immediately following the opening credit sequence, the action cuts to the interior of a speeding car. Mr. White, driving with one hand, is trying to comfort Mr. Orange, who has been shot in the abdomen and is bleeding while screaming in delirium. They arrive at an abandoned warehouse, the robbers' rendezvous point. Mr. White holds a visibly frightened Mr. Orange in his arms until Mr. Pink appears. Mr. Pink angrily suggests that their robbery of a jeweler, orchestrated by Joe Cabot, was a police setup, indicated by the rapid response of the police to the alarm. Mr. White agrees, and they wearily get their stories straight with each other. Mr. White reveals to Mr. Pink that Mr. Brown has been shot and killed by the police, and the whereabouts of Mr. Blonde and Mr. Blue are unknown to both. The scene cuts to a flashback of Mr. Pink escaping from the jeweler's with the diamonds and then cuts back to the present moment.
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| And everyone dies. Really. |
In terms of location, about 90% of the film is oddly shot in one room. Which I found interesting.
In terms of clothing, typical 70s ish clothing that really reflects the persona of each character:
Old guy wore an old guys jumper.
"Professionals" wore professional suits.
Douchebag wore a douchebag uniform.
 |
| Tarantino used fashion as the syringe to reflect whether the audience should like or dislike certain characters. (Hypodermic Syringe Theory) |
Primary Research - Audience Preference
The following is a questionnaire that carries out some questions that will help me determine what needs to be included, or excluded from the production of the media text, in ways that will better-suit the audience.
I chose the questionnaire approach/method because I can aim it at the certain demographic that I intend on making my target audience, or/and filter through the results according to people's basic info, e.g. Gender.
The questionnaire method also has a short turn-around time which is just perfect considering that I have a short time-frame to work in!
The purpose of the questionnaire will be mainly for the script writing of the media text: Finding the most suitable composition for the audience to like.
Sketching a timeline!
This is a quick timeline of events we had created in a “scrum session” in order to organise the sequence.
All the following is only outlining the text, and is subject to change!
Characters | Props available | Extras | |
Tim | Smooth Chocolate Tim | 2 Revolver guns. 1 Baton Wireless Microphones Fairly old vehicle. (No offence, Lara!) | Sam C. Scott C. Charlie S. Tally W. (Child) Kira W. Tom J. Jack B. Tara H. |
Lara | Lara-Violet | ||
Dan | Danny 'The Rookie' Smith | ||
Scene One
3 Characters start off in car, cruising. One has a mugshot print on a piece of paper.
Radio is turned on. The radio music will become the non diegetic audio track in the sequence!
To be decided, the positioning of each character in the car, this is very significant for character empowerment.
Scene Two
Character step out of the vehicle.
Hippy band is playing in-sync with the “nondiegetic” music. (Confusing: is the music diegetic, or is it not)
Evil occurs: Something is gone wrong.
Todorovian equilibrium is disrupted.
Scene Three
Characters split. Each goes onto a different task, to be reunited in the end of the sequence.
Scene Four
Lara’s action.
Scene Five
Dan’s action.
Scene Six
Tim’s action
Scene seven
Dan and Tim are united on the road, Lara stops by for a pick-up.
Characters turn off the radio, and the non-diegetic sound would stop accordingly.
I'm sorry, who?
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| Smooth-not-so-smooth |
Protagonist #1 Smooth Chocolate Tim is a well known copper in the PD. His unusual style of "Shoot em or chuck em in cells" has been widely criticised. Smooth shows little or no care about social acceptance; he smokes, he kills and he doesn't call his mum on daily basis. Also, Smooth is quite a self preserving personality: We rarely ever hear him speak.
Although Smooth doesn't talk to have a motto, he does have one tattooed across his chest:"Good or bad. I'm the guy with the gun."
Outside working hours, Smooth enjoys fresh flowers and long walks on the beach.
Protagonist #2 Danny The Rookie only recently joined the PD. He was assigned to be under the command of Smooth & Violet somewhat as a penalty. He's full of Adrenaline and is eager to feed his ego which is constantly smashed by his superiors. The Rookie's a very sociable personality.
His Motto is "If you could shoot it, I probably already have."
Outside working hours, Danny spends his time in a VIP nightclub rumoured to be owned by a Mafioso known as "K. Rexha".
Protagonist #3 Lara Violet never dreamed of becoming a copper, she was more of a vet personality up to the point a chav reportedly killed her rabbit. According to the records, she had then received a "Best Citizen of 1975" award for murdering the chav in cold blood and disposing of his body. She was then offered a place with unit 13 who are responsible of finding lost victims' bodies. After having found every single victim there was to be found, she was promoted to Smooth's unit, replacing his old partner who died tragically due to a bad case of the Mycoxaphloppin.
Her Motto is "My only trace is the bodies were men once stood"
Antagonist #1 Charlie-Busker-Stargatt is known in the local area as a friendly coke dealer. Although he was subject to a bad youth, the Busker doesn't seem to have been affected by it, instead, he always says that he sees hope in people, and he only sees coke as a money making machine and that the two should not be mixed. How moral.
At one point in the film, Charlie is unfortunate enough to go under the hands of Lara Violet.
Antagonist #2 Only known as "Tom", he lives in the shades and the comfort of his little den in a rather suburban area. On the shell, Tom's a friendly personality, he walks his dog in the morning and bakes cookies for his neighbours.
It's worth mentioning that since Tom moved into the area, there has been an increase in reported Theft, Arson, Murder, Kidnapping, Speeding, Drug usage, Drug dealing, Bribery, Aggravated Assault, Homicide, Conspiracy, Credit and ID theft, Vandalism and crossing the road before waiting for the green man.
Whether there's a connection between Tom and the reports, the police is unsure.
Antagonist #3 known as JB. Some speculate that he was named after the Whisky.
JB and The Rookie once were friends, and like each-other, JB is also full of adrenaline.
It'd seem that they simply took different paths in life at one point.
Since JB got his hands on a gun, there have been reports of terrorising activities in the area, including "An act of urination via the mail opening in the door".
Unlucky for JB, in the film, he crosses Smooth on the day he couldn't get a cigarette.
Little Tally has been reported missing this morning. Her parents are worried sick. They're not sure what happened. They reported an open window in her bedroom that they're certain was closed the night before. Her brother added "Hide Yo Kids, Hide Yo Wives, Cus They Is Raping Everybody Out 'Ere!"
Later on, the chief runs out of ideas and decides to send the damned crew (Violet, Smooth and The Rookie) to see what the prime suspect Tom, JB and The Busker are up to.
The hippie band (Kira and Tara) of PuckleVille are a signature in the area. They're known by everyone around. One old lady nearby reported "They're the only blossom of hope I have in this God Forsaken place!".
The hippie band take no interest in money, but they do accept donations which they use to help extinguish war all around the world.
Scriptin' out!
The following is a more detailed version of the aforementioned script overview.
Scripts are defined as “methods of representing procedural knowledge”: In media, scripts help define the actions and lines of each character, to keep everything organised at the set.
Notation | Meaning |
X: | Character lines |
*X…* | Character actions. I.e Pull gun |
-x…- | Character (body language) reaction. I.e. Shock |
[y….] | Scene description |
Script:
1A
[In car: Engine is running: Lara at the driver seat: Tim in the passenger seat]
*Dan approaches car: Opens door and rides in: he holds a mugshot print in his hand of one of the druggies*
*Lara starts driving off*
1B
*Tim has an unlit cigarette in his mouth: Starts flicking the radio station and settles on one that plays the audio track Lara made on Garage Band*
*As Lara is driving off, Dan shows Tim the mugshot*
-Tim and Dan nod in agreement-
1C
Dan: Pull over there.
*Lara skid-stops*
[Fairly sketchy location: Quite urban and secluded]
2A
[Scene now moves to the lane adjacent to Lara’s home in Pucklechurch. Camera is looking at Tim’s back, over the car]
*Tim appears to pulling his zip up after having finished “having a slash”*
*Dan is standing on the other side of the car to Tim, by the back door, closer to the camera*
*Lara turns off the car engine and comes out of the car, slams the door behind her*
[Camera close up on Tim]
*Tim is about to light the cigarette but he is interrupted by Dan*
[Camera close up on Dan]
Dan: Check this out
[Camera close up on Lara]
Lara: Wha~
[Camera close up on Tim]
-Tim raises an eyebrow-
[Camera is now walking away with Tim, towards Dan, so all characters are now aligned in a row, this is one out of three scenes where we can apply the 180 degree rule]
2B
[Camera is now over Dan’s shoulder, With Lara in the frame, and Tim in the background shown barely interested. The camera is pointing towards the mugshot printout from over Dan’s shoulder]
Dan: Look over there.
*Dan points towards two people in the distance, one of them is the guy in the mugshot printout*
[Camera shifts over to over Lara’s shoulder, pointing towards the mugshot with Dan in the fram]
Lara: Let’s do it.
2C
[Screen blacks out as the camera is now shifted into the back boot of the car. As Lara opens it up, the three characters are now in the frame]
-Lara smirks-
Lara: See anything you like?
*Dan reaches to grab a revolver; he then holds it up, opens the barrel and knocks it back in*
Dan: I love my job.
*Lara grabs a snub nosed revolver and conceals it. She then gets a jacket out of the trunk and wears it*
*Tim grabs a gun and holds it up to eye level and holds it there as Lara interrupts*
Lara: Stick to the plan.
*Tim and Dan conceal their guns and start walking away*
*Lara shuts the trunk*
3A
[Camera is now moving sideways with Lara, walking down the lane, as she’s walking, we can see a hippy band in the background playing in sync with the music, so that’s a guitar, a bass and some drums. For this scene, I suggest a slightly tilted angle]
-Lara is looking shady with her jacket on as she’s walking-
*Kira is standing by the hippy band, with her knee bend supported on the wall wearing J. Lennon glasses. Kira slightly drops the glasses and looks at Lara with disapproval/disgust as she’s walking by. In my suggestion, we have a closeup on Kira doing so in order to emphasise her stance towards Lara, with the band playing within the frame. This is where we can have our manual focus shot*
*Lara finally approaches the 2 men*
[Music is still playing with a longshot from the encounter so audience can’t hear what’s being said in the encounter]
*Lara appears to be talking to the guys at this point in a pacifist manner. The idea here to show Lara going undercover attempting to purchase drugs from the shady characters*
*One of the characters extends their arm towards Lara to show that Lara has succeeded in convincing the seller*
*Lara very sharply whips her gun out*
[This is when the music should stop]
3B
[Camera is now is in about medium shot-distance: Showing all three characters from the waist and above in order to emphasise the conversation between them. The characters now shift from a triangle position into a position where Lara is on one side and the two other characters are on the other, emphasising the encounter’s hostility. The camera work at this point must be handheld and very shifty in order to stress the magnitude of the situation]
Lara: Hands over your heads. On your knees.
*The two dealers very sharply do as Lara says*
Scott: (As he’s complying to Lara) Shit man, I told you she’s a copper! Listen, I’ve got nothing to do with this, alright?
Charlie: (Interrupting Scott) Shut, Shut up man! Just shut it.
Scott: Honestly, I have nothing to do with this!
Lara: Fine then, what are you still doing here.
Scott: Wha~
Lara: Go.
*Scott starts running backwards and away, as he gets a bit further away, he turns around and starts jogging down the lane*
[Camera pans back from Scott onto Charlie]
*Charlie is trying to be sly, standing on one leg, prepared to run away*
*Lara points the gun back at Charlie, sharply*
Lara: DON’T move a muscle or I promise the last thing going through your head will be my lead.
*Charlie rests back on both of his knees*
-Charlie is restless-
-Lara smirks-
*Lara pulls out handcuffs*
Charlie: Oh no, c’mon you don’t have to do this.
*Lara goes behind Charlie and applies the handcuffs*
Charlie: Please! C’mon!
Lara: Stand up. Get moving.
*Charlie complies*
4A
[Scene is now back to 2C, in the trunk]
*Lara opens the boot*
Charlie: What?
*Lara orienteers Charlie with the gun’s muzzle assigning him to get inside*
Charlie: Nu-Uh. No way.
*Lara point the gun at Charlie’s head and pulls the gun hammer-lock back*
Charlie: Alright! Alright! Women.
[Camera shifts to the front of the car, observing the characters]
Lara: Good boy.
*Charlie ducks down and Lara shut the trunk*
*Lara conceals the gun and walks towards the car door, gets in and ignites the engine*
[Camera is moves to the left back corner of the car]
*Lara drives away*
5A
[In this scene, Dan and Tim are leaning on to something. This is a stake-out. The camera is looking at Dan and Tim’s backs]
*Tim has the unlit cigarette in his mouth*
[Silence for a few seconds]
-Dan is uncomfortable-
*Dan attempts to make a conversation with Tim*
Dan: Saw the game last night?
*Tim turns his head, looks at Dan, and then goes back to the starting posture*
Dan: Yeah, It was a good game. I won 300 quid from it.
[Few more seconds of silence]
Dan: Those shoes are really uncomfortable…
[Few more second of silence]
[Camera shifts to Tim’s side]
*Tim is about to light his cigarette, but he is interrupted*
[Camera focuses on Dan in the background]
Dan: They’re here.
[Camera is now at the back of Tim and Dan again, but this time, it has a longer sight and we can see Scott who ran away earlier knocking on one of the house doors]
Dan: Let’s go.
*Tim puts the lighter back in his pocket*
*Dan and Tim start walking towards the door. The door opens. Scott talks to Sam. Dan and Tim continue approaching. At this point, the music comes back on to emphasise tension building up. As Tim and Dan get close enough, Scott and Sam notice them. Dan and Tim start running. Tim goes after Scott. Sam tries to go back in the house and shut the door, but Dan gets there in time and he force opens it.*
6A
*Dan just pushed the door*
*Sam starts running to the back*
*Dan follows him*
*Sam heads upstairs*
*Dan follows him*
[At the top of the stairs, in this scene we apply the 180 degree rule and Shot-Reverse-Shot]
-Dan is stunned-
*Dan aims his gun very directly at Sam
*Tally is tied to a chair*
*Sam is standing behind Tally, holding a gun or a knife to Tally’s head/neck*
Sam: Back off, or say goodbye to the kid.
Dan: Don’t make me do this.
Sam: I said back off!
-Sam is in deep tension, we can see him shaking-
Dan: Put that motherfucking gun down, boy. You ain’t worth my bullets.
*Sam pulls the hammer back*
*Dan shoots Sam in the head* [This portion should be shot twice. Once with the camera between Sam and Dan, and it pans from Dan to Sam and another directly from Dan’s shoulder. This is to allow us to create two different shooting scenes to pick the one of the better quality]
6B
[High angle shot to show Dan in a heroic manner]
*Dan walks out of the house, with Tally in his arms*
7A
*Tim runs into a warehouse-like place whilst holding a gun, he then looks around for Scott*
*Tim is breathing heavily- turns around looking towards the entrance*
*Scott jumps in trying to slash Tim with a knife*
*Tim counter-attacks Scott-knocking the knife out of his hand, but also losing the gun meanwhile*
*Scott gets a gun out and runs behind an object*
*Tim very rapidly takes the gun off the ground and runs behind another object*
*Scott comes out and tries shooting at Tim – 6 times. And misses*
*Scott goes back behind the object and tries to reload*
*Tim heard the barrel opening click, and runs right up to Scott, looks at him in the eye and shoots him in the head*
8A
[The camera is at the back of Dan whilst he’s carrying the child]
*Tim walks into the frame and stands next to him*
*Tim lights up the cigarette, finally and inhales*
Dan: Turn that shit off. Can’t you see I’ve got a kid here.
-Tim is looking at Dan with calm anger-
*Tim throws the cigarette away*
[Car comes in and parks infront of Dan and Tim]
[Car is playing the same music]
*Dan and Tim go in the car*
[Car drives off]
8B
[In the car]
*Tally looks at Dan in the back seat*
Tally: I need a wee.
*Tim puts another unlit cigarette in his mouth, and reaches towards the radio and turns the music off*
Actual Script
Script:
2C
[Screen blacks out as the camera is now shifted into the back boot of the car. As Lara opens it up, the three characters are now in the frame]
-Lara smirks-
Lara: See anything you like?
*Dan reaches to grab a revolver; he then holds it up, opens the barrel and knocks it back in*
Dan: I love my job.
*Lara grabs a snub nosed revolver and conceals it. She then gets a jacket out of the trunk and wears it*
*Tim grabs a gun and holds it up to eye level and holds it there as Lara interrupts*
Lara: Stick to the plan.
*Tim and Dan conceal their guns and start walking away*
*Lara shuts the trunk*
3A
[Camera is now moving sideways with Lara, walking down the lane, as she’s walking, we can see a hippy band in the background playing in sync with the music, so that’s a guitar, a bass and some drums. For this scene, I suggest a slightly tilted angle]
-Lara is looking shady with her jacket on as she’s walking-
*Kira is standing by the hippy band, with her knee bend supported on the wall wearing J. Lennon glasses. Kira slightly drops the glasses and looks at Lara with disapproval/disgust as she’s walking by. In my suggestion, we have a closeup on Kira doing so in order to emphasise her stance towards Lara, with the band playing within the frame. This is where we can have our manual focus shot*
*Lara finally approaches the 2 men*
[Music is still playing with a longshot from the encounter so audience can’t hear what’s being said in the encounter]
*Lara appears to be talking to the guys at this point in a pacifist manner. The idea here to show Lara going undercover attempting to purchase drugs from the shady characters*
*One of the characters extends their arm towards Lara to show that Lara has succeeded in convincing the seller*
*Lara very sharply whips her gun out*
[This is when the music should stop]
3B
6A
*Dan just pushed the door*
*Sam starts running to the back*
*Dan follows him*
*Sam heads upstairs*
*Dan follows him*
[At the top of the stairs, in this scene we apply the 180 degree rule and Shot-Reverse-Shot]
-Dan is stunned-
*Dan aims his gun very directly at Sam
*Tally is tied to a chair*
*Sam is standing behind Tally, holding a gun or a knife to Tally’s head/neck*
Sam: Back off, or say goodbye to the kid.
Dan: Don’t make me do this.
Sam: I said back off!
-Sam is in deep tension, we can see him shaking-
Dan: Put that motherfucking gun down, boy. You ain’t worth my bullets.
*Sam pulls the hammer back*
*Dan shoots Sam in the head* [This portion should be shot twice. Once with the camera between Sam and Dan, and it pans from Dan to Sam and another directly from Dan’s shoulder. This is to allow us to create two different shooting scenes to pick the one of the better quality]
6B
[High angle shot to show Dan in a heroic manner]
*Dan walks out of the house, with Tally in his arms*
8A
*Dan and Tim go in the car*
[Car drives off]
8B
[In the car]
*Tally looks at Dan in the back seat*
Tally: I need a wee.
*Tim puts another unlit cigarette in his mouth, and reaches towards the radio and turns the music off*
Cool, but where?
Location number 1: Somewhere in Yate, there's a lovely Sub-Tunnel known as a high-activity shanking range. That'd be quite good as it represents that urban sketchy dodgy cop-raided, chav infested drama we're going for.
Unfortunately, we came to the conclusion that Yate is simply inaccessible to the crew. So that one was off the table.
Location number 2: It just had to be Baglyn Avenue. I personally got mugged there twice. Happy days.
Needless to say, the Avenue was secluded enough for us to manage to film without any interruptions. It's OK. We had guns.
Here are a couple of shots of the location. (They're of unfortunately bad quality because I was taking them as I was running away from the God forsaken place)
Location number 3: At this point I was starting to run out of ideas; I needed a median location between Yate's architecture and Baglyn's dodginess. Pucklechurch was the place I needed. The place with statistically the highest rate of inbreds in the South West of England (Fun fact of the day?). Pucklechurch comprises of a fairly quiet infrastructure seeing as it's not infested by shops or anything that may provoke traffic. Beside it being quiet, it was accessible by the whole crew.
So basically...
We went to Pucklechurch.
Maple Walk was the place to be, because it had quite a few alleyways. This is one of em:
 |
| Must I point out that this image is courtesy of Google Inc? |
Audience Certificate
(Film Classification)
But then, having referred back to bbfc.co.uk, their 15 certificate guideline says:
"The work as a whole must not endorse discriminatory language or behaviour."We realised that this does not go along in the context of our characters, despite that the script steers clear away from those aforementioned elements, the characters may raise some question marks. I.e. Smooth Chocolate/Violet. (Racism and sexism)
As a conclusion of this, we decided to raise our age certificate to an 18.
This will allow us to have a lot more freedom with the content of the text, such as strong language and scenes of violent nature.
Sequencing stuff
(Shooting what, when, where?)
What I thought would be a good idea is to organise a spreadsheet stating the location of the shot, who's in it and whether weather is something we should pay attention to, or not, since weather is very severe at this time of the year (Which is why we haven't started filming already!).
This was the outcome:
And this is the spreadsheet, sorted by location: This way, we don't have to go back to the same location twice. The catch is that we'll have more post-filming work to do, in order to reorganise shots in order.
So assuming we have all the actors at our disposal at all times, we'll be shooting in bundles:
1- 1A,1B,1C,2C,4A,8B
2- 2A, 2B,3A,3B
3- 5A,6B
4- 8A
5- 7A
6- 6A
Last minute additions:
1- We are to add a scene, titled 0A. The scene will take place before everything else and acts as a prologue to the story. It will feature Dan The Rookie reminiscing upon memories. This will help establish the time of the occurrence of the narrative, therefore helping the audience engage further. This scene will also be an opportunity for us to use the Manual Focus function, in order to harness the technical grades.
2- Filming has been delayed due to severe weather conditions. The team had decided that snow is not a suitable component of the mise en scene of the genre and narrative and will in-fact repulse audience who are in the tendency of using common sense. We expect the weather to improve within two weeks. By then the snow hopefully would've cleared, and we can pull off some colour correction tricks in the editing suite, to help enhance the mise en scene quality, as we've researched that most films of the Cop-Drama genre tend to be set in a summer-like environment, and very rarely with notable weather conditions.
More stuff I need to do:
Making the audiotrack article
Upload the Storyboarding
Put up the location article.
Write up the prop list.
Chat a bit more about generic codes and conventions and justification of genre
Research more into broadening the potential audience demographic.
If it moves, I shoot it:
Finally everything started falling into place, after what seemed like a hectic project that could never work.
Weather wasn't too bad for once either.
We decided that we will shoot in the 23rd and the 25th of February. Those dates were picked on the notion that everyone involved in the shooting is free.
Day 1
On the 23rd of February, we planned to do the shots that involve the child. As well as take photos of the cast and do the profiling.
We also had plans to get the shots that involve the car out of the way, but we had some complications whereas our lovely driver Lara didn't know how to turn off the immobiliser ;)
We managed to get A1 done! Great...
Well, no, we did actually manage to get about 50% of the filming done, at least. But I was not particularly happy with the quality of the filming for the following reasons:
1- The camera was crap. The quality of the image was unfortunately... rubbish. There was an overlay-mask of grain texture, which doesn't help with the 70s theme we were going for in which everything was Matt or Gloss.
2- We had a kid. Say no more.
3- The car was small. No working around this one. It was very difficult to find a place to put the camera and still get all of the characters and clearly show what they're up to. I wonder how they do it in the films.
Day 2
When I say Day 2, I actually mean the following 3 weeks from the shooting which I spent on editing, this is mainly because at this point, we had decided that us as a team were working very inefficiently, and it'd be better if we break off, having done the shooting in which we need each other.
I shoved all of my various scenes onto Adobe After Effect, and cut out what's not suitable. I then arranged them into a timeline in order of appearance.
The next stage was to insert the audio which Lara had created on Garage Band. I will analyse this in more depth later on.
I added in my film title, as well as the production company's intro segment and I released my film.
This was the end product:
Last minute additions:
1- We are to add a scene, titled 0A. The scene will take place before everything else and acts as a prologue to the story. It will feature Dan The Rookie reminiscing upon memories. This will help establish the time of the occurrence of the narrative, therefore helping the audience engage further. This scene will also be an opportunity for us to use the Manual Focus function, in order to harness the technical grades.
2- Filming has been delayed due to severe weather conditions. The team had decided that snow is not a suitable component of the mise en scene of the genre and narrative and will in-fact repulse audience who are in the tendency of using common sense. We expect the weather to improve within two weeks. By then the snow hopefully would've cleared, and we can pull off some colour correction tricks in the editing suite, to help enhance the mise en scene quality, as we've researched that most films of the Cop-Drama genre tend to be set in a summer-like environment, and very rarely with notable weather conditions.
More stuff I need to do:
Making the audiotrack article
Upload the Storyboarding
Put up the location article.
Write up the prop list.
Chat a bit more about generic codes and conventions and justification of genre
Research more into broadening the potential audience demographic.
If it moves, I shoot it:
Finally everything started falling into place, after what seemed like a hectic project that could never work.
Weather wasn't too bad for once either.
We decided that we will shoot in the 23rd and the 25th of February. Those dates were picked on the notion that everyone involved in the shooting is free.
Day 1
On the 23rd of February, we planned to do the shots that involve the child. As well as take photos of the cast and do the profiling.
We also had plans to get the shots that involve the car out of the way, but we had some complications whereas our lovely driver Lara didn't know how to turn off the immobiliser ;)
We managed to get A1 done! Great...
Well, no, we did actually manage to get about 50% of the filming done, at least. But I was not particularly happy with the quality of the filming for the following reasons:
1- The camera was crap. The quality of the image was unfortunately... rubbish. There was an overlay-mask of grain texture, which doesn't help with the 70s theme we were going for in which everything was Matt or Gloss.
2- We had a kid. Say no more.
3- The car was small. No working around this one. It was very difficult to find a place to put the camera and still get all of the characters and clearly show what they're up to. I wonder how they do it in the films.
Day 2
When I say Day 2, I actually mean the following 3 weeks from the shooting which I spent on editing, this is mainly because at this point, we had decided that us as a team were working very inefficiently, and it'd be better if we break off, having done the shooting in which we need each other.
I shoved all of my various scenes onto Adobe After Effect, and cut out what's not suitable. I then arranged them into a timeline in order of appearance.
The next stage was to insert the audio which Lara had created on Garage Band. I will analyse this in more depth later on.
I added in my film title, as well as the production company's intro segment and I released my film.
This was the end product:
