Researching the Film Industry

Researching the film industry

Production

The production companies have the major tasks when it comes to the film industry. These include; writing up the script, directing the film, casting the actors, filming, props and costume, equipment and finally raising the finance to fund the whole process. Companies raise the money through sponsors such as omega watches for James Bond or though investors normally large companies that will take a slice of the profit.
Examples of production companies are:                                                        
• New line cinema
• Colombia pictures
• Warner bros picture
• Film 4

There are 3 stages in the production process:
Pre-production- This is the preparations done before filming has started such as the location cast and crew, also includes the development stage. The creation of the film and the script.
Production- The actual filming
Post-production- This happens after the film is finished and is when all the editing is done music sound effects, visual effects are all added.
Warner Bros pictures is an example of a large production company they would have enough money to fund their projects themselves and distribute and market the films as well. This can be compared to a smaller British company such as Film 4 who raise money though sponsors and the British lottery.


Distribution
 Distribution companies such as Miramax and Lionsgate have the job of releasing the film to the public. The way they do it is to maximise profit. They will start with releasing the film in the cinema to get money from box office (it is also the distribution companies job to decide with the cinema how long and when and what screens there film is shown in). After that they will release the film as a DVD then box set and finally film sites. Smaller films won’t be able to hire the more established distribution companies and won’t be able to get there film on cinema and so may have to put their films up on the internet straight away.
Because distribution companies and production companies work so close together a healthy relationship is needed to make the film as great as it can be, because the distribution company make the trailer and want to get people excited about the film however production companies won’t want a lot of their film shown in the trailer so good relationship would be helpful for both companies in this situation.

Marketing
The main objective for the marketing companies is too make the most money as they can. The ways they do this is by making trailers of the film. Also making posters to try and entice people to watch their film. Avatar is an example of a heavily publicised film posters where put up everywhere on buses and on billboards. Other marketing techniques are interviews with actors in magazines or on television. Marketing ploys like this will raise awareness for the not only the film but also the actor which in turn again raise intrest in the film because a well known actor is starring.

Silence of the Lambs is a very accreditied film and is in the same genre as our film pschological thriller;                                                          
Produced by: Strong heart/Demme Productions                             Distributed by: Orion Pictures Corporation.

More Targeted Research into Genre

Psychological Thriller

The genre choice for our film is broadly thriller, but its sub-genre could be seen as psychological thriller as it's more focused on the unstable state of our victim (main character). Psychological thrillers usually consist of a major plot to which something dramatic or horrifying happens at the beginning and the story is told through that event unfolding.

Archeypal characters

These stereotypical characters are usually seen throughout most thrillers:

- Victim: who is usually the protagonist/the main character. They are made to seem somewhat vulnerable hence why they have been attacked. Whatever has happened to them/their personality They are also made to seem vengeful and want to punish the person who hurt them. Turns into a strong character through whatever has happened to them.

- Threatener: who is most definitely the antagonist of the film. Anonymous at the beginning in order to maintain the mystery of the film and of it to be scarier when the revenge begins to take place.

- 'Red herring' type character: the person who the audience may suspect and is an all round suspicious character in the film. They are usually mysterious and in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Narrative Themes

The classical narrative that we usually see throughout the thriller genre is from the victim's point of view as the audience is more connected to the protagonist and they then feel sorry for them.

- Fear is presented easier if it's from the victims view point as the audience can empathise with them and see what they're seeing. It is therefore scarier.

- It also creates mystery/tension as the audience doesn't know what the antagonist is doing therefore we don't know the next step they're going to make or where they're going to go.

Costume

The costume that is worn within thrillers is very stereotypical and normal usually.

- Victim is usually in plain/simple clothes. Sometimes young girls are in promiscuous clothing to show their vulnerablity. If afer the awful event their clothing is usually tatty/dirty/ripped.

- The evil person is sterotypically in black as it shows that they're trying to remain annoymous/mysterious. It also creates tension as it usually hide their idenity therefore making it more scary for the viewer.

Lighting

- The lighting within thrillers is usually dim and low-key.

- The lighting usually focuses on the victim rather than the suspect as it then the audience are more attached to them. It also then focuses the mystery and evil of the suspect by having a black light mainly on them.

- Usually the setting is lit up through a low key light in order for it to have a more spooky atmosphere.

Location

- Thrillers are usually set in an isolated location/a place where such an incident can happen. Stereotypical places are a woods, an isolated cabin/house, shabby estate.

- This is because it is spookier for the audience and more mysterious due to the isolation.

Common editing decisions within thrillers:

- In between scenes there is never usually a smooth transitions but jumpy moves between them. This then has an of course jumpy impact on the audience.

- Constant black outs are edited in to create tension as the audience then must wait to see what happens next even if it's for a few seconds.

Use of sound

- Non-diegetic, high pitched/fast paced music is frequently used throughout thrillers in order to create tension for the viewers as they know something is going to occur from the music whereas the characters cannot.

- Sound perspective is often used from the victims perspective as it places the audience in their postion therefore they feel as tense and somewhat scared as the victim does.

- Ambient sound is used in thriller's in order to create a realistic feel for the viewer as backgound noise is heard. It also makes it spookier for example, rain, thunder and lightening, wind blowing, floor boards/doors creaking.

I think we will be able to use most of these key features in our piece as they are already part of our planning.

Storyboard Second Draft

Our chosen genre (Thriller)

http://www.slideshare.net/MeganObrienn/mediathriller-genre-15303995

Practice Filming - Running Scene

We think that the running shots in our peie will be the hardest technically. In a real situation, we would be able to use a dolly or even a steadicam, but we have limited equipment. We could film using the tripod and doing basic panning shots, but we are not sure this will have the right energy for our piece - so we have practised different ways of handling the camera to capture the running scenes.

Researching Chosen Genre

Researching your chosen genre

Action Thriller

In stereotypical action thriller movies, the stock characters are: hero, villain, victim and lover. There are normally two teams against each other, competing with one another over something or someone. There is normally a build up of events which leads up to a scene of the two groups or two individuals meeting and there is often a huge fight involving guns, fire, physical fighting and someone close to one of the teams being held hostage. The characters also normally become more scruffy  in appearance as the film goes on as it shows they are focused on what they have to do to get what they want rather than anything else.

There are normally a lot of events involving crimes or murders occurring at the beginning or even before the film starts which the villains normally seem to have got away with as the police are not a big part of this genre of film. If the villain is punished, it is usually at the hands of the hero, often through a revenge scenario. There is normally one hero or group, fighting for a good reason while the other group or individual has bad intentions.

The hero is normally the one who has to stop the plans of the villains to save his life or the life of others. There is also normally a love scene where you see one of the individual’s emotions and the viewer becomes more attached to them as they feel closer to them and also because having a love interest gives them more to lose. Normally there is only one group who wins and typically it is the group that the audiences feel closer to (the good guys) and they become the heroes. The good guy is never completely innocent but as the audience likes him or her and feels closer to them that never normally matters.

I looked at 'Taken' when researching action thriller, this I think was a great film to refer to as it is a very dramatic and exciting film. It is edited very well and uses a lot of different camera angles and movements.

Mise-en-scene

Lighting- normally  in action thrillers in the build up to the events lighting is high key so that the audience can take in all the detail to establish what it going on. Normally in the day light, they use natural lighting for example the sun light of being outside. When action events happen there is normally low key lighting to make the event seen more dark and gloomy. Also they use back lighting which can give off a strong contrast between the character and the object for example the bad guy and a gun, the lighting can bring out the fact he has a gun in his hand and is going to do something bad with it by use of silhouette. Another lighting state they may use is hard lighting make scenes looks more brutal with the harsh textures and crisp edges. As we are filming in December, we are hoping that we get a bright, crisp day as the lighitng will work well for us.

Costume -normally men wear suits to look smart and important but then throughout the film it changes to plainer, ordinary clothes (jeans, dirty tops).  Normally of the actors will normally also wear sun glasses to look important and cool. The clothing is normally dark to show it is not a happy film. The woman in the film (lover) normally wears tight or figure hugging outfits to bring out the fact that she is very pretty. Her outfits are normally more colourful to show she is a happier part of the film.

Setting-normally starts off in a city and then when the fight actually happens it is in more of a remote area. This shows the audience that because what they are doing is bad that they cannot be in an area with a lot of people. When in the city, the characters are normally in rich and glamorous places. It is set in an exterior location.

Actors -The men in the film are normally very muscular and rough looking, the men all look quite similar. The women in the film are normally beautiful and look very glamorous. even when they are in dangerous situations.  

Props -normally a gun and high tech electrical gadgets. Phones are normally also a main prop as it is used to connect with the other character to see if they are okay. There are normally fast cars that are used to be smashed up in the fights and also used to get away from the enemy quickly. For example in Taken there are a lot of fast car chases while shows action and excitement.

Camera angles and movements

-close up is used to show the importance of a character and to establish the emotion and to feel closer to the character

-long shot is used to show both the groups fighting

-canted angle is used to show confusion that something is wrong

-pov shot is used with the main character so that the

-Establishing shot is used as the location is important key element as it can used to pick up places they have already been

-Short take used to create pace and a feeling of immediacy- used in the fighting scenes

Editing decisions

-making the shots look more blurred and dark so that it is more easily shown that the scene is looking back in the past

-extreme close up to show emotion and importance of a character

-cross cutting used for conversation between two people

-cut to quickly move to one shot to another so that it can show madness / disturbed psychological states that so many things are happening at the same time

Conventional ways of using sound

-dark, gloomy music builds up to a scene, this builds up suspense

-quick low music in fighting scene to make the fight seem more dramatic

-in the love scene there is slow happy music to show this is a happier part
- use of soundscapes to establish a dangerous past / memory - this is something we might well use.

Research our chosen genre

Researching our chosen genre (thriller/mystery/drama)

 

It was hard putting our movie into a genre because there are now so many similar film genres which ahve a lot of overlapping characteristics, and there is a trend to merging genres (hybrids), so that’s why in the end I have characterised our film as a mixture of three.

 

Common themes for these genres
 

Our film is clearly related to the thriller genre and typical thrillers tend to be fast-paced and normally on a large scale such as a terrorist plot. It can be on a small scale but normally will involve a very big and serious situation for an individual.

Thrillers also have features in common with mysteries as there tends to be something to figure out e.g. where will a bomb detonate or in our case who was the abductor and how will they react. Normally something bad will happen to the main character near the beginning of the film. This is done so we feel sorry for them and develop a relationship with them. Along with the villain there’s normally a love interest or another similar character, maybe a daughter who will play an important role in the film and have some kind of close relationship with the main character. Normally they will get killed off. This is done to further the connection between the audience and the character and to see their emotions and give the audience the feeling that after all this character has been though they want them to have a happy ending. There is almost always a villain and lots of fighting scenes, and commonly a final fight scene between the protagonist and the villain where the villain is killed by the main character. This is generally the climax of thriller film. There is normally only one protagonist in thriller films who in the end saves the day, for example "Taken" features Liam Neeson as the film's main character who finds his daughter from mainly his own efforts and as I said before manages to kill the villains that took her. 

Thrillers also have always had a very tense plot where anything could happen at any time and the audience will always be filled with suspense. The story lines for thrillers are normally far-fetched, however because we are so used to them, with the hero foiling the bad guy and saving the day, they carry a high media verisimilitude. People see this narrative in films all the time and even though the plots are in real life ridiculous people watching still see it as believable and ‘real’ because it is a media trope that is very familar.
 

Locations for thriller types vary between films but common settings would be large cities or urban areas. Often there is use of well known cities such as London or New York to create a sense of verisimilitude because people will recognise these places and relate to them. Thrillers are typically filmed in high key lighting so bright and harsh lights because of the seriousness of the genre, depending on the film the main character is generally a tough man who knows how to fight and so the actor is picked accordingly so he looks the part and is normally associated with that genre e.g. Tom Cruise. However in our case we’ve gone the opposite way and chosen to have a weak and vulnerable girl as our main character who is being abused by a strong male character and so when we cast who the actors will be we will have to get people who fit the part and look like the character they are portraying so the audience can create a connection and find it more believable.
 

Editing in thriller films is often fast paced and quick going from scene to scene also there tends to be a chase scene and cross cutting will normally be used to create a fast paced action there is also a lot of filming on handhelds so the camera wobbles making it seem that the viewer is there with the character. An example of these techniques is this scene from the Bourne Ultimatum:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4VznKqWl5VE

It is filmed using quick cuts and transition very fast paced creating tension which is very common in fight scenes in thriller movies.
 

Sound is very important in films and thrillers and  normally the themes are very serious so the underscore will generally be orchestral and have very dark tones, almost brooding, to help create tension and suspense in the needed moments coming up to the climatic scenes the music will increase in volume and pace to coincide with what’s happening on film.
 

Thrillers will normally have a happy ending with the protagonist solving the mystery or foiling the bad guy and solving the problem of the film. 

Camera Movement Task

TASK

Film a conversation using:

Establishing shot that zooms in

Panning shot to show character 2’s arrival

Shot / reverse shot not equal distance representing one character as less prominent / lower status

Arc shot / 360 shot – character 2’s reactions to dramatic news

Tracking shot as character 2 runs off.

Objective: to practise camera movements and evaluate technical issues around them / pros and cons for their use.

Presentation of Storyboard

 

Cristian, Shauna, Megan, Lizzie (in order of speaking)

 

 

Here we are presenting our storyboard as a group. We have worked hard on creating a detailed board for our opening. Althoughwe might make a few changes as we still have some time before filming, the basic ideas are set now and we are just trying to improve them rather than come up with soeting new. We have also identified the key techniques we want to use in this presentation.

Titles and Credits

This is the mindmap I created while watching film openings to analyse how titles and credits are used. Main points:

- should work with the music or be linked with sound in some way
- choice of font and colour for title is very important
- quite simple in our genre
- need to leave spaces for them to appear while filming

Titles and Credits

This is the mindmap I created after watching opening sequences with a specific focus on how the titles and credits are used. You can see that I have looked at order, timing, colours, impact - all things we need to think about for our own titles and credits.

Production Company Logos and Indents

20^th Century

 

-15 seconds

-A lot of animation

-Makes it look grand with lights and gold writing

-Build up of music

Columbia

 

-10 seconds

-happy music

New line cinema

 

-17 seconds

-Happy music

Paramount

-12 seconds

-flying starts

Entertainment one

 

-Loud music

-12 seconds

-Jumping lights

SUMMARY
 

10-20 seconds for each production logo

Music normally builds up to create a build up of atmosphere

Music normally sounds like live music rather than computerised

Name of logo does not normally link to animation 

Normally animation 

Titles and Credits Research

Titles and Credits
 

Our film is a thriller so our titles and credits have to match.

Our company logo Dancing Pens will have a fun and childish feel. However,  through my research into many opening scenes of films I’ve taken inspiration from aWarner Brothers because they sometimes fit their titles and their logo to coincide with the genre of the film. For example, for their majority of films they use their normal colourful logo with a soundtrack underneath whereas in films such as Batman or Mystic River the logo is in black and white with no sound track or a dark and ominous sound track. I have also found that the sound track for logos tend to be orchestral sounds and builds up into a final still of the logo for a couple of seconds.

For our logo we were thinking of linking it to our production name by using stop motion to move pens to spell out the D for dancing and the P for pens. Also we found that the font is quite important so we were thinking big bold writing to make the name clear. If we were making the logo and nothing else we would of made it colourful with a upbeat sound track. However,  we thought for this film we might adapt our usual logo to the genre as we are imagining it being a big summer relaease, so we were thinking of using black pens and doing it in black and white with a dark sound track to coincide with the rest of the film.
 

We have decided to put our logo as the first thing then to go straight into the film after that and have the actors' names coming on screen while the film is playing. We thought about doing this because we want the audience to have a connection with our protagonist and feel the pain she feels and we thought this would help, in comparison to a murder film where they wouldn’t show the actors names at the beginning because some will be killed off and they don’t want the audience to develop a relationship with the character and for them to get killed which could put them off. However, I am not sure about this decision and I think we we will film with this idea in mind, leaving room for the actor name, but also feel free not to use this if it doesn;t give the right feel, as breaking the feeling of reality is a big problem in our genre - you need to involve the audience straight away and not distance them from what they're seeing.
 

While researching film titles and credits I looked at many different types of films and genres, one being Lord of War. I really liked the opening scene of this film, it traces the path of a bullet from production to eventually a human's head. I thought it was very different it was simple yet effective, the director of the film went straight into the film, no logo or credits as such and the first credits you see are the actors which are displayed while the film is running. This film also had music playing throughout the opening scene which is another idea.
 

Another very different film opening I watched was the film The Cabin in the Woods which is a horror/ thriller film, similar in genre to our film. The directors started with the production company Lionsgate logo, another company that changes their logo to fit in with the film.  I also found that it is common to have the name of the production company and 'presents... 'right after the logo which is something I need to take into account when thinking about our group's opening titles.

They also have a sound track underneath the titles. I found that music was very important for setting the mood and was probably even more important that the logos themselves. After that they show the secondary production company's name, then they start the film with the two characters have their dialogue and about 3-4 minutes into the film the name of the film shoots on screen which a loud sound to make the audience jump, I found this very effective because it was enticing and I found once the clip ended I really wanted to watch on. Using my research to help me I am hoping to create an opening film which gives the audience the same feeling. I don't think we need to create a jump, but we need the title and credits to help reflect the feeling / genre.

Prelim Task

Here is our Prelim task.

Discussion of Early Ideas

From left to right: Elizabeth, Shauna, Cristian

 

 

Here we are discussing our ideas so far as we feel that we need to clarify them as a group. Megan was away for a few lessons so is not included, but has watched this and commented on it.

Value of Research So Far

After the early research into what makes a good opening sequence,  I watched several kidnap and abduction films. Although we have not totally agreed a plot outline, we all agree that our film will be on this film so it's good to look for more specific ideas.

One of these was ‘Taken’, especially the abduction scene. I liked how they filmed it from the girl’s friend’s point of view through a window which somehow made it seem so much more immediate and as if you as the audience are watching helplessly too. We haven't written in a friend character, but I would still like to create the same feeling in the audience.

 One film I quite liked was Martha Marcy May Marlene. There wasn’t really a kidnap as such but she was held against her will and was abused, similar to our plot. I also liked how she tried to adjust back into society but couldn’t because she still knew in the back of her head they were out there, this helped me thinking up the story line for after the girl gets back from her abductor. I also learned that we need to concentrate on the main characters' facial expressions to get across how affected she is by what has happened.

Also from watching beginning scenes I have realised that many of them do not show much of the film at all. I had to take this into account when making up our first two minutes because all our original ideas had much too much information for the first two minutes. We need to get information across without getting too far into the plot. This is hard because of course we want our courdework to impress, and we need to find ways of doing that without showing much action.

Initial Film Ideas

Story Outline

A girl (17) gets abducted at a young age is abused and raped, and manages to escape by hitting her kidnapper on the head with an object. She runs home. Her family are over the moon to see her, ask where she has been she can’t talk about it as she’s traumatised by the events. It takes a couple of weeks for her to eventually speak about it, the police go to the man’s house and find it empty, the man’s not there. She’s trying to get back to normal life but can’t because of bad recurring dreams of the night she escaped because she knows he is still out there. Eventually he tracks her down to finish her off because she told the police about him. They have a final fight she manages to kill him and can finally start to rebuild her life.

This is a rough idea for a film that I feel we could make an effective opening sequence for.

Ideas for Opening 2 mins

First two minutes

Camera pans around to look through a half closed door of a girl of about 17 sleeping in a child’s room (pink and fluffy). Girl in the bed is having bad dream, tossing and turning. We then cross cut to a P.O.V shot of the girl running though a forest heavy breathing. We will do this several times each time using a different camera angle. Trying to give the audience the sense that the girl is having a dream of something that happened to her. This will account for the majority of the two minutes. The last 30 seconds we will have the girl burst up from the bed; we will have a close up of her face to show that she’s very scared then cut to her talking to her parents asking her about it asking what she sees in the dream what did he do to her etc.  

Maybe we shouldn't show the girl in bed? Maybe it would make a tenser start if we don;t know whether it is dream or reality? 

Value of Initial Research

I have looked at several more films to add to my initial research. At the beginning of my research, I was looking at how film openings work. From this I have learned that we need to have  a very clear focus about what we want to achieve and to be sure what we want our audience to know and understand. I also have learned various ways of manipulating the audience eg use of sound. I am still looking at this but also looking more closely at my genre, and also for more specific ideas now that we have a good idea of what the overall plot of our film is going to be. Some of my recent research includes:

·         Taken 2 – Starts off in the middle of a situation leaving the audience to understand what is going on without explaining it (sitting in the car waiting for his daughter). This makes it more interesting as you are more engaged with the film as you want to know what is going on as it is not given to you. We are going to start in the middle of a scene like this.

·         Paranormal Activity 4- starts with a big killing scene which leaves you sitting at the edge of your sit. This is a big opening for the start of a film, this is good as you are so build up at the start of the film that you can glued to the screen. This could also be a bad thing as you are so build up at the start of the film that you are expecting even more from the film so the rest of the film maybe a letdown if it is not as rushed and gruesome as the start.

·          Kidulthood- starts off with cross-cutting from different angles of the playground , this I think is effective as it establishes the area as well of getting everyone’s POV of what is going on. Even though it is a different type of film this can help us with our opening two minutes as it is very effective. We will be cross-cutting between the police station, the girl running and the flashback and we need to make this dramatic and intriguing but not messy and confusing.

Ideas for First 2 Minutes

My Ideas for Film Outline

In my group I am going to be working with Megan, Lizzie and Christian. For our film we are going to be working on thriller. For our production company we are using the name ‘Dancing Pens.’ We came up with this idea as we have done some practise animations and this is a name we can make a short animation for quite easily and it also sounds lively and catchy.  I was thinking that we could use very dark colour pens with a dark background rather than bright colours to show that our film is not uplifting and highlights the fact that it is a thriller. After they finish dancing we could flicker them changing colour to show mystery which links into our film type, if we feel this would be the kind of film where the production company want to match their logo.

My plot for the film is about a girl being kidnapped by a man for years and years and she finally escapes. When she does escape she is receiving night mares about it and can’t seem to live with the fact of what has happened and what has been done.

It starts off with a long shot where you see the girl (played by myself) from the crack in the door of her bedroom is cause mystery feeling very vulnerable whist having a nightmare in bed. There is then a cut to a bridging shot of her running  away from something. The sequence keeps cross-cutting from the girl in bed to her running, each time it cuts the camera is being positioned nearer and nearer towards the girl so that the audience can establish where she is and can see her emotion more clearly as the camera becomes closer . The shot then changes to the girl stopping running and looking down at her hands and seeing blood, the camera could then do a slow motion/360 degree shot to show confusion that the girl is feeling. She is feeling this way as when she went to break out of the house where the man was killing her, the man was trying to hurt her and she had had enough of it and found the first thing she could and hit him with it. She was so afraid that she did not even take a minute to look down at her hands and see the blood. The scene then changes into a shot of her in a police station still looking at her hands to show a link between the two scenes. The police man is asking her questions but she is not answering. When she finally does answer, it is with bluntness and confusion. The rest of the film is about her having to live her life with what has happened to her and trying to go back to everyday life without people asking questions. The reality of her hurting and running away from a very dangerous man comes back and haunts her as she has to face her worst night mare of the man and his group trying to come back and find her and trying to hurt her. She spends the rest of her life trying to hide from him, whether she does or not we will never quite know..................