Evaluation 7 - Opening Sequence

Evaluation 7 - Prelim

Evaluation- Marking

George's evaluation was very thorough and used a range of methods to evaluate his work. I didn't really understand his work on representation- he chose two very opposite characters to talk about. His work on institutions and audience were very thorough although it wouls have been better to have explained how he intended to use Facebook in more detail. George's director's commentary on his preliminary and final piece were again very thorough but did not show much of a link between the two.
George 16/20

Film Opening Marking

Level 3 36–47 marks
There is evidence of proficiency in the creative use of many of the following technical skills:
• Producing material appropriate for the target audience and task;
• using titles appropriately according to institutional conventions;
• using sound with images and editing appropriately for the task set;
• shooting material appropriate to the task set;, including controlled use of the camera, attention to framing, variety of shot distance and close attention to mise-en-scene;
• using editing so that meaning is apparent to the viewer and making selective and appropriate use of shot transitions and other effects.


I liked George's film opening. The film contains material appropriate to it's audience. The titles were conventional but a little inconsistent in their timing. The music was appropriate and worked well in setting the tone of the film. The voiceover was a nice idea but seemed odd as it was too short. The camera work was very good on the whole with some nice shot selections. I didn't like the flashback sections which weren't set up particularly well (thrown in, in ranfdom places). I liked the use of slo-mo for the wine glass and the shot at about 1.50 where your villain walks through the camera was nicely done. The meaning was very apparent through your choices of what to show. Two povs from your abuser was perhaps an odd choice.

George 46

Thriller opening -Test screening

I decided to show my opening to a small audience to get there feedback; the feedback I received was positive. They said they liked the music and it immersed them into the story with another saying 'I wanted to keep watching on, so I could find out what happens next'. From that comment, I feel I have achieved what I set out to do and entertain an audience.

Furthermore, I showed it to people outside my target audience as well, they had they same response and enjoyed it. This displays to me how successful the film could be and how it potentially appeals to a greater audience than first thought and again this could be due to the thriller genre being so diverse and appealing to a great deal of people based on the many sub-genres the narrative may follow.

Obsession - Final production piece

Evaluation 6

Evaluation 5

Research and Planning- Marking

George shows a good understanding of genre although he seemed to miss some of the more obvious conventions and didn't explain himself clearly at times. I liked some of his points on editing choices. His mood boards were not really what I was looking for. The questionnaire results showed evidence George's audience research but I am unsure how much he would have taken from this in regard making informed choices in his production piece.

George's analysis of the opening sequence of Donnie Darko demonstrated a good understanding of mise en scene and how directorial choices create meaning for an audience. The sequence illustrated introduction of character but he did not demonstrate an understanding of film openings specifically. His analysis of the opening of Dark Knight provided a fair level of analysis but did not give anymore insight into how films should open. This was also true of his analysis of Se7en. George's post on title sequences do show an understanding of the different way that films can open but he did not explain the effects of the different openings.

His work on the BBFC, health and safety assessment and film companies demonstrated an understanding of media industries. His post on film companies showed some understanding of industry but it would have been better to have looked at companies as examples.He showed a very good understanding of psychographics and demographics and how media industries use these to target audiences. It would have been better to have had a more in depth analysis of psychographics with a specific relation to audiences and film choices.

George's planning was evident and in the posts about music and filming there was a demonstration of how his product evolved.

George's blog covered a wide range of appropriate topics but too often his entries lacked the sufficient depth to gain a higher mark. His analysis was of a reasonable level and he covered all the right areas in his research and planning but I would like to have seen more insight.

George  12/20

Evaluation 4

h   I would likely choose to go by the guidelines of a 15 rated movie because it would allow a range of themes and content to be shown and still be accessible to a wide range of people; being open to different demographics. My target audience would be predominately male as thriller audiences are mainly males due to the masculine scenes shown. Examples of this are films such as 'Seven' and 'The Dark Knight' which both have male protagonists and have little female prevalence in important roles; this potentially deterring the female audience. Often females are used to satisfy the 'male gaze' and used a objects to attract the male audience.

In my thriller I decided to put a female in a lead role as well as a man so that their is less female discrimination, however I have used stereotypes of women to direct my narrative; this will Help the audience understand the characters better. The use of a female in an important role is more common nowadays and I hope that by doing so the thriller genre will attract the females to it.

When identifying my target audience, I used myself as a guidance as I am an age which fits into the target audience band. I used my knowledge of films I have seen as an influence to who the film would be aimed at and why. This allowed me to look at Conventional characteristics the audience expects to see and give me a chance to implement them. 





Name: George Patient
Age: 16

Likes
Films: Fight Club, Se7en, Star Wars, Marvel films.
TV: Sherlock, Dexter, Game Of Thrones, Orange Is The New Black, The Walking Dead, Friends.
Social Media: Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, LinkedIn, YouTube.

Dislikes
Films: Romantic Comedies
TV: Soaps, Reality.
Social Media: N/A

As you can see; I have used myself here. I have done so as I feel that I am a prime example of my target audience. As you can see, the majority of my TV and Film likes are thrillers and have lots of common themes both with the genre and sub-genre. As my film will be using social media to market itself; my likes in this area will be a big convenience and benefit to the distribution company (Warner Bros).

As you can see, my target audience predominately use social media; this is why social media will be a big factor in marketing my movie.

I do not have a specific male or female in my primary target audience because thrillers are so diverse and have a range of themes that I do not feel specifically appeal to one in demographic or psychographic. In terms of demographics; I would suggest my thriller is aimed at the middle class and above because psychological thriller can be complex and hard to follow so i'd perhaps suggest the lower classes may not have to interject to understand and follow the complicated narrative.

Succeeders and explorers would be targeted from a psychographic perspective because the explorers are generally the younger generation; i.e. students, which are my main target audience of my psychological thriller. Furthermore, succeeders would be targeted because they are generally the upper class and more intelligent individuals so they would be able to understand my complex narrative.

Here is the posters of several movies my target audience may enjoy. This is because they all build tension and suspense; in keeping with the conventions of the thriller genre.

Evaluation 3

Evaluation 2

I have decided to compare my protagonist to Jodie fosters character in 'Silence of the lambs'. I am comparing them both because I feel they have some similar qualities in the way they are stereotyped; they also have some differences in terms of the actual characters they play.

Appearance

Obviously both characters are female and will have default stereotypes made about them on sight.  Unconventionally Jodie Foster was a lead role in the film 'Silence of the lambs' as a female protagonist. She was portrayed as a fairly strong character; and the fact she has good career in the police force which is seen as a masculine job reinforces this. Despite the masculine job; she still maintains her very feminine look with her hair and make up looking like she has spent time making sure she looks presentable - The male gaze attracts larger audiences to watch the film. My character is weak and vulnerable; the opposite to Jodie, she is trapped in her own mental prison and she can not escape - the audience is exposed to this during her voiceover which is giving the audience an insight to the activities going on inside her brain (relating to my sub-genre - psychological). My character purposely looks run down to make the audience feel sorry for her. Fosters character is powerful; she has freedom. My character is trapped in a mental prison and her husband has the key.

Costume

Jodie character is well dressed which reinforces her strength as a character and a female. Her clothes are quite masculine which also relates to her profession. My character is wearing pink to reinforce feministic stereotypes and thus showing her femininity; causing the audience to think she is weak and helpless. Furthermore her black eye created with make up with create empathy towards her from the audience making her more lovable. My character is middle-aged which is conventional of most film genres including thriller, if a teenager was used the narrative may not be as convincing.

Representation

Jodie Foster applies to the male gaze quite a lot in 'Silence of the lambs' as she is presented as pretty, my character is portrayed as rough in the image above as my film is psychological thriller, there will be a lot of emotion on the surface to convey this. Because women are 'overly emotional' I followed a stereotype to help the audiences identify cues to what a character may be like based on their stereotypical expectations.

Evaluation 1

Locations

My main location was my house which was unconventional as the main location for a thriller almost always appears to be a city or a very rural location. My location also little-none signifiers to a thriller genre however the idea for my psychological thriller is how everything seems normal on the outside but its inside where the action is.

Props and costumes

In terms of props; I kept these to a minimum so that filming was easier and good acting was no required as much. In terms of conventional props in thrillers, guns are often used within the action sub-genre and I was going to potentially include one but the change in my plot meant I did not require any props I did not already have. The only item that was of importance in my opening was a fork which was used as a means to inflict pain.

Male antagonist - Wore a casual/smart shirt with a suits blazer and trousers. This implies that he is of middle-class and the fact he is shown to us early on makes us believe he is a good character; thus making the unfolding events even more unexpected and creating an enigma for the audience.

Female Protagonist - Wore a pink blouse with flowers. The pink is seen as a female colour which would therefore connote weakness and vulnerability and the flowers are also another representation of femininity.

One prop that I did use was a wine glass; we smashed it. This meant when filming we had to take safety into account so the no injuries were inflicted on anyone.

Another apparent prop I used was fork. This was used in a violent manner and had to be held sensibly so that nobody got injured or stabbed with it.

Camerawork/editing  

I used some fast paced scenes to begin with to try and build up the narrative early on due to the tight timeframe I had for the opening sequence but I then tried to slow the pace down a little bit as I did not want it to have a trailer like feel and movies within the action genre tend to have fast beginnings where as thrillers conventionally are quite slow. However the level of speed I used followed thriller conventions of building tension and suspense which would also be an important factor in maintaining audience engagement.  Another important decision I had to make was how I was going to include the titles in the sequence; this is where my influence from 'Limitless' came in - I want to have a black screen with titles appearing so sound in the form of a voiceover could be focused on without any distractions from the visuals appearing on the screen. These titles included; production companies, actors, editor, producer and directer which appeared last as this is very conventional but yet again due to a limited time, I had the restrict the prevalence each title was given. 

The effect used on the titles when they appear/disappear was used as it is effective but not too over the top so therefore more attention could be applied to the sound in this first section of the sequence. The actual title appeared at the end of the sequence as the couple minutes leading up to it were creating a climax for the catchy title to come in after; giving audiences goosebumps. I also feel the silence and lack of music used in this section could resemble the loneliness felt by the female protagonist.  In one part I used an extreme close up - this was to convey emotion and show the characters reaction to something; this is often used in thrillers and therefore I stuck to the conventions.

Title font and style
I decided to keep the font simple so that the audience could understand it and so it didn't draw attention away from the diegetic sound of my voiceover. Furthermore, I kept the text white to convey how my characters lead a boring normal life; or so it would seem. The antagonist in my story has a compulsion where everything has to be just right and how he likes it..... possibly meaning a very plain setting because he does not like clutter; the white colour represents the nondescript nature of the character.

Genre and opening
The genre of my opening is a psychological thriller and I decided on this genre as my survey results showed that this was the most popular sub-genre of thrillers amungst my target audience. The first signifier that it could be something psychological is the fact it starts with a voiceover; suggesting the audience is in somebodies head but I purposely did not include many genre signifiers because there simply are not many accessible in the psychological sub-genre - I did use emotion to try and convey the psychological aspects. Another reason for this opening was most thriller films make you think to what the sub-genre is and mine did this, thus sticking to the conventions of a thriller; moreover the tension built in the opening would suggest a thriller to the audience.

Character Introductions
The first character the audience is introduced to is the protagonist, She is introduced with a voiceover and soon after introduced during a flash back scene which also includes the antagonist of the narrative. The antagonist 'John' is introduced having an argument with the protagonist. From the dialogue shown during the credits we know something is wrong with our female character so from this we conclude John the antagonist is a character we are not meant to like. I followed the conventions of thrillers here by telling the story from the vulnerable characters perspective.

Storyboard

Filming

Diary of day shooting

Due to my experimenting with ideas throughout production; I had various filming locations. At each location I did encounter some difficulties such as camera position, lighting and weather conditions.

This was the first location I experimented with. When filming certain scenes the camera was portrait which consequently made the footage look unprofessional and unconventional in terms of cinematic framing. Furthermore this location was about an hours drive away which made it difficult to return to make any adjustments so I decided to change my narrative and sub-genre to something I could achieve closer to home.

Here is some of the recorded footage from this location.

This was my second location I used during my filming. Unfortunately the weather impacted how accessible it was to film there; there were a couple sunny days which I felt were inappropriate to the tone I was trying to convey of a dystopian environment. We also had to be considerate with the public and make sure the location of filming was empty to maintain public safety. This was because during filming it was dark and we were running in and around locations that could startle or panic a member of the public. I did not feel this story would of carried an effective narrative and came across predictable to me so I decided to try another new idea.

Here is some of the recorded footage from this location.

This was my third and final attempt a finding a good filming location. The location was my house; it was suitable as it was easily accessible 24/7 and when I was brainstorming some ideas, it was an optimum location for the narrative I was trying to convey. However some high angle shots were hard to position due to a lack of equipment.

Shooting schedule

Because I was working on my own, I had a lot of flexibility on what I wanted to do and when I could do it. As a consequence I worked in time frames and due multiple reshoots my schedule was not followed strictly .

Editing diary
Editing was the final step in creating my production piece; once filming was done. I started by creating my production company intro.

The images above show a couple intros that I was considering using for various reasons.  Each of them contain the colour blue; this is because Patient Productions' logo is blue so I wanted to keep to the colour scheme and blue connotes loneliness and because Patient Productions is an independent company, the idea of being separated and solo I feel is conveyed through the use of this colour.

Production company/name/logo/ethos

I have decided to use the same production company that I did for my horror film trailer that I made last year for GCSE as I feel that it sounds good and links to my own name. The company is called ‘Patient Productions’. As an independent film company; our ethos and sole aim is to immerse audiences and bring them cinematic enjoyment. The uses and gratifications theory could link in here. In terms of watching a thriller film, the uses and gratifications I feel to be relevant are;

•       Learn and educate – This is because of a thriller sub-genre; psychological. This sub-genre can sometimes be in and around the topic of mental health so I feel it could raise people’s awareness of different mental illness’ and educate them a little bit.

•       Escape reality – As with any film; people watch them to escape their daily lives to be immersed into an alternated reality of the characters they are watching. With thrillers, the audience may watch them to excite them due to their enjoyment of tension and suspense.

•       Entertain – This is very important to Patient Productions because we want our audiences to enjoy themselves when watching our films.

•       Social interaction – If our film reaches a high level of success, word of mouth will be a key factor with people telling friends and family about the film and then encouraging them to watch it. Sites such as IMDB.com offer a good way of communication over the internet because it has lots of features that provide you with information about the film you are searching for.

However, because Patient Productions is an independent company; It will most likely need to synergise with a bigger production company to help distribute the product. For example, Warner Bros could help produce the film and their big name as a conglomerate would tell audiences that the film is to a reasonable standard of expectancy. To promote my company, I have created a film poster. I will also create a logo to show them. To raise awareness; Patient Productions now has a Facebook and Twitter page to enable audiences to interact with us and keep up to date with our latest projects.

Facebook

Twitter

Pitch/brief

The plot of my thriller begins with a women putting on her lipstick like any other day, but this time; the camera pans and reveals a bruised eye - creating enigma. She is married to an obsessive husband who is very particular about the ways things are set up and is quick to violence when he gets angry or something does not go his way. The wife is paranoid and wants to make sure everything is perfect so he does not get annoyed but when he gets home, he is not happy with something so he gets annoyed and a dramatic event unfolds before the end of the opening sequence.

The choice of these types of characters came from the film "sleeping with the enemy". The protagonist is a middle aged male which is conventional. Moreover, thrillers tend to have more of a male following so having a male protagonist means they haven a character they are more likely to relate to. Because I am doing a psychological thriller the tone of it will be quite tense and revolve around mystery and potentially murder due to the protagonists short fuse.

Health and safety/Risk assessment

The park
When filming some potential scenes for my production piece I had to be aware of my surroundings here. This was because it was getting dark when filming so I had to ensure my phone had battery so I could use a torch to see; avoiding any falls or getting lost. Furthermore I had to watch my footing closely to ensure I did not trip over and tree roots or fall down a ditch.

My house
Although my household environment is reasonable safe to film in; when I shot a glass smashing, I had to ensure I was a safe distance away from the smash site so I would not get injured.

I do not feel too much health and safety had to be considered as the environments I was predominately in where controlled and safe.

Music

Music

Types of sound;

• Diegetic
• Non - diegetic
• Dialogue
• Tone of voice
• Silence
• Soundscape
• Voiceover
• Sound motif
• Direct address
• Soundtrack
• Soundbridge
• Synchronous sound
• Synchronous sound
• Musical sting
• Pleonastic
• Contrapuntal 
• Incidental

Why music is important

Music is what keeps the audience focused on the screen and it can be used to display a variety of emotions and convey several tones.

What did I use to make my music?

Because copyrighted music was not permitted I decided to use the internet to try and find some appropriate royalty free music to use for my soundtrack. However, none of the music I found grabbed me so to action this I decided I was going to make my own incidental music. I used a piece of software called ‘Logic Pro X’ which took me a while to understand but once I did I found it very useful in creating sounds and music as it offered a large library of options for me to choose from and edit so it suits me. I could use my Laptops keyboard to play specific instruments.

Tone of music

I experimented with various tones of music which all created different atmospheres but I felt they fitted the horror genre more opposed to thriller so I decided to watch some thriller openings to get a feel for the speed and pitch the music was used at; I feel this helped me to establish the tone I wanted to use in my title sequence.