In this week, we have looked at the news to gain a better perspective on the lives of Britain, there a lot of real life stories within the news which, we can use in our own movie. Therefore, this has made it easier for me and my group to come up with realistic ideas in our movie, to portray the struggle within the british working class lives. Nevertheless, when we had obtain this news title, we had to do a post called 'What's in the news' which, made me elaborate my ideas in more detail so the plot becomes more clear, in this process I also learnt more key conventions within a british social realism movie in addition, to the kind of props, location and themes. As a result, making our movie pitch more interesting with some sense of originality and realism
We also discovered a new website called 'Art of the title', which had a lot of different opening sequences. The use of this would help me gain a good insight of the structure and format of opening sequence and how they generically are.
We also did 'beach combing for inspiration' presentation, where we included at least 20 items that could be presented in our own opening sequence, this expanded our creativity that would be further put into our future production.
At the start of the week I had to look at Robert McKee's 'classical narrative structure' - where he examines the narrative structure of a work and what makes a story interesting or not. From the use of this, it had helped me improve my analytical skills due to knowing these key conventions within the film industry. We also had a pitch focus group within the week, where we had to gather a group of people to asses our work. Giving us good feedback and criticisms from a non-bias point of view. As a result, learning this useful feedback made us make sure that our movie was achieving its purpose to entertain and mirror an actual BSR.
Robert McKee's 'classic narrative structure' examines the narrative structure of most scripts of films that are given to him and examines it to pin-point the whole layout of the movie. They are divided into:
Exposition/protagonist: The main character of the movie.
Our protagonist is called Tate, an average teenangers who finds himself depressed along the struggles and events that occur in his life. A conventionally sterotype that happens in our contemporay society of Britain. He is 16 years old and is often isolated from society, due to his horrible family life. He only finds himself to love his girlfriend where he lives in Central London, Stockwell and in an council flat, which shows that he is from working class background due to this conventionally location connoting this.
Agent of change: Something that occurs to have a knock on effect that leads to a conflict/complications
Tate is in a unstable and inconsistent relationship with his girlfriend as one day, she confesses to him that she is pregnant. This leads to his frusturation and the anti-social behaviour he develops aganist society and the people around him. Moreover,the baby is not even Tate's as this leads him to storms out of Bethany's sight and wonders round the streets of a dark and dangerous London.
Conflict/complications: A situation that involves the protagonist in a negative way and must be overcome.
Tate wishes to find the culprit by narrowing down the suspects who he believes got his girlfriend pregnant, through this frusturation he starts to develop contempt for this mysterious person, who he didn't even met. He wants to threaten him to a corner, with a gun he finds at the start of the movie, where he will admit his mistakes.
Elaboration: This is the agent of change, conflict/complications and even the main story plot that is explained.
He goes through various methods of dedicing who could have impregnated his girlfriend, such as studying who out of her current friends and links could be a suspect, stalking her house and actions. This makes Tate quite crazy as he finds himself going through a vicious cycle of looking and looking for the suspect.Consequently, he believes he has found out who it is, he gets him to a dark basement, away from anyone that could interrupt his plans and talks to him in a aggressive and patronising tone.
Climax/Resolution: This is near the end of the complications where they will be resolved and the climax of the movie will occur.
He points the gun at the culprit's head and repeatedly asks: "DID YOU DO IT!?" The culprit is frightened and panics in this abrupt situation. Consequently, he cries and confesses that he did cheat with Bethany. This confuses Tate, as he is happy that he found out who done it and is at the ideal situation to kill him. However, he feels that he can't do it as this is his first time with a gun to someone's head, he knows that revenge won't solve anything and thinks about how much of a physco he has become. This confusion leads Tate to break down crying, the culprit runs away feeling confused but saved as he life is spared.
Coda: This is the end of the movie, where the equilibrium of the movie is restored back to normal . The Coda we decided to do is not one that an audience would expect, as it not so convetionally as it has no solution.Tate goes home and on the way decides that he doesn't want rvenge, this prompts him to dismantle the gun and throw it away in the ocean. As he heads home he thinks about his life without anyone who he truly loves now and goes into further depression, so there is no real coda, In my opinon, a quite unconvetionally ending that follows the McKee's narrative.
Coda /
A CODA is used to resolve the film and add any unanswered questions from the audience, it creates a satisfying end as the resolution of most of the films that use coda, result to an happy ending. As in this extract, we see everyone graduate and play their final band after all of the mess they was in.
- Post Production - Work done on a film once finished.
- Visual effects CGI , Special effects , Green screen
Visual effects create effects that are not really in the movie but, because they are non-existent they can be placed anywhere in the scene adding more creativity for the editors when they are editing, it also makes it more realistic as, they can also add a graphic match towards it.
Editing Techniques
Cutting Clips
Graphic match - When the visuals match with the sound
Eye line match - Making eyes synchronous with characters.
- The point of a graphic match is to match the sound to the visuals thus, making the extract have more emphasis on its sound , creating no disorientation within the scene
- Also, an Eye line match creates reference to one of the characters point of view therefore, the audience know what the object or person placement has in the film, creating no confusion
Superimposition -
The use o superimposition is an type of edit used to put someone on top of a scene, it can be used to create illusion within the scene to add a more mysterious effect. Or, otherwise just to add someone else in the scene who is not really in the scene, so their existence is still in place. However, they are not real used in BSR or in Hollywood, unless is used to add illusion.
Cutaway
A Cut away is used to transition two scenes, creating a reference between one point of the scene to another, it is used alot in family guy to reference jokes to each other thus, making the audience visualize it more easier. Or, it can be used in more serious films to show a flashback to add more emotions within the scene, the transitions often used are.
- Dissolve
- Fade In / Fade Out
- Wipe
Jump Cut
Jump cuts are used to quicken the pace of the movie thus, making any unnecessary parts in the movie cut out therefore, the audience watch the movie at a smoother pace, also they are mostly used in Hollywood and rarely seen in BSR due to it having less realism and BSR's are usually at a slower pace.
Crosscutting
Crosscutting is used to create correlation between the two scenes, to show the audience an link, a link that shows reference and creates much more suspense as two scenes happen at the same time, also it creates good continuity within the film making it a much more easier watching experience for the audience.
Parallel Editing
Parallel editing may be similar to Crosscutting however, there is one difference. As in this godfather scene, it shows a timeline of events going back into the past thus, making it the scenes not happen in the same time but instead, just a series of flashbacks going through the characters head as, crosscutting is the effect of two scenes happening at the same time. However, they have the same purpose of giving correlation between two scenes.
This is one mass difference between two action-packed scenes filled with violence. For example, Fast and Furious ( a Hollywood production film ) puts big emphasis on their action,as they try to surprise our everyday audience with locations,explosions and other props to create a new atmosphere. Moreover, the camera move is quite fast paced along with the transitions of the cuts, it makes the atmosphere less realistic, but more surprising and tensed. On the other hand, if we take a look at the Wild Bill action scene, it is more realistic and slow. It takes a while for the action to actually get started as, it tries to build up the suspense for the audience or, try reveal some information within the dialogue, unlike Fast and Furious which get right into the action to leave no waiting. Also, the camerawork is quite focused as, there only few times it changes angles or movement thus, making it more slow but adding more realism thus, creating more of a personal identification towards the audience which, is what most British social realism intend to do.
In these two scenes, there is still the theme of violence and action but yet again, the two scenes take time to build up. As we see in adulthood, the location is quite dull and boring which everyday people from London can recognize or relate with thus, creating a more level of personal identification for the audience just because of the location. Moreover, the scene starts with slow camera movement following the characters, this slowly builds up the suspense for the audience. However, in the Hollywood film the suspense and action is put right in just like the last one, the location is quite big and huge, and not something an everyday working class person would see, as we see fast pace camera work with stunts, that will cause shock from the audience. This creates less personal identification for the audience and realism but, more of thrill and excitement showing a difference of purposes for the two extracts.
In these two scenes, is a massive juxtaposition as we see, they both have a different purpose as one wants to set mean,purpose and setting while, the other one wants to please the audience with full on action. In fish tank, the camera movement is very slow ( just like the other extracts ), the cuts happen at a slow pace too and there alot of establishing shots with ambient sound, to set the mood of the movie adding to the sense of realism. However, in the other movie it puts the audience right into the action with fast-paced camera movement, and a quite less poor location which is New York ( Manhattan) unlike, fish tank which is set near the council flats. Thus, creating less personal identification but more shock and surprise to give the audience more escapism
Overall, Hollywood seems to have less realism, with fast-paced camera movement, key conventions of explosions which, create alot of escapism but less of a personal identification, They also, tend to put the audience straight into the audience rather than, using establishing shots to set the scene and create more of mood in addition, to less ambient sounds and more Foley sounds. On the other hand, British social realism use establishing shots and more poor areas, to emphasis the poverty the working class live in and create a better sense of realism also, making the audience have more sympathy towards the cast. They also use slow camera movement and slow paced cuts to add the sense of realism, and ambient sounds also to add this thus, making it a kitchen-sink-drama.
Film 4 is a British film production company owned by Chanel Four Television Corporation. They have been responsible for backing a large number of films in the UK. It started in 1998 and the company was known as ChanelFour Films however, later on it was branded was Film 4 and started with it's first film called 'Walter' which was directed by Stephen Fears. They are also owned by channel 4 and are behind some of the most iconic British films of the last twenty-seven years, a film production company that is independent and uniquely British, nevertheless they have had several specialists in co-production with tribute over 15% in their film budget.
Film 4 Themes
Film Four Production have built a status for producing social realist films which, are often british. However, they are mostly refereed as kitchen sink dramas due to it symbolising an everyday british working class life, and it portrays it realistically as possible. This is mostly done by the rough,ready style camerawork and design, using grim real life locations or not much of the big star actors who, are mostly untrained. This is also connoted through some of the actors heavy ascents, and the accented areas. Nevertheless, they deal with mostly politically sensitive and controserevial themes which question race, social facts , taboos , homosexuality , drugs , gangs and other themes, in a very extreme sense.
Each film here is an example of what would be on Film4, as they are all british social realism which portray the domestic hardship of working class life as, they experience poverty in very graphic images.
Film 4 Ethos
One of Film4 Ethos is to develop a unique British Talent and be leader of innovation in the British Film industry and invest around £500,000 per film, at a rate of around 20 films a year. They also plan to support international independent film makers which, is by investing in innovative and interesting foreign films, making it more multi-cultural. Nevertheless, they are planning to offer a platform for British and independent cinema on terrestrial television by committing to revealing each one of Film Four Productions films on channel 4 and it's sister station Film Four.
In this week, we have looked at the news to gain a better perspective on the lives of Britain, there a lot of real life stories within the news which, we can use in our own movie. Therefore, this has made it easier for me and my group to come up with realistic ideas in our movie, to portray the struggle within the british working class lives. Nevertheless, when we had obtain this news title, we had to do a post called 'What's in the news' which, made me elaborate my ideas in more detail so the plot becomes more clear, in this process I also learnt more key conventions within a british social realism movie in addition, to the kind of props, location and themes. As a result, making our movie pitch more interesting with some sense of originality and realism 
