Planning: Production Roles - Miss Begum

Introduction
Between me and my group members we have decided to share out different production roles between us to balance out the workload and use our expert skills for the identified areas. I have taken the roles that i will be taking control of with my other member taking control of the other 4.

Sound - I have decided to take on this role largely down to the fact that one of my other AS subjects is Music Technology in which you are taught deeper into the details and specifications of the technology side of the music industry and things such as drowning out the sound of unnecessary noise just to hear the footstep of the antagonist can be done with such ease. 


Location - I decided to take this role as since between the two of us i travel the most in terms of range. Because of that i could know areas on my way to school or so and so that can be the location for different scenes in the thriller.


Lighting Operator - With the help of Music Tech info i can be able to use my knowledge of the equipment to be able to control lighting to suit the type of lighting needed in different scenes. Also as i know the type of lighting i need i will be able to picture it in my head and get a better idea of what i will do as operator of the lights.


Costume, Hair & Makeup - Because neither of us know how to apply makeup i find it best fit to seek help or advice into applying the face paint needed for the clown effect on both antagonist and victim. With costume i can sort that as with Dance (other AS subject) i have access to props and costumes for the themes needed as a clown hair and everything else is already in my hands.


Director - I have given myself director and not producer because they are both the top two jobs and my partner is better at producing than i am whereas due to my experience of watching thriller and non-thriller films i feel as if i would be a better director to create the effect my antagonist will need to show his intimidating posture. 

Planning: Storyboard - Miss Begum

Introduction:

In the media lesson me and my group went through our final idea and drew up a storyboard of basic 

features within each scene that would help us when it comes to editing and recording.

Storyboard 1:

Storyboard 2:

Storyboard 3:

Storyboard 4:

Planning: Opening scene narration - Miss Begum

Introduction:

From the idea me and my group have pieced together the start would be the introduction of this character, possible antagonist sat on a chair with the spotlight clear on them just showing him as a good clown then reverted back to him as a bad clown and so forth. Then the middle of that scene will be him noticing a young one or girl to use as his sidekick and then persuading them to join him, then the last scene will be them getting ready to leave and then the finale is them walking away, a shortened version of the narration, but with more detail this is the opening narration.

Scene Narration:

At the start the camera will be focused on an empty chair with spot lighting used to show the audience that this specific chair plays a key role in the opening scene, then the audience will be introduced to this antagonist or character of which the audience will be shown his bad side then his good side and so forth.

The clown will then look at the camera using manual focus just to add that extra effect on the opening scene and the audience, during this scene the camera will show the clown taking part in activities linking to what a clown will normally be doing such as riding a tricycle or shuffling cards or trying to juggle then switch to his bad side to him cleaning a blunt weapon, checking himself in the mirror and holding a body bag or a sack to show he is planning something.

The first part of the middle scenes will be an establishing shot used to show the audience the clear location of this park and a young teen by themselves maybe listening to music and on their phones chilling or shown as a distressed youth possibly a rebel after running away from home, which will allow for a reaction shot from the clown as they notice this young person. A panning shot will be used to show the antagonist enter the park and greet this young child and then persuade them to join him with open arms. Not too much dialogue will be shown in this scene, maybe the young person feeling a bit worried for their safety but then realize they are “not wanted anyway so who cares what happens”. This scene will then be followed by the young person following this antagonist off into the distance with the camera panning from them sitting on the bench to being set on the ground to visibly show their cold icy footsteps walking away into the distance.

The second part of the middle scene will be of this young person in the process of being turned to the antagonist’s sidekick through the process of training and not the cliché ritual that seems common in mediocre films these days like ‘The Conjuring’. The young person will then be seen putting on a clown mask as an indication they have finished their transformation to this humble and newborn antagonist the original antagonist wants them to be.

The last scene for this opening will be the main antagonist clown donning his mask with an extreme close up of his eyes but not revealing his face to show emotion as he prepares for his next mysterious outing with his new trusty sidekick, he will then briefly say, “Are You Ready?” with the camera then switching to an extreme close up of his new sidekicks eyes replying “Yes” then donning the mask also.

Then the camera will be set up to show these two new antagonists walking away from a scene with red liquid splattered over them to indicate they have done their deed and to show that they are covered in blood to the audience (but obviously not going to cover them in real blood). While they walk away the camera will go the back of them when they are walking allowing for the young person to turn their head and smile at the camera in a daunting manner as if to show off, then the camera will fade to black quickly to cut off the scene there.

Conclusion:

This opening scene is good as it shows in detail various common conventions from other thrillers and reintroduces elements of the horror genre into this as to kind of steer away from typical thrillers and lead into its own pathway. Also deciding this narration with the group was drawn using ideas from our initial ideas and that seen in other thrillers to piece together an amateur masterpiece. 

Planning: Final Idea - Mrs. Quinlan

Narrative/Plot:

The final idea will be changed from the narrative of this main male character running away from his troubles, who are shown to the audience as grown men with no face or identity, to the narrative of a contrapuntal clown that commits manslaughter due to his own past just to get over it, like a much crazy Joker and with more instruments to help in his attacks, finding a young girl on the streets and then converting her into his sidekick to aid in his motives and actions so that he isn't by himself. 

Narrative structure:

In terms of narrative, Todorov’s structure which consists of a clear start, middle and end is what we are most likely to go for due to the basic and simplicity of it and the fact that we only have two minutes and in those two minutes we don’t want to give away too much or give too little. The structure makes it easy for us to also make an opening without too much confusion and make unnecessary complications.

Characters:

There will initially be only two characters just to keep the dialogue at a minimum level. Firstly the antagonist, which is a clown with two sides to him maybe because of that his name can be Yin Yang but that is another topic. Then another character, victim turned antagonist due to her conversion by this clown to do his dirty work. After seeing things like Mikey banned for allowing such a young child to commit really savage work like murder with blunt weapons we will make sure the child is not too young may be use someone in their teens but remain young so that they seem young enough to not have any idea whether what they are doing is wrong or right.

Mise En Scene:

This is something we haven’t yet discussed and will dwell on later during our planning, and leave this blank till we come to a conclusion on Mise En Scene because of the possibility we may change our minds after a while and go for another idea on Mise En Scene.

Location:

First scene will be a dark unknown room to reveal to the audience the first character as a happy and sad clown, then the next scene will be a dark and distorted park to show his transformation of this victim from happy and joyful to dark and gloom, then the last scene where the New Equilibrium begins will be a house as the two clowns get ready to walk down a lonely ghostly street which will be the fourth location.

Lighting:

By primarily putting the spotlight on him when the clown is sat down on the chair in the room at the start just to show the audience he is clearly the main character in this opening, then with the effect on the flooring from the moonlight the lighting in the park will be something special and specific, however the lighting for the remainder of the film will be low key.

Costume:

Realistically a clown outfit for both characters is what we discussed and settled on due to the fact that it adds that effect that they are devoted and we have actually put in effort to make it look authentic. We have the intention of making the clown look scary so the makeup or mask will have to be a psychological bonus if we want to create that element from the costume.

Iconography:

The clown mask will be something of an iconography due to what it symbolizes and also it is a way of hiding the identity of this antagonist from the audience. The clown suit is also something as to say that this is what the antagonist wears when committing all this mischief.

Body Language and Facial Expressions:

This will depend on the mood of the antagonist just to add a little twist to scenes recorded. We also want to show the audience a mixture of body languages and facial expressions to indicate the personality and actions of the clown are unpredictable.

Film Influence:

The influences of this film come from Halloween and the fact that the personality and depictions of clowns can vary.

Audience response:
The audience response of this will hopefully be that of one who is scared of clowns as opposed to someone who isn’t affected by this type of material. Our aim is to have a psychological effect on the audience and allow for them to feel as if our opening has gotten to them or atleast scared them a little.

What makes this conventional?:

What makes this conventional is down to the fact that the motive of the antagonist are distorted and become a bit clear when he receives help from someone else. As the child imitates him and becomes like him, the audience will be able to question what may be going on in this opening 2 minutes which is what will make them have the urge to watch the rest of the film.

Themes present:

The themes that may be present in this will be clowns due to the fact both characters are clowns, imitations as the young victim will become the mature clown and copy what he has done or what he wants to do and friendship because with this new sidekick he has found someone to share this passion with and is no more lonely.

Conclusion:

We want them to initially feel really scared of the antagonist as they do not know anything about his personality because of the drastic change. This narrative along with the added features and planning ideas will be able to make this happen and allow for the opening to be as good as we planned and hopefully even better.

Planning: Developing ideas in groups - Miss Begum

Initial planning

Idea 1-Emeka

For my initial idea I have conjured up a more than basic idea and draft towards a final idea using all my research from former blogs and from the data I had collected in my questionnaires. Further research may help me in further improving my idea rather than changing the full thing and also help my group to decide on a final idea with some aspects and influence of my initial idea.

Narrative

For the narrative of my opening I went for a character trying to run away from his mistakes and regrets which are portrayed as big men in suits with no face to the audience but to him are still just his mistakes and regrets. Which I found a good idea as most thrillers tend to have the character running from an actual thing whereas I would have made it his own problems based on the things he done portrayed through characters with no identity. The idea was based on an episode in Sci-Fi Drama, Doctor Who of which the characters were aliens in black suits called The Silence.

Title

The title of my film was hard to decide and I had many ideas including taking the name of the characters I named in Doctor Who and calling it the 'Silence' as his thoughts are portrayed differently to the audience which could leave the audience confused yet intrigued as to what the movie will be about. Another name I went for was 'Who’s Who' as if to say both the audience and the character are confused and we have no idea who is who, whether his troubles are caused by him or they are caused by these men in suits is something the audience will want to pay attention to. Another name I may use for my opening thriller is ‘?’ as if to say we as a production company are speechless and don’t know what to say or what to make as the thriller title which helps to aid in confusing and adding a psychological effect to the thriller.

Sub-Genre

Considering the many different sub-genres available for my thriller opening I came to the conclusion that I could make it whatever but to suit the purpose the sub-genres I have chosen from the possible many are first, Psychological as many scenes will give the audience a spice of authenticity in order to gain a psychological response and receive better feedback. The other sub-genre was Drama as it has the sense that is has an intention to be more serious than relaxed and comedic, with the focus of having characters dealing with realistic ordeals and emotional struggles.

Character

For characters, I have gone for the victim of which he is to himself and has to find a way to do everything himself, he has no-one and is his own hero, due to the fact the characters face may not be seen often it will be better to make the character a bit of a subtle character in terms of noise and not action Another character is the men in the suits as his thoughts and regrets but the audience don’t know and won’t understand if they are real or just his imagination. Another character I include in my opening is a psychiatrist in which their part may be to tell him that he is alright but that character too is just in his head and isn’t apparent to the audience but to us a producers and him as it is his worries.

Theory Application

With theory application I would use Todorov’s theory of Equilibrium, Disequilibrium and then New Equilibrium but may switch the last around to leave the audience on a cliff hanger instead of ending it there and then, this would be better as it would leave the audience questioning the motion and what just happened further making them more interested in my opening. Todorov’s theory is by far the most simplest of the four of them as for films like this where there aren’t that many characters it allows someone to make something without too much hassle or problems of what to add to a small scene. Using elements from Aristotle who centered his theories round themes and emotions. I may use his structure which consisted of the film going from an ‘Exposition’ in order to know the character. Then next in his theory was the Rising Action which is when the protagonist is able to finally understand his/her goal allowing them to start working towards it. It reaches the Climax which becomes point of the greatest overall tension; the phase in which everything goes mostly wrong. Then the climax ends and there comes the Falling Action which is the turning point of the story and is where the main character makes the decision that defines the outcome of the story, then lastly comes the Denouement which is the resolution and all mysteries are solved. 

Conclusion

Conclusively putting all my research and ideas together I can come to a final idea using thoughts from my initial idea and my group idea.

Idea 2-Umut

Narrative:

A teenager is being interrogated by an officer and is being told to wear a wire so the charges are dropped. Then the next scene we see a group of masked individuals robbing a store and fleeing from the scene via bikes. The boy wearing the wire drops and the device is visible to his group. He is chased out and caught, also murdered in a disturbing manner with a message sent to the officers in charge using the boy’s blood.

Title:

No Face No Case

Sub-Genre:

Crime, Drama

Characters:

5 Teenagers around the ages of 17-23

All big builds to look intimidating

Masks on face

Theory Application:

“Barthes theory” could be applied to my narrative because most

MES:

Lighting and colour:

Interrogation room could have high key lighting with no filters to show the seriousness and security. However the heist could be carried out in the nigh, therefore low key lighting and maybe a grey colour filter to portray danger and death.

Settings and iconography:

An interrogation room is a typical setting for a thriller film, especially for an opening scene. The store could be a warehouse or factory, which may still be really convenient to a thriller film.

Body language and facial expression:

Body language should portray strength and power so the actors would have to keep their muscles stiff. Facial expression wouldn’t be a problem as the heist is going to carried out with masks, however the other characters such as the police officer, teenager being interrogate and owner and workers of the store may be difficult to get into character.

Advantages of this idea:

·        Bikes are easy to access

·        Teenagers could be found easily as were in a school

Disadvantages of this idea:

·        Murder may be difficult to look realistic

·        Finding a device

·        Finding a store to participate

Idea 3-Abass

Narrative: a man is stalking a young teenage girl that goes to school. He does this by looking at her Facebook looking where she is at times of the day and going outside her school looking where she hangs out after school. One day he sees the girl alone in a park and attacks her until she is unstably damaged. Police and ambulance come and the man runs away and loses the police. The girls is damaged and is near death. The true motives of the man is unknown.

Title: who’s who- this is the title because you don’t know who the actual attack is.

Sub-genre: drama- as the friends and family of the victim are devastated

Psychological-because seeing the way the girl gets attacked affects the audience in a psychological way

Characters: antagonist-the man, victim-Jessica (the girl)

Themes: violence- when the man attacks the girl.

Stalking-when the man finds out everything about the girl.

Narrative structure:

Todorov’s theory: Equilibrium-when everything is fine and the girl is going to school. Disequilibrium-when the guy attacks the girl. New equilibrium- when the attack is over.

Advantages: the Narrative of the story has a good effect on the audience.

The story of the opening scene is good.

Disadvantages: the story is too conventional.

We might not be able to find an empty park for this too take place.

Lighting: low key lighting because it creates more fear to the audience and it affects them psychologically. If I were to use high key lighting it wouldn’t be as effective as the audience would think the guy doesn’t pose a threat.

Cinematography: close-up on girl in order to show facial expression. And establishing shot to show the environment.

Research: Questionnaire Results - Miss Begum

From the questionnaires i conducted i made graphs on my results and these are my data findings from the people i asked. I will use the feedback from the data collected to have a basic thought of my final idea.

This helps with audience age and target audience as then I will know who will be watching my thriller and get a better understand on what that age group likes more in films and more specifically thrillers. The majority of people that filled it out are the conventional audience for a thriller.

Helps with target audience as I can get a different opinion from both genders and analyse them to generate an idea using both opinions, e.g. averagely women may feel as if too much violence and graphic scenes are can psychologically damage the viewer, whereas the men may feel as if action is what is needed in a thriller film to give it that extra edge and not really be affected by anything psychologically.

This helps as I would know what my target audience do during their day and if they have enough time to watch thrillers which will also give me an insight into if they don’t have time to do so then they are not ideally the best recipients for effective feedback.

Helps as I would prefer a better opinion from people who have actually watched a thriller film compared to those who have not. However, their feedback may not be useful as it won’t really have a noticeable effect on my thriller opening, it’s just down to who will be able to notice what makes my thriller good from their experience of other thrillers.

Here I asked about who I considered conventional characters according to the thriller genre in terms of their representation. The majority of people said that they knew of Morgan Freeman in thriller roles. This feedback has been beneficial to me because I may now want my protagonist character to be an older black man who is going to potentially solve the puzzle that arises from my opening.  

With this I will have a better idea on what sub-genre to add to my thriller opening and further give me knowledge of which thrillers with action as a sub-genre to look at and get a better idea of what to include in my thriller. Using this I now understand what sub-genres may be popular to include and instead of following down that path I may choose to use Sci-Fi as a sub-genre.

From the research here most of the people that answered have seen thriller films and only a few have not seen thriller. This can help in my research as open questions will give a better idea of content.

From the research conducted the theme of controversy and revenge is more seen and known of in thrillers as opposed to psychological and temptation may be due to the fact that it is hard to depict what  temptation and psychological themes consist of, as thrillers with a revenge theme may have more action.

The age certificate that people would apply to thriller films based on my research is PG due to the fact that some scenes may be unbearable for a young audience to handle on their own and may require an adult to help them deal with this.

From the research here the favourite character in a film is the anti-hero averagely based on the results gained from my questionnaire. People answering aged 16-21 years preferred anti-hero over hero and antagonist and the modern anti-hero may be a cause of this as the likes of Batman have a very large fan base.

The type of lighting preferred here is dark lighting as we can see here, younger audience preferred the use of high and bright lights whereas the older audiences preferred more darker low lighting to apply in their thrillers as opposed to medium and high.

This would help me in knowing and getting a better idea of where to locate my thriller and what other settings will have an impact on the scene and the angle of the camera to have an effect the thriller.

With the information here that majority of the people that conducted my research would apply a soldier attire to their protagonist I can now dive into the idea of applying military gear to my protagonist in my opening due to statistics gathered. Other option is casual as that is a common convention in thrillers.

With the information taken from this data i will be able to collate a general idea on how to conduct my research to use this information to my advantage. This can also help me in terms that other people's idea and opinion blended in with mine can help to create a possible masterpiece and therefore create the path for a final idea of my thriller opening.

Research: Censorship - Miss Begum

As discussed in my other posts on age certificate the BBFC control anything that is allowed or suitable to be produced and viewed in the United Kingdom. They are the general commanders or head inspectors of the British film industry in terms of handing out age certificates and deciding whether a film should be banned, cut or censored. Their known role is to protect the viewing public from any offensive material or anything that could cause harm to society, such as the visible promotion of drugs. BBFC are important in terms of providing safety and protection to a massive audience and protecting those from viewing something so bad it may have the power to psychologically distort and mess them up.

The type of material that gets censored is things that show reference to extreme violence, religious offending, extreme brutality, demoting of women, graphic scenes of sexual assault unless portrayed in a way to show the consequences after, political controversies, extreme torture, promotion of drugs and alcohol, practical and moral messages such as carrying a gun is a good thing, and using a child as such a brutal antagonist like in the movie Mikey can be something censored by the BBFC due to the age of the child and the nature of his actions like killing an elder with a blunt object is something that the audience would not like to see. Also a movie like Scum was banned and edited several times as it contained scenes of gang rape and suicide, and also had graphic scenes of savage brutality in which the victim does not have the power to fight back so they’re just literally beat the hell out of, which is the sort of material that needs to be banned as it can temporarily or permanently damage a viewer psychologically.

Another banned movie is The Bunny Game, made in 2010 considered as torture porn, with the narrative a cocaine addicted prostitute who in turn is abducted by a mad male truck driver and then tortured, other reasons why this was banned was down to it having repeated dialogue, lack of plot, and no evident characterization.

The difference between films being cut and banned is clear, when a film is banned it cannot be released or distributed to the audience as it has been entirely stripped off publishing rights due to its nature and material, however when a film is cut it means that the producer has a chance to remove any scenes that the BBFC do not like or would not allow them to release if it remains, allowing for the film to have less scenes that could harm the viewer psychologically. An example of a film being given the chance to cut some scenes is the controversial ‘A Serbian Film’. On 25 August, the BBFC handed the film's distributor with a list of things that needed to be removed. As it says on their site, ‘49 individual cuts were required, across 11 scenes’ in total.  They claim that around 'three minutes 48 seconds' of the film would need to be removed and although this may seem like a contently large number of cuts at first, many of the cuts made in the film were small parts. 

An example of a film that was banned entirely is ‘Women In Cellblock 9’, this remains banned in the United Kingdom due to its large amounts of sexual violence, and one of the lead actresses in many of the sex scenes was 16 at the time the film was made. The film upon release was rejected by the BBFC when it was submitted and still has not been successfully appealed to be shown to viewers. This could be down to the fact that the actress in a lead role was 16 at the time and they used her in many unusual scenes for a girl of her in any period of time.

The debate for censorship still rattles on and is a debatable topic; the two different sides are Forna (for censorship) and Kemode (against censorship). Forna is for censorship and believe that films with unsuitable material should be censored due to the psychological effect it could have on a viewer and topics such as sexism would be considered very oppressing and controversial if a film was released demoting women as a whole or they released film about 9/11 which could cause society to have second thoughts on who to blame and may have an impact on modern lives, mixed with my opinion I am TeamForna and I believe that films should be censored as I would not like to enter a cinema with the worry that there is a mad man dressed up as Jason with a chainsaw or massive machete in his bag ready to slaughter anyone, nobody wants that worry. Reports in the news arose over a man, dressed as a character from the box office hit The Dark Knight Rises, shooting at the audience during a film in the cinema, it is generally common of shootings like this is in modern day now as there are no real laws imposed on weapons. Everyone wants a weapon now after watching all these uncensored movies. Kemode on the other hand is against censorship which may be down to the fact that people have an interest in the things they show and instead this material should be shown as audiences have a free choice to go and watch these things, they are not forced. Linking in with my opinion I understand this side of the debate as take me for example I can watch a movie like Kidulthood and not want to pick up a gun and use it as a means of defence or watch Human Centipede and not want to capture people off the street and attach their mouths to their face, you can say that films can be censored because it may harm the audience but at the same time they have that choice to go and watch these things no one forced them, it may be certain individuals that are affected by this, there are people in mental and psychiatric asylums for a reason yet there are others like me that can watch graphic movies as such and not want to make it happen in reality, as I’ve said, it is all down to personal choice and freedom.

Conclusion

From researching censorship I have a basic and mature idea of what to include in my opening and what may be suitable for an audience. Since I won’t consider myself as a troubled person and someone who takes interest into these weird and graphic ideas and motifs, my opening will be fairly simple something that can enter the BBFC and come out rated 15. From my research I have a basic idea of what to include in my opening and because of my research I can always go back and look at what to improve.

Research: Questionnaire - Miss Begum

What is the importance of Primary Research?

The importance of Primary Research is that we get our own perspective using our ideas and structure to create a pathway for different possible ideas for an opening. With feedback from the audience i have questioned I'll be able to learn and understand their ideas and what I can do to my own ideas to create something based on my creativity and their opinions. The purpose of feedback is to create a suitable opening generated from your ideas and ideas of those that took part in the questionnaire, you also use feedback as a way to improve and know what to add or include in your movie.

There are advantages and disadvantages to Primary Research. Several advantages of Primary Research are that you gain clearer and direct feedback from audience, you also receive loads of relevant feedback from the audience that answered the questionnaire. They allow you to handle data in a more organized way, and gives you the chance to make more key decisions based on the data collected.

The disadvantages of Primary Research are that it may take a lot longer than Secondary Research and can slow down generation of ideas due to this as you have to take a lot of time collecting data and organizing them as such. Also the person taking part may give false information which could affect the data in a minor way not too impacting but still lead to less accurate data and more false information.

I gave my questionnaire to 20 people from the age range of 11 and older or more accurately the year groups year 7-11 and a few teachers in the school being mindful of not asking for their age so that the answers could be a bit more spread out and not one sided. I didn't however spread it out equally amongst genders I just gave it to whoever I came across in terms of teachers and reliable students.

Conclusion

Based on the data I have collected from my Primary Research I will now use this to help me generate ideas towards my narrative structure and what my opening may consist of. The feedback will also help me if I get stuck on ideas as I have a basic idea of what the audience wants to see and what the audience doesn’t like or want to see. This can be used to good effect as my opening could be deprived from the different opinions I received instead of it all just coming my plans and ideas.