Inspiration 2

Developing our theme of rape we thought it would be interesting to show it from the view point of the rapist. It would offer something different as often the focus is on the victim. In no way would we want the audience to feel sorry for him, we still want to keep the audience feeling sympathetic towards the female character. 

When researching for our last project I came across a short film on the BBC Film Network website. Playground tells the story of a man who picks up a young hitchhiker. As the awkwardness builds in the car we find out more about the man's past and what his intentions really are. This film offers a different view point as we hear the story from that mans point of view. It starts off with a close up of the mans face. Half of his face is lit, and darkness surrounds him. The lighting has a blue hue to it and the man begins to say "my names Gordon".. he talks directly to the camera, almost like a video diary. We cut between a close up of his eye, to his mouth and then to his face. The lighting gives a thriller like feel to it,  and makes the man appear mysterious.
We really like the technique used here, throughout the film we come back to this scene, it is in these scenes that we learn more about Gordon. He begins to tell us about his past, and finally reveals his intentions. Playground has become our second piece of inspiration. We had talked about creating our piece from the rapist's point of view, rather from the victim. We wanted to use the technique of the diary like entry to introduce the male character and almost tell the story.

Inspiration 1

We came up with a few ideas, and so began to look for inspiration. Our first idea revolved around the theme of rape. We wanted to use fragmentation to show the scene itself and incorporate Andrea Arnold's style of naturalistic shots with sound of the scene over the top.

It was not necessery to restart all of our research again as the topic still comes under drama, so the sound research, director research and all analys' were still relevent. The editing techniques and colourisation would still apply. Ken Loach and Andrea Arnold- who has already been a huge influence- would be good directors to research as they both focus on presenting social realism and hard hitting topics.
It was important for us to research into the characters emotions so that we portrayed her and her emotions correctly. A film that i was already aware of- Speak- tells the story of Melinda Sordino who after a traumatic summer, enters high school where she struggles with friendships and family life as she tells the dark tale of her experiences and why she has chosen not to speak.
The clip below shows the scene in which Melinda remembers what happened that night. I found it hard to watch as she appears very innocent, very smitten over this guy who then takes advantage of her and forces her to do something she doesn't want to do. There is no sound other than that coming from the two characters. Melinda's screams as she struggles against him add to the tension and utter disturbance of this scene.
(starts at 11:30 and finishes 12:30)

Changing the idea

We felt as though our project was not pushing us enough, as the editor I was not being challenged. The shots, although hand held just had to be cut together. There was no opportunity to show lapses in time, use slow motion or speed things up. It had become very simple, and because of this we were not passionate about it. The kitchen shots had become messy and cluttered which allowed no space for experimentation. The limited space stopped us using tracking, which would have made more interesting shots for the audience. The house its self had a very homely feeling, an environment that did not relate well to our character. The shots in the bedroom work well as the room is bare and very neutral. It was hard for us to create this atmosphere in the rest of the house.
After showing a cut to out teacher she suggested we shoot the shots in which Richards breaks the news to Sarah outside. The idea was to show Sarah as being trapped within her own home. She was in an unstable and miserable marriage, and we wanted her home and surrounding to inform the audience of this. Filming outside would have lost this feel of loneliness and captivity.

Feedback for footage so far

Kitchen shots- close up of hands needs to be more close up.
Close up of Sarah's face nneds re-shooting

When creating an atmosphere of tension- kitchens are very hard to create this. Does it have to be in a kitchen? in a house? Could they be sitting on a bench? Look at the locations carefully- could it be a location in which they use to spend lots of time together. Think about Andrea Arnolds work- a kitchen doesn't say much about a person. Push yourselves to look at the locations you have.

The water from the kettle looks cold.
In terms of framing it is too busy.

Upstairs shots are very good- they create a sense of detatchment.

Opening shots are too long. However the close up of the footsteps is good.
Richards head needs to be in shot- the whole of his head. Briefcase shot is very good- it creates a sense of tension.
Robin shots are very good.
Would Richards say ''for f* sake Sarah'' if he had just broken bad news to Sarah? Think about reality.

Creating our title

Below are some experiments with fonts using the website http://www.dafont.co.uk/

''impact label''

''moms typewriter''

''old typowriter''

''MTF epic''

 

 ''a song for Jennifer''

''pointy''

''techno''

''twilight new moon''

''scriptina''

''mcgarey''

Title/ font research

We already had the name for our final piece- 'The Story of an Hour'- so all we need to do now is choose a suitable font for our title. To do this we will research into other titles and see what effect or relation to the final piece they have.

Twilight in terms of Editing and appearance has been a huge influence however It appears too 'fantasy' like, and although works perfectly for the kind of film it represents, it does not ours. It fits the film well due to its vampire and werewolf narrative, the black background adds to the dark fantasy narrative and will appeal to its selected target audience.

This is one of my favourite titles, i feel as though it fits the genre it is intended for well. It suggests drama, perhaps not of the current day, and the smudging is effective too. I think this text would also work well for our production. We have a serious narrative, and so something that flows wouldn't be suitable, i want to try experimenting with this font to see what it looks like.

Sound Research

When doing my research at the beginning of the year i came accross the short film 'The Magic Mile' on the BBC Film Network website. The piece of music at the beginning sets the mood for the rest of the film. It opens the viewer up to a piece that is perhaps going to be dramatic, draw you in, have a message or make you as the audience sympathise with the character. The opening music is very important as it informs your viewer on what type of film they are watching as well as subtly steering them into feeling a certain way. I want to either create a piece similar of find a piece of music that will work with our film.

Behind the Scenes

Make up- it was diffucult for us to rely on the actress' natural look due to the change in character. Miranda emphasised the lines in my face, she made me look tired and ill by adding dark circles under my eyes and pailing the skin. The character Sarah can be compared to Bella Swan, in the most recent of the Twilight Saga, she becomes ill and made to look really malnourished. I have attatched a picture below to show Bella's transformation.

Although Bella's transformation is done through CGI, the make up team have done a good job by removing all the hair from her face, scraping it back so that all of her features are visible. Bella is extremely malnourished and although Sarah is not, we want to make her look tired. Bella's hair is scraped back but we feel as though Sarah would hide behind her hair, and so we have decided to keep it down. The dark blusher makes Bella look starved and the dark make up uder her eyes emphasises how tired she is. We want to use these effects around the eyes to show Sarah's serious lack of sleep.

Below we will show the Transformation of the character Sarah:

Changes to the script

Due to our actress Nicola Stewart pulling out of the project- for personal reasons- we were left without a Sarah. Unfortunately we couldn't find somebody within the playing age we wanted for Sarah and so we went back to the original story. Miranda suggested, that because my dad- Simon Oxley- is playing Richards that Sarah should then become his daughter. In the original story Sarah is infact a 20 year old woman, making it easier for us to refere back to the original story and change the script.

Editing techniques

The last part of this scene shows Bella- the protagonist of stephanie Meyer's Twilight- as she falls into a state of unconciosness. Catherine Hardwicke chose to include a montage scene of Bellas face from various points throughout the movie as well as mixing in key events throughout the film. The non diagetic piece of music placed over the top adds to the sympathy you feel for the characters. You get to see Bella's vulnerability and the fast paced merging help make the montage seem more 'dream' like.  I particularly llike the quick merging of Bellas face at different points of the film and find it very effective. The movement of the camera appears shaky but overall adds to the finished effect. I would like to experiment with a short scene like this for the end where Sarah has a hart attack. This is the one scene we are unsure on how to film, but know that we want a lot of experimental effects added to it to make it unique.




One of my favourite techniques actually requires no editing at all, but i think it would be and interesting technique to try as it can show detatchment from the character and i feel it would work well just before Sarah has a heart attack.




This sequence from Harry Potter and The Prizoner of Azkaban shows Harry being saved from dementors by a patronus charm. At the end of the clip Harry clearly becomes too weak and so faints. Alfonso uaron has blurred harry's face before using a very interesting piece of camera work in which the camera stays level and turns with Harry's face whilst he falls to the ground. I think this shot shows the characters weakness but also shows his detatchment from what is happening, He begins to zone out. i like the idea of using various blurred shots along with the piece of footage itself. I think mixing the two together will show what is happening inside Sarah's head. I also like the idea of shaking the footage around a little, so that is isn't fixed in one position.

Ideal distribution company

Our film will not be a blockbuster release, the storyline is not particularly easy to understand, so therefore will not appeal to a wide audience. The cinema closest to us that would consider our film would be Cinema 3 in Canterbury. It is an independent cinema that aims to advertise more niche films. Although sometimes mainstream films make it to the screens it focuses more on specialised, experimental film that would not be shown in a multiplex.

Vue listings

Cinema 3 Listings

 As shown, Vue is dominated by blockbusters. American films tend to dominate the multiplexes where as they do not in specialised cinemas. Our film would not be suitable for Vue and so therefore would be shown in Cinema 3 as these films are often require you to think about whats going on- they challenge the viewer.

.

Rough cut from day 1

Below is the footage filmed from day one. Miranda roughly cut together the footage so that we were able to see what needed to be filmed the next day.

 

This became really useful as we were able to see the quality of what was filmed. It allowed us to see what the locations, costumes and they way we had dressed the set looked like on camera. From these clips we were able to establish that the sound sounded a little 'tinny' and wasn't as clear as we had hoped. To over come this, on our next filming day we will need to re-record this in a more controlled environment. We will also try filming with a boom make to see if this has any significant difference.

Twitter and tumblr feedback

Before filming we 'tweeted' what we were doing. We did this to gain interest in our product, when we have completed our final piece we will post it on Twitter, Facebook and Tumblr. By doing this we will be able to get feedback and find out what our audience wants to see.

 

Filming Schedule

17th December
Our actress was unavailable for filming, so we decided to film as much of Richards bits as possible.
The shot list for today was as followed;
-Close up of richards feet as he walks towards the house
-Mid shot of richards hand showing the newspaper and briefcase he is carrying
-Extreme close up of richards finger as he pushes the door bell
-Long shot as he stands back to look up at the house
-Medium shot as the door is opened revealing richards
-Richards dialogue- medium shots
-Medium shot of Richards sat at the kitchen table
-Extreme close up of Richards picking at his briefcase lock
-Medium shot as he loosens his tie
-Richards kitchen dialogue
-Long shot as he exits the kitchen and makes his way into the hallway
-Medium close up of Richards outside the bedroom door
-The same shot but inside the bedroom- for experimenting-
-nature shots- the birds outside the window- if possible