Main Task- Video Auditions (NATE)

Chris Knight

Main Task- Video Auditions (FARAH)

I chose to do video auditions because many of the actors who have applied for the role do not live locally and it would be easier for them to get in touch. It is also useful because I don't have to set a date for auditions, they can send them when they have time because many are in full time work. I am also able to keep records of each and look back on them easier and by doing it to camera I can see how confidant they are whilst being filmed. I am also able to send feedback and send dates and notify of changes a lot easier.


Jolie Myatt

Lina Hanson

Rhiannon Barker

"I decided on this bit of script because it was the final climax of the play. I put together a short monologue combining bits of the last scene. I felt a strong connection to the character as her frustration builds. I like how this is where she really gets to express her true feelings and does not put on her hard face or hold back. I hope you enjoy this and I am what you are looking for."

Main Task- Script

Compulsion

Main Task- Casting Update 1

On the 7th of December I posted a casting call on a website called Star Now. 
My Casting Call
I advertised for all my roles (Farah, Nate and Unnamed man). 
So far I have had 28 applications and 465 views. Many of the applicants have asked for extra information and all seem really keen to help. I sent a message to 16 applicants I chose to shortlist:


Hello, may I first start by saying thank you very much for responding to the cast call so quickly. I would also like to take this opportunity to inform you that you have made the shortlist for 'Compulsion'. You made the list because I feel you are right for the part and would love to hear more from you.

The production will be in Peterborough (Cambridgeshire), I understand, that for many, this will be too far to travel.

Unfortunately I am unable to pay for your services to my production because it is a student film, however I will ensure that you are catered for and have a pleasant and enjoyable experience during your visit. I will send you the finished film so you are able to add it to your portfolio.

For the audition I would be grateful if you could send a short and simple video of yourself reading lines of your choice from the script. (It would also be nice to hear why you choose those lines and why you think you would be a valuable asset to the production)

http://www.scribd.com/doc/74934747/Compulsion

(or see attached file)

You can send me videos via email

emilywilson16@hotmail.co.uk

I will be send more details shortly. Thank you again for your time, cooperation and interest.

Main Task- My Pitch

Similar Products (Task 12)- Poster Analysis 5 - Inglorious Basterds

Inglorious was a controversial yet relatively successful film directed and written by Quentin Tarantino. The film was criticised for its complete lack of historical correctness but praised for its sheer brilliance as an unconventional, unique and historical based piece of cinema. The poster directs how Tarantino intended for the film to be received by its audience.  The certificate is an 18, therefore appealing to an adult audience.

1. The tagline clearly shows the context of the film and suggests it is a historical based film with unconventional portrays, for example explaining a well known event such as the Second World War as a story "Once upon a time". The audience can gather what the film will be about and this tagline clearly identifies with an audience who want to watch the film. Although the film fits in the War genre, the poster shows it is by no means a conventional war film (as this may put many audience members off- especially those as young as 18 years of age). 

2. This part of the image shows what side the protagonists are on and also gives away what they do and what happens in the film. The battered Nazi helmet hanging off a signed bat shows many things:
- The Nazi's are the victims of this film, they are shown to be under threat and weak (unlike any other war film)
- The bat has been signed by multiple people and judging by the state of it, it has been used often- this suggests that there is a group of people working together against the Nazi's, the fun and light hearted nature of signing the bat shows the group enjoy what they do.
-The blood stains on the helmet and bat connote the film is violent and bloody, immediately connecting with its intended audience. 

3. The film title sells itself on previous successes and also sells the brand of 'Tarantino', those familiar with his films and fans of his work will go and see the film regardless of it's genre or plot. The swashsticker within the actual title again backs up the context of the film and creates a logo for the audience to identify with the film.




The poster is successful because it simply conveys the values of the film, forgetting all about the plot and characters, the audience immediately know it is a film about hunting Nazi's, it is based during the Second World War, it is unconventional and light hearted and it is a Tarantino film. 


However the poster could could portray the protagonist more clearly, both the baseball bat and the Nazi helmet are symbols of violence and hatred. But this could suggest the morals of the film, both are bad but one is far worse. 

Similar Products (Task 12)- Poster Analysis 4 - The Sixth Sense

The Sixth Sense is a successful and famous horror/ thriller film directed by M. Night Shyamalan. The film has arguably one of the most quotable lines in cinema "I see dead people" the film became well known due to the shocking twist at the end and the array of emotions portrayed throughout the film. The certificate is a 15, so the target audience for the film is fairly young and it appeals to a large group.

1. The film poster sells using the idea of a young boy trapped in a mysterious, dark and supernatural situation. This is shown by the use of a glowing supernova style '6' which the silhouette of a young boy in the foreground. The '6' is a orange/ red/ yellow colour, this could be interpreted as dangerous and harmful or perhaps warm and mysterious. This connotes the concept of the film as the boy tries to come to terms with his frightening and unusual gift.

2. The text on the poster is like handwriting, this suggests that supernatural beings are trying to get in contact, this is because many other films work on the idea of ghosts or such writing messages to the living. The font gives an eery feel to the poster. 

The poster is basic but creates a strong audience response towards the film. The audience can gauge that it will be a dark, supernatural film. It is successful with its simplicity and not giving away too much. Ferdinand de Saussures' theory of binary oppositions can be assessed in this poster, the supernatural and dangerous colours of the '6' contrasted to the innocence and vulnerability of the young boy. The boy is the same colour as the background suggesting it is this 6th sense that creates the issues in the film.


The poster is unsuccessful in the fact it is not very interesting to look at. Although it is eye catching, the audience isn't able to look at it for a long time and learn more about what happens in the film. It gives very little away about what the film is about, which in many ways is appealing, however to an audience wanting to see a horror or thriller I feel more needs to be suggested about the film.

Similar Products (Task 12)- Poster Analysis 3 - The Shining

The Shining is an iconic, famous and extremely successful example of a thriller movie. The film is a certificate 18 so the poster aims to appeal to this audience mostly. The film was released in 1980 and was  not successful with audiences at first. However as times changed the film became a classic and one of the most famous films ever made.

1. The poster works on the success of famous director Stanley Kubrick, if the audience were to try and guess the style of film by this they could assume the film is psychological and most likely to involve symbolism and a complex plot and concept behind it.

2. The main focus of the poster is Jack Nicholson, he is renowned for playing strange and often insane characters therefore the audience could guess the theme of the film is likely to follow that of a psychotic nature. The image used is iconic and the most famous and well known images of the film. The character has broken through  a door. The facial expression shown suggests the character is menacing another character, is violent, out of control and most likely to be psychopath. The image is extremely successful because of the image alone, the characters bottom teeth are showing resembling similarities to the image of a crazed animal. The image is unnerving as the character not only looks crazed but also overly excited. The poster uses Roland Barthes enigma code, "What is happening in the image?"

The poster is successful because it simple, it gives very little away whilst suggesting so much about the film, the poster is eye catching and makes the audience really think about the emotion of the character, it is an poster that must really be assessed deeply and although nothing gory or violent is explicitly shown the audience can immediately tell who the film is aimed at. 


The film falls short in the fact that not much is suggested about what is happening within the picture, however the sheer iconicity of the image is enough to sell the film. 

Similar Products (Task 12)- Poster Analysis 2 - The Hitcher

The Hitcher is a Gothic thriller/ horror directed by Dave Meyers. Although it is not as well known as most blockbuster thrillers it is definitely a successful thriller. The certificate for the film is an 18 therefore the poster looks to appeal to those within this age group. 

1. The first thing that draws the viewers attention to this poster is the unidentified character to the left of the poster, the positioning of this is really important to consider because when we view something we instinctively look from left to right (as if we are reading it like text). This positioning makes the character more powerful and as we can see they are shown to be taller than the car. 

2. At the bottom of the poster the road surface is red, suggesting blood, murder and violence. This gives the audience an indication about what kind of film the poster is selling. The lone car suggests the characters are trapped, being watched over, or hunted. The style of car used also suggests the victims are young- which is conventional of horror/ gory films. 



3. The top of the poster tells the audience what to expect the film to be similar to. It uses past successes in order to sell the latest film. 

Similar Products (Task 12)- Poster Analysis 1 - Pulp Fiction

I chose the poster for Pulp Fiction as it is a very successful and iconic poster. Pulp Fiction is a certificate R film (over 18 in the UK) this suggests the poster was created to appeal to this audience, it has been successful in doing so, this is for a number a reasons:

1. The poster clearly advertises that it is a ‘Quentin Tarantino Film’ therefore if an audience were to judge the film based on his previous work they would be aware that he makes adult, violent films with explicit language. 

2. The book the character is reading is called ‘Pulp Fiction’, the audience is able to assume the film is based around a concept or ideology, the plot may be complex and philosophical.

3. The poster explicitly shows adult themes such as smoking. A gun is also shown in the foreground which suggests violence as well as suggesting the power position of certain characters within the film.

The poster is dark in colour, suggesting it is a serious film. When first looking at the poster the audience would first see the picture, it doesn't suggest much about what happens in the film but definitely about the type of film it is, what the characters are like and who the poster is appealing to. The title of the film stands out the most as the red and yellow colours contrast each other. The poster is iconic and successful in reaching its target audience. 

Main Task- Similar Products (Task 11)

My thriller character is named Farah. She is in her mid twenties and works as an assassin; this is how she is introduced to the audience. She is a dark yet likable character, poetic in her speech and very strong willed. She was trained as an assassin by her former boyfriend; Nate- little did Farah know that one day she would be forced to kill him due to a mistake and him working as an agent for a large corporation. Farah is a beautiful, intelligent young girl with a lot of potential and a wealthy future in the black market. She tends to remain emotionally unattached to those she loves; she knows it makes her less vulnerable. She is often considered heartless and cold to those who know her least, keeping herself to herself and remaining a closed book. She met Nate when she was 16; she liked the danger and excitement and knew he was different from all the boys in her High School. She ran away from an unhappy home life to live with him and soon started training as a female assassin.

She is shown in the film talking to a man who never gets properly introduced to the audience, she tells him how she got into the situation she is in and in this way we learn a lot about her. I chose to do this because I feel this is how you learn the most about someone, what they have done, how they have gotten there, the chain of decisions they make to get to a certain point, not by what a character is doing then and there. However there are key aspects of the characters presentation that show the audience what she is like, for example, she has been stabbed but doesn’t mention the injury once and doesn’t show pain.

The plot and the character of Farah rely on the success of Barthes enigma code. Farah makes the audience ask questions such as; ‘why has she been stabbed?’ ‘Who has stabbed her?’ ‘Why is she there?’ ‘Who is she speaking to?’ ‘Why is her former boyfriend relevant to the plot?’ Farah could also fit into many of Propp’s character types in his theory of Seven Spheres of Action, for example she shows traits of a hero- she could be restoring a natural equilibrium, and may be aiming to defeat the villain. However she could also be regarded as a false hero or even the villain as she is shown to have been in a fight, this isn’t made clear-, which relates back to the enigma code. The audience may choose to consume this media for entertainment as well as escape- Blumler and Katz; Uses and gratifications theory.

Farah could be compared to a number of female characters:

Jane Smith (Mr. & Mrs. Smith)

They are common in the sense that they are both assassins, keep secrets and are strong, independent women. Jane tends to ignore pain when engaged in a violent fight with John- like Farah even after she has been stabbed. They are both prepared to kill the ones they love, and even if they don’t initially show it are deeply upset by what they have done.

Mia (Pulp Fiction)

Mia is an intellectual, laid back and sophisticated character, much like Farah. Her words sound practiced and engaging, like the dialogue Farah uses. Mia is attracted to powerful and dangerous men, she is married to the leader of a criminal group and lives a very wealthy life because of it, and she celebrates this lifestyle as a heavy user of cocaine. Farah is also attracted to dangerous men, however she is not yet wealthy and she enjoys working in a black market rather than just enjoying the benefits of being married to someone who is in the black market.   

Preliminary Task- The Evaluation

It was very important for me to make this film turn out as good as it looked on paper. In order to achieve this I left as much time as I could to give me the opportunity to improve it and edit to the best of my ability. In hindsight I am glad I make the decision to film early, as I needed to re-film the majority of the shots. When watching the rough edit back something just didn’t look right, it wasn’t as poetic or engaging as I had planned for it to be, this, I discovered; was due to two key things missing from the film. The first was the fact it was shot at night, not much was clear, you couldn’t see the surroundings, you couldn’t make out facial expressions and there wasn’t much emotion you could gather from it being so dark. The second was that many of the shots were facing away from the camera; you couldn’t see her face or eyes, therefore couldn’t connect with her. I decided it would be beneficial to the film as a whole if I were to re film the bridge scenes during the day. This way it would be easier to get more shots of the characters face, more shots of the surroundings and it would look more professional and of higher quality.

I feel if I had not made the decision to re film the emotion of film would have suffered. Luckily I had a really willing and helpful group of people working on the project for me. This included Ruth Cooper who helped the first two shoots run smoothly and also helped with the lighting, and Tom Leatherbarrow who gave editing help and advice and also acted in the film. My actress was also very keen to help and was happy to do several shoots to get it right. The film doesn’t look how I originally expected it to look but it gives the emotion I always wanted it to have. The poster compliments the film well and is very in keeping with the atmosphere and emotion the film presents. It is cinematic without being excessively dramatic and I feel it promotes the film well and attracts the target audience well.

Feedback for the film has been positive. I find that girls relate much more to the film and find it emotional and even tear provoking, which is what I wanted the film to be seen as, and seeing as my target audience is most women I feel this shows the success of my film within my target audience. There are a few things that I would have liked to change and add, possibly more panoramic shots for the opening, maybe a new and better quality voice over and I would have liked to improve the flashback scenes. However this would mostly be out of meticulousness rather than necessity.

I have learnt a lot by doing this task, not only how to edit and go beyond basic skills on Final Cut but also how to use other programmes such as Color and I am also more familiar with sound recording softwares such as GarageBand. This task has also taught me that in order to get the best shots first time you must think about things that could hinder a perfect shot, for example the lighting or not feeling connected to the character. I find that the best shoots are the most laid back ones, this is because the actors are more relaxed and people feel more able to suggest shots, I achieved these shoots you just need to allow plenty of time to do them, which I normally don’t have when going on shoots. This has given me more of an incentive to start productions as soon as possible.

For my main task I know what I need to do in terms of editing and other technical aspects. I am also able to see now what is and what isn’t possible on a no budget film and what I can and can’t expect non- actors to do, this is why I have decided to find professional actors for my main task, because although Bernadette did an amazing job on my preliminary it wouldn’t be possible to achieve this with the amount of lines I have in mind for my main. I have also decided that flashbacks work really well when you only have a small amount of time to explain not only the current situation of a character but how they got there in the first place, so I’m going to use flashbacks in my main task, but in a slightly different way.

Overall I’m really happy with how my film looks, although I would change some things I feel it is enough to convey the feelings I wanted to. It was a really valuable experience and I have taken a lot from the project I wish to incorporate into my main task. The film is the first I have made that I originally wrote as a short story, so translating this to a script and hoping it will turn out just as I had imagined it was not only hard but also really important for me. I feel the task was vital for me to have the opportunity to test and improve my technical skills. I am also more cautious when writing scripts as to whether it is feasible to expect so much from it, to avoid this I make them easier to film, allowing me to add really unique and interesting shots.