The final idea which we have come up with for our AS media coursework is the genre of horror. We will have 3 main characters in the opening two minutes; a journalist (Evie), the homeowner (Mike), and the homeowner’s nephew (Herbie). We are going to have a journalist come to look round a very large house called Voewood. The journalist is going to arrive and walk up the driveway and look up at a window and see someone looking out and quickly shutting the curtain. She will knock on the door and Herbie will open the door quickly followed by Mike. She will go in and ask lots of questions about the house and its old purposes and the story behind it. She will find out that it used to be used as a school and it got closed down because a young boy died there in an accident. She will then be shown around the house and in a couple of different rooms and as she walks out of one of the bedrooms a rocking horse will start rocking without being touched. Towards the end of the two minutes the journalist will be shown towards the door to leave but a locked room next to her will catch her attention and she will try to open it. Mike will quickly stop her and explains that no one is allowed in there. The very last scene of our 2 minute opening sequence will show what is inside the locked room. Inside there is framed photographs along the walls of young children who have perhaps been involved with.
(JN)
(JN)
We are planning to film on the 20th December during the Christmas holidays as it has been a hard task managing to find a time when we are al able to get there. Also Voewood often gets hired out for the night and Christmas is a busy period for this so its been hard to find a date where the house is free and we are all able to get there.
Evie: Hi, I’m Evie I’m the journalist who’s come to look round for BBC reports
Evie: So, is there much you can say about Voewood?
Mike: Bugger all, actually?
Herbie: *Aeroplane noise*
Evie: So how many of you are there that live here?
Mike: Just the two of us.
Evie: So what was one of Voewood’s purposes?
Mike: It was a school for a long time.
Evie: Why is it no longer a school?
Mike: There was an incident that meant it got closed down.
Evie: Why? Sorry, if you don’t mind me asking.
Mike: A young lad died here.
Evie: Oh and what’s it used for now?
Mike: It’s just my home.
Evie: Just you and… you’re son?
Mike: My nephew, yes, just the two of us.
Evie: So what’s your name?
Mike: His names Jack, he doesn’t talk much.
Evie: Oh so what’s in here?
Mike: Nobodies allowed in here.
Evie Holness - the journalist
Michael Holness - the house owner
Herbie Holness - the young boy
We chose Evie to be the journalist in our film opening because she is related to Mike and Herbie and therefore they all worked well together. It was also convenient to use Evie because she would be coming to Voewood anyway and therefore we would not have had to provide transport for anyone else. Evie worked well as the character because she’s very confident and is able to adapt her personality well to fit the character.
We chose Michael to be the house owner partly for convenience because of the situation with the location availability. Another reason we chose Mike for this role is because he has done acting before so was easily able to fit the character he was given.
We chose Herbie to be the young boy (Mikes nephew) because he again has a lot of experience in acting and he was played the main character in our practice video and we were really happy with his performance and the outcome so we wanted to involve him in this too.
(EV)
(EV)
The location we are using for our opening two minute of a film is Voewood. Voewood is a very large country house. It’s an arts deco house that is filled with bizarre objects. This made it perfect for filming our movie in because it came across as eccentric which suited the character mike played. We also chose this location as Evie’s mum works at the house and was able to give us the connections to be able to use the house for our film opening.
Clipboard
Wooden Aeroplane
Camera-
Notepad-
Pen
Glasses
Walking stick
Rocking Horse
Paintings
Door
WHAT WAYS ARE WE GOING ABOUT ATTRACTING OUR TARGET AUDIENCE TO COME AND SEE THIS FILM?
We have also found that people are more likely to look at something online if it is a video or picture rather than a normal post. So we may think about including a very short teaser clip for people to view. We also need to make this stand out from all the others so people are attracted to it. We could also put pictures of the characters and setting up and give an overview about them so our target audience wants to know what happens to them in the film.
We will also attempt to attract the target audience throughout the film as well. Our characters, setting and outfits are all able to be related to by our target audience. This means that they can put themselves in the characters position, making them feel the emotion and environment around them. This should be able to attract target audience and make them want to watch more.
(LM)
WHAT IS NARRATIVE?
Narrative is seen as the art of storytelling. Narrative is the structure of a story line of a film. It's how the film contains a start, middle and end and how they link together. Also the different ways of structure, for example: having the ending at the start then going back in time before that point for the rest of the film until you finally get back to that point and carry on. There are many other ways to structure a film as well. As a result of there is so many films that have been produced, many directors have to come up with new, original ideas so that its makes their work unique and stand out to the target audience from the rest. Here is a typical narrative structure:- Opening: establishes setting and introduces character
- Build up: Relationships established. Development of characters and their world
- Problem: a dilemma or series of complications. Characters are faced with an obstacle to overcome a mystery to solve, or often more than one
- Events: a series of events/action as characters try to overcome obstacle, solve problem, discover truth and so on. Further complications may arise in the process
- Resolution: the protagonists are victorious, problems are solved, truth revealed
- Ending: characters reflect on events, reinstate relationships and look forward.
WHAT ARE THE CONVENTIONS OF NARRATIVES IN EACH OF THE GENRES:
COMEDY...
The narrative of comedy is that it is trying to engage the audience by making them amused and laugh. It is trying to entertain the audience to keep them watching. An example of a comedy would be 'The Hangover'. Throughout The Hangover, there is humour from start to finish. This is done in many different way from jokes to funny props. You don't have to really focus in order to understand the film and the change from start, middle and end is very smooth. Typically comedies are known by starting in the middle of the film plot then starting at the start to explain how they got to that stage then working to the end of the story.HORROR...
The narrative of Horror is that it is scary and sinister, also overly realistic for the audience to watch as they feel that they are in the characters position and can feel heir emotion first hand. An example of a Horror movie would be Paranormal activity' which encourages the audience to feel freaked out as it is very dark and has a realistic plot. This film is an account of a friend and goes from start to end creating tension, giving no hints of what's going to happen or any indication of the future which make the audience use their imaginations and think about what will happen next. A way of doing this is by including cliff-hangers. Horrors are also made to get the audience involved through fear factor and tension. Horrors typically begin at the start or can begin as something 'scary' happens to engage the audience straight away.ACTION...
The narrative of an Action film is that they are fast and packed with lots of different bits of action. This engages the audience by giving them the adrenaline from the action and the tenseness from the 'what will happen next' scenes. An example of an action film could be 'Die Hard'. This film keeps the audience on edge throughout, wanting to know what will happen next. The audience can become really engaged with this film as there is a lot of heart racing scenes such as fighting, explosions and near death experiences. Action films can either begin at the start then the audience sees where the plot has started, or they can also go straight into the action. For example, in Skyfall we are introduced to a character dying and James Bond trying to find and chase the people responsible. Then throughout the first half of the film, we find out everything that has lead up to that point.DRAMA...
The narrative of a drama film is to spread the characters emotion. During the start and middle of the film, Dramas can have any different types of emotion shown from love to hate, but typically at the end, dramas aim to make the audience feel either happy or sad. For example, in 'Toy Story' everything is all going well until Andy gets Buzz, a new, (controversially) better toy. Woody gets jealous immediately of Buzz and he is no longer the favourite toy so the audience feel for Woody. however, at the end Woody and Buzz are friends and it is a happy ending as they made it back home together after Woody was accidently left at Planet Pizza. In Dramas, the film typically starts at the beginning of the plot leading to the end therefore the audience know the build up and can use their imaginations to think about what may happen in the future. Additionally, Toy Story's target audience is mainly younger people, therefore the simpler narrative structure of start to end is easiest for them to understand and therefore makes the film more enjoyable.ROMANCE...
The narrative for a romance film it to share feelings and emotions between the couple. An aim for a Romance is to make the audience capture the moments of love, hate and heart break etc. A usual romance narrative structure would have the start at the beginning, an introduction to the characters emotions such as love towards another, then further on there is typically a change in emotion such as love to heartbreak and it finally ends with a 'happily ever after' or an emotional moment for a character and even the audience if they were engaged. An example of a romance film could be 'Titanic'. During the Titanic the audience is introduced to many emotions such as love, lust and hate during the middle and it finally ending with heart break.. This rollercoaster of emotions can captivate and audience very easily in my opinion and the ending stays in peoples minds for a while which means they are still thinking about the film even after watching.NARRATIVE THEORY - PROPP, TODOROV, BARTHES AND LEVI-STRAUSS.
- Propp: Vladimir Propp broke up fairy tales into sections. Through these sections he was able to define the tale into a series of sequences that occurred within the Russian fairy-tale. Usually there is an initial situation, after which the tale usually takes the 31 functions -https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vladimir_Propp (Under the sub heading: Functions)
- Todorov: Tzvetan Todorov is a Bulgarian-French historian, philosopher, structuralist literary critic, sociologist and essayist. Tzvetan Todorov's narrative theory suggests that all narratives follow a three part structure where they begin with equilibrium, where everything is balanced, progress as something comes along to disrupt that equilibrium, and finally reach a resolution, when equilibrium is restored.http://dictionary.reverso.net/english-definition/equilibrium%20film (equilibrium meaning)These are the steps for all traditional stories:1. Equilibrium (everything is as it should be)2. Disruption (by an event)3. Recognition of disruption4. Attempts to repair disruption5. Return to equilibrium
- Barthes: Roland Gérard Barthes was a French literary theorist, philosopher, linguist, critic, and semiotician. Barthes' ideas explored a diverse range of fields and he influenced the development of schools of theory including structuralism, semiotics, social theory, design theory, anthropology and post-structuralism. Barthes theory was that any narrative can be narrowed down into 5 codes. 1. The hermeneutic code (HER.) 2. The proairetic code (ACT.) 3.The semantic code (SEM.) 4. The symbolic code (SYM.) 5.The cultural code (REF.). https://www.cla.purdue.edu/english/theory/narratology/modules/barthescodes.html (what each code means and how they link together)
- Levi-straus: Claude Lévi-Strauss was a French anthropologist and ethnologist whose work was key in the development of the theory of structuralism and structural anthropology and many other things. His theory was that all narratives could be reduced down to binary opposites. Examples: weak vs strong, boy vs girl and good vs evil.
(LM)
WHAT IS NARRATION?
Narrating is what you do when you're giving a spoken commentary on the action taking place during a drama. It's a useful technique when you want to inform the audience of what is happening.Narrating can make a drama more understandable in a number of ways:
- an actor can speak the commentary over the action happening in the drama.
- a character can speak out what they think the audience needs to know about the characters or the situation of which they are a part - this is called self-narrating.
- an actor can just tell the audience what they need to know in-between scenes.
- a character can read or write a diary or letter that informs the audience what is important for them to know about what is happening or going to happen.
EXAMPLES - USE OF NARRATION IN:
COMEDY...
Narration is used in comedies to keep the audience entertained while informing them about the characters and the setting. In the Inbetweeners movie, narration is used to set the scene and tell the audience about the characters. In this film, the narration is spoken by Will - a character in the film who talks about all of his friends current life situation, saying his own opinion and what the others think. this is good because the audience learns about their lives and engages them by wanting to know what happens to them next. Comedy is introduced during this by jokes and 'subtle comments' said by Will. this clip is not from the movie but from the series however there is still narration in this scene.HORROR...
In horrors, narration is used to make the film seem more dramatic and add more tension. This is also used to give all essential background information to the audience. By using narration, it keeps the audience engaged as it makes them guess what is going to happen next when something may have been suggested in the narration. The audience is kept guessing and on the edge of their seats in American Psycho which shows that narration has worked effectively in this film.ACTION...
Action films also use narration as an attempt to engage the audience. In action films, narration is used to emphasise the characters emotions and thoughts during each situation. This keeps the audience watching as they feel like they get to know the character and they want to see what happens to them in the action. Narration can also be used to set the scene about why that scene is happening what happened in the past without having to spend time showing it. Narration is used for al these reasons in Kickass and this could be the reason why it is such a popular film. The audience can feel the emotions of the character through narration, which then leads to an adrenaline rush in scenes like this.DRAMA...
Narration is used in dramas to show what the characters are thinking. For example, in Titanic, the character Rose is the voice over however this is Rose from the future looking back at what happened. This is very effective because throughout the film we learn about her unusual love for a stowaway boy (Jack) and by the narration and dialogue in the film; then by the end, everyone feels for Rose as they have captured her change in emotion when Jack dies. Even thought there was very little narration where Rose is looking back, it is used effectively in the right parts. There is enough dialogue here to engage the audience as well. Many Dramas also have narration where it is looking back at events, this can engage the audience because they get to see a new viewpoint, where the characters talk about the situation and how they feel about it now that it's happened. As a result, the audience is trapped in the situation in scenes like this.ROMANCE...
In romances, narration is used to let the audience know the characters true emotion so that they also feel these emotions. This means the audience can capture and feel the change when different things happen during the film to flip the characters emotions. Many emotions are felt by the audience due to narration along with dialogue Bridget Jones Diary.WHAT IS REQUIRED FOR A GOOD FILM NARRATION?
A good film narration has to keep the audience engaged to the film while also staying linked to the genre. For example, a comedy film would have narration with things such as jokes and sarcasm; whereas this wouldn't be used in romances as the aim is not to amuse the audience but make them feel the characters emotions, therefore the feelings would be spread to the audience instead. A good film narration also needs to be able to pull the missing pieces of a film together so that the audience get a full understanding of it. This is done by including background information and explanations of why thing are happening etc. Personally, in my opinion, I believe that the best films with narration are those where the characters are the narrators. I really enjoy this because you can feel there emotions better first hand and can see the difference between what they say in the narration compared to the dialogue which I find interesting.ARE WE CONTEMPLATING USING NARRATION IN OUR COURSEWORK?
We have thought about using Narration in our film opening, however we have decided against it due to the fact we do not want to give too much information away. We will engage the audience instead by making them wonder what will happen next and leaving cliff-hangers. We also believe that the characters, dialogue and setting will all provide the audience with enough information to understand what is happening in our film.(LM)
Character:
In our film opening we will only include 3 characters: An older man who lives in a grand house (Voewood), a young boy who lives with his uncle who owns the house and a journalist who is writing a piece on Voewood. It is very important in a film that the characters are well suited to their role because it makes the movie more professional. For our opening 2 Minutes of film we need to ensure that our actors are well matched and their acting ability does not detract from the overall quality of the movie.
Character 1
We want to use an older man who looks eccentric. He will play the part of the owner of the house and the uncle of Herbies character. For this part we will either use My dad (Michael) who is 52 years old and is well spoken. We may also use Simon Finch the owner of Voewood this may work best because he knows most about the house. It may not work to use Simon because he has a very busy schedule.
Character 2
We also decided that we would like to use Herbie, the actor from our practice task. He is well suited the role of the young boy living in the house because he is able to adapt himself to the character. He is the right age of the character we want him to play (10 years old).
Character 3
Our final character is the journalist who has come from a magazine company to make a report on Voewood. This role will be played by a young women.
In our opening 2 minutes the audience will not find out a huge amount of information about our characters, main storyline is the house itself so its not as important for the characters to reveal too much about themselves. We don't want the characters to distract from the plot so we decided that it's unnecessary to make.
(EV)
(EV)
Horror:
In a horror movie I would expect to see frightening scenes that make the a I think the target audience of horror films would be older teens and 20-30 year olds. It would be hard for younger people to watch horror films because they may be frightened. People above the age of 30 may find horror films too immature and unnecessary.
Sci-fi:
A sci-fi films normally involve abnormal human characters with some sort of power or magical ability.
Comedy:
I would look for a comedy film to make me laugh and be enjoyable. I think its very important that a comedy film remains interesting and comical the whole way through, rather than just having short bursts of quality engagement with the viewer. Comedy films can appeal to all ages as long as the content is appropriate, Of course there are comedy films which are aimed mainly at small children and others are aimed at an older audience. The target audience is flexible for comedy films.
Romance:
Romantic films need to draw on the heart strings of the audience, I think that a common mistake that occurs in the making of romantic films is they are too cheesy. This makes the film cringey and uncomfortable to watch. The target audience for romantic films appeal to almost everyone above their teenage years because romance has affected everyone and they can therefor relate to films with this as a focus.
Action:
An action film should include thrilling scenes that make the viewers heart rate increase. A thrilling action film is normally more successful because its engaging and gripping. Crime: Crime films often exaggerate the crimes that happen everyday across the world. Emphasis is often added to the more comical or serious aspects of the crime scene to maker the film more interesting for the audience.
(EV)
What are the conventions of music in film openings in the following genres?
Comedy:
Horror:
Action:
Drama:
Romance:
(JN)
What is dialogue?
Dialogue is a conversation between two or more people as a feature of a book, play, or film.Is dialogue necessary in the opening 2 minutes of a feature film?
No, dialogue is not always necessarily needed in the opening two minutes of a feature film. For some films words and conversation are not needed because maybe they do not want to give away too much of the plot so it makes people try to read into it more and use their imagination. Other films do use dialogue in the opening two minutes because they want to maybe say something that will get the viewers hooked early on so that they want to watch more.Find one example for each of the following genres where dialogue is NOT used and one example for each where it IS used in the opening two minutes.
Action- There is dialogue in the opening two minutes of suicide squad.
There is no dialogue in the opening scene of Ghost in the Shell
Horror- There isn't any dialogue in the opening two minutes of The Woman in Black.
There is dialogue in The Blair Witch Project opening scene
Comedy- there is no dialogue in the film opening of Devil Wears Prada.
There is dialogue in the opening scene of Finding Nemo
Drama- there is dialogue in the opening scene of Inferno.
There is not dialogue in the opening scene of The Revenant.
There is not dialogue in the opening scene of The Revenant.
Romance- There is no dialogue in the opening scene of The Notebook
There is dialogue in the opening scene of Love Actually.
What are the positive effects of dialogue in the example you have used? And what are the negatives?
What are the positive effects of no-dialogue in the examples you have used? And what are the negatives?
The positive effects of no dialogue in the examples I used are that it doesn't give too much of the plot to give anything away but it gives enough to get the viewers hooked. There isn't any dialogue in the opening two minutes of women in black and this creates an eerie feeling in the film which enables us to tell that its a horror film and it is going to be scary. There is also no dialogue in the opening sequence of The Notebook and it gives us the feeling that the film is going to be emotional and this makes viewers want us to watch more.What issues do you think you would face in your own coursework by not using dialogue?
The issues that we might face in our own coursework if we did not use dialogue is that we would not be able to convey to our audience what our film plot is going to be about. This might result in our audience not being able to engage with the film and our characters and they might not want to watch more.What issues do you think you would face in your own coursework by using dialogue?
The issues which we might face in our own coursework if we did use dialogue is that we might make it boring for the audience. The dialogue might come across as awkward and slightly forced if we cant get proper actors to be in our film opening. We want our film to look professional and sometimes when there is dialogue in the student film openings which we have seen it looks cliché and fake. We want to avoid this so it may be easier for us to avoid using too much dialogue.(JN)
What is it?
The Fourth Wall is a term for the imaginary “wall” that exists between actors on stage and the audience, to keep up the illusion of theater, the actors pretend that they cannot hear or see the audience. The same effect often occurs in movies, where the fourth wall in that instance is a camera. By breaking the fourth wall, the character is talking to the audience and looking straight into the camera lens instead of ignoring the audience and just letting them watch the events.Examples:
"Ferris Bueller's Day Off"
"The Fabulous Destiny of Amelie Poulain"
"The Wolf of Wallstreet"
Is it something you would contemplate in your own coursework?
We did not think about contemplating breaking the fourth wall in our coursework, mainly because our plot is quite serious and would not give the mood we want to create. Breaking the fourth wall often has more of a entertaining effect which would not work with our film. There are also more main characters, rather then just one who would share their thoughts with the audience.
(PA)
(PA)
