Lights, Camera, Action!

We booked a camera to use over the holidays, we planned out what scenes we were going to shoot and went ahead with doing so.

Storyboard

Posted up soon..

Mise En Scene: Costumes

Our opening sequence consists of a young business woman on her journey home from her workplace. A classic business woman look is very elegant, samrt and also slightly sexy. Our character will be wearing classical attire such as:


This is the type of smart clothes you would expect to see a business woman in. The black suit makes the character seem to be very serious about their work. Also the heels will make her look sophisticated and feminine.



This is the type of hairstyle we want our character to have. It is a neat and practical by stylish hairstyle which we like, because although she is a business woman she cares about looking presentable.


The trench coat connotes that the character is sophisticated. Aloso this part of the costume is essential because we will be filming in cold weather.


The character will be holding a briefcase because this prop will help the audience to identify the character is in fact a business woman.


This prop will also be useful to help the audience establish the character. Blackberry phones are manufactured to be used for business use. Also our character through the scenes will be making lots off calls, to connote to the audience her work is an important factor to the character and she carries on her work past working hours.


Another prop that will be used is a business diary. Whilst our character is making her way home and also making phone calls she will also be jotting down appointments within the book.

Our story is that the woman will go through some traumatic experiences and we want in the first sequence to show a contrast of her appearance being smart, clean and pristine, and the little snapshots will see her looking dishivelled.


In the psychiatric ward we plan to make the characters wear wite, to show connote to the audience that it is a institute of some sort without being too obvious. This is the type of look we want to go for, where the character wears all white and looks distressed and manic. The messy hair also adds to the mise en scene and is what our group will do with our character.


In our sequence we are going to show doctors in the pshychiatrist ward. We will dress them in white coats like above to establish that they are doctors. we plan to give them props that a doctor would carry such as a clipboard, pen and will be dressed smart.

Mis-en-Scene

Location:
The opening sequence of our thriller is going to be filmed in several places. The scène of the character of being a psycho will be filmed in a drama studio seeing the person lying on a bed. The filming of the business woman will take place outside a Cafe ahop where she meets up with her collegue; other scenes will take place on a bus and in a flat.

Settings and Light:
The opening sequence was filmed in a day light time where everything looks ordinary whereas the scene of the psycho has been located in a dark room. It creates the feeling of loneliness

Costume and Hair and Make up:
The costume and the hair of the business woman will represents a normal social class worker.

Body language and Facial expression:
The facial expression of the disturbed character is full of fear. It shows she is scared of something that happened in her past

Sound:

Locations

Whilst planning our opening, we decided to take pictures of different places we would like to film and use as part of our opening..

Psychiatric Ward

In our opening sequence, there will be a short scene of the character in a psychiatric ward. We researched different thrillers to get ideas of the mise-en-scene, setting and the camera shots.



This is a clip from Final Destination 2. We have chosen to put this up because in this particular sequence, there is an encounter in a psychiatric ward. In our opening sequence, there will be a scene in a psychiatric ward. Therefore, we researched different thrillers where they have used a psychiatric ward and we focused mainly on the mise-en-scene and different camera shots.



This is a crabshot from the sequence, the mise-en-scene is really effective because of the lighting and it has a unique setting as it shows a lot of trees, fog and is almost is an unknown place. This creates a miserable sense of feeling because the lighting is quite dark and gloomy. You can tell that it is a psychiatric ward or hospital as the people who are doctors are wearing only white.

sams comment

Make sure that you meet as a group – come and find me if you need to discuss anything, or need a room/computers to work on before Fridays lesson. You must be prepared to film by the end of the week, this will mean having a script & storyboard – if you want to film before, or need to use the drama studio, make sure you come and talk to me!
You are now being marked on your organisational skills and planning

Title Ideas

Before we came up with a title, we looked up different words which would fit perfectly with the storyline.

Firstly, we wanted to name the film 'Mental', we then decided to go on to www.thesaurus.com and see different words which were similar.

We then had a choice of four different titles. These were:
- Disturbed
- Deranged
- Out of Line
- Frenzied

We couldn't decide which one we wanted to use, so we looked at each of the definitions and decided that 'Frenzied' was the best.

Its definition was:
1. extreme mental agitation; wild excitement or derangement.
2. a fit or spell of violent mental excitement; a paroxysm characteristic of or resulting from a mania: He is subject to these frenzies several times a year.
–verb (used with object)
3. to drive to frenzy; make frantic: She was frenzied by fear when she smelled the smoke.

We thought this fit perfectly with the character.

Plot Ideas

Our group came up with many different plot ideas. We then decided to combine different elements together to create one.

Firstly we gave out questionnaires and found out that the most enjoyable and watched thrillers are psychological thrillers. This is why we decided our thriller would be psychological.

The first plot idea we came up with was that the opening would show a character who is experiencing weird things and briefly hint to the audience what the rest of the thriller is about.

As we researched psychological thrillers, we came up with another idea of adding a psychiatric ward and create a character who has gone 'mental' and ends up in a psychiatric ward.



As we done further research, we noticed that most thrillers included little girls. This added more suspense and drama to the whole psychological thriller.




We then decided to combine these ideas together and create an opening sequence where there would be a character who finishes work and leaves her workplace at about 7:00pm. She waits for the bus and there is a little girl constantly watching her. However, the character doesn't see the little girl watching her but the audience do.



During her journey home, there are short snaps of weird things that she has previously experienced. These things include writings on the wall/mirror, a shadow, someone at the window, burnt pictures, letters and continuous phone calls at a certain time. The character has nearly reached home and there is another quick snap of her in the psychiatric ward twitching. She reaches her home, slams the door shut and it cuts to her in the psychiatric ward screaming, and all the doctors rush in to calm her down.









We continued our research to see if there were any improvements or any other ideas we could add or change. We came up with another plot which involved a diary. We were going to use this diary as an object that would have a big influence in the storyline and would also be used for the credits. This opening sequence would be a girl at the psychiatric ward talking to a doctor, this girl would be rocking back and forth. This would indicate to the audience that the girl is a bit 'crazy'. The doctor would ask the girl 'When did it all start?' and then the girl would point to a page in the diary and it would show the girl coming out of work.. etc. This is similar to the first plot, whereas in this storyline, as the girl comes out of work, she drops a diary. This automatically indicates to the audience that the diary has some sort of importance to the film.



Both plots were very similar. However, the first plot started with the psychiatric ward being shown later on and the second plot began with the character being in the psychiatric ward and explains how she got there.

After a long time discussing various plots, we came to a conclusion that we would use the first plot. This is because as it is only a 2 minute opening sequence, the diary credits would take too much time there would not be enough time for everything to go on at once.

Preliminary Final Cut

Preliminary Storyboard

After our group had read the rules of the preliminary task, the next step was to think of a storyline to show in the sequence. We had many ideas such as one tof the characters dying in the room or a fight being shown. We decided against these because it was not going to fit in the allotted time. In the end we decided on a plot and decided that Lulu And Talha would be the actors and the classroom is the locain to shoot the footage.

We wanted to show through the film that a woman is in a rush to the classroom and stumbles in. On entering the classroom she is going to look for an unknown item. Whislt she is looking for the item a mysterious person who saw her rush into the room reveals that he has what she is looking for and orders her to sit down. They then exchange a few words that explains to us the woman did something to the man and he threatens her with a gun.

We also made a storyboard to show how we envisioned the scene to be and also to help us with filming, as you can see here.

Storyboard For Preliminary Excercise

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Preliminary Excercise

The preliminary excercise was a task that our teacher gave to us to get to grips with using the camera and learn to shoot footage with it. This is to prepare us for the main project that will be started at a later date.

The preliminary task was to complete a 30-60 second sequence. The rules were that within this sequence we had to show:

Continuous character movement
an understanding of the 180 degree rule
A match on action shot within the sequence
Characters exchanging at least for lines of speech

Conventions Of A Thriller Film

Today the genre of thriller is diversely split up into different sub sections. There are many types such as:

Action Thriller
Conspiracy Thriller
Crime Thriller
Disaster Thriller
Horror Thriller
Legal Thriller
Medical Thriller
Political Thriller
Psychological Thriller
Supernatural Thriller
Techno Thriller

Although they are split up in to sub-sections there are a few things that they still include that can identify them as a thriller film. The storyline in thriller films usually have a mystery, crime or murder that have been committed that the antagonist (the 'baddy') and protagonist (the 'goody') are somehow entwined into.

In the film the protagonist's weak points will be exploited by the antagonist showing them have an experience of near death, usually near the end of the film. There will also be scenes of the protagonist in turmoil where he or she will be degraded to feelin helpless and isolated. They will be seen to overcome it by a miracle or self-strength, which will then lead to them finding the antagonist and defeating him.

The narrative is sometimes used to create false paths and clues, or enigmas that the audience will expect to see resolved at the end of the film. Usually within the narrative little clues are revealed to the viewers that build up to a climax. In the opening sequence, one or maye a series of enigmas are unleashed, showing the audience what the film is about, but also to show what will in fact be resolved at the end of the film.

Mise en scene is used in the thriller films to enhane the persona of good and bad. The mise en scene around the protagonist will usually be bright colours. Conventionally the colour white signifies good and black is bad, but in thriller films today this is mixed up.


This image shows batman, a faous character who is in fact a protagonist, but his face is covered and he is suited in black.



These two images are from G.I Joe. These two characters are also unconventionally suited as the character wearing white is the antagonist n the character suited in black is actually the protgonist.

Props and costumes also help to show good and bad, eg the attire of the character, the objects in the roiomn with the charaters and also the weapons they may or may not carry. Antagonists are usually seen to carry harmful weapons whereas protagonists are not seen with weapons unless defending themselves.

The title of a thriller film will connote to us an aspect of the antagonist or protagonists psychological state. Films like 'Disturbia', or 'Insomnia' demonstrates this.

There are also themes present in thriller films such as identity, voyeurism and revenge.

Analysis of a Thriller Film

Se7en

The first sound heard in the film is the low rumbles and a siren of traffic outside. This is used to give the audience an idea of where the film is located. Also, the siren of a police car represents the nature of the film and how it is about Crime. The opening credits is loud, low pitched music, giving a threatening sense to it.

The music of the title allows the audience to know that the film is dark in nature. Properties such as blade has been used to show that it could be also a violent movie. This is mostly important to represent in the opening of the film due to the audience understanding that the rest of the film will be as dark as this. A big reason of representing this message is the mise-en-scene because in the first scene with detective Summerset preparing for work allows the audience to understand Summerset. This is shown through Summersets well-groomed clothes already laid out on his bed neatly similar to his pen, his badge and his penknife. The mise-en-scene used in the opening of the film is mainly to illustrate how Summerset is more intelligent, experienced, and organised than Mills although Mills is more relaxed and believes he can do well which is shown through his cocky attitude. Summerset's apartment is clean and tidy as we see when he is preparing for work and in the scene where he rests in bed unlike Mills' untidy apartment, which is seen later.

A long shot of Summerset’ room as been used to show what his room looks like. Looking at the opening sequence, lot of low angle shots are used on the main characters. Another shot that is used quite regularly is a long shot, this is so that the audience get to see the surroundings of the characters and so they know the setting of the scene. It also allows the audience to understand about where the characters are and helps them get an idea of the period of time it is set in. There are lots of jumpy shots being used at the end of the opening sequence, this gives effect because it makes the audience a little confused about the situation but it also gives a slight insight into what will happen at the end of the movie.

Lulu Analysis

Thriller Film Analysis - Se7en

The film Se7en is a crime thriller film made in 1995 starring Morgan Freeman and Brad Pitt. Their characters are police detectives who are set on many cases around an unknown city. The case highlighted in the film is focused on the seven deadly sins and is interesting and mysterious. The opening sequence demonstrates a lot the audience about the film.

Mise-En-Scene

The first clips of the film show an establishing shot of Morgan Freemans character in his kitchen. These first clips help us establish what type of person the main character is. His home has been set up to be cold and dull. The wallpaper and furniture are dull greys and whites, and the furniture is minimal. Around in the kitchen and bedroom, there are not many objects of homeliness and there are no signs of companionship, but we are frequently shown how tidy and in order his possessions are. From this the producers want to show us that he is a lonely man, but also very tidy and pays attention to detail.

The next location is of Morgan Freeman at work, on a crime scene. The producers again have made the set dark and dull, and there are props of bodies and blood on the walls. This is a contrast to his neat and pristine home.

He is dressed in smart attire and a peak hat, almost playing into the part of detective in the film. When Brad Pitt enters onto the location he is dressed in a leather jacket, shirt and tie, almost scruffy compared to the other character. The film creators wanted to show that these two characters are very different and that their relationship will be vital through the film.

Outside of the crime scene into the streets of the town, the location looks very run down with graffiti on the walls and bars over windows. Also there is a dark, gloomy feel to it because this is establishing the location is a rundown, decrepit town which the audience will expect horrible crimes to happen.

For the title sequence there are many props being used such as razor blades, pictures that have been anonymously shot of random people’s faces, pages of writing and clippings from books. These all look eerie and old, faded and the film makers want you to recognise that these are clues to the film, thus creating an interest for the audience.

Use of Soundtrack

The use of soundtrack is most evident in the opening credits. An eerie, mysterious sounding soundtrack is played whilst the credits and title are played, alongside the images of an anonymous hand cutting and sticking from pages and sticking pictures. This was intentionally added to show the audience something strange and also important is going on, but they do not know exactly what. The soundtrack also is there to establish that the genre of the film is a thriller.

Diegetic Sound

The diegetic sounds are very useful to help the audience understand the characters and their values. Morgan Freeman’s character is seen to be very articulate and pays attention to detail. He also seems very detached from everybody he communicates with and lacks emotions. We find out that Brad Pitt’s character is slightly hot headed.

We are shown that he thinks about the unobvious through him asking “did the kid see it” whilst at the crime scene. His colleague responds that his question is irrelevant, they don’t care and all that matters is the man is dead. Also the colleague mentions that “we are all going to be real glad when we get rid of you”. This demonstrates to the audience that this character thinks the unthinkable and considering he is a police detective, this is foreshadowing the fact that he will use these skills that others find so annoying, to unveil a mystery.

The non-diegetic sounds that were on the opening titles were put there to add suspense to the film. The slow tempo drum beat imitates a plot being unfolded slowly which is what will happen in the film. The sounds like thunder add a scary factor to the music.

Editing

The editing is very important for the opening titles because the shots used in a random order add to the enigma of the film, the audience want to know what is going on.

Camera Shot, Movement & Composition

Camera shots are important within thus film. The most important are to establish the main character Morgan Freeman. One shot that particularly stands out is the shot of him with a neatly made bed and a blazer perfectly lay out upon it. The jacket looks perfect but he picks at little bits of unseen fluff on it. This shows that the little things are noticed by him.

An eye line match shot of his dressing table top shows his carefully lined up objects that he carries around from day to day. He puts them into his jacket one by one suggesting that this is a daily routine for him.

When this character is going to bed at the end of this sequence, a close up shot of a metronome is shown to the audience. It is to imply that he has to use a repetitive noise to fall asleep which is not normal. This gives the audience suspense about the character making them want to continue to find out about him.

The opening title shots are very shocking, such as the close up of a person scratching the tips of their fingers off with a razor blade. This is an audience grabbing shot because it is not a normal everyday occurrence.

Special Effects

There were mainly special effects used in the opening titles, such as shots being merged into one another, taken from different angles. Also special effects were used for the title fonts and the way in which they were shown on the screen.

Questionnaire

Film Questionnaire

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Introduction To Group

Our group is going to be producing a opening sequence to a thriller. To help the making of this run smoothly, we decided to assign ourselves a role to be in charge of.

Tash - Camerawoman

Natasha - Director

Lulu - Editing

Although we are in charge of these roles, we will be contributing ideas to each other when needed and will decide on decisions as a group. Every now and again we plan to have a group discussion about improvements that might need to be made and to ensure that we are progressing well.