Planning - Location Confirmation

Email Confirmation of Our Location

This is the email of confirmation that we could use the Red Hall for our thriller opening. We payed and booked our available time slot so that we could use one or more of the rooms available to us.

Pitch for Opening

Innocence - Thriller Opening

Innocence - Thriller Opening

How we chose our title

How we chose our title

 We created a PollEv in order for our group to finalise our thriller title. We used PollEverywhere.com and this website helped us to gather answers and tally them and also helped the public who voted. PollEv is simple to use and all you have to do is send which ever code for the title you want to the number given. then your vote will be sent in.
Innocence was the most liked and picked title therefore we decided to use it as it would interest our audience more.
The reason we gave a choice of six titles was so the audience had a large range of titles to chose from so when we had a favourite one we knew that it was the right title from our thriller as it was picked out of six titles.

ISL Week Twelve - BBFC Classification

ISL Week Eleven - Audience Profile

Shot List

BBFC Research

BBFC

BBFC is ‘The British Board of Film Classification’ which is an independent, non-governmental body which has classified cinema films since it was set up in 1912 with videos/ DVDs since the Video Recordings Act was passed in 1984.

The BBFC is a trusted guide to media content. It works independently with self-financing, operating a trusted classification label in the UK.

The BBFC are meant to:

·         Protect  the public, and especially children, from content which might raise harm risks.

·         Empower the public, especially parents, to make informed viewing choices.

·         Recognise and respect adult freedom of choice within the law.

·         Respond to and reflect changing social attitudes towards media content through proactive  public consultation and research.

·         Provide a cost-effective, efficient classification service within our statutory remit.

·         Work in partnership with the industry to develop innovative service models to provide content advice which support emerging media delivery systems.

·         Provide an effective service to enforcement agencies.

U
The symbol stands for Universal which means suitable for children aged from four years and over. At a U label only ‘damn and hell’ are used at infrequent times as well as a form of very mild violence that will be shown. however no behaviour is shown that the child would copy. There may be brief scary scenes and moments where the characters are placed in danger. As with violence, although these scenes will be balanced by reassuring the children that watch them with things such as comic interludes or music to bring down the peak scene. There are 'Baddie’ characters which may carry or use weapons, but there will be no emphasis on these. Child or ‘hero’ characters are unlikely to use any kind of weapon outside, for example,  for it to be used in a historical setting.
 

PG
PG stands for Parental Guidance, meaning that the film is for general viewng, but some scenes may be unsuitable for younger children. A PG film should not disturb a child aged around eight or older. Parents have the decision to decide whether the film is suitable for their child to watch or not. In a PG the only bad language that will be used will be things such as ‘shit’ or ‘son of a bitch’  but the context and delivery are always important.

12 and 12A
Films classified 12A and video works classified 12 contain material that is not suitable for children under twelve years old. When going to the cinema no one younger than twelve can see a 12A film unless they are with an adult. An adult who is thinking of taking their child to the cinema to see a twelve classified film have to consider whether the film is suitable for their own child. Some types of bad language are used in a 12 or 12A but does depend on which type  or manner it is used in. There are only small references to sex but it is only briefly portrayed as well as drug use only a minor use.

 

The 12A involves an adult to go with any child under 12 seeing a 12A film at the cinema. This is enforced by the cinema staff as it has a licence which they may be at risk losing if they do not follow the rules. The 12 part is enforced at home which is mainly for retailers who cannot sell or let them rent any DVD or Blu-ray to anyone under the age of twelve.

15
No-one under 15 is allowed to see a 15 film at the cinema or buy/rent a 15 rated video. 15 rated works are not suitable for children under 15 years of age.  In a 15 rated film it is possible to see strong violence as well as strong language, portrays of sexual activity and strong references to sex.. You may also see sexual nudity as well as drug taking, as well as discriminatory language or behaviour.

18
No theme is prohibited at 18. Adults are free to choose their own entertainment as long as the material is not illegal rated 18 are for adults. No-one under 18 is allowed to see an 18 film at the cinema or buy or to rent an 18 rated video. No 18 rated works are suitable for children as it may be harmful towards them, even towards viewers that are over the age of 18. In an 18 you will see very strong violence, strong portrayals of sexual activity, scenes of sexual violence, strong horror, blood and gore, discriminatory language and behaviour and real sex in some circumstances. there is no limit with language use in rated 18s.

R18
The R18 category is a special and legally-restricted classification primarily for explicit works of consenting sex or strong fetish material involving adults. R18 films are only allowed to be shown in specialised cinemas that have the license to show them. R18 films are not allowed to be supplied over a mail order, as well as not being available to the public as they could include offensive titles with explicit or offensive content.

Our thriller would be classified at a 15. I think a classification of a 15 is suitable as there is use of weapons which could be offensive to some viewers. There is no dialogue in our opening but linking from the words that featured on our opening like ‘death’ could lead to the rest of the thriller having peak moments of horror as well as strong violence as they would find out what happened for the body to be like it was, shown in the opening, which could offend some viewers therefore wouldn’t be suitable for people aged under 15 as they find the thriller too threatening or too much violence for anyone under the age of 15 to see.

Storyboard Improvement

We have improved our storyboard as the original did not match what we actually filmed. Now we have a more detailed one with the effects that we used as well as the shot type. The pictures are basic however the information below will explain what is going on in the image. We have a shot number and the action that is happening which we didn't have on our original storyboard therefore this one is more detailed.
We decided to change our storyboard as the day of filming did not work out as we planned and the shots that we were going to get was harder to film as we had ripped the costume for the ending part before we filmed the beginning so we could not film some of the beginning part to show how the injuries happens. However some shots we did not plan to get, turned out well therefore we used them.

Shot List Improvement

Shot number	Details of the shot	FX	Shot type
1 Scene 1	Ident appears ‘SceneScreen Productions’	Dandelions flying away	Mid/close up
2	Image of the house	Blast effect in slow motion	Midshot
3	Words ‘death’ and ‘present’	Blast effect on top of picture; slow motion	Close-up
4 Scene 2	Blood trail along the floor	Blast effect	High angle point of view
5	Following the rope going down the stairs	Blast effect with slow motion	High angle
6	Shots of hand and ‘staring’ on screen	Blast effect with slow motion	Extreme close-up
7 Scene 3	Following the rope leading to a name on the leg (Bailey Danahar)	Blast effect with slow motion	Extreme close-up
8	Continuous rope leading to the door handle	Slow motion on top of blast effect	Extreme close-up
9	opening of door from the opposite side of the door	Blast effect	Long shot
10 Scene 4	Following the rope into the room with a shoe on the rope	Blast effect and slow motion	High angle canted shot
11	Name of Becky Boyfield on neck injuries	Slow motion with blast effect	Extreme close-up
12	Cut to door opening and continuing with following the rope	Blast effect and slow motion	Door-long shot Rope-extreme close-up
13 Scene 5	Newspaper shot ‘all over’	Slow motion and blast effect	High angle panned shot.
14	Following an arm with ‘Scott James’ written in the wound	Blast effect with slow motion	Close up
15	Rope shot leading to Becky coming through the door	Slow motion and blast effect	Close up-panned leading to Becky which is a long shot
16 Scene 6	Rope over to the door leading to Becky and seeing the body	Blast effect	Close up pan leading to long shot
17	The body	Slow motion	Pan of whole body leading to a close up
18	Zoom of Scott into a corner	Slow motion blast effect	Long to close shot
19 Scene 7	Scott grabs Becky	Slow motion	Mid shot
20	Scott’s hand is over the dead body	Slow motion blast effect	Close up
21	Scott disappears then the title ‘innocence’	Fade into black but still in slow motion and with blast effect	Mid shot

 

Soundtrack Ideas

We liked the first soundtrack because it is sinister and confusing so it would be good for a thriller because it would help create the sense of enigma by creating the tension so it engages the audience so if we decided to drop the tension for effect then it would help.



We also liked the second soundtrack because it was more horror than thriller so it would make the audience scared and alert so we could used this idea to make the opening affective. We would like to find or create a soundtrack that combines the aspects of both of the sound track so the audience is scared but still alert and holding on to the tension that has been created.




We have decided to go with this soundtrack because it has a mix between the two because it has the aspects of the first one as in the drum hits and the deep sounds mixed with the high sounds creates a sinister feel because it is confusing and is out of the ordinary. it also has aspects of the second because it has a horror thriller feel and makes the audience alert.

Also on our thriller opening we will use 'Garage Bound' to make different pitches of violins at peak moments in the opening, to add extra suspense. We find that 'Garage Bound' will be useful as we can create some of our original ideas and add them into where fits the best.





This section of the thriller film, Sinister is what we got our inspiration from for our thriller opening. We felt that this was very effective and was also very freaky which fits in with the thriller genre.

Thriller Audience Auditions

We needed to do some auditions before we went out to film so we knew who the best people was to act and how they were going to make our thriller opening successful.
Some of the people that we used was part of our thriller opening however some wasn't, but we needed a scale of people to audition so we had people to choose from.
The audition was for the protagonist and the antagonist, seeing how people would fir into that character role and if they were successful or not.
It is only 0:27 seconds longs as we took clips from each person as we did not want to show the whole audition but enough to see if they fit into playing that particular role.
The first person that auditioned was Ross who auditioned for the protagonist, next was Becky again for the protagonist, seeing if the gender made any difference. We found that having a female protagonist made them feel more victimised which would create tension a lot quicker as women are see as the 'weaker' gender and not able to protect themselves as much as men unless they're an anti-stereotype.
next, we auditioned for the antagonist. Scott played this part well as he has the broadness and height which made him more threatening to the protagonist and be more dominant against the protagonist as he may come across more threatening than someone smaller.
Overall, the auditions went well and we found parts that people could play therefore giving the people the correct parts in the thriller opening.

Filming Schedule

Planning- Filming Schedule

9am

Laura meets Becky at her house to make sure we have all out props and costume before we leave for filming. We both finalised plans and then had something to eat before we left.

9:45am

Left for Tesco to meet Bailey and Scott at 10:00am. We will then walk to the Red Hall for 10:10am. 

10:10am

Inside the Red Hall, handed to money over to the woman who let us use it. Then we shall choose a room which we are going to film in and set up our equipment. 

10:30am

All equipment will be ready to go and Laura and Scott will be ready in their costumes. Bailey has prepared he camera ready to begin filming. We will then start filming. We will mainly focus on filming the reveal of the setting and Laura's body.

12:00pm

Lunch break. We will also discuss what we are going to do after we have finished eating. We will prepare any new props and talk about what we want to film during the other half of the day.

12:45pm

Finished lunch, we will now prepare to shoot the rest of the video. We will now focus on Scott's part in the opening. We will use the torch to create highlights of Laura's body and to visualise Scott. This may take around 45 minutes.

13:30pm

After we have filmed Scott's parts we will then move on to Becky's part. It will not take long to film her parts as she not in it as long as Scott and Laura. This will roughly take and hour.

14:30pm

Finished filming. We will pack all our equipment away and tidy the room we used. We will then turn off all the lights close all the doors and then post the keys back through the letter box, once we have locked up. 

15:00pm 

We will return to school to talk to our media teacher and make sure we give back our equipment. At 15:15pm we will all go home and Becky will begin editing the opening using her iPad.

16:00pm 

Finished!

Opening Pitch

Thriller Opening Pitch by BeckyBoyfield

Shot List

Justification of Locations

Justification of Location Choices

 

We have decided to use these locations because we felt they represented the thriller genre best. The reason for this is because in a typical thriller film, the setting of the film normally sees a group of people assembling at a particular house that could be owned by one of the characters. By using the Red Hall we can use an old and run down room to create a crime scene. The room will help to set the scene of where Laura was murdered and we can control how much light is in the room. We can also use the darkness to highlight parts of Laura's body with a torch. The Red Hall also looks like a haunted house which creates an enigma as you don't know what could be inside. The house offers us room to spread multiple props and have newspaper all over the floor. We can also have photographic evidence of how Laura died as we film. Also when Becky enters the hall, we will get to look around some parts of the house as she makes her way to finding Laura's body. The pictures of the bridges represent the second location we are considering to shoot at. We may possibly shoot some of the shots at a bridge to show where Laura was murdered.  The bridge is quite modern as it has graffiti over it and has litter and rubble around it. This fits into the thriller genre and the conventions, as thrillers today are modernised a lot and some natural props are used to help set the scene and create an image in the audiences mind.

Actor Contract

To Potential Actor,

The current year 12 Media Studies students are working on an important project for their coursework, which will count towards their final grade for A levels. The coursework will consist of a film opening for a crime-thriller film. This will include taking pictures and videos of models, which will be set in certain locations.

 

The film genre is a thriller and will be aimed towards people aged 15-25, male and female.

 

I am writing to you to request permission to use the pictures and videos of yourself for the opening.

 

Please indicate your decision by deleting the option that does not apply and signing at the bottom of the slip below. Your signature confirms that I have permission to use yourself as a model in our opening.

Kind regards,

Scene-Screen Productions

As Media Student

I do/do not give permission for the use of my photos and video in the film opening

Signed…………………………………………………………………………

Date………………………………….

Storyboard - Orignal

Risk Assessment

Reasons for Roles

Actors
Bailey – Bailey is going to take the role of being the director and the person in charge of the camera. Bailey has chosen this role as he is used to acting as he takes drama so he knows what will work and what wont, also it is different from what he does normally, which is act,  therefore will be interesting to have a different role  than what he is used to. Bailey will be successful as a director as he can see what happens therefore seeing if it is right or wrong so we can change it and make it better. As Bailey is the director/cameraman he will be in control of the lighting to make sure that the shots that we need are as clear as possible and in the correct place so the continuity editing will be correct.

Becky – Becky will be one of the protagonists in the thriller opening but towards the end. We have decided this role for Becky as she is confident therefore will be good at acting for this opening and creating tension. As she is female it lives up to the stereotype of being a protagonist and being easily defeated, in most thrillers is what happens. As Becky is only being seen in the end it is better for her to play this role as she has the correct items of clothing that she can wear so it fits her character, of being pure as well as secretive so the antagonist doesn’t know that she is there.

Scott – Scott is the only antagonist in the opening as he has a strong build like an antagonist would. He is the tallest and broadest out of everyone therefore has the most power and can be seen as being dominant towards the protagonists which is a stereotypical antagonist that fits to the thriller genre. From Scott’s height it will show the power that he has over the protagonists therefore would look realistic as in person he looks stronger and well-built to be able to act like he would have the ability to commit something that happens in this storyline compared to Laura murdering Scott which wouldn’t seem convincing as women in the media do not have the control and strength like men do.

Laura – Laura is the other protagonist which the thriller opening will focus on parts of her body that have been attacked. We chose Laura to have this role as she is a female meaning she could easily be targeted. Laura doesn’t usually act and is being the camera therefore we chose to change roles to make it interesting for everyone else by doing something out of our comfort zone. Laura has long hair therefore we could use it to cover her identity so not much is revealed in the first two minutes of the opening. The make-up will be done by Laura and Becky as they already have the resources therefore know what will work and how to do it, instead of having to buy the resources that we need.

ISL Week Ten - Gender Representation

ISL Week Ten – Gender Representation

‘In the thriller genre males are either heroes or villains; females are always the victims’

Women are represented in the media as the less powerful gender and tend to deal more with emotion and the family instead of the crime and ‘tough’ issues that men may deal with.
Women are often seen as housewives or mothers who are linked to the domestic situation. They are often seen as sex objects in the media which is represented to entertain the male audience. Often in types of non-fictional media women’s roles tend to be smaller than males as the males are seen as the most powerful and dominant gender.  Also, in fictional media women are less likely to be the main source of leading news stories which include politics, business, the law and some religious stories.

There are main stereotypes of women, these are:

·         The female action hero

·         The sex object

·         Retain their sex appeal to male audiences but have masculine characteristics for example, use of weapons and violence.

Some of the well-known female action heroes:

·         Ripley from Alien (1979)

·         Sarah Connor: The Terminator (1984) & Terminator 2: Judgment Day (1991)

·         Nikita from La Femme Nikita (1990)

·         Lara Croft from Tomb Raider (2001)

·         Azumi from Azumi (2003)

·         Zen from Chocolate (2008)

·         Alice from Resident Evil (2002)

·         Katniss Everdeen from The Hunger Games (2012)

·         Elastigirl The Incredibles (2004)

·         Hit Girl from Kick-Ass (2010)

As well as women are being portrayed differently in the media, here are different stereotypes of men, these are:

·         The Joker – Popular character with boys, they have the ‘mask of masculinity’. This stereotype portrays that men are not serious and cannot be emotional.

·         The Jock – he always is willing to compromise his own long term health to help others. The Jock uses violence and fights a lot to win approval of other men and then women.

·         The Strong Silent Type – The person that is in charge, acting authoritatively whilst containing emotion as well as being successful with women. This stereotype shows that men must always be in charge and have the control so talking about their feelings is seen as having a weakness.

·         The Big Shot - The professional status that is very successful in society. This stereotype shows that men must be economically powerful and socially successful.

·         The Action Hero – Strength is the most important thing that they concentrate on. They are often angry and aggressive with a lot of use of violent behaviour.

·         The Buffoon – commonly appears as the father figure on the television. He is usually well-intentioned and light-hearted. These characters can range from slightly incept to being hopeless when it comes to being a parent or dealing with a domestic or workplace issue.