Mood Board Side 2

 

Mood Board Side 1

Independent Research 2

 The History of Satanism / satanic murder with art

While finding the body is only a small part of our whole sequence - the lead up to finding the body is where the tension builds through the use of symbols and satanistic drawings in the ground, I decided to do some research on the history of satanism so our production group could get a fuller understanding of what can actually occur during a ritual and how it presents itself. 

'Satanic Panic' was actually a common term used mainly in North America in the 1980's where cults were becoming an issue, the term first came out by the publication of the book, 'Michelle remembers' written by a psychaitrist. Numerous allegations were formed around cults mainly focused on abuse and in extreme cases abduction and used as human sacrifices. This information can be used in our group as it gives us more context to how we could portray the body to make it clear that it was a satanic/ cult attack. There are many ways we could do this, the most stereotypical symbol used is a star with a circle around it, but to have more of a variety we could use any of the ones below.

Because we have quite a lot of extra time in the 2 minuets we were thinking of doing blank screens combined with font titles which are related to the symbols that the man is seeing everywhere, and also adding a symbol into the dead body's forehead and maybe on her costume.

A case study of an 11 gear old girl, quotes that she was forced to drink human blood & eat human flesh and was given drugs to make her hypervigilant in a 'secret cave'. Obviously we only catch a glimpse of the dead body and we aren't going to show her being forced to do anything by the creature that has killed her but this could give us an idea of some props to use, such as we could have a empty glass next to her that once had blood in it. 

Our group has decided that our symbols will play an important part in fitting nicely into the horror convention so doing research on these will hopefully help us get a better understanding of what happens and what props we can include to make it look more realistic 

Independent Research 1

 

How to make fake guts

From the feedback we got, our production group quickly realised that using a fake body with manufactured parts to show it was a body would create a more dramatic effect as we could make it look more mutilated than on an actual person with special effects makeup - and this would be hard to make it look realistic. 

I decided to do an independent research on how to make fake guts so we could effectively use this in the process of making the 'body' look like its been massacred. The image down below would hopefully be the final result that we could achieve and put under the costume, this would imply that it was some sort of supernatural being that did this attack.

  

The process of how you make this, consists of many different steps but the method is simple and all the 'ingredients' can all be found at home so we don't have to spend money on getting the products needed. I've linked a recipe for scar wax which you can then put on skin and carve blood/ symbols into which will be very useful for the symbolic side of our sequence. We would also have to make fake blood; the ingredients for this is red food dye, cornstarch, water and onion flakes - this is added onto the scar wax and rolled up in cling film for the perfect fake guts effect which I feel will make big improvements to our opening sequence. 

We would make multiple of these fake guts with more blood than used initially though applying the fake blood to not only the cotton but also on the scar wax as this will help us achieve a more gory look. We will also combine the guts with meat pieces to exaggerate how much of the girls body has been damaged. 

The recipe for the 2 pots of scar wax are also linked to this page but you only need petroleum jelly and flour - we would add slightly more petroleum jelly to make it stick to the cling film better.

    

Developing idea from feedback

 

Our production group pitched our idea to our head of production and teacher - we realised that our backup idea would be more fun and interesting to film, so we focused more closely on this idea. We developed our idea by;

               - adding more symbolism with the dead 'body' with using some sort of substance so it looks more like a 'massacre' instead of a killing and we don't have to use a body.

               - we developed another concept where the innocent bystander of a man also becomes in danger towards the end and starts running away.

               - costume - we decided to focus on the costume of the dead girl and juxtapose the costume with her state, the costume would look innocent and young while her body is completely mutilated. we will make this look realistic with effects and fake blood over the 'body'

               - we thought a dog would be effective to bring focus to the dead girl where the dog sniffs the body and makes that the main focus 

               - film from creature pov to fit into horror convention

 

Group concept presentation

 

Camera workshop 2

 In our second media workshop, it was more of a practical lesson, first, we learned about the 180-degree rule and learned the importance of it to the audience -  the 180- degree rule was illustrated by 2 students sitting down opposite each other and the rest of us were on one side so we all say the same right and left, but this lesson was about where to draw the line and noticed that if you went over the 180  it would confuse the audience
as they don't have a physical sense of the set and have to rely on where characters are. 

We covered the most effective ways to capture the most interesting picture and went over the rule of thirds,  this helped us realize that if there's too much headspace or room around the sides it doesn't make the most dramatic effect possible.  

When we  were comfortable enough to film our own short sequence, we shot 4 different angles, one was wide, mid, close up, and one from very low down - it's important to do the  wide shot first  because it  establishes the  set/ location and introduces the character(s)

Continuity is very important in film-making and if you mess it up it can ruin a whole sequence. Continuity is just making sure that one shot from another looks the same (i.e if someone is drinking water when you cut and start the action again you have to make sure that there's a similar amount of water in the next clip), it makes the film look very natural and flows well.

Marks are partially used for continuity but also for the actors so they know exactly where to stand - the marks are usually made by tape but we didn't have any so we  just used  a camera lens

On a film set, there are certain phrases that are used as command words, standby, roll camera, action, and cut, these will usually be said by the director. These specific words are used as they're very clear and everyone knows exactly what you mean when you say it. From 'action' to 'cut' the camera will keep rolling and  this is because you  could get  a  great shot by chance and it helps the natural flow of the film

We were taught to not watch the footage back on set for 2 reasons; the first one was that sometimes when an actor/ actress watches their footage back they can overthink and they are less focused on the scene and more focused on the way they behave and it can make the film look very unnatural. Another reason we don't watch the footage back onset is that it wastes time and when we shoot  our coursework we won't have long on set and you are paying rent on the studio/ location, the actors time as well as the camera and lighting operators - so you have to  use all the time you have actively shooting

Camera workshop 1

 

In media, we were able to do a practical workshop where we had a practical lesson on an introduction to cameras and filming - the cameras we used were Black magic 4k mini URSA but we were also shown how to set up tripods and prepare the cameras to film. We learned safety sips and how to take care of the equipment, by using the "yours" and "mine" rule, ensuring nobody dropped or damaged the equipment. To set up the equipment you first set up the tripod, it's important to adjust the height of the tripod starting from the bottom for balance. Once you've done this you can slide the camera on and adjust the spirit level which you can do by unscrewing a screw on the bottom and making sure that the circle is in the middle of the larger circle; this ensures that the camera can get a stable shot without the risk of it moving. 

Along with this, we learned how to focus the camera and the fact that you have to 'crash zoom' into the subject to get it to focus, and then you can zoom out and adjust the zoom to wherever you want. We explored different white-balance settings, and were told how it affected the color on the screen is useful in reference to the light sources.

At the end of the workshop, we practiced 'striking' which was essentially learning how to put the equipment away correctly and safely 

Opening sequence idea 2

 

CASINO - A DRAMA

Genre - Drama/ thriller

Location - A Casino

In the opening sequence:

It'll start with the a group of older men, smoking cigars and drinking some whiskey all sat around a roulette spinner. There's clearly some tension between 2 of them, when the roulette spinner tell's them to put their counters  on the board one looks at the other questionable and anxiously and the other is smirking and looking superioir. The one with a higher status smirks and nods and so the other one puts all his counters on one single number. As the roulette starts spinning we get two different shots. One is a close up of the ball spinning and the other is of the woman getting ready - as the  ball gets quicker the shots get shorter. The shot of the woman would be putting on a long red dress and doing her makeup, some of these shots could be in slow motion. As the roulette ball comes to a stop, one of  the men looks defeated and the other looks proud and smug (the man who was anxious is the one who looks defeated). Thewoman arrives at the casino and the man who won stands up to greet her while the  other goes home.

The backstory and the rest of the plot:

 

The man who lost the bet was currently in a relationship with thewoman, but owed the other a lot of money. The agreement was that if he won the game that he would pay him the money back, but if he didn't, that  he had to end things and the woman  would then marry him and all his debt would be gone. For the rest of the story the man is depressed and alone but eventually goes back to the   casino - wins the money and gets his wife back. 

The Pianist Opening Scene - War

 

The pianist - a war film

 

The pianist, based on the book by Wladyslaw Szpilman is a film based in Poland during the start of the second world war – the time period and location are clearly established through the writing but also through the vintage film and it all starts off in black and white. It then switches drastically to a newer, more modern film with color and better focus and cuts to a man playing the piano – as the film is titled ‘The Pianist” it draws our attention.

As the opening scene is very short and the first minute is very peaceful and calm, we are expecting something to happen as the genre is war. We know from contextual knowledge that Poland was heavily involved at the beginning of  WW2 and so we are anticipating action. We don’t get much information as to what is going on because the dialogue is muted as we are seeing it in the Pianist’s point of view, this adds to the sense of uncertainty and tension. We are confused as to why he is being signaled to stop playing and yet refuses and as the diegetic tone of the piano gets faster and more stressful -  the closer you get to the explosion happening.

We can see that there will be some dark topics explored in this film as world war 2 was a very violent and horrifying time period meaning that the target audience for this film would probably be a more mature audience but would be seen by people who can someway relate to that time and place of war or people who are interested in thriller/ action films. Although we don't see much action apart from at the very end of the opening scene, the sound and lighting are used effectively, because the piano is playing through the very starting scene we are inclined to assume it's a non-diegetic sound piece, however, when it cuts to the pianist it makes it feel a lot more real -  because the piano is being played in a minor key it creates an unsettling atmosphere, combined with the location and time period we know something will happen. The lighting is used to create this atmosphere also as it presents how different things are inside and outside. Another contrast is from the pianist's point of view and the person in the room opposite to him, we can't hear the man talking so we assume he can't hear the piano - meaning that he is experiencing this situation a lot differently.  

The mood and atmosphere change drastically from an eerie mood to a terrifying one very quickly - the pianist is in his own world and doesn't stop playing even when  2 men are frantically miming for him to stop and making gestures that he will die. When the explosion happens this is the only time the piano stops playing signaling the end.

Favourite film review

 ALL THE BRIGHT PLACES 

 

 

All the Bright Places is a film released in 2020 -directed by Brett Haley- is based on the book written by Jennifer Niven and Liz Hannah which was released in 2015. It stars Elle Fanning, Justice Smith, and Alexandra Shipp. All the Bright Places is a story about 2 teenagers, Violet and Finch who meet each other while struggling with the trauma and pain of their past – they go from friends to lovers and discover that even with their emotional and psychical that they can find a bright place in the worst of times, and if they can’t (unfortunately in Finch’s case) – they can be that bright place for someone else. This film brings out all emotions, heartbreak, grief, happiness, hope, and love.

 

The thing I love most about this movie is the message it gives out, it focuses on the stigmatized and tabooed topic of suicide, the movie handles the topic well by neither demonizing it nor glamorizing it – while it mainly focuses on how it would feel after losing someone to suicide, which unfortunately in Violet's case she does. The movie kept my attention from the very beginning which is one of the opening scenes Violet and Finch are both standing on a bridge, both planning to take their lives coincidentally at the same time. Finch slowly talks Violet out of following through and she returns the favor to him. From there they get closer and Finch helps Violet come out of her shell and trust again, which in my opinion is the most beautiful thing someone could do. The cinematography after this is incredible, the scenery combined with the music brings along the movie so well. You feel a sense of relief and hope that Violet is healing but soon realize that Finch is deteriorating more. The scenes where they properly open up to each other seem so genuine and eye-opening to what people go through. 

 

The film then takes a turn and gets darker and more serious, Finch and Violet have an argument, and through his pain, he pushes her away. I’m pretty sure the next scene shattered everyone who has watched it, Violet finds Finch’s body in the lake where he drowned himself, the acting is incredible, Elle Fannings manages to portray shock, heartbreak, grief, and guilt in one shot, and the whole cinematic experience exaggerates the experience to a new extent. From there you get to see the bittersweetness of Violet moving on and finally being content with where she is in life but the wrenching heartbreak of Finch not being there with her anymore. When Violet gives the presentation they’d been working on together it makes me think about life on a whole new level and the state of how it would leave the people I love if I left. 

 

Overall this film gave me a new perspective on so much, I loved watching Violet grow as a person and watching Finch have hope momentarily when he was with Violet.

Film poster mise en scene

 

ALICE IN WONDERLAND FILM POSTER

 

How does the mise en scene and camera angle/ composition within the poster communicate concepts and connotations to the audience?

 

Alice in Wonderland - released in 2010 and directed by Tim Burton is a remake of one of the most famous and intriguing plots originally written by Lewis Carroll in 1865. The story can be interpreted in many different ways and metaphors and similarly with the film poster, there’s a lot of different elements that make it interesting, mainly the color, characters, and setting.

 

The setting of the poster is in wonderland - where nothing makes sense and we can see this instantly. The main focuses are the white rabbit, the mad hatter, and Alice, in the midst of them there are mushrooms and other mysterious plants which gives off a psychedelic effect – tying in nicely with the plot and author (who was rumored to be on psychedelic drugs while writing the book). 

 

There is lots to be said about the mise en scene, the costumes and makeup being one of the first things you notice. The mad hatter's appearance draws the most attention to the viewers – he looks completely out of the ordinary as does the white rabbit and this contrasts with Alice as she is wearing just a simple blue dress. The fact that the mad hatter is the centerpiece of the movie poster shows that Alice is an intruder in their world; an outsider in the world that she created. She’s out of control and is confused by the new reality she’s faced with, the mad hatter is the one who’s really in control – we can see this through the costume and makeup of him which aligns with the location and film. 

 

The tone looks mysterious but also upbeat -  the facial expressions give away a lot about how the characters are feeling, whilst Alice looks understandably curious, the other characters seem to be taking everything in their stride which gives us some reassurance. The movement of the Mad hatter looking like he’s skipping shows us that this is completely normal for him. The white rabbit is positioned lower down, telling us that he is not as relevant in the story. While the bright colors and the positioning of the mad hatter connote a happy tone, we know that it gets darker as the film goes on. The font of the text at the top could represent the trees and eerily atmosphere 

 

The theme of gender isn’t really applicable to this but status somewhat is – Alice comes from high-class background and lives an ordinary life, her status in her ‘real’ world is high, however in wonderland the status works completely differently – where she is of a lower status which creates contrast as she isn’t used to this new hierarchy.