Opening 2 Mintues - Initial idea time plan

0 - 10  - Production logos
              Pan of street                         - Audio bridge of banging on the door
              Close up of door - fist knocking on the door comes into frame
20 - 30 - Pan down to letter box
               Open and shot through the letter box
                See feet  hanging across the room               - Music change = Tense
30 - 40 - Zoom in through letter box
               Cut to the rope + knot
40 - 50 - Pan down to head + shoulders - clearly been hung
               Flash + cut to 'flashback' - burnt toast
               Flash + cut to body - feet
50 - 60 - Flash + cut to match on action - mothers wake
               Flash + cut to close up - back
60 - 70 - Flash + cut to empty house with him in
               Flash + cut to close up - neck
70 - 80 - Flash + cut to party - key scence drugs
               Flash + cut to mouth
80 - 90 - Flash + cut to dealer and protagonist
               Flash + cut to side of face
90 - 100 - Flash + cut to pinned against the wall
                 Flash + cut to blood drips
100 - 110 - Flash + cut to black eye
                   Flash + cut to close up of eyes
110 - 120 - Eyes Open
                   Cut to sitting up in bed.              - heavy breathing - signifying nightmare
                   Fade to film title.

General Codes & Conventions of Film Openings [DRAFT]

As a homework task, each member of the class had to create a powerpoint on a film opening from the noughties. Without any persific genre set, this was a good chance to make notes on general codes and conventions of film openings.

Marley&Me [David Frankel] [2008]

• 40 second company credits - animation and white text on black background (20th cent. fox, Regency)
• Voice over from centeral protagonist
• Links sound and action - makes you th ink the person on screen is him.
• Change in diegetic sound 
• Frame paused when protagonist jumps over the fence (exposition that this is the person who voice is being heard.)
• Exposition through voiceover
• Interesting framing - through the door
• Another character introduced - mise en scene (wedding day)
• Stereotypes - American married couple
• Rated PG   but includes adult themes
• Typical rom-com but also covers social issues such as death

 Napoleon Dynamite [Jared Hess] [2004]

•  2.40 mins of opening credits - paramount, MTV Films and other titles including actors and directors
• Non diegetic music signifies comedy
• Heavily stylised and creative
• When it does get into the film, not much happens in further minute - exposition of centeral protagonist - geeky -> hair, glasses and clothes.

Where The Heart Is  [Matt Williams] [2000]

• based on a novel
• Romance + drama genre - hybrid genre
• Audience = American teens.
• Appeals to working class
• 20th Cent. Fox 
• Audio bridge - dripping sound from car signifies important object/social status of people
• Exposition through dialouge
• Accent and mise en scene links to stereotypical texas characters
• Goes against general convention of first onscreen character being central protagonist.
• Pregnant woman - loses male gaze
• Titles appear after 2 minutes.
• No signifers of romance genre in opening 

Hot Fuzz [Edgar Wright] [2007]

• 30 second production titles - Universal + Working Title + Studio Canal
• First scene very long shot - Establishing shot - Police office
• Quick cuts -> fast paced signifying his skills
• Mise en scene -> verisimilitude 
• Voice over (exposition) + diegetic and non digetic sound. ('Goody Two Shoes' song from the 80's which signifies the target audience age.)
• Preffered reading of genre - action with comedy twist
• Quick established equilibrium - central protagonist being a hard working police man
• Ending on disequilibrium - being moved location to small village.
• Good representation of the police force
• Binary opposition between rural and urban 

Anchor Man [Adam McKay] [2004]

• Company logo - Dreamworks - Apatow > text on black - documentary style
• Exposition through voice over -> very vague about time and date, but specifies location - San Diego - and exposition about the character
• Ron Burgundy - Central protagonist. Propps archetypes theory -> the Hero - "the balls" "legend of.."
• Comedy genre
• Exposition through mise en scene -> News room
• Older audience -> 70's songs and time period
• But also attracts younger audience with silly humour 

• High social class -> Scotch, ring, suits. "He wore suits that makes Sinatra look like a hobo" - inter textual references signifies older audience to get preferred reading

Donnie Darko [Richard Kelly] [2001]

• Production comanies : New Market, Flower Films Productions + Pandora
• Genre - Hybrid genre, Drama, Mystery, Sci-fi Thriller, Cult film
• Audio bridge -> Thunderstorm over text into opening shot - signifies horror, connoting possible darkness of the film
• Thunderstorm contrasts with the opening shot where there is no storm
• Camera pans scenery along with non digetic sound of tense, slow music.
• Protagonist turns to face screen, laughing. -> signifies a weird theme to the film
• Music from the 80's could suggest time period. -> "The Killing Moon" by echo and the bunny man - connote horror film
• Halloween party sign provides exposition to the date and signify a horror linked into the holiday.
• Generally tracking Donnie - significance to being central protagonist
• Anchorage to mysterious film with message on the fridge - "where is Donnie?"

Second Podcast

Our second podcast - explaining our initial basic plotline.

Genre Research - Psychological Thriller

Psychological Thriller
- Sub Genre of Thriller, in which some aspects contrast against the codes and conventions of thrillers.

Codes and Conventions of Psychological  Thrillers

• Claustrophobic spaces
• Dark lighting - Dark to light contrast
• Foreshadowing
• Quick Paced Cuts
• Dramatic non digetic music 
• Aspects of Propps theory - Hero + Helper
• Ignites audiences mind
• Focus on both plot and character. (Thriller tends to focus just on plot.)
• Older characters -> Older audience (who seek more than just slasher horror.)

Research from [Wiki ] and from own research by watching films.

Themes surrounding the genre

• Reality
• Perceptions
• Mind
• Existence/purpose
• Identity
• Death 

 

Mini Microdrama

To learn and practise Propps theory of the 7 main archetypes, we created this production with characters which represent each.



We extracted and deleted all sound, as some parts there was too much background noise. Instead we replaced with subtitles giving some exposition. However with the lower web quality, it is hard to make out what these say.

Podcast

This is our first podcast, just to basically explain where we are at right now.





Hopefully next time I won't have a sore throat!

Initial Pitch

My original idea for the opening two minutes of the film, which I presented to the class in hope that someone would like my idea and we work together and create a project.

My idea was to do the ending of the film, at the begining. I like films that opening with the ending, as it can allow the director to be more creative in the opening, as they don't have to explain the story as that is done later, and it can contain a dis-equilibrium which is a more exciting part to the film.

The genre in which this is typically used is psychological thrillers, or occasionally horrors. I have found other examples which are crime/drama. Films in which fit this non-linear structure are often created to  make the audience think about the story line and the characters, rather than it being an easy watching movie.
Here are some films where the opening is the ending:

• Memento [2000] [IMDB] 
• Carlito's Way [1993] [IMDB] 
• Severance [2006] [IMDB] 
• Trainspotting [1996] [IMDB] 
• Bandits [2001] [IMDB]  
• Pulp Fiction [1994] [IMDB] 
• Slumdog Millionaire  [2008] [IMDB] 

So for my pitch, I described my main idea for the opening two minutes, of a non linear film. The opening scene would be of someone banging on a door, and then the camera pans down to the letter box. The person opens it, and looks through. - The audience never sees the person who is looking through the door, which creates narrative enigma, encouraging them to carry on watching the film to find out who that person is.

As the camera looks through the letter box, there are a pair of feet hanging. A zoom through the letter box, to symbolise the camera going into the house and leaving the person behind the door. A quick cut to a rope tied to a pipe on the ceiling, which signifies a person being hung. A quick flash effect and change scene to something that has happened in the past. A series of flashbacks then take place, which are all short, and leave somethings to the audiences imagination, which then makes them want to keep watching to find out. The final scene of the opening would be back to the persons body who is hanging, and a close up on his eyes, which then open, and it cuts to him suddenly awakening in bed.

The main audience for this would be 15-25 as my central protagonist would be male, around the age of 18, and it will deal with issues commonly associated with teenagers, such as school, relationships, drugs and alcohol. With issues such as these, he BBFC could be an 18, depending on how detailed I go into it, otherwise if there was only brief mentioning of drugs and alcohol it could be rated as a 15, providing there is no glamourisation of drug use.