Production Log Week 11

This week we have finished all the treatment ideas and audience analysis and we have got our plan all ready and setup for our recording sand filming when we go out in January we also have started working on our location reccie so and we have written in specific detail about the location and its significance in our opening sequence in our BSR film. We have also written our shooting script for our opening sequence and have written directly what happens in each scene and explained what sounds that can be heard during the scene, the shots were also specified and even what angle and what the actor’s names are. We have also done our production schedule and this became an issue as we had to find a right time for the actors for our opening sequence to be available for filming and make sure what role they have to be playing and we have to explain what story is and how they affect it.

 

Another issue that was also addressed during our planning was the time when was going to film and where such as 12pm or later and what exact location  we wanted to film at because we didn’t really want to have a very dark atmosphere but at the same time we didn’t want to have the scene to be bright as it would take away the dark horrible feel of the opening sequence and also which day we are going to film as Friday is the best day for us as we have the weekend so we have more time to spend on the production, and we have the most available people during that time zone so it’s the most efficient way for us to film which is an essential part for us as it would be the most productive and useful  period.

Production Log Week 10

This week we finished off our treatment for our BSR film idea and story such as the narrative and we went into detail of how the opening sequence would play out and what will happen within i.e. suggested what things we would like to do if we had the budget and support of a film that film four would have and things we wanted was more advanced equipment such as DSLR cameras and audio aswell. What we also did this week was get primary research for our idea by asking people questions about our idea and story of our film in the style of Vox pop questions. We had to ask people 5 questions that would give us feedback about our film such as 'what is your opinion on this' and other questions that directly influence our film.

After the results and data we collected from all the questions we asked people, we took the main ideas and this helped influence the develop the ideas for our film such as the actors, when we asked people about the idea of slavery within our film they all thought about slavery in the past and not modern so one idea that we are avoiding is having any Black protagonist to avoid any relation to historic slavery as its a serious topic and we want to combat it and help improve depictions on it. We're not going to change the main story as well as most people think it was an interesting story that the film is based on and think its good as it helps people understand what happens in the world and it increases its publicity while its never touched at all and it needs to be addressed to help resolve the people in real life that are going through these tough experiences in life.Another thing is the style of the film such as the colour of the film, and we have taken this into account and what we have decided is that we are going to have a grey and dull colour platte to give typical life look but also to denote depression and sadness to the film.We also will have slow paced shots but also fast ones during the chase segment to give tension to the audience and give that affect of the smash mouth opening.

Production Schedule

Cast List

Location List

Call Sheets

Location Reccie

Shooting Script

Qualitative Data Analysis

Production Log Week 9

This week we have started developing the narrative for our film and creating the basic ideas for our film to be based upon, we have learn types of narrative structures that past films have and the techniques they use to accomplish them. A lot of films in the industry especially Hollywood films use and omniscient narrative structure which is when a character within a film doesn’t know what’s going to happen such as ( a man walking by the corner and they don’t know he’s there)but the audience knows. This is the narrative style were going to be using in our BSR film, for instance in our opening sequence of our film there will be a moment where our protagonist is hiding from the slave owners but he doesn’t know where they are but the audience will know and this creates a sense of tension and dramatic conflict between the characters and it helps makes the audience feel for the protagonist as he’s being hunted by slave owners and the audience doesn’t know the result but they can see it coming closer.

 

Within my treatment we used this for our opening sequence and some things were changed it best suit it and the content within the whole treatment was decided between me and my partner and we discussed which options were best to help the most interesting and deep story of a BSR film based upon modern slavery. Some choices such as the ethnicity were changed to flip the portrayed stereotype of black people being the slaves and instead we will have an Asian actor play as the abused protagonist to show how slavery isn’t just one specific group of people but many aswell. We also changed the title of the film to denote a less obvious meaning to our film and instead we decided to give a more in-depth detailed meaning.

 

Production Log Week 8

For our film we have developed a lot of things to help produce a concept for our BSR filmsuch as the media and past students work. There was influences that helped develop our idea of our film such as the media portraying Brexit and how it can influence the Uk so what we decided to do was take this topic and emphasis it further to a point where it literally causes tension and problems all around the Uk and all of these issues would just escalate to a point where people are targeted for their traits views and features. The reason why I’m working with partner I’m in a group with is because he has very good views and description of the story that we want to portray and he can describe it in a lot of detail and this is essential for our story narrative and overall story production. He is also works well and we help put forward ideas that we want forward and this is a good sense of team work and dedication to help make our final version of our BSR film as the best as it can be

 

When the groups were picked to create the BSR films that we were set I saw no issues that can cause a serious issue and problems that we had to overcome but as the work increased we did have issues that we encounter such as story plot clashes and we would both disagree on certain things as we both visually portrayed them in a different way. For instance the antagonist in our opening sequence was going to do a lot more violent things but at the end we decided to remove a lot of them as it would become too violent based for realism for our story ,but we kept some to an extent to denote how horrible people’s lives can get.

Production Log Week 7

This week were researched many things that would help develop our idea of our film but we have encountered many issues that have hindered our progression of our film in many ways that we eventually got around improvising or finding a solution. We had to link the current media to our idea of slavery and one of the only ways we could somehow make them relate is through Brexit, for instance we did this by looking at modern slavery in the Uk and linked it to Brexit by our story mentioning how slaver has increased of Brexit because of the extreme uproar of racism from the vote and this has gone to a horrific rate. This is one reason why our slave owners abuse Jummani because of his rate and how easy he is to take advantage of and abuse his traits. The real issue was how to put it together which took time and thought to develop our idea into a more solid definition and this took trail and error of attempts of making a story more relatable to audience because of the current trend in the media

 

The decisions we took were for the better as we originally wanted to involve trump to the media to help kick start this racism trend in our film but since it’s the US election it didn’t really work and we really couldn’t find a way to incorporate this into our opening sequence which is why Brexit was the better option to choose as it was more relatable to our story and characters and would have a major impact to the country while the US election would have a direct impact to the people in the UK. Another idea that we explored and decided to follow through with is mental illness and how it becomes an actual problem and you’ll see how it is a problem in our opening sequence as the slave owners appear to be deranged and emotionless towards Jummani an have no respect to him what’s so ever.

Meet My Audience

Data Presentation

Production Log Week 6

What I have learnt about opening sequences is that there are many various things that are needed to make one work and feel and work to a standard which gives an effect to the audience. An opening sequence must contain many variables such as and intuitional logo and maybe even the parent company if there is one such as Marvel studios. Another thing that must be included in the opening sequence is in the logos there are also themes and genres that can be established for instance when Disney makes a film, their brand and logo have theme of the film such as star wars. The opening sequence must consist of credits that shown the people that were involved in the making of the film such as the director and production teams and screenplay. The title of the film also comes early in the credits to show the audience what the film is called and from the style of the graphics and film also denote the theme.

 

This will impact my production as our film ‘Backwards’ will have a dark and dull opening sequence which will have our title open up and with all the people involved and we will include sound bridges to link our institution logo to our film so it all relates and links together well. Our film will also have a smash mouth opening to engage the audience right away and give an interesting start to our film instead of a slow boring opening that would make the audience lose interest. We will use mise-ene-scene to help create the best realism as possible. The music would also be non-diegetic as it wouldn’t play during a chase scene of our opening sequence. The methods we will use is super imposed graphics that appear on the screen when the chase is taking place we will use sounds bridges especially at the beginning where the logos appear. We will use different angles and camera language to show different ways of filming.

Vox Pop Questions

What is your opinion of films that depict peole in Britian living a harsh life suffering from poverty and drugs?

Our film, is based around slavery and abuse simular in terms of 12 years a slave what is your view on this?

Our main protagonist is male that has had poor education and is abused for these traits, is this an interesting story in your opinion?

Does having viloence help solidify the theme of suffering in our film?

Would there be any things you would like to change in our film?

BSR Treatment

BSR Treatment

Narrative

In our BSR film is based on real life stories and events that have happened which is all revolves around Slavery and racism within the Uk. In our depiction of Slavery we will be focusing on one man who has many problems dealing with the society of the UK and how he tries to adapt but can’t. The man protagonist of the film who is called Jumaani, is a refugee who has left his country for the intentions of having a better life and hopes to aspire and get an education and live and help integrate into the Society of the UK. Since our main character has troubled upbringing being that he has suffered from poverty and many other problems he is an easy target making him become a Prime target by Two Slave owners who notice him by his foreign use of Clothes and speaking making him a victim. In the opening sequence of the film, there will be a scene of Jumaani Eventually planning his escape from the Slave owners after years of punishment and labor, while he is making his dramatic escape he is hunted down and caught by the slave owners and is beaten till be is unconscious, During most of the opening sequence  it is a linear Omniscient narrative as the audience can see where the slave owners are while Jumaani is hiding and he can’t see them, I specifically choose this scene to give a intense and suspenseful feel as the audience are waiting for Jumaani to be caught and worry for him giving a sense of connection to the characters which is a huge investment that we will make to our story. During the main course of the film Jumaani will go through many encounters and brutal punishments/labor tasks set by the slave owners in poor working environments and he plans his final attempt at an escape plan which takes place a majority of the whole film until he does escape but the slave owners were awaiting his escape at the escape location where they batter him so much but it mostly happens off screen to give an effect of tension, scared and terrified imagery for the audience as they won’t see the final results and it’s all up to the audience to create that image, but I will incorporate as much of the conventions that are listed above in the main film into the opening sequence as much as I can, but also not too much that it ruins the story or reveals too much. 

  

In our opening sequence of the film, it will revolve around Jumaani running and escaping from the slave owners and this is a smash mouth opening which will help engage the audience into a dramatic and terrifying setting, which helps set up the genres and feel of the movie. Jumaani would be running down alley ways and underpasses such as the Brewery in Romford and it would be set during dusk so its not too dark but not to light as it helps give a gloomy atmosphere and sets up the genre and themes even more, during this the slave owners will be on a direct pursuit with him trying to chase him and track him down as they claim to own him and make him do all the work they want him to do. While all of this is going on a news reporter or radio will make an appearance with diegetic sound as everything is real-time and the reporter will be mentioning about the current status of Brexit and many other controversial articles which all relate to the racism and discrimination theme of the film. There will be tracking shots and very quick shots edited together to give a dramatic pace to the opening sequence and gives an insight of the dramatic horror and the courage Jumaani will take to leave and escape the terror of Slavery. During this whole chase lots of enigmas will be created as the audience won’t know Jumaani is or why he is being chased and who. This will establish the main characters of our film and depict and image of how they interact with other members of the community helps flesh out their background. Eventually Jumaani will get to hide from the Slave owners and a tension suspenseful event takes place as they are looking for him and Jumaani doesn’t know where they are and this all supports the linear omniscient narrative as I’ve already mentioned. Then he is beaten and the theme of violence is denoted and this helps flesh out the brutal but also realistic nature of  a BSR film and this is directly denoted in the Selfish Giant when Arbor is about to get his hand cut off but Kitten. 

Technology

For our BSR film we will use standard equipment that has been given to use by the school such as the standard camera, which comes with a tripod and a 8gb SD card. The camera allows us to record the particular scenes and shots we want which is all saved onto the SD Card which can be accessed later on during the post-production. On the camera there is a play back feature allowing us to watch back on the footage that we have just recorded allowing us to evaluate on it and decide to either reshoot that particular scene over again. The tripod allows us to have smooth consistent shots such as pans and tilts which is better than handheld. It would be a benefit if we could use other equipment during our production of our film such as a mic boom or a DSLR camera as it would increase sound and visual quality of our film. The mic boom would also allow for more dynamic effect as the microphone would be attached on top of it allowing for more concentrated and focused sounds such as footsteps instead of it being built inside the camera. A filter for the microphone would also be very useful as it can filter out any unnecessary sounds such as background noise traffic and maybe even ambient doors in the background.

The DSLR cameras that we would like to use

 

The Microphone filter to help clear up any unnecessary sounds

 

The Microphone boom to help stabilize the microphone and provide better quality sounds as there are less vibrations

 

Conventions

During our film we will have many conventions that will relate and help build up a specific theme and genre for our film. For instance we will follow the typical conventions in a BSR film such as the lighting and colour Platte that they use such as the Selfish Giant use a dull grey colour Platte which helps set up and build that dark gloomy atmosphere that the film is situated around. Another thing is that we will use natural lightning throughout our film to give a sense of realism and Verisimilitude for the audience. This is because in most big Hollywood films they use artificial lighting in rooms which help enhance the lighting and feel of the setting which isn’t realistic, that’s why we are going for this style and also because we don’t have the required equipment to do so. Another convention to help us link to our chosen genre that is the BSR is that the locations deeply affect a way the film is portrayed and how characters and themes are presented and depicted for instance we will film in an underpass that is denoted below instead of a fancy skyscraper such as the shard as it will not fit with the theme of depression/slavery and deprived while an alleyway or an underpass can easily fit into this theme as it is a dark creepy area where gangs and aggressive people are known to hangout around which is also a sterotype.one reason why we chose to film in this location is that we have access to film there instead of a higher status building as the Shard and it is easier to film there too. You just wouldn’t see a person held as a slave be in a pristine build modern skyscraper as it would be unrealistic and it can immediately eradicate the verisimilitude of the audience.

Typical flat blocks that are used in BSR films

Next we will include empty but simple sets and props for our characters to use and interact with. This will help simulate that basic but desperate feel of the people savaging for items or things to help them survive the harsh reality of life, We will do this by our protagonist scavenge for items that he will need to help him escape from his slave owners. Another convention that we will use to include into our opening sequence is the use of untrained actors that have no experience or little to any experience at all. This is because one we don’t have the budget to do a film with highly trained actors and we it also gives a feel and sense of realism and a gives a better depiction or emotional and even more natural. Another convention that we would use to enhance our BSR opening would be the use of editing, we would use basic editing techniques and fairly quick but also long duration of shots that would take place usually around 5 seconds long which would show the street and local area that is being denoted. The reason why we would use slow shots is that it helps give the audience an understanding of what is going on and its not to fast like Hollywood films so that the audience has no clue what is going on and it also gives a more realistic sense while sci-fi films have very fast crazy camera angles where we really wouldn't see that in normal life making it very unrealistic and even fantasy as its so unreal. We would use a decent amount of mid shots and close ups to help depict the characters facial expressions that are denoted and it helps link the audience to the character and understand the situation that they are going through.

The alley way we are planning to film at

We would also include the use of SFX to help give the dynamic use of sound throughout the opening sequence such as the running and chase scene that we are planning to depict as our main protagonist who suffers from slavery is being hunted down by two horrific slave owners the sounds could be breathing and even a non diegetic music playing in the background to help solidify the tension that were are trying to portray in the opening sequence. This can be created by the use of Foley sounds or even on scene sounds, if the sounds are recorded on the set the better it is as it is true and the most realistic as the sound is literally coming from the object that you see on screen but this cant always be achieved and there are alternate ways of solving this issue. Using non diegetic sounds such as maybe a sounds track wouldn't be used that much at all apart from maybe the opening sequence as the film is trying its best to be as realistic as possible then soundtrack wouldn't play in real life so we are also addressing this as well.

Style & Iconography

For our BSR film opening we would use the best appropriate shots to help reveal and create establishing shots to set up the themes and genre of our film and it would help set up the whole setting of the film aswell. With the panning shots and tracking shots of characters and the environment it would denote basic housing and buildings that look the same and it would get repetitive as everything would look the same and this would signify the typical life of the characters and the typical life’s of people in real life, such as they work and struggle for a long time for most of their lives trying to scavenge resources to try and help themselves survive. For the tracking it, would show over the should shots and follow the main characters around and this would show their relevance in the film but also denote their daily lives as they go around walking around their local area and this could reveal all other things that are related to them.

Adulthood

In our opening sequence there will be non-diegetic music playing out throughout the segment, there will also be diegetic noises such as ambience that will give that realistic sound to the film and there may be some Foley sound effects added to help boost up or add sounds that cannot be heard by noise cancellation or disruption by other sounds, but these sounds need to be realistic sounding and not cartoony as it would ruin the whole atmosphere of the film. The song that would be used would have no lyrics as it doesn’t fit the whole genre of the film. This would also help improve the verisimilitude of the whole film.

The costumes of our characters  of our film would also help build up and create the style of our film, for instance the characters would have worn and dirty used clothes to signify the poverty between the characters and this can denote how desperate they are and how much they want to get out of it. Another way is from the accessories the characters would carry around for instance the slave owners would carry bats to denote violence and aggression and even the superiority and dominance of the characters. Even their names can signify their role and status in society such as shortened names which sounds very slang and this would fit with their dialect as most deprived people would have poor education and would suffer with poor language skills and their names can suggest this.

This can be denoted in our opening sequence by the protagonist having poor communication to speak to other people and also his clothes would be all worn out and used and the slave owners would beat him up with bats and other props that would help represent the style of our film. We would also use colour to help enhance the visuals of our film such as a dull grey and even browns as well to help sterilise the gritty gloomy nature of a BSR film, this will help denote themes and the typical working life of characters within the film. In the film Adulthood and even many other BSR films they use a wide range of techniques that distinguish their films but they all have the same sort of colour mood within them, that dull grey brown colour Platte and the typical dark orange street lights at night give that feel of a normal urban neighborhood where nothing special happens and everything is predictable

Title

The title of our movie is called backward, this connotes many deeper meanings and an obvious main theme in the movie. The title firstly denotes to the viewer that this will be a much darker movie that may not be positive as backward often comes with the removal of something such as the viewing experience they might have being a sadder film/ending than usual.

This title also connotes that the movie may be over a dwelling of the past from the words backwards something often connoted is the past, the past being the beginning of the movie could be what is dwelled upon from the beginning of the movie right to the end of it. It could also denote its ending being unsatisfactory for the viewer and the Protagonist being so dark with mainly bad things happening. The title is also very simplistic as it has the simple meaning of little progress especially backwards as all the progress that is made for the slave to escape in the beginning is thwarted and later on in the movie he escapes again but this time he loses his main beliefs and becomes morally ambiguous to the audience like they are meeting a new person after all the progress to good that is made throughout the film which like the title suggests is the Protagonist moving backwards similarly especially the part where the protagonist comes out the worst from the ordeal.

 

Institution

The production company in our brief is Film 4 Productions, this has had little impact on out film as we were even before researching our production company were going for this gritty British social realism film, being a subsidiary of the much bigger Channel 4 with many other major divisions including their own,
"The parent company Channel Four owns many other television channels for exhibiting television shows and movies (including ones from Film Four Productions), these include most notably, the main channel, Channel 4, 4seven, Film4, E4, More4 and many others including the most popular music television channels such as 4Music, The Box and Kiss through acquisition of The Box Plus Network. The company also owns a few internet services including the ones to accompany their own television channels and in the past have owned a radio service that was eventually closed down to focus more effort onto their existing television services.
There are advantages for the success of Film Four Productions films by being owned by Channel 4 as it is much easier for the company to do all three of producing, distributing and exhibiting films as all three can be done through the parent company as all three are owned by Channel 4 this makes it much easier and faster for Film Four Productions to produce one of their 20 films a year. Most importantly, however, as all companies owned by Channel 4 are working towards one similar universal goal it is much easier for the production company to reach its own goal with the combined help of other companies under the same parent company of Channel 4."

Film Four Productions

The above is a quote from my Film Four Productions research where I went into much more detail and research about the larger scale of the relationship between Channel 4 and Film Four Productions where in short I had found out that most of the subsidiaries of Channel 4 ticked all according boxes for Production, Distribution and Exhibiting, its many channels being for Exhibiting and our production company that we are working under, Film Four Productions being a Production company such as in the title and distribution being its own distribution company Film Four distribution, this is where physical copies of the movies are made.


However, the production company itself has not restricted any of our creative decisions for our movies as Film Four itself goes for these creative ‘artistic’ movies and our movie alone was also very small scale based upon this hidden underground world explained further in the narrative section.

The distribution of our film may also be done online through streaming and various other larger scale paid movie sites which pay to keep the movie on their own streaming service than others, in other words there is a lot of competition, between the streaming sites therefore as there is no monopoly on these sites it would be a good decision to put up the movie there, another similar option is to let the movie stay with Channel 4 to let it stay on 4OD to stay on their own streaming site, as the movie was made through the parent company a good deal may be also made for the movie.

Before exhibiting it through these streaming sites, it should first be given to cinemas for viewing on, ‘the big screen’ so that the film is much more appreciated, the movie may not even go to a major cinema such as VUE or Cineworld as the movie may turn out to be too small to be exhibited there or other bigger films may be chosen over it, in that case we may be able to show it in a smaller movie theatre or only show it at film festivals for people who really like the art of films, we could exhibit such a movie in a festival such as the BFI film festival where the film, ‘The Selfish Giant’ was exhibited at first and as it is on a similar scale and theme to our own film we could use this as a template to follow for our own film.
 

Representation 

The key characters in my film are the Protagonist and the Antagonist notably throughout the film we should get this omniscient view of both characters almost as if the movie is exploring two different lives. One of the main themes in the film being social class clashes, evidently in our two main characters they are the forefront of this social class clash which subverts to the themes of the higher class being in control of the lower, in this case on a much greater scale through the theme of slavery, and that the lower class are easily taken advantage of.

The antagonist in our film is nicknamed ‘the master’ getting this nickname by being the slave master of so many underground and secret slaves, although he does have a real name which is not mentioned in the film his relentless sadistic nature which is explored from outset of the film helps him establish this nickname not only to the characters within the diegetic world but to the audience of the film as well, the outset of the film shows him killing a person showing what a dangerous person he is, also if further analysis is done by the viewer they may start to understand that his operation is so big, it would make no sense to come out and potentially risk some security over one escaped slave. This could be to set an example or because he genuinely enjoys fatally hurting people but this is left up to the interpretation of the viewer. Many themes can be shown of this character from the smash mouth opening alone, including, this sense of violence and the enjoyment and disregard the antagonist has of it, a possible mental health issue due to this sadistic tone he has and the sarcastic outlook he has on it.

The protagonist of our film is named, 'Jummani' this is only revealed a quarter of the way into the film, making him seem very morally ambiguous and just in general a hard to understand person as so little is known about him moving through the film until a certain point, however, these uncertainties help the build up to the climax of the ending of the film.

The characters will mainly conform to society the main examples being mental handicapping and disability being most likely to be preyed on in the film for being a slave such as in real life.

Target Audience

The target audience of our movie is 16-24 year olds similarly our movie consists mainly of the same target audiences age as slaves are more productive and useful to the antagonist of the film being younger and also the antagonist has this young evil mastermind feel towards his character to suit him towards this role as typically a stereotype is that these sorts of people are much younger

Our target is very broad as although the audience includes older school children it may also include much more experienced and working young adults around the 24 year old range as if leaving school at 16 that gives the audience at least 8 years in the real world e.g. looking for work and such, what this may mean for some is that they may want to find an escape which is not commonly found in these movies although these movies are darker and sad this could be to lift the viewer above the darker world of the movie, also the age group usually are more active and less easily entertained and more often than not look for this fast paced action, to appeal to this need from the offset of the movie there is this fast paced feel especially through this smash mouth opening.

My target audience should be quite 'technology savvy' as commonly perceived by older people the younger generation are quite skilled with technology being a bigger and bigger part of modern day life in this newer generation, linking to the exhibiting of the movie itself it would be safe to exhibit on streaming sites as this younger generation usually has experience with such sites and it should be fine to exhibit the movie here, my target audience looks through many movies on this site and to preview a movie usually watches the first two minutes, the smash mouth opening could much more easily draw them into this movie targeting this group in particular, instead of them skipping the movie in boredom.

The target audience usually consists of many classes so similarly I will try to keep the slaves class ambiguous throughout the whole film so that all social classes could feel like they could relate to this character who was forcefully enslaved. Similarly, the target audience consists of both genders to appeal to this as much as I can I have left the main characters to be adapted from the narrative gender wise in the terms of the gender that plays them, I feel that this way when both genders that a character could be considered it will appeal more to both gender groups than usual.

BSR Narrative and Story

Narrative

The opening sequence starts off with a slave who is unnamed at this moment in time to keep this sense of his unimportance in comparison to the grander scheme of events that is going on around him but we later find out he is called Jumaani, and the slave master. The slave is running after just escaping from his captors around his leg is a beeping device which we find out is a police house arrest device. The actual scene starts off on a black screen with some casting and the background noise of this beeping noise soon after this heavy breathing is added to the scene and then footsteps when the on screen film starts to play we see here the unnamed slave running away from his captors. The protagonist gets into a close encounter with one of his captors whilst escaping as an irrelevant minor antagonist walks through the tunnel the protagonist hides on the side of the wall covering his mouth with his hand to mask his heavy breathing. He also tries to muffle out the sound of the house arrest tag with his clothing. The captor continues past the tunnel not spotting the protagonist, until the protagonist accidentally slips revealing the beeping much more clearly.

At this point the opening sequence becomes clearly omniscient (where the viewer has more knowledge about what's going on as they've seen more than certain characters) we see our first shot of the menacing antagonist here we can see him playing with some sort of weapon, the shots are exchanged back and forth between the captor chasing the protagonist and the protagonist alone running and also the antagonist testing his weapon, the time between each exchange of shots gets smaller and smaller until the antagonist and protagonist meet.

The antagonist swings his weapon at the protagonists’ leg breaking this beeping of the house arrest alarm and forces the protagonist to be planted onto his back.

After some exchange of dialogue between the antagonist and protagonist we find out that he was not the only one to have escaped, someone close to the protagonist has been caught, this person is brought out and revealed to the viewer, we also find out the nickname of the slave master, being shortened to, 'The Master' for both the purposes of his roles and to intimidate all others around him.

The antagonist asks three of his thugs to hold down the protagonist and they beat him to the floor, the shot is cut to a shot of the antagonist aiming for the face to Jumaani’s sibling and the shot is cut to the antagonist asking someone to record this whole ordeal.

Both the audiences camera and the camera within the diegesis is now locked onto the protagonist's face, the antagonist asks his thugs to force his eyes open so he can see what is happening to this person of importance of the protagonist. The camera still locked onto the protagonists face shoes his face in despair. The master jokes and says 'Why stop there?' off camera as the camera is still locked onto the protagonist who forces himself out of the hold of the Masters thugs and then the Master continues to destroy the jaw of the protagonists’ sibling off camera off camera we can hear the antagonist sadistically joking about Jumaani’s sibling’s jaw falling off.

Conflict and Complication

The conflict and complication of this film comes before the movie starts so that we are thrown straight into the action of the movie being a smash mouth opening, it is however the Masters slavery regime and how it is run, obviously with slavery there is obviously a complication of the slaves wanting to be freed but there is further conflict with the brutality of the Master against anyone who objects him.

Elaboration

Through the film we see the many ways the Master has this ‘hold’ over his slaves and how he has this much bigger world under his hand that the Protagonist could see before the beginning of the film after trying to escape, this escape led the Antagonist to see that Jumaani is indeed talented and should not really be wasted away on one of the masters factory floors and warehouses. Jumaani reluctantly after agreeing to join the Master as one of his hit-men, though more restricted, sees this bigger world of the master and sees this world that the average person cannot see of abuse and slavery under working with the master his moral compass after meeting one of his targets is realigned and helps this fight against the Master.

An important note is that the same moral compass is shifted again by climax of the film where he shows no mercy to the family of the Master.

The narrative after the opening sequence.

After the opening sequence we see the Protagonists eyes linger onto the pool of blood on the floor and he has a bag put on his head, the Master asks how this happened and is explained to by the thugs, the Master is very surprised by the ways he escaped and got into a van and continued to have him being escorted back to this mysterious supposedly abandoned storage facility. The Master takes off the sack from the protagonists head and explains through dialogue that he's been taken to the Masters most brutal facility but he will not be working as a slave for a very long time it's at this point we understand that things for him are not going back to normal. We see the backlash of the protagonist's actions and he is tortured through a montage (the month over a period of months, each time a month to a week passes we see his hopes and aspirations of anything slowly die overtime as he is being tortured around this one room, we see scenes where he is dying of thirst and scenes where he is almost being frozen to death being constantly watered down.

The montage almost starts to slow down when 'the Master' comes in from another room before checking a notification on his phone to check on 'Jumaani' and jokes around with the weekend slave, the Master says he forgot all about him, but the audience through the omniscient view knows it is all planned. The Master now properly understanding these new capabilities of Jumaani, the Master now has a higher purpose for him than being one of his average slaves.

We are taken on a tour of The Masters storage facility, which looks much more like a production line in a factory than anything more commonly associated with slavery. The Master goes around the factory almost maliciously pushing Jumaani around with him collecting a few pieces from each of the sections of the factory very slowly and dramatically as we see the larger, 'empire' that the Master has and all the people that he has forced under his thumb with all of the house arrest tags on their legs.

He pushes him onto the table and tapes him down, he starts to put together a device using all of the parts that he has together he starts to form a gun and completes it with parts from the other factories he has, he gets a bullet out of his pocket slowly and loads one in the chamber, Jumaani barely even flinches as the Master cocks the gun, a cut happens and in this omniscient style we see some thugs bringing in a person unknown at this moment of time to the viewer, the Master moves to point the gun at him. He quickly moves the gun to the left and pulls the trigger a body falls onto him, so weakened he cannot move the body off of him. We see the Master talking but music outside of the diegesis drowns him out.

He is put back into the cell he is contained in and is left to think, the viewer follows his thoughts into a dream sequence. We see an empty room which seems to be carved out of dirt slowly fill up with supplies, we also see a group of people trying to escape but guards of this place shoot at their legs slowly taking them down and we see two people working with each other and a guard we find that this person from the beginning is his step-brother and that they share a deep connection, the guard being a rival gang informant and the other being related to Jumaani. However, this dream sequence is cut short when we see both of them being killed together the same way they were killed by the Master.

We are bought to a room with a two-shot of the main characters Jumaani and the Master here coming to an agreement to work together, Jumaani reluctantly agrees to go with the masters plan of being one of his hit-men with nobody left in Jumaani’s life to help his conscience he feels there's no way out of the masters trap than working his way out like everyone else.

The master reveals his master plan to be the only source of high military grade weaponry and to storm London with gangs under his thumb, he admits that inevitably this will end in the death of thousands on both hands from his own gangs, the police and civilians but he explains by the time this has all been resolved he would be far away from all of the trouble and would have pinned it all on one of his slaves.
Agents of change

Here the weak and personality of Klaus throughout the movie helps the protagonist see himself in a much better light, although Klaus is overall a weaker person than Jumaani he is very smart, however, this smartness is also Klaus’ downfall seeing as when Jumaani and Klaus first meet, Klaus feels that the only way that he would even be able to survive against the like of the slave master is to keep hidden for as long as he could being an immigrant with no documentation had left him helpless, now Klaus is trying to just survive against our protagonist. Jumaani is this beacon of hope that Klaus follows and that Jumaani accepts furthering this hope that they can escape the grasp of their slave master.

Over some time we see Jumaani start to fit in to his new situation working under the person who killed two of the most important people in his life, this continues over a portion of the film where we see him take down two people, we understand that people who even begin to escape the masters grasp are very talented and skilful. On one of hit-man objectives he meets a peculiar person who says he can help Jumaani not just escape the Master but take him down as well.

We explore Klaus' base where he built the supplies to hide away from both the Master and his many mercenaries, we find out that Jumaani is one of the first people to ever find him since he escaped, although he has had many close calls in the past we meet another person who shares the name Klaus but goes under the name Kay he seems to be disabled but is very talented when it comes to computing; people like Kay are optimal to become slaves under the Master's command.

As the movie progresses we see Jumaani and Klaus working together to best the Master. The Master as always in this movie was one step ahead, the Master explains he found someone when he followed Jumaani out one day, he brings out Kay, with the same weapon he uses to kill his step-brother he in one hit damages Kay, Kay is hurt and confused due to his disability, the Master continues to beat him until he becomes fatally injured. The Master laughs and mocks Jumaani.

The Master leaves the room he leaves his weapon behind perhaps as a sadistic reminder, however, there is a beeping on Kay's dead corpse, he checks the pockets of Kay we see a note that reads, 'I'm sorry' from Klaus, he had found a way to escape and found it too risky to bring Jumaani along, however, a room number is on the card, Jumaani knowing full well that things cannot get worse makes a dash for the room in anger and for motivation he picks up the Master's weapon.

Climax

The climax is typical of most other BSR films, with little resolution and almost no justice for any of the characters that is shown on screen, in fact in my own BSR film, the main character Jumaani, also loses some of his humanity having the same amount of care as the Master at the beginning of the film when he hurts the Masters son. The protagonist comes out of this the worst out of all the main characters, the Antagonist from the ending had presumably won and Klaus after one slightly heroic gesture goes back to his cowardly ways.

The room is packed out with everything Jumaani could need for escape, however, Jumaani needs more after all he endured, a file with information about the Master is also in this room, it defiantly has been tampered by Klaus so he could make sure that he escaped but Jumaani has seen enough to know where the Master lives.

We see a younger Jumaani from the opening escape from armed guards in fear, through many cuts back and forth from before the beginning of the film he escapes in a more forced and stronger way gunning his way through thugs form the skills he's gained as a hit-man through the film.

He eventually makes his way to the Masters house and meets one of his children who seems to be in their late teens, Jumaani questions his son asking he knows what his father does, Klaus stumbles in from another room presumably stealing schematics from the Master, Klaus runs and says sorry, Jumaani aims and misses Klaus with his gun.

Here is where all characters meet in a final standoff, Jumaani has the Masters son in a similar position to his own step-brother as the Master steps into his house in a rush after seeing Klaus leave he sees Jumaani destroy his sons jaw we see both scenes cutting back and forth from the beginning of the film and in the present and Jumaani proceeds to hurt him much more as the Master could only watch on the Master shoots and aims for Jumaani's head, Klaus in one heroic act saves Jumaani but he is still wounded in the stomach, on the news we see that the rest of the inner city is in panic with gunfire from all areas and we see that Jumaani is the one that is pinned for the blame. Klaus and the Master make their escape more concerned about authorities than each other and the movie ends.

CODA

In this movie there is no clear CODA, although the movie could continue past the events shown in film, the main points that the movie had tried to make have been made and there is no clear path for the movie to take beyond this point, also being a BSR it is very rare that these sorts of films actually see sequels, similarly to movies such as, ‘The Selfish Giant’ I wanted to keep the ending of the film open for the viewer to interpret it however they please a sequel or even a clear CODA could ruin the films darker tone which has been built throughout the whole film and give viewers a false silver lining which goes against this theme of helplessness throughout the film.

Production Log Week 5

This week I have learnt a lot things to help me with coming up with ideas for the narrative for my film, Me and my partner have decide to create a story about Slavery and racism for our BSR film, this is a good choice especially in the developed countries which exposes the weaker infrastructure of a country and helps give a reality to our film instead of a Hollywood route that consist of glamor and glory. Our film also has a direct connection to the current events that are taking place within the media. It’s also a genre and style very rarely used in the developed countries in the modern day and age.

What makes this an issue is that it is hard to come up with an original idea that is very creative and un generic and this is one of the main concerns when making a story, One way that we used to help me and my partner was looking at real based events that have taken place and this will influence our development of our final opening sequence. There were many decisions that we have taken place to help our story and narrative. We had to have no flash backs during the opening sequence because too much of the story would be revealed making it worthless movie if that is the case.

We have to stick to the rules and guideline of our film such as the style and feel of the film and make sure it fits a BSR film, it also can’t be over complicated as the audience won’t enjoy the film as they have any understanding of what is going on during the film. We have also used past students works to help create a guideline for where our outcome should be similar to. Another issue I had to address is that we have to create the whole story and not just the opening sequence and make sure how much is in the opening sequence and if it’s too much or too little it can cause a problem for the whole narrative.

 

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-38070411

Conventions Of An Opening sequence

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Creating Iedas For Our BSR

The violence in teenagers is a very common place in British social realism films but often we don't see the world through the eyes of the killer or murderer, however, the killer may have much more going on than the audience knows, we rarely see a killers perspective even when we do it is usually after they have been reformed and know right from wrong or they were forced into the situation.

Combining this with the idea of mental illness could paint a much more creative and three dimensional, story for the viewer and these ethics are questioned in much more detail than before, for example, is it right for someone with such a mental illness to not have another chance at life after prison. This could also be played other ways as well for example a built mental illness after a forced murder, fantasizing about the things you could have done to prevent this could lead some sort of mental illness, especially with mental illnesses being such a common place nowadays with 1 in 4 people suffering with such a condition nowadays.

Real Life Inspiration 2-

From the image of the Metro newspaper below it denotes a front cover with pictures and text all about the US election and Donald Trumps win, and that there is racist protests in America, this was very similar to Brexit. For my BSR film the ideas I may have is a that In England there's lots of protests about the Brexit and the US election which causes a huge uproar in Racism which would be one of our themes, especially about the conflicting views of Donald Trumps polices against Muslims. This can cause a split between communities within the film and racism gets out of hand and people start fighting each other which is violence, which also is a theme that could be in our film, social classes can also be affected making people be represented in a bad way and be segregated.

 [Add postsecret image here]

Here we can see a post secret card of the US election With very aggressive remarks and this could be used for Racism and aggression to other races as Trump has made very rude racist remarks towards racists as denoted is a supporter of Trump and this can link to the social class clashes and it can also be linked to the Brexit as well.

Real Life Inspriation 3-

Conventions of Institutional Credits

Conventions of Institutional Credits

http://www.artofthetitle.com/title/an-education/

Denoted on the opening sequence of the film called 'An Education' is a bunch of graphics that show the names and roles of a bunch of people that were including in the making and development of the film such as the directors and production teams. At the beginning we can clearly see that the distributor is BBC films and it was produced by Finola Dwyer productions and wildgaze films productions. The location of the film is set in the Uk and in a school were a girl does really well in school and wants to go to Cambridge and she falls in love with a Older sophisticated older man ,which makes her parents very disappointed.From what we can see in the opening sequence is a bunch of random segments of scenes of rooms with education such as science rooms and math's rooms giving a sense of high class environment and it the film is set in past around the 2000s you can see this as this is denoted in the opening sequence through the various equipment the students and teachers are using throughout it such as the blackboards and old fashioned looking books and even the entire environment looks dated with the old polished wooden oak flooring. Another thing that gives away the setting of the film is the clothing of the students and teachers they look very formally dressed from the era of the 1960's which helps give the immersion of the whole set. The props such as the book I just referred to also give the opening sequence a old feel such as the old fashioned looking flour packaging that was used at the food rooms and also the man powered whisk that was used this shows the lack of modern technology and sets the film in a previous time.


Denoted here is a screenshot of the BBC institutional logo,and first of all we can clearly see its distributed by the BBC and so it will have some what of a major audience as the BBC is one of the worlds leading News channels. What this connotes is that the film will some what have a huge influence by them and this could be the budget so the film can have a more diverse emersion than other films because they can pay for more props and equipment to make the film even better.

Another denotation in here is the style of the graphics used here in this shot.We can clearly see the 'BBC Films presents' appear on the screen and after it appears the yo yo comes down and falls. What this can connote that the BBC films has a larger importance over anything else that is shown showing that they have the main priority throughout the opening sequence of the film. The yo yo can also symbolise what the film will have in terms of content and style since it looks like drawings on a chalk board we can immediately interpret that the film maybe set in the past because of this.

Denoted here is how basic the colours such as the black and white, this connotes a simplistic and basic style and it also can symbolize a smart intelligent environment as blackboards in films are usually associated with Math's and science based work. It is also very basic when compared to the rest of the opening sequence because the rest of it contain a bunch of crazy animations and things going all across the entire screen.



Denoted here is the typography of the text throughout the opening sequence. What is shown here is the name of various people that helped work on the film and any other things that they are being credited for as well.The text for the names are randomly placed on the screen and they change to different places when a name appears on the screen. The name 'Alfred Molina' appears on the bottom left of the screen which could connote an unorganized feel.

What else is also denoted is what the text looks like.The text looks like small white chalk that is used on chalk boards that I have stated above. The text appears to be in all capitals or in bold to maybe show a sign of significance or it could try to show the persons importance. The font of the text also appears to be fairly basic and firm which can connote a more realistic approach instead of fancy magical writing.

The final thing that is denoted is all the background animations that are happening. The things that are happening in the background such as the equations and symbols can all represent a school life and high class education system connoting that this isn't some basic education. Another thing why this could of been used is that it makes the entire opening less boring and more interesting for the viewer to watch. It could relate to what the students learn in the school and show what the subjects would've been like back then.