Storyboard

"The Godfather" Film Analysis by William Haines

Analysing the first 5 or so minutes of The Godfather (1972). The film starts off with a very slow opening title sequence. The first 20 seconds is dedicated to the Paramount logo. After that, it goes dark for an extended period of time, eventually soft music played on a brass instrument, possibly a trumpet or trombone. At around 48 seconds into the runtime of the movie, text appears saying "Paramount Pictures Presents" After it ends there is more darkness, than around about 57 seconds, the name of the movie 'The Godfather' accompanied by 'Maria Puzo' appears on the screen. Keep in mind that music still accompanies the title sequence. The text uses a fade transition, the text fades in and fades out away slowly.

The music, the slow pacing, long title sequence and long transitions join together to create a calm atmosphere.

Suddenly, a voice starts talking at around 1:17. It made me jump when I first heard it. Especially seeing as you don't know what to expect due to the long drawn out title sequence. Then about 2 seconds later. At around about 1:19. The man who is talking appears in the centre of the frame. He fades in slowly. Low key lighting lights up his face as well as High key lighting in some places. The light casts heavy and soft shadows. His eyes are in the shadow. The light has a warm feeling due to the orange-ish tint. His forehead is lit up with a fairly powerful light, while the lower portions of his face are dark. Perhaps his forehead is a defining feature of his character? Or perhaps the light is artificial and is concentrated downwards from an above light. It would make sense at to why the rest of the room is fairly dark.

The camera slowly moves away from the man, we can assume it was either a zoom or a literal pan. The man talks up until 2:49. At around 2:40 you can just about see a character to the left of the frame. The characters are talking over a table and the camera is placed behind the blurred out man, with this evidence we can assume it was definitely a zoom out and not a pan out. The new character is out of focus. A shallow depth of focus. At around 2:52 of the movie, a man hands the character that was talking a drink. He is off screen and only his arm his showed, which probably means that the third character is not important. At around about 3:46, the second characters name is revealed.

At around 4:05, a man comes in and whispers to Corleone. Then at 4:07 the face of the Mafia leader is shown. He doesn't seem very happy. This shots lasts until 4:17 before Corleone finally speaks again. Which leads to an awkward silence. For the rest of the 5th minute the film uses long shots, and for the last 30 seconds it only uses the same shot which is focused on Corleone. Like I said about the title sequence. The pacing is incredibly slow, shots last more than 10 seconds at least. Dialogue is slow, especially with the Mafia leader. Everything is calm, which is reinforced with the Mafia Leaders soft voice typical of a Mafia member.

Unlike our film, it doesn't contain any action at all, it is paced slowly and does not use jumpcuts.

Nikos Proposition Shot List

Post-production Questionnaire

Post-production Questionnaire

1.    What is your age?

12 – 14 [  ] 15 – 17 [  ] 18 – 21 [  ] 21 – 49 [  ] 50+ [  ]

 

2.    Briefly describe what you thought of our film? (Storyline, acting, editing etc.)

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3.    Based on your previous thoughts on the film what would you change if you could? (Leave blank if not applicable)

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4.    Would you pay to watch the film either in a cinema, on a disc, or online?

Yes [  ] No [  ]

 

5.    What genre do you think would be appropriate for our film?

Action [  ] Adventure [  ] Sci-fi [  ] Romance [  ] Comedy [  ] Other [  ]

If ‘Other’ please specify: ________________________

 

6.    Any further comments on any aspects of the film?

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Evaluation Question 7 by William Haines

At the start of the year we made a preliminary video to showcase our understanding of continuity and framing as well as simple techniques like shot-reverse-shot (S-R-S). I feel that we have learnt a lot from the preliminary, as well as developing those skills and learning new skills afterwards.  Our film sequence contains multiple S-R-S's to show emotion and reactions while the characters talk. Continuity is kept in quite a few scenes, our film was completely smooth, but it was too long and certain scenes were slow and boring, and didn't feel very intense, so we felt losing continuity in certain scenes and between shots for jump cuts to speed up action was a good choice.

We feel that we have gotten better at the editing process, I feel that I have cemented a strong grasp and understanding of editing. I have also gained a strong understanding of visual and special effects, which is something I haven't done before so it was a sharp learning curve. We also feel that we have gotten better at framing shots correctly and making use of the locations and lighting available to us. 

"Overall, we are very happy with the progress we have made, we feel that we have learnt a lot over the months."

Film Analysis by Daniel Robb

Evaluation Question 7 by Jamie Sykes

Evaluation Question 7 - Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product?

The preliminary exercise was an initial test to ensure we could meet the basic skills needed to be a filmmaker. Since the preliminary exercise, we have developed the techniques we use when filming scenes. We have diversified the types of shots we use in filming and attempt a multitude of more advanced techniques.

Our brief for the preliminary exercise was a continuity task where a character would open a door (match on action), walk across the room, sit opposite another character, and have a short conversation (shot-reverse-shot) all while the camera maintains the 180-degree rule.

As you can see from the photos below we met all the criteria and passed the preliminary exercise:

Having passed the preliminary exercise, we began work on our coursework project; to create a two-minute film opening sequence including the opening titles. The main take-away from the preliminary exercise was the importance of continuity in films and we ensured it was maintained throughout our two-minute opening sequence. The preliminary was also important as it taught us how to operate the technology we would have to use to create our opening sequence.

I would say, comparing the two side by side, we have vastly improved the quality of our work. We did not stay within parameters and instead experimented with different shots, such as the use of handheld shots and first person shots in our film. We have also learnt new editing techniques that create smooth and dynamic transitions between shots instead of the simple cuts used in the preliminary task:

Evaluation Question 7 by Daniel Robb

Evaluation question 7 by daniel robb from Daniel-Robb

Evaluation Question 6 by Daniel Robb

What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product? 

The key decisions we made about technology during the production processes were that Premiere Pro should be the primary editing software along with further adobe products for visual flair such as After Effects and Photoshop. Reasons for choosing these products involved the superior quality and greatly renowned reputation that embodies Adobe products in a creative atmosphere. During pre production our choices to use Microsoft PowerPoint and Word enabled us to tackle the stages of planning such as questionnaires and research into genres (displayed earlier in the blog) at an efficient level whilst retaining the element of professionalism. Furthermore, learning about using the blog as a potential portfolio of our product proved to be an enlightening experience and inviggorated the creative atmosphere for producing an improved final product.

Upon Production, we learned through repeated use about how to configure the appropriate settings for our DV cameras and utilising a tripod for mounting the camera proved to be a success when we managed to achieve our intended shots on location. 

The post production process quickly became the source of deciding whether our film would be perceived to the high standards we set. Learning about how to use Premiere Pro for editing and After Effects for visual flair e.g the muzzle flares was a highly engaging subject. The transitions and cuts were produced in Premiere Pro which were mostly successful due to the smooth nature they regained however the challenging aspects of this software principally derived from attempting to exclude the background noise on certain shots and incorporate an effective zoom in shot upon the head explosion effect. Furthermore, After Effects was used in order to recreate the muzzle flares on the guns and conclude with an aesthetically pleasing title sequence. Unfortunately, the title sequence was produced in a minimal amount of time therefore unable to be finished with the addition of some of my personal favourite effects including optical flares and volumetric lighting. However, despite the exclusion of these, the title sequence proved to be effective in developing the theme of grandeur in our end product. 

Overall, I've learnt how to edit and recreate a well refined film using the Adobe suite of products and various other tools for production practices reinforced by the DV camera and tripod- establishing a deeper sense of gratitude for film making and its intricacy's regarding technologies used to construct a final product. 

Evaluation Question 5 by Daniel Robb

Evaluation question 5 by Daniel Robb from Daniel-Robb

Evaluation Question 4 by Daniel Robb

Who would be the audience for your media product?

The target audience for our film would have predominantly consisted of young men aged between 15-30 years of age. This is mainly due to the typical demographic of most other films within our action genre reaching this audience in the most abundance. The urge to witness competitiveness is present within the evolution of this audience as films involving violence and crime excite the belief of an illusion of power or control which has developed into the human nature over vast periods of time therefore we used various methods to reveal the exact type of people that would watch our film.

Printing out a pre-production questionnaire (uploaded previously to our blog) helped reveal this demographic as we used it to determine what sort of themes and actions we would take to develop a film that catered towards their desires. Although, the overall resolution was that our chosen genre of action indeed gained the most popularity.

Understanding the target audience was of the utmost importance to develop a film that would succeed upon distribution regarding figures and interests of our chosen demographic.

Evaluation Question 3 by Daniel Robb

What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why? 

Personally, I proposed that using Sony as the conglomerate to fund our production of the full film would have proved to be the most useful choice due to the large budgets and wide distribution elements including marketing techniques. If Sony backed our film, we would have had an immense capability to introduce higher quality resolutions regarding the cameras and locations more fitting to incorporate the overarching tone of a criminal underworld. However it is true to argue that our creative process may have been limited by certain censors constructed through the global mass market that Sony attempt to have withdrawn from any claims for overly offensive material or misconstrued use of certain legalities issued by the laws of the countries our film may have been distributed to.  Spectre (Dir. Mendes, 2015) was produced by Sony and received a $245 million budget for representing the storyline similar in many aspects to our own involving crime and violence amongst an action genre. We may have had the potential to market our film using YouTube trailers and posters distributed globally to attract a large audience and amassed profitable gains at the box office if we delivered using Sony as a production company. However, they could also be admitted alongside any of the 'big six' including Universal who we ultimately decided may have been the best choice due to the 'Fast and Furious' franchise engaging our target audience the most.

Alternatively, our film would have most arguably the best chance of a realistic success using an independent company such as Warp films.

Despite the ideal of realism, an independent company such as Warp films may possibly deliver a much lower budget and therefore the marketing campaigns would have been far less successful as previous films e.g. '71 (Dir. Demange, 2014) which received an unsuccessful box office gross of $3.2 million when provided a budget of £8.1 million. As a result, this exemplifies our film to potentially become the same in the box office which would not be how we intended for our film to grasp the widest audience possible and retain a top flight response at the box office.

Evaluation question 2 by Daniel Robb

How does your media product represent particular social groups?

Our film represented particular social groups using themes inspired from a typical gang culture. The protagonists, Johnny Demarco and Nikolai Kamarov were designed to portray the stereotype of gangsters and therefore develop a greater immersion into the realism of our action crime genre. Furthermore, the dark coloured clothing reinforced this stereotype due to addressing how the protagonists mindsets would have been, lusting for power and adopting the criminal contrast with brightness being the least intended purpose so as to blend in and evade detection.

The cinematography of our film involved many low angle shots conveying the power of certain individuals, Lukas (portrayed above) provides a prime aspect of the overall gang culture we aspired to attain. The white walls juxtapose with the characters black jumper and gold cross to purport to the atmosphere of tension due to the differences releasing the tone of power against all odds. In addition, the absence of women and children plays a major role in conforming to the stereotype of the drug underworld being a place that is often highlighted as without innocence therefore we ensured that they were represented through their absence as symbols of peace and nurture which does not incorporate into the development of our film. If we were to eliminate the chaos they would have probably been considered as an inclusion however the anchor point of our story primarily resided amongst the upset of control to heighten anxiety and engage the audience more effectively.

It could be argued that using the gun was an integral feature of our product effectively representing the criminality of the protagonists, especially Nikolai- the individual designed to drive the mechanism of maintaining control of the deal providing a desired conclusion of success.

Most importantly, the sound of hip hop beats and a high tempo musical score ensured that we further conformed to the gang culture stereotype as this music is consistently popular when regarding the dangerous characters due to messages of violence and drugs often illuminated within the music produced. Originally, we had the desire to instill this theme using '65 Hunnid' by Vince Staples however copyright strikes were considered therefore ultimately opting for a generic royalty free hip hop beat.

Evaluation Question 6 by William Haines

The best editing program by far is Adobe Premiere Pro. As a young teenager, I made gaming YouTube videos for others to watch, while I wasn’t successful on an ever growing and oversaturated web site, I gained valuable knowledge which I was able to pass on to others, and help to produce our film. However, even though I was using Premiere before studying at College, I still learnt a lot throughout the project, learning and consolidating my knowledge. I feel that technology is a big factor in the production of a film, various programs such as Adobe After Effects allow us to do stuff that you couldn’t do years ago where you had to use practical effects.

Technology played a massive part in our own film, as we had guns being shot in various scenes. Without the use of Adobe After Effects, the gun would not shoot, and it would look visually boring. I myself, wanted the gun to have a strong visual impact in the scene. I produced the effects for the gun shots, I made sure to emphasise the shot, which is unrealistic, but is what many films do to create a bigger and more ‘badass’ effect. I wanted the scene to pop. Bright muzzle flashes come out of the gun for one single frame followed by a great puff of smoke. The entire scene lights up, sometimes the scene only lights up in certain parts. Lighting up the environment.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WWHpmPjiX84

After I produced these, we inserted them into our film and added sound. Programs like Audacity helped us here, as we could change the sounds to sound better. Taking sounds from the internet and moulding them into something that fits our film better than the original content. Putting that little bit more effort in gives us a much better result. The sound of the gun shot really helps to emphasise the impact this might have on our two characters. Opening fire on officers of the law and various other people is a massive crime, so this establishes that they are committing more crimes then just drug dealing.

Of course, we learnt something with the practical technology too. Like learning how to use the DV Camera and the Tripod. How the legs can be moved, etc. We used flashlights to light up scenes, in the first shot, we used a flashlight placed under the camera, to bring more light into the scene. We had a second Tripod which Jamie owned. We used the to hold the flashlight still, so it didn’t move, and if we needed to stich two clips of the same exact shot together, they will both be relatively the same continuity and lighting wise.

Evaluation Question 5 by William Haines

I feel that we have reached our target audience, however we all feel that the age rating, in the real world, might be increased to a solid 18. Due to the strong implications of drugs and violence present throughout our film, including the frequent use of swearing.

When we were planning the production of our film, we made sure to include certain shots in the shotlist that might appeal, and add to the tension of a scene. Seeing as our film is of the Crime and Thriller genres, we made sure to include notes in our shotlist of how the shot moves, and how long it is before each shot. We wanted the action to be intense, so we inserted a lot of jump cuts in our shotlist.

AUDIENCE FEEDBACK TO BE COMPLETED ON RETURN

I feel that we could drastically improve in multiple ways. Some of the effects were rushed and felt cheesy. The zooming into the gun and zooming out of the gun (present in the first few shots as well as the last two shots) wasn’t exactly the best. Obviously acting could improve, but of course you don’t do Media to learn how to act. I felt that some scenes didn’t quite make sense. There was a role reversal at one point, where Demarco was leading Nikolai instead of the other way around. The running away from the garage is the highlight of this. I felt it was fine, as the situation is dire and they need to work together to escape, but after we filmed it all, I felt we should have changed that and had Nikolai being extremely assertive throughout.

Evaluation Question 4 by William Haines

Before we started the production aspect of making our film, such a filming and editing. We created a on paper questionnaires and got answers from a multitude of people. To cover a broad aspect of different personalities, likes and dislike; we gave the questionnaires to a bountiful amount of people. We then consolidated the answers into one document and uploaded it to Blogger.

The target audience is obviously those who like the genres Crime and Thriller and are of 15 or above years of age. While our film can be enjoyed by anyone, our film mostly appeals more to the male audience. Most females enjoy films with a romantic narrative, as well as the Romance and Fantasy genre.

The target audience is also those who enjoy a grittier take on film. Those who enjoy British Independent film might also enjoy our film, as British Film production companies tend to lean towards gritty reproductions of real issues and cases in Britain, films like ‘Borrowed Time’, ‘Eden Lake’, ‘Sean of the dead’ and ’28 Days Later’ all have a gloomy take on life.

Seeing as we already had a rough idea on what our film was going to be about, and had studied what locations and conventions we would need to follow for our type of narrative and genre, we barely used the information provided from the questionnaire. One key thing to note though, is that looking at what films the people questioned like (what genre) we knew that the age rating was roughly 15, as those questioned were of ages 16 and 17.

Evaluation Question 3 by William Haines

If it was possible to do, the best companies that could distribute and/or help produce our film would be the big six. The big six release high quality mainstream films year after year. Companies like ‘Disney’ and ‘Universal’ which release films like ‘Star Wars: The Force Awakens’ and ‘The Fast and Furious’. Both incredibly popular and profitable films. This shows that the big six are very familiar with the film business, and are good at what they do. Of course, that is in an idea world.

If we were making this project professionally, we would probably be an independent British Film Company, we most likely wouldn’t be able to have companies like ‘20^th Century’ distribute our film, only films with high budgets and predictable narratives that do well in American markets like the Romance genre, seen in independent British Films like ‘The Theory of Everything’ which was distributed by one of the big six (Produced by Working Title) do well consistently.

We would probably be in a similar situation to that of Warp Films, with low budgets they must resort to distributing the film themselves, often unsuccessfully.

In conclusion, the ideal company would by far be a company like Universal, who have had experience distributing similar films to that of ours. The ‘Fast and the Furious’ franchise is an example of the sort of films Universal distribute and produce. A company like ‘Disney’ would be less idea, as they have had less experience in the sort of narrative that our film is. They release mainly family friendly productions.

Evaluation Question 2 by William Haines

Our opening film sequence and our film. Represents certain social groups in a negative light. Within our film, we have a young male (Demarco) and an older male (Nikolai). Demarco, as a drug dealer and subsequently a criminal, he automatically has negative connotations. Drugs and crime are bad associations. We challenge stereotypes somewhat, as we have set up our characters as being intelligent. Which contrasts heavily with the typical conventions of a young drug dealer.

The gun helps establish negative connotations, as Demarco is seen as being violent. If you look closely, you will see that Demarco fires only two shots at the police, while Nikolai is trigger happy and fires many. This sets up Demarco as being less violent and aggressive. He only uses the gun when his life is threatened. Which is why he doesn’t wave it around during the drug deal, while characters like Lukas and Nikolai do.

We chose Jamie to play as Nikolai, not only because he wanted to be that role, we also all agreed that he’d fit that role. We felt he looked more assertive than let’s say, me or Daniel. He had a more assertive tone. Which is a big factor of Nikolai’s character. An assertive man who orders around a younger man and a drug buisness.

Mise en scene, in terms of Demarco’s clothing, hints at a roguish personality.

The locations further help to establish Demarco’s illegal/criminal actions (alleyways, back passage ways), which further help to push forward the impression that Demarco falls in line with typical lower social class conventions as well as age conventions.

Evaluation Question 1 by William Haines

The narrative of our film, sticks to the usual narrative seen in many other films. We did veer away from certain genre and narrative conventions, but it matches the typical formula quite well. You could compare it to films like “The Godfather” and “Pulp Fiction”, while also being able to compare it to TV series such as “The Sopranos”. All follow a crime related plot. And all have similar narratives. “Pulp Fiction” served as our main inspiration. The plot is essentially established within the opening sequence. The story also revolves around that key event. So, by establishing the storyline quickly as well as it being a key plot development which the film stems from helps to create an interesting narrative and story. It leaves you thinking throughout the film. The idea behind the film is that someone set up Niko and Demarco (Main characters), but they aren’t sure who. They assume it’s Lukas (The other drug dealer within the opening sequence). The sequence follows a circular and disjointed narrative as opposed to be linear. With flashbacks and flash forwards within the first 2 or so minutes. Screens which read ’30 minutes later’ and ’30 minutes earlier’ are used to signify and emphasise the jump in time.

The genres of our film are Crime and Thriller. With Thriller being the main one. The locations (Alleyways, garages, back passes) are all typical locations that you would see in a similar film with the same genre. This is because criminals want to do their crimes in secrecy in less public places. The colours are very monotone. Everything is quite dark and is set at night, there are a few oranges and blues. Oranges and blues are typical of action and thrillers. It is a favourite colour combination among many film makers. The clothing is typical of the genre, the ‘Demarco’ character wears quite rugged and unprofessional like clothing, which is something you might see in certain crime films (ones not depicting suit wearing Italian mafia of course). All this is typical of the narrative we have gone for and the genre/genres we have chosen.

Like in most action-packed films, the camera tends to not be on a tripod, especially for chase scenes, so our opening sequence and by extension our film plot, would call for a lot of hand held shots, with the camera moving erratically to increase tension. We tried doing it in our opening sequence, and we feel that incredibly fast movement just doesn’t work, as it is disorientating. We felt that slow but still quite fast movement was better. Following the characters but allowing the natural shaking of the camera from running with it just add to the tension. We didn’t purposely shake the camera while running, as we wanted a nice smooth-ish shot. At first, the first few shots where all joined up smoothly, continuity was constantly kept throughout and it was perfect, but we felt it was a bit too slow. Shots lasted for a while and thus wasn’t that exciting. We decided to use jump cuts from one scene to a next. This sped up the action tenfold, and therefore led to a more intense scene, which you might see fit into a professional film. The pacing was quite fast, apart from conversation scenes, especially the drug deal, which was nice and slow. We wanted it to be slow so that the characters seem methodical and intelligent. They use their brain before they speak, instead of letting their mouth do the talking. Which is what we wanted to emphasise. Slow pacing is what we needed to get that impression across to the viewer.

The music choice was incredibly important. We wanted the music to sound thuggish, something that a typical ‘gangster’ or crime oriented group might listen to. We wanted to establish that this was a crime film. Our original choice, which was Vince Staples ’65 Hunnid’ was unsuitable due to copyright complications. So, we went with another song instead.

Iconography, such as guns and drugs, really helps to establish a negative atmosphere, which is present in most crime oriented films. It also helps to establish a violent connotation. Guns and drugs are typical of crime films, with guns being typical of thriller films. A gun is present in pretty much all the various shots.

Evaluation Question 6 by Jamie Sykes

Evaluation Question 6 -  What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?

Because we made a film for our media product the primarily important piece of technology we used were the DV cameras. Because we were unfamiliar with the settings and capabilities of the camera we assisted one another with the learning process until we knew how to be achieving superior shots when we filmed.

In order to stabilise shots, we used a tripod. To safely operate the camera, we ensured we knew the correct way of setting up the tripod to reduce the chance of damage.

To turn our clips into a film we used an Adobe editing program known as Premiere Pro. To be able to fully utilise the power of this editing software, you must possess technical skills. We all developed our understanding of the program as we continued to edit our production. With an understanding of Premiere Pro we began involving other software in the production process to help create visual effects that immersed the audience. Photoshop and After Effects were both used to help create muzzle flares and animate them into our film. Finally, sound places a huge part in films and we used Audacity to equalise and mix sound so it would complement our production.

After reviewing our finished film multiple times I would say we were successful in the uses of new technology in the production of our film. 

Evaluation Question 5 by Jamie Sykes

Evaluation Question 5 by Jamie Sykes from J4mieSykes

Evaluation Question 4 by Jamie Sykes

Evaluation Question 4 - Who would be the audience for your media product?

The likely audience of our film would primarily consist of teenage to middle aged men. The audience would mainly be employed in some capacity and have discretionary income to spend on luxuries like going to the cinema, purchasing a DVD, or streaming online. The audiences interest in the film depends somewhat on their preferences in media consumption, specifically genre. Those who enjoy similar crime, action-thriller films will also enjoy our film.

To analyse the audience we should market our film towards, we carried out a pre-production questionnaire which is featured on our blog. It details specifics on our audience including age, gender, and media preferences. Following the basis of our research we composed a target audience profile which we included in our film treatments. The consensus was that action films were popular and people took interest in our film who would potentially pay to see it. These people fit our age range and were mostly employed.

It is important to understand the target audience in which you plan to market your film towards to maximise potential revenue, misunderstanding your demographic is one of the reasons some films don’t succeed.

Evaluation Question 3 by Jamie Sykes

Evaluation question 3 by Jamie Sykes from J4mieSykes

Evaluation Question 2 by Jamie Sykes

Evaluation Question 2 - How does your media product represent social groups?

Our film took inspiration from American gang culture for the representations of the two main protagonists, Nikolai and Johnny. The choices we made in many micro-elements were made to help portray the stereotypes more effectively. Initially both characters are from poor backgrounds and had to build their lives through a dark drug and crime underworld. In a full production of the film, Johnny would be approached by the authorities to help assist in the capturing of his known associate Nikolai Kamarov in return for a pardon against all outstanding charges in Demarco’s name. By subduing to the demands of authorities Demarco subverts the stereotypes associated with gang members. He is intimidated by people higher up the social hierarchy and resultantly forced into carrying out their demands.

As previously mentioned, the choice of micro-elements was specific to help insinuate the themes of the film. Both characters can be seen wearing hooded jumpers, jeans and coats which are all darkly coloured. This implies they dress practically for their occupations. In certain scenes such as the one pictured below of a dialogue exchange, lighting is effectively used to show the split personality of Nikolai, the dark half is his ruthless, tyrannical, and aggressive street persona juxtaposed by the light side insinuating his care and compassion for his associate and friend, Demarco.

One crucial choice of micro-element was the sound used, especially in the final clips. A hip-hop track called ’65 Hunnid’ by American rapper Vince Staples was originally intended for use, but due to copyright laws this was changed for a royalty free hip-hop beat. Hip-hop is commonly associated with gangs and violence and was a sure choice when evaluating what music should be used in our film as it is fitting to the stereotypes of the characters.

Evaluation Question 1 by Daniel Robb

In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products? 

An opening sequence has great significance at playing the introductory role of any film produced. This establishes the tones and themes that will resonate throughout the rest of the medium and enables the audience to the element of judgement depending on whether they would enjoy the film as a whole.

Action films are usually the most successful at encapsulating the largest audiences in the box office and it was therefore considered to be the most undisputed choice of genre for our product, if we had chosen to use any other genres then it would have been less likely to engage the widest audience for our film as they may not compare to the action phenomena present amongst this contemporary era.

Cinematography of the action genre typically portrays engaging and dramatic shots to increase tension or visual aesthetic. Using the above shot as an example, it is conveyed that the protagonist is overwhelmed by a great sense of urgency possibly sprouting from an unseen threat which conforms to the genre stereotype of the inevitable threat causing an upset in the balance of control and being the catalyst for the majority of the storylines resolution. We ensured that our shot types varied, resulting in deeper immersion and providing more entertainment value for a more positive reaction from the target audience. Regarding the mise en scene, our choice of the time being at night alludes to the stereotypical conventions of crimes occurring under these time constraints more so than daylight due to the cover of darkness being a great ally and the crime action genre would mostly incorporate this element e.g Narcos. Furthermore, the lighting has therefore much greater potential to summon drama due to the strong juxtaposition between the bright illuminations and darkness aiding a significant contrast therefore leading to the conventions that occurs most predominantly in this genre.

Considering continuity, we ensured that our primary goal was to keep this intact ensuring our film provided verisimilitude and a fast paced rhythm. In order to recreate the high tempo pace, I shortened the length of many clips in post production and stitched them in a method that continued the story however alluded to urgency, this was also coupled with a fast paced non diegetic soundtrack 'Run'.

Finishing the initial scene with large typography '30 minutes earlier' helped to establish the circular narrative of our film. Personally, I believe that this generates a uniqueness in terms of narrative of our film and potentially subverts the genre slightly due to linear storylines being the overarching norm upon most films of the action genre especially our sub genre of crime. Using a black and white colour scheme along with capitalised, blocked, text was necessary to understand the importance of the message of the text and eliminate any confusion from the target audience.

  

Evaluation Question 1 by Jamie Sykes

Evaluation Question 1 - In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

Action films are one of the most saturated genres in the media industry. The audience of action films are grittier then many other genres, they prefer being immediately immersed in complex action sequences with imminent danger. Slower opening sequences that rely on initial narrative to set the tone of the film are less successful then those that meet the requirements of the audience in terms of exciting visuals and sequences.

The title sequence is a crucial point in any film. If a production fails to meet the conventions and expectations of its genres audience in the initial few minutes of screen time, the production does not succeed to its full potential as they lose audience interest from the beginning. It was important to me when creating our film that the audience are thrown straight in to an action-packed sequence that slowly calms allowing narrative to take over, which results in elements of the story being revealed.

The entirety of our opening sequence included tense dialogue between characters, action scenes involving gun fights and violence and a sense of foreboding danger throughout creating anxiousness in the audience as the story plays out. A key part of our film was our non-linear narrative style which helps differentiate it from other action films following more linear structures. Events do not occur in the correct order, for example, the opening sequence which in the full film would actually be the climax of the plot where out protagonists carry out the drug deal.

Our genre and sub-genre were action and crime. I took a lot of inspiration from American gang culture and applied it to the settings and characters we had at our disposal and built from there. In order to create the gang and crime register we were aiming for, we made use of fast editing and fluid shot movements to maintain pace throughout the sequence as well as low angle shots to create a sense of power in characters in the appropriate shots.

Other elements used to help create a tone of gangs, action and violence were our choices of character outfits, guns, and music. Our outfits and props were based heavily on prior research into our genre and similar films such as Pulp Fiction and the Fast and Furious franchise. The music we used in our film was based primarily on hip-hop as part of the gang culture inspiration but also more traditional action movie music like the track ‘Run’, a fast-paced non-diegetic track used to build tension in scenes with little action.

'Narcos' Title sequence analysis by Daniel Robb

From the website www.artofthetitle.com, I'm studying the opening sequence of Narcos (2015).

Firstly, the opening shot immediately establishes the tone of the film as that of mysterious and dark by introducing elements such as the dark blue tint and low exposure lighting. Also the imagery of the recorder demonstrates a mysterious construct at play due to the connotations of espionage associated with the antiquity.

As the scene moves forward, the spilling of cocaine enters the frame as if exploding onto the background which immediately reinforces the criminal undertone by explicitly demonstrating the mechanism of future greed and aggression. Also, the close up shot effectively introduces the importance of the narcotic therefore drawing on the main hook point of the show.

Furthermore, a certain intensity is initiated concerning the implications of how the episodes will endeavour to dramatise the issue of drug abuse and dealership. As a result, the use of monochrome colours aids the black and white mentality relating to good and evil which also cleverly demonstrates a method of juxtaposition.

In direct contrast, orange tinted lighting introduces a metaphor for rose tinted glasses relating to the 80s era of how the world was seen in an optimistic lens furthermore the white barrier covering the eyes serves to reinforce this ideal by utilising their eyes as receptors of the ideal. However an alternative interpretation could be argued that the barriers act as the elimination of targets for the drug enforcement agency therefore alluding to the criminal undertone present amongst the atmosphere of Narcos. Furthermore the saturated colour scheme enables an essence of claustrophobia as it spills from the edges seemingly trapping the viewer into an already bustling environment.

Using the imagery of an unidentifiable soldier also relates to the criminal themes however it could be argued that the red bandana and cap help to conceal their identity therefore the mystery element is kept intact and a layer of uncertainty allows for a fear factor to be introduced.
Therefore, the following shots culminate into an effective method of encapsulating the criminal undertones and thematically relating to the tyranny of Pablo Escobar and associating itself with a correct alignment of how the TV show will play upon these themes.

Incorporating archived clips would also benefit in increasing the immersion as it effectively introduces the different element of realism that would be provided relating to the accuracy that Narcos will need as prerequisite due to its unconventional take upon releasing a genre that meets the middleground between documentary and action.

Finally, revealing the aerial shot of the city and a long shot of a burning car recapitulate the overarching themes of freedom and chaos that have the potential to be foreshadowed for the remaining episodes; driving the inevitable suspense into stimulation for audiences.

Niko's Proposition - Opening Sequence Treatment

Niko’s Proposition – Full Film Treatment

 

Niko’s Proposition – 2 Minute Sequence Treatment

 

Title: The title of the film is Niko’s Proposition.

Duration: Estimate 2 minutes to 3 minutes.

Audience:

Our film is aimed at 15 years to 50 year olds who have an interest in Action and Crime films. Stereotypically, males aged 15-50 may like this film as intense action is more associated with males, while romance is often associated with females. Similar films and tv-series such as The Sopranos, Pulpfiction and Narcos have a similar demographic; young males. The certificate rating of our film is a 15. This is because it has violence, bad language, references to drugs being taken and strong references to drugs being sold.

Distributer:

The most ideal distributor is a famous conglomerate, preferably a long time industry veteran so we know we can trust their decisions. If we were a professional film making company ourselves, and we do not own a distributing company (Not a conglomerate, having to resort to horizontal integration instead of vertical integration) it would be in our best interest to work with a professional distributing company so the product which we have spent ages making (and is of high quality) doesn’t go to waste.

Certificate:

The certificate of our film is a strong 15, of course various countries have different views on controversial topics, so even though they might keep it at a 15, we may need to censor our final product. And with the opening sequence of our film having strong references to drugs, the film may not be allowed to air in some countries. (Possibly bumped up to an 18)

Summary of the opening few minutes:

Demarco and Nikolai are running from the police, sirens scream in the background. Demarco and Nikolai, have been running for a while, so they resort to jogging down the alleyway. They are under the assumption that they have escaped. They talk for a while, then the scene changes to the title sequence with the title and various actors popping up over footage of everyday city life. The title sequence ends and transitions into the drug deal scene. Demarco is making a deal with Alexei and Lucas. After some time the deal is about to finish, but before it can finish the police show up. After an intense shootout Demarco escapes with Nikolai. They run away and have a conversation as they run.