Review of film openings

Harry Potter- Film opening
The film Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s stone is a fantasy adventure; this is represented well through the mise en scène of the opening reflects this genre well. Such as, as the scene opens with a mid shot of an owl amongst a very foggy dull-lit scene; sitting on the road sign listing where the main character lives and is set at night whilst it is very foggy and dark. An owl can be related to the fantasy style of wizardry, along with the weather conditions of at night time; this first opening scene is effective and relates well to the rest of the film.
The camera then pans out as it follows the owl flying off into a long shot off the dark misty road. A character then approaches closer from the distance; it then cuts to a mid shot of character as he walks behind something and the camera then focuses a mid shot onto a cat sitting; this shot is showing an important feature to the audience.
After this the camera cuts back to the first character, who is still walking up the quiet road whilst taking out an object from his pocket and then lifts the object up. A close up angle is used on the object as the character flicks it on, using a close up angle means the audience can see clearly what the character is doing and gets a better understanding of what is happening. At that moment it cuts to a long shot from over the shoulder of the character, showing from his perspective what is happening as he seems to take the light from the street lights and seemingly sucking it into his gadget. This unusual happening shows that the film is definitely a fantasy and through this duration the background music picks up-tempo emphasizing to the audience. As the character turns to the last street lamp, this would be the end of the opening as the scene carries on in the same setting.

Here is a link to a clip of the opening scene of the film- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5ooCiiPDU3w




Dear John- Film opening
The film Dear John’s genre is romance. At the beginning of the film the opening credits include the film’s production company screen gems, relativity media and temple hill. It opens on to an over the shoulder shot of the main character lying on the floor with a typical army uniform on, this shows the audience already where he is by recognising how he is dressed, this also includes a voice over of the main character the audience knows this as he speaks in first person. It then cuts to a mid shot showing more of the scene and his colleague picking up his limp body up as he appears injured. Then coins begin to rush across the scene as it cuts to a memory of the characters childhood, with a head shot of the characters facial expression portraying happiness. It then cuts to a series of extreme close ups that include the making of coins, this is detail that the director wanted the audience’s attention to be drawn to as may mean importance later on in the film. It then cuts back to the main character and a voice over of him saying a metaphor about the characters life in the army, and then finally a close up of the character as it fades to the credits.

Here is a link to a clip of the opening scene of the film- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CaC3-8iyUsI





Review of Melodrama genre film opening
The flood: who will save our children- Film opening
The flood is a Melodramatic film directed by Chris Thomson in 1993 based on true events. The opening scene to this film is very effective as a typical Melodramatic film it shows the characters at the happiest positive stage. The first clip is a long shot of the outside of the church as it shows lots of people standing around a bus, this allows the audience to see the setting and have a better understanding. It then cuts to shots of a parent hugging and talking to their child with the film title text across the screen. It also includes a short clip of a character filming with a camcorder, which helps the audience distinguish that the next shots are recorded from this characters point of view. It then cuts to another character whom is sitting and waving towards the camera as well as the shot including effects on the screen to look like it is recorded by the hand held camera, giving the audience a better understanding. The next couple of shots also include this effect as it records families laughing together hugging and kissing emphasising the feeling of close relatives and portrays to the audience the sense of happiness of love. The children then aboard the bus as they call through the windows goodbye to their families; this gives a clear message that a class of children are going on a type of trip and that they all have close loving families and this portrayed clearly to the audience.

 Here is a link to a clip of the opening scene of the film- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EMe4LYPvR2w

Film Genres

The genre of a film is the type of category the theme falls under. 

Action
Action film genre typically includes a series of challenges that require physical adventures, extended fights and frantic chases. It includes a character that will have to challenge against odds, which may involve life-threatening situations, an evil villain, and/or being pursued, with victory achieved at the end after difficult physical efforts and violence.  Explosions, fist fights, gunplay and car chases are all typical institutions of the action genre. Subgenres for action- action comedy, action horror, sci-fi action as well as others.
Examples of action genre- Die Hard, Jurassic Park, 48hours
Origins of action
During the 1920s and 1930s, action-based films were often adventure films in which Douglas Fairbanks wielded swords in period pieces or Westerns. In the 1970s, detective stories and urban crime dramas began to combine themselves with the new "action" style, which lead to others such as maverick police officer films, such as those defined by Bullitt in 1968.

Horror
Horror Films are unsettling films designed to frighten and panic, cause dread and alarm, and to invoke our hidden worst fears, often in a terrifying, shocking finale, while captivating and entertaining us at the same time in a emotionally stunning experience. Horror films effectively centre on the dark side of life, the forbidden, and strange and alarming events. They deal with our most primal nature and its fears: our nightmares, our vulnerability, our alienation, our dislikes, our terror of the unknown, our fear of death and dismemberment, or loss of identity. Subgenres of horror- Comedy horror, gothic horror, natural horror, science fiction horror.
Example of horror genre- Friday the thirteenth, Halloween, Nightmare on Elm Street
Origins of horror
Horror films go back as far as the onset of films themselves, over a 100 years ago. From our earliest days, we use our vivid imaginations to see ghosts in shadowy shapes, to be emotionally connected to the unknown and to fear things that are unlikely. One of the first origins of supernatural events appear in several of the silent short film created by the film pioneer Georges Méliès in the late 1890s; and since then has developed and evolved into the modern horror films.

Romance
Romance film can be defined as a genre wherein the plot revolves around the love between two main characters. This genre usually has a theme that explores an issue within love, including but not limited to: love at first sight, forbidden love, love triangles, and sacrificial love. The tone of Romance film can vary greatly. Whether the end is happy or tragic, Romance film aims to evoke strong emotions in the audience. Subgenres of romance- RomCom(Romance comedy), Romantic action, Romantic thriller.
Examples of Romance genre- Ghost, As good as it gets, Notting Hill
Origins of romance
Romantic movies have a long history which has started since 1890s. Even though silent films were majority in the earliest days, filmmakers described romance, desire and sex. Then romantic films described some painful love from 1920s to 1950s. After this period, a variety of unusual pairs appeared on the screen from 1960s to 1980s. Furthermore, unusual love has been often expressed in romantic films since 1990. There are several periods of romantic movies and each describes different types of love.

Melodrama
The term melodrama refers to a dramatic work that exaggerates plot and characters in order to appeal to the emotions. It may also refer to the genre which includes such works, or to language, behaviour, or events which resemble them. It is usually includes music that is slow or emphasizes the more emotion provoking situations that the character experiences allowing the audience to feel empathy.
Examples of Melodrama- Far from Heaven, Rain Man, Sling Blade, Ryan's Daughter, Breaking the Waves and many more.
Origins of Melodrama
Beginning in the 18th century, melodrama was a technique of combining spoken narrative with short pieces of accompanying music. The first full melodrama was Jean-Jacques Rousseau's Pygmalion, the text that was written in 1762 but was first staged in Lyon in 1770. English melodrama was really evolved from the tradition of populist drama established during the Middle Ages by mystery and morality plays, under influences from Italian media as well as German drama of the post-Revolutionary period.
Why we chose melodrama
For our film opening we decided to choose the genre Melodrama, the reasons for this decision was that we liked the feelings that it portrays to the audience and our group thought that this genre made us feel more captured to the storyline and provoke us to watch more. We also thought this would be an easy genre to portray in the opening. By including slow music to show drama that will emphasise the sad emotions, maybe showing a character grieving so that the viewer feels empathy and drawn into the film making them want to watch more.
Film inspiration from a Melodrama
After researching into Melodrama's and looking at films under that genre, we came across the film 'The Flood: Who will save our children'. This film we particularly liked due to many reasons. The first was that the opening was very effective as it was typically joyful with happy families bidding goodbye to their siblings and children, which we thought was very good foreshadowing (I reviewed this opening in more detail under 'Film opening reviews'). Also that the film was based on a true event, this we thought was very effective as the audience will be able to imagine the grief of the families as they know it actually happened. Also the loss of a child is very sad as they are still young and innocent this will also be very effective for the audience. Losing a family member is very common and due to this the audience will be able to relate to this, meaning they will get more emotionally attached not just to the characters but also the storyline. Although these are all typical occurrences in Melodrama as they are emotion provoking and dramatic, but we hope to reflect this greatly in the film opening. This way we are sure to grab our audience's attention and they will definitely want to see how the event affects the rest of the film. We want to include possibly a death in the opening and maybe the accident is by a natural phenomenon or something that is a common death. We would also want the characters to be young as this also will play on the viewer's emotions as they are perceived as being more helpless and young.

Spider diagrams- planning

This is a plan of the camera shot and angles that I will be using for the opening of my film, such a s close-ups and long shots. By using this way of brainstorming features with my classmates we were able to work together to think of a range of ideas that were related to the opening. From this we can develop these ideas into camera shots and what conventions to include in the scene. This is the begning of our planning and can now develop these ideas further.

A spider diagram showing a rough planning on the storyline for the film, information about the main characters that are in included in the film. These are ideas that me and my group brainstormed together to come up with a rough plan of the storyline for the film, deciding on the events and genre with vague ideas we can now use this plan to develop the ideas further,

Preliminary task

In class we created a short preliminary clip where we tested different camera shot/clips. This included change on action, shot reverse shot and not breaking the 180 degree rule. I found filming these clips very easy and the only difficult part was making sure the camera was still, apart from that it was fine. But editing the video together was slightly harder and we found that the clips didn't run as smoothly together as we thought and had to video more parts. We did this to fill the gaps so that each cut wasn't as noticeable and including more shots gives the viewer a better understanding of what is happening in the scene. Whilst filming we made sure that we followed the 180 degree rule, this was fairly easy as we just ensured that the filming was taken from one side at all times as if there was an invisible line. We also included match on action shots within our filming this was slightly tricky to include as we had to ensure that the character was moving from one cut to the next smoothly to make it appear more realistic and professional. Shot reverse shot was another technique we included, we did this by filming a short conversation between two characters then cutting from the opposite characters shoulder which gives the feel that you are in the conversation because of the camera angles.

If I was to do this task again we would have smoother editing by including more cuts within the scene making it clearer to the audience; especially at the ending so they are able to fully understand the scene. I would also improve the lighting throughout the scene particularly the part of one of the characters as it is too dark this can affect the audience's understanding of what is happening.

What I think went well for our preliminary clip was the match on action, as the movement of the character between the three different cuts was almost completely synchronised as she was running through the two doorways. Also when it comes to creating my final piece I know that I need to include more clips to make the scene flow better and I know how to use the editing software more due to the practice of editing when doing this task.

Institutions

An Institution covers a variety of things; a type of organisation, establishment, foundation or society that is devoted to the promotion of a particular cause or program. In Media an institution is a company that has a large range of connections in the different types of media that they own such as the internet, Films, Print(newspapers & magazines), Broadcast(tv & radio) or Music and be grouped together as one large institution.



The company Walt Disney is an Institution as it is a large business which has a broad variety of media that it owns but doesn't always represent. Such as all of the Walt Disney films including most merchandise related to the individual films. In broadcast they own disney channel, disney junior as well as including other television shows such as ESPN sports and abc which are still popular but with different audiences. Endless examples that are part of the Walt Disney institution that break the usual conventions.

 

Three types of shots

Shot reverse shot- This type of shot is used regularly during filming of a character such as during conversations between two characters; as one character speaks the camera would be on them and as the next character replies the camera angle will change and be on them. But the filming is smooth so that the cut isn't noticeable. This makes the scene more realistic as the audience views what is happening from different camera angles, getting a better understanding of what is happening. An example of shot reverse shot- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QLkUHZ1qips

Match on action- This type of camera shot is used when filming a clip and cutting from one position to a slightly different angle but fluently so it is hardly noticeable at all. This is usually to film a character that is moving, for example as a character enters a room and then cutting to the character walking into the room but being precise so that you can't see them stopping and it appears they are continuously walking.

180 degree rule- This is the rule that when filming you can never take a shot over 180 degrees so for example all that should be in a shot is in front of the camera and slightly to the sides but not behind.

Camera shots

Using a variety of camera shots during a short or long film makes them more interesting and can also portray more detail to the audience that they might not otherwise realise. A large variety of camera shots can be used within a scene, and each scene can vary the amount of cuts it includes. For example a scene that includes a variety of camera angles, but seems to only include one cut is the beach scene from the film Atonement; this technique allows the audience to see the whole scene givinf them a better understanding of the situation. Compared with the ending scene which is a contrast as it includes many camera shots and lots of cuts this is to help the audience visualise the context better as it uses visual shots to explain.

This is an example of extreme close up shot as you can
see the  camera angle is very close. I will use this angle as
this shot is used to portray detail to the audience, this may not
just be a close up shot of somebodies to exagerate the emotions;
but it can also be of an inaminate object something that
has importance so this way it shows it to the viewer clearly
but subtly and would only be a section of a persons face such
as their eyes.

This is an example of a close up shot, as shown in the
image this is similar to an extreme close up shot, but
instead it isn't as close. I can use this type of angle within
my film as it is a way of showing important details
or characters expression, but instead it is more subtle
and is able to include more in the frame such as
a characters whole face instead of just their mouth.




This is an example of a over the shoulder shot this is
mainly used during two characters conversing, but not
always are they speaking it could just be capturing the
facial expressions. I will try to include this type of angled
shot so that the audience, are able to see clearly the
conversation between two character, and give them a better
understanding of what is happening within the scene. It will
also give the viewer the feel of that they are in the scene due
to the positioning of the camera over a characters shoulder.



This is an example of two shot, this is a shot that
includes two characters within a frame. I will use this
angle as the audience will be able to see the two
characters clearly and see the two converse, seeing
the reactions of both actors giving the audience a
better understanding of scene and the two
characters relationship.







This is an example of a mid shot, this camera shot
includes the characters upper body and face. I will use
this angle whilst filming as it allows the audience to
see clearly what the character is doing and give them
a better understanding of what is happening within
the scene as well as the shot including the background,
so they can see the character interact with the
surroundings.



This is an example of a long shot, I will definitely
include this type angle  as it shows to the audience the
scene which gives them a better understanding of the
settings in which is it set. Without this the audience may
not be able to understand what the setting is and may
not understand what happens within the story.

This is an example of a wide shot, this includes the whole of a chacter and the surroundings. This angle will also be included as it captures particularly if the character is moving within the scene as it allows the audiecne to see clearly the character interact with the surroundings.



Why I chose AS Media

Ever since I was younger I've always enjoyed all things artistic; when asked what my favourite subject was I would of always replied art, and not just the basic sketching in art but everything that could be included within it from abstract sculptures to historic patterns seen in victorian portraits. Even when watching television I enjoyed seeing what was normally annoying adverts just to see how some companies display their product or try and attract the viewers attention especially when the advert may be comical but completely irrelevant to the product it still catches their attention. I remember using an old Sony Erricson phone at the age of 10 not for calls or text but just mainly to video my friends and pausing the filming at certain points to make it seem like they had disappeared or whatever my imagination could think of. At GCSE I chose to take a double Art Btec which helped me a lot as it broadened my knowledge and allowed me to explore the many areas of arts. But one area that wasn't developed was looking at performing arts or film making or things found in that sort of industry; the closest I came to using a computer for art was researching artists or editing a photo on photoshop. So for one of my A levels I decided to choose Media, even though media is not all about art I still like to learn about the more technology side. So that is why I have taken AS Media.