Michael's Evaluation

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

Thriller is a very well defined genre with many traits and conventions. There are many specific aspects for a film to be defined as a thriller film. Typically in a thriller film the cinematography consists of close-ups mixed with very fast editing. This increases the rhythm and pace of the film which is particularly important to Thriller films. It isn’t just what’s on-screen that matters for a thriller film, the sound of a thriller film adds to the tension and the drama. Misé en scene is also a big part of the thriller genre as it tries to convey the theme across to the audience, things such as low key lighting is used to add suspense and tension. Typically the characters in a thriller film consist of a vulnerable female and a criminal mastermind. These types of films however are usually thriller hybrids such as espionage thriller and crime.

Our film features many of the stereotypical traits that are associated with the thriller genre, featuring a mixture of classic and contemporary. Firstly, our film has a very classic ‘revenge’ based storyline however it has some modern twists. Our film consists of many techniques used within the thriller genre such as fast editing. The Location of a Thriller film is usually in an exotic area to add a bit of an enigma, this is because foreign locations make the audience suspicious as it is out of their comfort zone and puts them into the unknown. However when picking locations we didn’t have a wide variety of areas however we knew that we wanted realistic areas that are associated with everyday life, such as a park or school. Enigmas are very common in thriller films and our film also shows this as there are enigma’s presented to the audience, firstly the death, who is he? How?

However we didn’t completely stick to what we would normally associate with the thriller genre, for example a thriller film is usually set at night or in very dark areas with low key lighting, yet ours is filmed in broad daylight. Unlike conventional thrillers we didn’t have a score for a majority of our film and only had a bit near the end where the tension and suspense is needed to grab the audience. For our cast we again went against the conventions for a Thriller film, we had to use what was available, therefore we had a all male cast, however it wouldn’t make much of a difference as the typical thriller has a female victim, such as Alfred Hitchcock’s ‘psycho’. Yet in our film we do not see the victims face therefore a different cast wouldn’t have made a lot of difference. Our film would definitely be considered as a quintessentially a British film, simply because it has a gritty film generally considered to be part of British cinema. Our film is also a contemporary twist on a classic ‘revenge’ based storyline.

The film that we have made has been influenced by many films, particularly ‘the Dark Knight’. This film has heavily influenced our film as the hostage scene from ‘The Dark Knight’ is very similar to our hostage scene. Also the whole issue of direct consequences due to the decisions we make, this is a very prevalent theme within ‘The Dark Knight’ as well as our film. This is represented by the choices both our characters make and in ‘The Dark knight’ the choices can be shown by the flip of a coin deciding a person’s fate.

2. How does your media product represent particular social groups?

The way social groups are represented in films are very important, this is what leads to stereotypes that are often associated with the particular social group. Firstly, the main type of social group, men and women. Women are represented as very beautiful, weak and vulnerable characters within films that are very dependent on the male counter-parts. Men on the other hand are represented as very aggressive, handsome and strong.

There is also a representation of different age groups. The younger generation such as teenagers which are present in our film are meant to be seen as dangerous and volatile. Meanwhile elderly generations are represented as very weak, vulnerable and full of wisdom. Following on from teenagers we reach the representation of different ethnic groups. In many films we see Black people being represented as dangerous, Asians are generally seen as very dodgy and that Caucasians are rich middle-class. In our film we have played into the ethnic stereotypes as we have teenagers acting very unusually, one is a drug dealer, another has a gun. This adheres to the generally known stereotypes that have been associated with teenagers.

In our film an all male cast has been used with and our victim is quite a scrawny male, which isn’t very common within films. We could easily adhere to the thriller stereotype with a female victim however we are unable to see the victim as their head is covered and therefore it wouldn’t have added or taken anything away from the film. In order to maintain the classic thriller element of our opening sequence a masculine cast is useful as many of the male characters within thriller films are often well built and we have tried to adhere to this. Therefore in some ways we have abided by the classic thriller stereotypes with our drug dealer ‘Chris’ and have also challenged the way particular social groups are represented with a male victim as opposed to the typical vulnerable female.

3. What Kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?

Our Opening sequence to a Thriller film would be called an Independent, British film. This generally means that it is a low budget, amateur film. Which in our case is definitely true, there was little to no budget and none of our group had any experience whatsoever in film making or editing, other than the preliminary task we attempted just before. Our film was an attempt to make a realistic production as opposed to the typical Hollywood film that consists of a very big budget, this helps to fund a high profile cast and special effects, these are attempts to make the film seem realistic, however it often goes overboard and the films begin to look very unrealistic. Another thing that helped the realism of our film is that we used cameras with mini DV tape, this allowed a gritty realism to our film, rather than celluloid used in Hollywood films giving an enhanced and unrealistic looking film.

Unfortunately because our film is an independent opening sequence it is unlikely that our film would be picked up by mainstream media and therefore it will not be distributed via the mainstream cinema chains such as Vue, Odeon or Cineworld etc. This is due to a lack of funding, firstly this means that we are unable to get a high profile cast or Production Company, this leads to a lack of advertising that means we will be unable to attract a large audience to our film or have money to pay the cinema. Therefore it is more likely that our film would be shown in a local, independent cinema such as Waterman’s in Brentford or the Electric cinema in Notting hill. Another way that we would be able to distribute our film is through film festivals such as the London Independent Film Festival which started in 2004, or on a smaller scale a local film festival such as Portobello Film Festival. Unfortunately again due to the independent nature of our film and the high profile of the event, an attempt at the Cannes Film Festival or to a lesser extent the Sundance Film Festival would just be impractical.

Another way we would be able to distribute our opening sequence is through television. Some channels such as Channel 4 are a government owned public service broadcaster that are to create and to broadcast shows and films for a minority interest. This would then allow us to put forward our opening sequence in the hope that it might be shown for the viewers with the minority interest. Furthermore there is a chance of a local, community-based channel on cable or satellite which broadcasts user created content. This would allow us to have our opening sequence on television; however it will be broadcast to a very small audience.

Fortunately though there is a very good way to distribute our opening sequence, and that is through the internet. Video hosting sites such as YouTube and MySpace gain million of visitors per day. A very good thing about these sites is the social networking aspect to them; this allows a large number of viewers to be attracted to our opening sequence quickly, seemingly like a domino effect. On top of that some sites such as MySpace allows for profit to be made due to the option of downloading the product, which we are then able to charge for.

4. Who would be the audience for your media product?

The research that we had done for the audience of our clip we had decided that our opening sequence was going to be targeted at 16-25 year olds. This is because our cast is teenagers and therefore it isn‘t very likely to appeal to anyone over the age of 25. We would have liked to be able to aim for a 12/12A rating due to an increased possible audience, however the storyline involves many themes that are not suitable for those under the age of 15 and therefore the certificate our opening sequence would be given is 15.

There were a few concerns as we have violence in our film as well as ‘drug taking’ so it is off limits to young children which may affect the times it can be shown on a TV channel such as channel 4 as it would have to be shown after the watershed, to avoid a young audience. Even though we have no use of strong language or any sexual content what we have got warrants a 15 certificate and therefore we have tried to target an audience between the ages of 16-25.

5. How did you attract/address your audience?

We first looked at the British Board Of Film Classification regulations and after looking at what is required for a Thriller film and so we had an audience generally between the age of 16-25. To captivate the audience we decided to pick a relevant topic for our audience and the story line is based around drugs. That is when we settled on the idea that something goes wrong and a revenge story plays out.

For our audience to easily associate with the film we used a teenage cast, we also used a school as the setting which many people in their teenage years or early 20’s can easily relate to. On top of this the school as a location or as part of a storyline has lead to some very successful films and TV shows, a prime example of this is the American pie films.

After the 1^st draft of our film was viewed to say the audience feedback was negative would be an understatement. Our audience feedback consisted of about 15 members who told us what was good about our opening sequence, what was wrong with the film and how it can be improved. Our 1^st draft of the film wasn’t very good as there was a very out of place voice over, and the film wasn’t completely understandable. This extensive audience feedback was very negative, however in one respect it was very helpful as many of the flaws were pointed out and we were able to re-film, re-edit and improve our film as a whole. Another benefit from our audience feedback is that they were the age that our film was targeted at and they said that it was ‘very relevant’ or quite relevant’ as an audience. Our audience also picked up on a lack of diegetic noise in the background for some parts of our opening sequence; this was due to a voiceover meaning we had to cut all noise from our first clip. To solve this we went back to the location of filming and recorded diegetic noise of the area and edited them into our clip. We also had an issue with the score; our film lacks a score for the most part due to dialogue being used to get across the story of our opening sequence.

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

Throughout this project we have used many different technologies. Starting with the basics such as researching, through to filming and editing. Firstly research, for research we used the internet, sites such as Wikipedia and YouTube were vital to our assignment, we were able to get research for our blog, this made a very big difference as it was a quick process as opposed to doing it all without the use of the internet. On top of all of this it allowed us to download copyright free music and sound effects that we were able to add to our film to make it more engrossing and entertaining for our audience. Furthermore YouTube has allowed us to distribute our film to a vast number of people free of charge and allows us to get more audience feedback.

Also for our project in particular non-linear editing software was needed, for this we used ‘iMovie HD’. Due to being non-linear editing software we were able to film our opening sequence in any order rather than inconveniently film it in a chronological order. ‘iMovie HD’ therefore saved us a significant amount of time as we were able to easily align our sequence in order even though it was filmed in a completely different order. Furthermore iMovie HD also allowed us to redraft, delete and change parts of our film very easily.

To film our opening sequence we used DV cameras and DV tape. The DV tape allowed for more realistic lighting and look. This allowed our film to look a lot more realistic and have a gritty feel to it. As opposed to the Hollywood counterpart celluloid, enhancing colours and in general giving a less realistic look to the product. Unfortunately there were some downsides to the recording technology, our cameras had internal microphones that weren’t very powerful, we didn’t have access to and external microphone and therefore voice recording was very hard, this resulted in voiceover, which takes away from the realism of our film. This was very unfortunate as our opening sequence needs dialogue so the audience can fully understand what is going on even though we tried to keep the speech minimal, which detracts from our film.

7. Looking back on your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product?

We have progressed very far from our preliminary task in developing our final product. Firstly for our preliminary task we didn’t have much preparation, only a storyboard to work from. However for our full product we had researched what we were aiming to do, had a better understanding of what we wanted our final product to be. On top of this we had produced a more detailed storyboard, produced a script, a synopsis and a timescale for when we can get it done.

During our preliminary task we had encountered many issues. Firstly, the 180 degree rule, it is a very basic concept when you get to grips with it but we had little understanding at the time. Therefore we were unsure as to whether we were breaking it or not until editing. Another issues we had was overlapping and how specific it needs to be, how the smallest detail can detract from the realism. This meant that we were extremely careful when we were filming an overlapping scene for our final product. Every mistake we made in our preliminary task we were careful to try and avoid making the same mistake.

During our preliminary task everything seemed very new, we weren’t as technically able with the equipment. Since the preliminary task we have become more accustom to the hardware and software that we have been using and therefore we have been able to use them to the best of our ability. This allowed us to make the extra tweaks needed to make our final product a better product. Therefore I believe that we have vastly improved since making our preliminary task and that the improvements should be shown in the difference between the two tasks.