Tuesday 29 September 2009
Comparison between 'Somerstown' and 'Slumdog Millionaire'
In looking and researching British film we have been asked to research both 'Slumdog MIllionaire' and 'Somerstown', and research and compare the 'Britishness' of both films. 'Somerstown' is obvioulsly a much more blatent British film, it is a low budget Britsih film, but however has done very well. It is set and filmed in central London, and it represents the culture and socity of the time, it persifically represents the working class comunity. This is something which really emphasises it 'Britishness' as it is very common for British films to represent a certain social group ir culture in Britain, as we can see from other iconic British films such as 'Trainspotting' or 'This is England'. The film represent many fdifferent aspects of Britain and for that I think would be classed as a British film. The film has British actors and a British director - Shane Meadows who is a renoud British fim maker and a British writer Paul Fraser. I think the British influences on the film are very strong and generally it has a very british gritty feel, also a factor which makes it British. However the film is funded by Eurostar a non-British institution. This could be a factor which you argue make the film less British, however I think that the style and narrative of the film make it very typically British. 'Slumdog Millionaire' however is somewhat the opposite, it is funded by channel 4, a very typically British institution. But the stroy is originally written by an Indian author, and the book is set and about India. The story looks alot at Indian culture and the problems within India and has relation back to Britain. However the Director, like somerstown is a renound British director, who also directed 'Trainspotting' and '28 days later', so the style of the film may have British elements. Also the writer of the screenplay - Simon Beaufoy is a British writer and so the script may have British insluences in their. I think although the story is not actually about Britain and so in that respect it is not British, I think that becasue of the British input through the both the sirector the institution and the screenplay writer that there will still be also of British influence and when watching the film, like somerstown you really get a feel of the 'Britshness'
Wednesday 16 September 2009
Analysis of three articles
Representing Contemporarty Britain
This article explores ways in which British cinema represents various issues such as; sexuality, class ethnicity and gender. It looks at many different films giving examples of different ways things can be represented. Through this also it explores how films over the decades have influenced eachotherand are also influenced by society and the changes with in it. It also explores how within British cinema there is a big political influence, for example in the section on 'sexuality' it talks about how the representaion of homosexuality reflects the political and societies resposes to it. The article gives many examples of different films over the years and and within this shows trends and patterns of how films represent the different aspects of society. The article is not really criticle but rather observes how representation has changed and how and why.
Richard Curtis Article
This article explores film can represent the ideologies and values of a society. In particular the writer looks at Richard Curtis and his films and the representaion of Britain he beliefs Richard Curtis is trying to create - 'Curtisland'. Everthing written about Curtises films is related back to politics, for example it talks about how the optimisim within Curtises films reflect the mood of Britain at the time. It is criticle of the picture of Britain it claims Curts tries to create - "Britain was suddenly a witty self-deprecating place, a Doris Day film by the Thames in which it was forever Christmas". The article looks at this Richard Curtis trend of films from 'four weddings and a funeral' to 'Briget Jones' and oserves the similarities of the representaion of Britain and relates it back to politics.
Meidia, Pleasure and Identity
This article explores how the media is used for the public to escape from the real world, also how different type of media are interpreted by audiences in different ways.
This article explores ways in which British cinema represents various issues such as; sexuality, class ethnicity and gender. It looks at many different films giving examples of different ways things can be represented. Through this also it explores how films over the decades have influenced eachotherand are also influenced by society and the changes with in it. It also explores how within British cinema there is a big political influence, for example in the section on 'sexuality' it talks about how the representaion of homosexuality reflects the political and societies resposes to it. The article gives many examples of different films over the years and and within this shows trends and patterns of how films represent the different aspects of society. The article is not really criticle but rather observes how representation has changed and how and why.
Richard Curtis Article
This article explores film can represent the ideologies and values of a society. In particular the writer looks at Richard Curtis and his films and the representaion of Britain he beliefs Richard Curtis is trying to create - 'Curtisland'. Everthing written about Curtises films is related back to politics, for example it talks about how the optimisim within Curtises films reflect the mood of Britain at the time. It is criticle of the picture of Britain it claims Curts tries to create - "Britain was suddenly a witty self-deprecating place, a Doris Day film by the Thames in which it was forever Christmas". The article looks at this Richard Curtis trend of films from 'four weddings and a funeral' to 'Briget Jones' and oserves the similarities of the representaion of Britain and relates it back to politics.
Meidia, Pleasure and Identity
This article explores how the media is used for the public to escape from the real world, also how different type of media are interpreted by audiences in different ways.
Thursday 10 September 2009
Media Practical Yr 12
Pitch -
Charlie Biggs is a sharp, attractive, impish, smooth talking, young man living in a working class area in North London. In trouble with the law, and various gangs around him he finds himself in a very sticky situation. To get away from his problems and lifestyle his only option is to move to rural Suffolk and live with his quirky great aunt on her 50 acre farm. The inevitable culture clash brings hilarious consequences but also love and happiness.
Synopsis -
Charlie Biggs is living in Camden in a small flat, unemployed and loving his care free life Charlie finds himself getting into all different kinds of trouble but somehow always seeming to get away with it, down to his charm and wit. Eventually Charlie finds himself in a situation which he can’t talk his way out of. Because he is in trouble with the law and a local gang, who are a lot bigger than him, his only choice is to move far away were no one can find him. Reluctantly he moves to rural Suffolk to live with his quirky great aunt, Enid.At first Charlie seems to despise his new life, not getting on with the locals and finding it very hard living with his slightly odd but very comic aunt. Eventually Charlie starts to appreciate the smaller things in life and begins to enjoy the company of the peculiar characters of the small town he is living in. Charlie, who has made quite and impression on the locals, falls in love with the land lord of the pub (were he works) daughter. When things are looking up for Charlie he is approached with the gang, who have found him. As well as Charlie being threatened with death unless he pays them the money, he is also disturbing the town and many of the people living are very distraught.
The Task
For the task we have to create a two minute opening to our film. We had to make the opening scene enthralling, exciting and most importantly make the audience eager to watch more. The
Group:
Elsie (Me)
Matty
Ibby
Influences
C.H.A.S.E was developed by a number of influences such as; Train spotting because of its thrilling chase scene. Our other influence was This is England, Kidulthood and this is England. The similarities between are two influences are that they have an British authencity and they represented life for the deprivated areas of England. These were all elements we were aiming to implement in our film. Also we liked the idea of how films sub merged genres so we wanted to add a love theme later on in the film which leads to the change of the protagonist.There were a few films that influenced into creating our synopsis;
http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=zKuhanoKds
http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=cDL8juJ5uBc
From these two intro’s we were confident we could combine the ideas and make our own effective opener in two minutes.The Storyboard. For the Storyboard me and the group decided to do a photographic storyboard. The storyboard contains the certain shots we are going to take, how long the shots are going to be and how we are going to sequence our opening two minutes. Below is a link to the storyboard.
http://www.keepandshare.com/doc/view.php?id=1137986&da=y
The Pitch Me and the group have to pitch our ideas to the media department in order to gain the integral equipment. Below is our pitch. Film Schedule The group and I have agreed to begin the filming process on Wednesday the 10th of December. furthermore, we have agreed to 11,15 and the 18th of Decemeber. All these dates are efficient for us because the group have free periods during some of these days and we have media lessons. The group are willing, to do extra days if needed to finish the task. We have agreed to locate our shots at 3 different places;
Cherwell School (North Site)
Cornmarket St (Town)
Paradise Square (Town)
Evaluation -
Genre- Urban Action Thriller
Our two minute entry to the film “C.H.A.S.E” was initially going to be and have the conventions of a romantic comedy, however when we started filming we decided that it would be more interesting and easier to portray an action drama. We tried to portray a typical British urban based action thriller such as films like ‘This is England’ or ‘Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels’. Generally the progress in making the piece went well and I am pleased with our end product. In our preliminary task we did not have a very clear story board, this made it hard to know exactly where to start in our filming and our filming was not ordered and that it much harder to edit too. From this we learnt that we must make a very clear storyboard to base our filming on. To try and organise the group and the actors we a made a film schedule, we gave one to each of the actors and then had one ourselves. It told everyone when and where we were filming and really helped in getting the group organised. We used the shots of the run down area and the graffiti at the beginning to portray the ‘edgy’ feel and to connote the working class area we wanted to show. We wanted our film to represent a sub culture that are involved in drugs, violence and gang culture. The protagonist represents a young working class boy involved in this culture – but who is also bright and very charismatic. We tried to portray this thorough the costumes chosen for our characters, with them wearing ‘hoodies’ which stereotypically represents this social group. The music we chose was typical of the genre as it is intense and fast and makes the piece more thrilling, a viewer may associate it with the particular social group being represented. We wanted to create a feeling of suspense in our product which is typical of an action drama. Our first few shots of our protagonist running were fast cut which not only matches the shots of him running, but gives a feel of the action that would be in the rest of the film, we got this idea from the British drama ‘Trainspotting’.We wanted our product to have conventional aspects of an action drama, so the first two minutes were very action based; we used fast editing and thrilling music and it was a chase scene. However we still did want to show the romance, so we challenged the conventions slightly by including a suggestion of a romance, this also set out an idea for what will happen in the rest of the film and an introduction to he principle characters. The girl represents an opposing social group; she is a well educated middle class young girl which we hope the audience will recognize. To try and portray this we made an obvious difference in their appearance having the girl in smarter clothes which were more suitable for her character, we gave her with a middle class accent. We wanted it to be clear that there was a difference of background because this is something that would be addressed in the rest of the film. I think that the institution that may want to distribute our film would be a British institution perhaps one like Film Four. Film Four has a lot of films which styles are similar as ours. They tend to have more independent films rather than high budget films which is what ours would be, it also often has British films and British film makers which we wanted to be a part of our film, such as film like ‘This is England’ - which is distributed by Film Four, we wanted our film to portray British culture which Film Four does often. Film Four attracts the type of audience we would want to attract. Our product would probably attract a young adult audience as the themes and issues of our film do generally attract a younger audience. Younger people are represented in the film which would also attract the target audience because they will be able to relate with the characters. At the start we used fast cuts and intense music in hope to drawing the audience in and get their attention strait away. At the end the audience is left at a ‘cliff hanger’ which makes them want to keep watching. We tried to make our product as thrilling and tried to create as much tension as possible to attract the audience and make them want to keep watching.To edit our product we used ‘i-movie’. This at first was hard as we did not no how to use the programme, but as we started editing more though we found it easier to use. The editing programme is not as advanced as some programmes, so it did limit us in some areas – for example we could not use effects or advanced editing tools. However this did not limit us as we did not want to use effects as our product was a realistic drama and we thought special effects would not be appropriate. When filming we used different equipment to help us; we used for example tripods to keep the camera at eye level giving the piece a more personal feel. It also helped us make the piece look more professional as the camera stayed in one place. Editing helped us in creating ‘mise-en-scene’, we chose to add the non-digestic sound making the chase scene have a more exciting feel and make it more conventional to the genre.The target audience would be people from the ages of 15 up, but not particularly aimed at a much older audience. We chose to use the hypodermic needle model of audience theory, this was illustrated in the first few scenes involving the chase by immediately creating this feeling of suspense and thrill which catches the audience’s attention and makes them aware of the action that would be in the rest of the film, this is conventional of the genre. We also considered bathes action and enigma codes, we used this in the scene where villain is looking for Sam, it is ambiguous why they are chasing him, this draws the audience and potentially making them want to keep watching. I think that overall are final product went well, I think that it conveys the genre and what we were trying to show overall. To improve however I think we could of made the scene with ‘Harriet’ more realistic as I think that we have not conveyed the relationship very well. From our initial idea of a Romantic Comedy I think that we have progressed a lot and there is a nice mixture of both genres which work well together.
Charlie Biggs is a sharp, attractive, impish, smooth talking, young man living in a working class area in North London. In trouble with the law, and various gangs around him he finds himself in a very sticky situation. To get away from his problems and lifestyle his only option is to move to rural Suffolk and live with his quirky great aunt on her 50 acre farm. The inevitable culture clash brings hilarious consequences but also love and happiness.
Synopsis -
Charlie Biggs is living in Camden in a small flat, unemployed and loving his care free life Charlie finds himself getting into all different kinds of trouble but somehow always seeming to get away with it, down to his charm and wit. Eventually Charlie finds himself in a situation which he can’t talk his way out of. Because he is in trouble with the law and a local gang, who are a lot bigger than him, his only choice is to move far away were no one can find him. Reluctantly he moves to rural Suffolk to live with his quirky great aunt, Enid.At first Charlie seems to despise his new life, not getting on with the locals and finding it very hard living with his slightly odd but very comic aunt. Eventually Charlie starts to appreciate the smaller things in life and begins to enjoy the company of the peculiar characters of the small town he is living in. Charlie, who has made quite and impression on the locals, falls in love with the land lord of the pub (were he works) daughter. When things are looking up for Charlie he is approached with the gang, who have found him. As well as Charlie being threatened with death unless he pays them the money, he is also disturbing the town and many of the people living are very distraught.
The Task
For the task we have to create a two minute opening to our film. We had to make the opening scene enthralling, exciting and most importantly make the audience eager to watch more. The
Group:
Elsie (Me)
Matty
Ibby
Influences
C.H.A.S.E was developed by a number of influences such as; Train spotting because of its thrilling chase scene. Our other influence was This is England, Kidulthood and this is England. The similarities between are two influences are that they have an British authencity and they represented life for the deprivated areas of England. These were all elements we were aiming to implement in our film. Also we liked the idea of how films sub merged genres so we wanted to add a love theme later on in the film which leads to the change of the protagonist.There were a few films that influenced into creating our synopsis;
http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=zKuhanoKds
http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=cDL8juJ5uBc
From these two intro’s we were confident we could combine the ideas and make our own effective opener in two minutes.The Storyboard. For the Storyboard me and the group decided to do a photographic storyboard. The storyboard contains the certain shots we are going to take, how long the shots are going to be and how we are going to sequence our opening two minutes. Below is a link to the storyboard.
http://www.keepandshare.com/doc/view.php?id=1137986&da=y
The Pitch Me and the group have to pitch our ideas to the media department in order to gain the integral equipment. Below is our pitch. Film Schedule The group and I have agreed to begin the filming process on Wednesday the 10th of December. furthermore, we have agreed to 11,15 and the 18th of Decemeber. All these dates are efficient for us because the group have free periods during some of these days and we have media lessons. The group are willing, to do extra days if needed to finish the task. We have agreed to locate our shots at 3 different places;
Cherwell School (North Site)
Cornmarket St (Town)
Paradise Square (Town)
Evaluation -
Genre- Urban Action Thriller
Our two minute entry to the film “C.H.A.S.E” was initially going to be and have the conventions of a romantic comedy, however when we started filming we decided that it would be more interesting and easier to portray an action drama. We tried to portray a typical British urban based action thriller such as films like ‘This is England’ or ‘Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels’. Generally the progress in making the piece went well and I am pleased with our end product. In our preliminary task we did not have a very clear story board, this made it hard to know exactly where to start in our filming and our filming was not ordered and that it much harder to edit too. From this we learnt that we must make a very clear storyboard to base our filming on. To try and organise the group and the actors we a made a film schedule, we gave one to each of the actors and then had one ourselves. It told everyone when and where we were filming and really helped in getting the group organised. We used the shots of the run down area and the graffiti at the beginning to portray the ‘edgy’ feel and to connote the working class area we wanted to show. We wanted our film to represent a sub culture that are involved in drugs, violence and gang culture. The protagonist represents a young working class boy involved in this culture – but who is also bright and very charismatic. We tried to portray this thorough the costumes chosen for our characters, with them wearing ‘hoodies’ which stereotypically represents this social group. The music we chose was typical of the genre as it is intense and fast and makes the piece more thrilling, a viewer may associate it with the particular social group being represented. We wanted to create a feeling of suspense in our product which is typical of an action drama. Our first few shots of our protagonist running were fast cut which not only matches the shots of him running, but gives a feel of the action that would be in the rest of the film, we got this idea from the British drama ‘Trainspotting’.We wanted our product to have conventional aspects of an action drama, so the first two minutes were very action based; we used fast editing and thrilling music and it was a chase scene. However we still did want to show the romance, so we challenged the conventions slightly by including a suggestion of a romance, this also set out an idea for what will happen in the rest of the film and an introduction to he principle characters. The girl represents an opposing social group; she is a well educated middle class young girl which we hope the audience will recognize. To try and portray this we made an obvious difference in their appearance having the girl in smarter clothes which were more suitable for her character, we gave her with a middle class accent. We wanted it to be clear that there was a difference of background because this is something that would be addressed in the rest of the film. I think that the institution that may want to distribute our film would be a British institution perhaps one like Film Four. Film Four has a lot of films which styles are similar as ours. They tend to have more independent films rather than high budget films which is what ours would be, it also often has British films and British film makers which we wanted to be a part of our film, such as film like ‘This is England’ - which is distributed by Film Four, we wanted our film to portray British culture which Film Four does often. Film Four attracts the type of audience we would want to attract. Our product would probably attract a young adult audience as the themes and issues of our film do generally attract a younger audience. Younger people are represented in the film which would also attract the target audience because they will be able to relate with the characters. At the start we used fast cuts and intense music in hope to drawing the audience in and get their attention strait away. At the end the audience is left at a ‘cliff hanger’ which makes them want to keep watching. We tried to make our product as thrilling and tried to create as much tension as possible to attract the audience and make them want to keep watching.To edit our product we used ‘i-movie’. This at first was hard as we did not no how to use the programme, but as we started editing more though we found it easier to use. The editing programme is not as advanced as some programmes, so it did limit us in some areas – for example we could not use effects or advanced editing tools. However this did not limit us as we did not want to use effects as our product was a realistic drama and we thought special effects would not be appropriate. When filming we used different equipment to help us; we used for example tripods to keep the camera at eye level giving the piece a more personal feel. It also helped us make the piece look more professional as the camera stayed in one place. Editing helped us in creating ‘mise-en-scene’, we chose to add the non-digestic sound making the chase scene have a more exciting feel and make it more conventional to the genre.The target audience would be people from the ages of 15 up, but not particularly aimed at a much older audience. We chose to use the hypodermic needle model of audience theory, this was illustrated in the first few scenes involving the chase by immediately creating this feeling of suspense and thrill which catches the audience’s attention and makes them aware of the action that would be in the rest of the film, this is conventional of the genre. We also considered bathes action and enigma codes, we used this in the scene where villain is looking for Sam, it is ambiguous why they are chasing him, this draws the audience and potentially making them want to keep watching. I think that overall are final product went well, I think that it conveys the genre and what we were trying to show overall. To improve however I think we could of made the scene with ‘Harriet’ more realistic as I think that we have not conveyed the relationship very well. From our initial idea of a Romantic Comedy I think that we have progressed a lot and there is a nice mixture of both genres which work well together.
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