Research: Target Audience

Who are our target audience?

We've decided that we want our target audience to be 16-17 year old females. This is because we are all of this age and believe it is important to be able to relate to the audience. Therefore as we are this age have a good idea what will appeal to them.

Secondary Research

This is a questionnaire I found which helps us to understand the audiences of Social Realism films

Audience and British Social Realism films from Amymedia123

From this I have learned that our target audience (16-18 year olds) are not likely to watch a social realism films. Therefore it is important that we consider the Blumler and Katz theory of identifying with the characters, and making sure that what we put into the film will appeal to them.

Primary Research

In light of this I conducted an interview to help us with certain decisions about our film, making sure that it will interest our target audience.

Findings

Question 2 Which elements of a film opening lead you to keep watching?- Responses showed that we need to establish an event but not reveal all of the information to keep them interested.

Question 3 What issues do you feel are relevant to your age group?- This helped us decide on the idea of alcohol

Question 4 Which gender would you prefer a lead role to be?- Using the unanimous female vote, we are going to use a girl as a lead.

Question 5 Do you like films where you can relate to the characters?- All said yes. This can be explained using the Uses and Gratifications Theory. Teenagers like characters they can relate to as they can identify with them:

• finding reinforcement for personal values
• finding models of behaviour
• identifying with valued other (in the media)
• gaining insight into one's self

In other words, they can take how a character deals with a situation, and use it in their own lives, and because of this we are using a girl the same age as them.

Question 6 Would a night time setting add a mysterious feel?- We had mixed results for this question, they all believed it would make it more mysterious however they also used the word "creepy", so we have to be careful not to make it look like a horror film.

Question 7- What sort of person do you think this girl is? We were very happy with the responses we got for this question. The girl in the picture is Mia, the lead in the British Social Realism film 'Fish Tank'. She was the inspiration for the lead in our film and so we were happy that they identified her as a lower class, troubled teenager, as we wish our lead to wear a similar costume, as the mise-en-scene clearly has good signifiers.

Music update!

I meet up with Antonio today and we brainstormed some ideas for a song, we decided that we did not want the lyrics to necessarily match the storyline of our film opening as that would be a bit cliché, and I also think there should be an element of mystery with our character, and wouldn't want the song to give away anything.
We have created a chord progression and the beginnings of a tune.
Hopefully as soon as we get some lyrics we can start recording some demos which I will upload ASAP.

 

 

If you're interested in how day went, he's doing VEDF (vlog everyday in February), and so filmed during the day :)

Why 'Revive'?

For the title of our film we have chosen the title 'Revive'. This was having decided that our film would focus on a protagonist going from a bad place in her life and then fixing it up. To decide on a title which was more original and interesting we began looking into words or phrases with this similar idea. We decided on 'Revive' as it is short and snappy as well as being memorable and original, also matching the key themes which we are addressing in our opening.

Reserach: Kidulthood 9 Frame Analysis

I have chosen to do a 9 Frame Analysis on the film Kidulthood's opening as it is social realism, which means I can study the conventions and how it uses enigma codes to get hints as to how our opening should be.

Below is a prezi presentation of my analysis of Kidulthood film opening in 9 frames. But before you take a look at it here are some quick information on this film:

-It follows the life's of many teenagers who attend the same school, showing the troubles such as violence, drugs, sex and alcohol that face the different social and ethnic groups in a rough area
-The film is rated 15, due its sexual and violent nature.
-It is distributed by revolver entertainment
-The film was actually shot in the principle areas (adds to realism)

Prezi:


Further Analysis:

Mise-en-scene= The general colour scheme is grey and dull which makes it look quite gritty. This gives it a more realism feel and compliments the run-down look of the metal cages on the edge of the playground, and the poorly kept grass. This shows further that the area is rough and not a very happy place to live in.

Editing= The editing used almost gives the effect of a CCTV camera, with blurring jump cuts together, panning across the playground zooming in to focus on the different characters and social groups. With the trouble and crime going on in the area the CCTV is quite appropriate and fitting. This effect also adds to the realism of the film.

Camera= There is a varied use of longshots to close-ups, panning and focusing again creating the effect of the realistic CCTV. Also the close-up of the drill highlights the importance of it and makes it more dramatic.

Sound= The film opening uses both non-diegetic and diegetic sound. The non-diegetic sound being a stereotypical 'grimy' urban track, and the diegetic being shouting, laughing, and dialogue. The music sets the pace which is quite fast but slows down when dialogue is used to make it more dramatic.

Enigma codes= The main enigma code of the opening, is the drill shot. This is because the audience is un-able to see what he is making this may trigger the audience to want to watch more. The  boy then goes on to hide it in the bin. This creates questions like, 'what is it?' 'why is he hiding it?' etc. Another enigma is the fact the hooded group is watching everyone looking suspicious, which makes everyone wonder 'what are they up too?' 'are they looking for someone?'. The middle class group who hand out the party invites also create an enigma code as a party where 'everyone invited' is not bound to go well, therefore we wonder what will happen at this party.

Aspects that I have learnt from this analysis and maybe useful to consider for our own film opening=
-A dark dull colour scheme will add to the realism
-Certificating at 15, would be suitable for concerning the social realism themes of violence, alcohol and sex
-Shoot in the real life areas to get full desired effect
-Look into the distributor Revolver Entertainment to see if it could be a suitable match for our film opening once made
-Non-diegetic music can be used to make things more dramatic and help highlight important bits which need to be considered in the opening
-Should use a vary of close-up and long shots, as this is creates the effect of some one watching or CCTV which adds realism

Research: Codes and Conventions of Social Realism films

The use of unknown actors- this helps to create the sense of verisimilitude because the audience see's the actors as ordinary people.
One main protagonist- The plot usually follows the story of one individual's life, looking at how they face problems and overcome adversities.
Most films use teenagers or young adults (13-20)- although this is not always the case with films such as 'Tyrannosaur' where the main character is in his 50's
Working class- I believe this is because the majority of audiences will be in or around this social class as it is seen as the most common, also they tend to have the most gritty story lines.
Set in council estates or 'run down' areas in suburban locations- this aids to the naturalistic approach. 'Fishtank', written and directed by Andrea Arnold, is a good example of this as Mia, the lead, lives on a council estate.
Wide shots- this is allows for a lot to be seen in one frame, mimicking that of what a person see's through their eyes, so again it helps give a naturalistic tone.
Location shooting (not a studio/film set)- this gives the illusion on real life and makes the film more convincing.
Explores at least more than one of topical themes- such as sex, money, divorce, alcoholism, prostitution, gangs, abusive realtionships, homosexuality, crime, drugs, poverty.

First draft and feedback

This is the first draft of our film opening









We gave the viewers a questionnaire to fill in, to see what they liked and what we needed to improve and this video is our response to this feedback as well as things we as a team think need improving.

Research: Trainspotting

I watched Trainspotting, the 1996 film directed by Danny Boyle who describes it as a movie which reflects "the drive and energy of modern pop culture", for this reason I feel it fits into the Social Realism genre, despite the fact it is classed as a crime fiction or drama. Therefore I thought it would be good to study for inspiration.

 

Basic Synopsis
The film is set in 1980's Edinburgh, where Mark Renton, a heroin addict is trying to come clean. The story follows his struggle to wean himself off the stuff hit after hit. After nearly dying of an overdose, he moves to London and gets back on track owning his own flat. However he gets mixed up with his friends again and they make a dangerous heroin transaction, coming into a large amount of money. As the others sleep, Renton leaves with the money and then vows to live a stable, traditional life.




Codes and conventions- Does this film conform to the codes and conventions of Social Realism?

The use of unknown actors- this was Ewan McGregor's (Renton) 4th film, however this was his first big one, and this film was Kelly Macdonald's (Diane) debut.

One main protagonist- The plot follows the ups and downs of one character predominately (Renton).

Most films use teenagers or young adults (13-20)- The majority of the group were in their 20's, though Begbie looks older and more aged.

Working class- It is set in an economically depressed area of Edinburgh.

Set in council estates or 'run down' areas in suburban locations- Set in urban locations such as Edinburgh and London and Allison flat which is presumably on some sort of council estate.

Location shooting (not a studio/film set)- many location shots were used such as Princes Street which is a real street in Edinburgh.

Explores at least more than one of topical themes- the themes of drug use, substance abuse, sex, violence, money and urban poverty are illustrated

Does it break any?

• there are some unnatural scenes in the film, to show the effect of the drugs, so we could say that this is not abiding to the idea or verisimilitude.
• Some scene cuts in the film are not true to real life. For example, at the end of one scene Renton is seen jumping off a wall outside. It then cuts to a shot of him landing inside a building. This is not naturalistic.

Things that inspired us about this film:-

• The idea of portraying what is inside the heads of characters. (Our lead is drunk and so we like the idea of her hearing the memory of her mother shouting, which we can show through the sound of a muffling, echoed voice played over the score.)
• The use of voiceovers is something we could experiment with, to give a clear back story of the main character.



Foley Sound

The only point in our video where foley sound was necessary was the break in. This was as we had footage to make it appear as if the actor broke in, although obviously it wasn't real. To get this sound we used a large door by forcefully going in to it shoulder first. This made the kind of sound that we wanted.









However we realised when we put it to the video, it did work but didn't appear as a break in. This clip is from the first draft of our opening. It shows how the foley sound worked alongside the footage. We decided in our final cut that instead of using the sound we would just have the action alongside music. This provided a much more believable appearance of a break in.

Research: Opening Credits

Film opening credits generally depend on the size of the production and the number of people involved in creating it. In research, an opening which contained a huge number of titles was Skyfall. Watching the video above it is evident that there was a very large team involved in producing it.


Realistically, the more people involved in a film the longer the credits. What we then did was to look at more film openings on artofthetitle.com to discover what names were mentioned in every film, as these would be the ones that a smaller, low budget film (alike our own) would need to use. These are the ones which we came up with.


-Distribution company
-Production company
-Name of main actor
-Co-actors
-Casting director
-Costume and Make-up
-Music
-Director of photography
-Editor
-Screenplay
-Producer
-Director


As seen from Skyfall in Hollywood films there are a lot of other roles which are mentioned to give people credit for their work. However in a smaller film only the key names must be mentioned as there are much less people involved in the creative process.