American Independent Film - Case Study

Memento

Memento is an American Independent film directed by Christopher Nolan. 

It was released in 2000 on a budget of $9million.

What makes it independent and what is the production cost?

• Memento wasn't produced by a major film production company, rather a small, unheard-of one.
• Memento also had a small filming budget, of 9 million USD - most independent films have production costs between 5 and 10 million.
• There are no famous stars in the film
• The posters and trailers are centred around the awards the film has won; such as awards at Sundance and Toronto Film festival.

Who stars in the film and why?

	Guy Pearce	...	Leonard
	Carrie-Anne Moss	...	Natalie
	Joe Pantoliano	...	Teddy
	Mark Boone Junior	...	Burt
	Russ Fega	...	Waiter
	Jorja Fox	...	Leonard's Wife

Has it won any awards?

Yes, Memento has won;

"Best Foreign Independent Film" - British independent film awards

"Critics award" - Deauville film festival

"Best Picture" - Toronto film festival

"Screenwriting" - Sundance film festival

and more.

British Film - Case Study

Gravity

Budget:
$100 Million

Release Date:
4th October 2013

Profit/loss at the Box Office:
$716,280,132

Reasons for success
Won many Oscars, which attracted people due to the awards the film won, however the star power in the films, with Sandra Bullock also attracted a large audience - this also goes for George Clooney. The pair attracted an audience that doesn't just fit in the Sci- Fi category. 
The buzz that was created also attracted many people through what other people said - the marketing in the film trailer and posters never gave away the plot, unlike many other films, and so people came away from the film talking about all the major points that were never mentioned in advertisements. 

The reviews also had a massive impact on the popularity of the film, on Rotten Tomatoes, the film sits with 5 negative reviews out of 218. 

Stars
Sandra Bullock and George Clooney.

Genre
Gravity was a Drama, Sci-Fi and Thriller.

Marketing
Gravity was Marketed in such a way that the plot was not given away, so after the opening Friday, instead of the normal 2.5x multiplier of the weekend, due to word of mouth and what people had said about it attracted many people to go and see the film immediately, instead breaking records and making a massive $56 million on the opening weekend for a 3.15x multiplier. 

Certificate
PG-13

Producers
David Heyman and Alfonso Cuarón

Current trends in the Cinema

Philomena -> Multiplex Cinema's.

• Elements of Comedy and seriousness would attract a wider range of an audience
• Big Actor/actress names such as Judy Dench and Steve Coogan
• Award winner, advertises that fact.
• Fair amount of showing times, not as many as blockbusters.
• Based on a true story and book, would attract people that have read the book.
• Would be screened in main screen cinemas
• Made profits of near $15 million. Not as much as a typical blockbuster

Aims and objectives

Sarah, Charlene, Alex

• The genre of the film my group is making is a war tragedy
• The target audience is similar to the audience of films such as "Dear John"
• The sequence will start with a girl crying at a grave, possibly in the snow to give the scene a 'chilly' feel
• Most of the middle section of the short film will be flashbacks to emotional subject such as how her and her dead boyfriend met until she gets the letter from the army about his death
• The flashbacks will be similar to flashbacks in "Forest Gump"
• Include a shot where the camera circles around the head of the girl whilst she's in a trance throughout many different scenes.

250 Word Reflective Analysis

In groups, we created a film sequence from a "Horror" genre film. We hoped to create the beginning of a chase scene which built tension with silence whilst involving typical horror conventions such as Religious iconography, low key lighting and also centering the hauntings around a lonely, innocent young girl, this is shown in the shot with the high angle and tilt down- as you can see crosses in the structural beams.

In our storyboard we planned to use shots such as handheld cameras at eye level, and then using other angles such as oblique angles, High angles and then low angles. 

However when shooting we encountered problems such as having to redo a lot of shots due to working in a noisy environment, so a lot of our clips we're slightly different to how we hoped to avoid the noise.

Whist editing, we encountered problems with sounds being repeated one cut to the next, so we had to edit it out and we also edited the sounds from the noisy environment out, as we wanted silence to build up tension with the audience. In Editing we also added non-diegetic sound for music and also added a jumpy sharp sound to add to the jump scare.

We also added a camera movement of zooming into the paranormal creature, which shows the importance of it as it is the antagonist. 

Film Studies Written Analysis on a clip from “I Am Legend”

How does the use of cinematography creates suspense and creates a response from the audience in the sequence from I Am Legend?

The shot begins as an aerial shot, from a bird's-eye view as an extreme long shot; this is to establish the setting and movement of the film. It also shows us the importance of the only moving thing in the shot – the car; this leads on to the rest of the sequence being revolved around the car. The aerial shot also allows us to see the derelict and post apocalyptic abandoned landscape, which immediately lets us know that something is wrong, so we're drawn into the plot straight away, which makes you think this is sci-fi as the genre often includes apocalyptic narratives.  An example of another post apocalyptic film is World War Z, which also uses the conventions of zombies, and a virus which needs a cure. This makes me excited and confused at t                                                          he same time, so I want to carry on watching to find out what happens and hope that the story will explain a few things I don't understand at the moment, for example how the world got to this dystopian future. This regular sci-fi convention is used in 'Bladerunner' in a slightly different way. Instead of having entirely derelict cities, in Bladerunner the chaos is with the majority of people who live on the ground. 

The aerial shot also displays a crossroad in the same shape as a Christian cross - this shows the religious element and underlying story behind the end of the world, and shows that there is a religious element to the film. This convention is common in other films of the same genre such as '28 Days Later' - shown in the church scene at the opening, and is based on the use of a priest, including symbolism such as crosses, and religious text to fight evil.

The effect of the mise-en-scene "mysteriously derelict area" makes me feel intrigued, and also confused; it makes me want to know how this happened and why it happened. Due to the setting and themes of being in a deserted, overgrown urban area, you could tell that the genre of this film is a thriller as a deserted urban area is a convention of horrors/thrillers. Another film that uses an aerial shot to begin the film of is “The Shining” which also starts with high key lighting.  The film could also be argued to be a sci-fi due to the dystopian future about disease and medicine. Throughout the film there are conventions of sci-fi (for example the apocalypse and the 'End of the World' mise-en-scene) so it may be classed as sci-fi but on the other hand it can also be a horror due to conventions such as the zombies and low key lighting.

When the shot cuts (straight cut) to inside of the car, it's a hand-held camera, as it gives a jerky bouncy effect making it appear quite realistic. It's as if you were driving over a bumpy unmaintained road, to show how the main character truly is isolated and alone. It's also a close up inside of the car which makes me feel claustrophobic and that the area around me is compact. 
The cuts are fast-paced and occurring quite often, this is to keep the pace and give the effect that the car is going fast. You have high angles looking down at the car driving off into the distance and low angles of the wheel as the car spins and swerves around objects. All these shots are focused on the car it shows that this is the only important thing, and that everything is revolving around the character driving it.

The effect of these shots of the car make me feel excited and tense, is he going to catch deer or not and do I want him to catch the deer? It displays a viewers dilemma of choosing whether the deer should escape or if it should be caught. It blurs the lines between what is good and what is bad. Also, a deer is synonymous with Bambi, which is an iconic Disney film, and no one wants to see a Deer killed as they are an symbolic of innocence. We also want to know why he's so desperate to catch food and looks distraught when it escapes.The fact that the lion killed the deer, epitomised the 'lord of the jungle' and took everything back to basics of survival.

The camera zooms in on a load of posters of the mise-en-scene that has the text saying “God still loves us” - 'God' being part of religion which is often a convention and iconography of the thriller/horror genre, also the fact that the camera zooms in on these posters in an ironic way, as there is no one left.  Most horror films use religion as the key theme of the film, therefore it's a convention, along with good against evil. Also on these posters, we see a butterfly which is a common symbol and key motif throughout the film, as it is constantly referencing the butterfly to god like in these posters at the start of the film. Later we see his daughter pretend to be a butterfly before she dies, and then before he dies we see a butterfly again indicating rebirth which signals a recurring motif.

A difference that this scene has compared to other thriller's/horrors is that most of it is in high key lighting whereas the convention of horror/thriller is low key lighting. However throughout the scene the light is constantly getting darker, this is a warning, and that the evil is taking over at night as all seems peaceful in day.

There is a jump cut forward in time, which we can tell due to the change in light and time in day, as it's dark and he's in a different location. It begins the shot with a high angled, mid shot, which emphasises the space around the two main characters, whilst making them both look small and insignificant - to get this effect the shot was a crane shot.
The camera then uses a tracking shot to follow the main character whilst he's hunting a deer, but from a distance which makes it look like someone's hunting him, it made me interested and edgy, and scared to what's going to happen. This was all building up for the jump scare.

When the deer is caught by the lion, it made me jump due to the sudden loud roar of non-diegetic sound. It made me confused at first as the protagonist seemed to be unsurprised, and left the lion alone as it was only fending for his family - this is an inclination and a hint at his past relations with his family. The fact that he left the lions could be due to him respecting them as they've managed to survive. We see all this in an "Over the shoulder shot" which is to give us as the audience the perspective of the character, and it also makes us feel involved in the hunt. The camera also has a deep depth of field, to focus on the action of the deer and lion rather than the person, and it makes us focus on the action too.

When the camera cuts (straight cut) to an extreme close up of the watch, it shows the significance of time and that it's foreshadowing the importance of time. It's also a POV shot from the character looking at the watch, which shows that he's been waiting for something that that makes me feel cautious and weary. The camera then highlights the sun by showing it on it's own in the  long shot and three times in over-the-shoulder shots with direct sunlight which "Bleeds" over the camera, and also when the character looks at the sun, we see him turn, then we see the sun from his point of view. We are shown in a long shot the sun setting, this is also foreshadowing and is the iconic symbol of the use of dark being used to represent evil.

The use of a German Shepard is related to power, and the connotations around that breed of dog is superiority and strength – this is used a lot to interact with the audience, as it made me protected and safe. Generally people are more affected by animals, so the animals throughout the film, like the deer, are used to make the audience sympathetic and feel emotions, it links with the audience.

The Shining - Film Analysis

In this essay i'll be analysing two scenes in Stanley Kubrick's 1980's adaption of The Shining. I will comment on cinematic techniques such as camera, lighting and sound and how specific techniques and conventions are related to the Genre of Horror. I'll also discuss the effect that this scene had on me and give a personal response.


Scene 1; "The Typewriter"

Throughout the film there is a common theme in High Key Lighting which is the opposite of most Horror's; which use Low Key Lighting to add to the thrill and added threat, however this is a missing convention thats found throughout the genre. High Key Lighting is more commonly found in Comedy films, so it could be used in The Shining to distance this Horror from others. 

The scene starts with a static camera, close up shot - with the low angle of looking up. The Depth of focus remains around her face throughout this entire shot - which highlights her reactions and tells us that the rest of the shot is less important to focus on. 

After we see the characters face, the shot cuts so that we can see what she can - this POV shot is used so that we can feel similar emotions to the character - i mainly felt confusion - a conventional fear used throughout the Horror Genre is 'the fear of the unknown' which is used here to provoke the audience to be worried, and to be on edge, this is also used in the film "Prometheus" when they're exploring the unknown planet.

The sound at the beginning of the scene is a eerie silence that helps keep the audience suspense - and you can see that everything interconnects; as she reads the text the sound is silent, and then when we see the text from her POV and we see the piles of the same sentence wrote over and over again; the camera does a quick zoom to emphasis the weirdness and how crazy this is. For example when the high pitched non-diegetic 'whining' sound effects are increased in intensity, the character flicks through the large pile of papers at a more eratic rate before cutting again to behind a pillar, the sound effects are scratchy and make me uncomfortable, it has similar effects to what nail's on chalkboard does. The new cut is viewing the back of the character we've just been watching, this suggests that it's a POV shot of someone trying to sneak and not be caught.

We see Iconography of Religion in the style of a Cross in half of our screen as the camera pans past it, which is dimmed and the light of this half of the screen contrasts with the brightness of the other half where the innocent woman is.

Continuity is again shown in the music, camera and performance when the panning stops, and a person behind the camera steps into the foreground of the camera as a silhouette (Which raises suspicion) - and at the same time as this the sound effects stop, which emphasis this unknown character that's just stepped into the frame, and is taking up a large portion of it, this made us feel claustrophobic and alienated - due to it being an over shoulder shot we only see what this unknown character is seeing in part of the frame, but it allows us as the audience to see everything thats going on.

Scene 2; "The Maze"
This entire scene's Lighting is in Low Key Lighting; this is due to the effects it creates, The dim hue and shadows that are created by this lighting are suited to the conventions of a horror film for me these conventions create tension due to it's mysterious and dark atmosphere. It also controls how much of the surroundings and characters are revealed and plays on the audiences fear of the unknown.

The Scene opens in the maze with an Eye-Level, medium sized camera shot so that the audience is able to see the sharp corners of the maze, which you're unable to see around and the dark atmosphere that creates a haunting and creepy ambience - these are all major parts that add to the tension and thrill of a chase scene.
The camera alternates between Low angled Panning shots and Handheld POV shots; these handheld POV shots emphasis the panic and threat of the sequence; the use of it being a handheld camera shot shows us this and also gives us a jerky ragged effect that creates realism and allows the audience to feel like they're actually running along with the scene. For me this was a major part of adding the threat and dread of the scene and kept me on the edge and interested. We can tell it's a POV as we're shown the characters face whilst he's running, followed by a downward camera shot of feet running through the snow. The parallel edits through this sequence of the chase show to the audience that the child is running away from someone chasing him at the same time, and that the mother is trying to rescue him as well; the parallel edits speed up the chase and keep the tenseness going.

The Sound throughout this scene is a similar style to the rest of the film - the non diegetic sound effects are a mix between very high pitched and very low pitched drum rolls, scraping, screams and other terrifying sounds - they're used to make you feel tense and scared and also to show the realism of danger for the innocent child.
I personally felt uncomfortable with the screeching sounds and occasionally the music alone gave me goosebumps. 

Also, the "Winter Wonderland" feel of the snow and maze contrasts with what's occurring, as the white looks innocent, however is helping the Psycho find the lost child. In this scene both the Maze and the child are conventions of horror; the maze shows isolation and loneliness; getting lost in a maze also means that you'd be trapped, for me this plays on the fear of being vulnerable to the killer. An example of another Horror film that keeps the protagonist of the film isolated and away from any help is "Friday the 13th" which keeps the victim's alone is by sending them to a secluded forest that's near-inaccessable. 

When the mum and child meet, i felt a sense of relief that the kid's not alone and he's partially safer now he's out of the maze which appears to loom over the height of anything else - which gives it a sense of danger and makes it that more threatening. It's also shown to be in the shape of a castle, which shows dominance and that there is only one way in and one way out - and more than likely it will bring about death.

Word count; 1146

Elysium Film Review

My favourite film to watch this summer was 'Elysium' – the film starred Matt Damon and Jodie Foster. The film was rated 68% on Rotten tomatoes and was given 7/10 on IMDb. The film is set in the future, 2156 and shows the Earth with all the problems that we're beginning to face now, overcrowding, overpopulation, poverty etc.

The reason why this film was my favourite over the summer was because the action kept me to the edge of the seat, and the plot twists and turns kept the storyline from being boring and kept the pace, even through the slow parts! The special effects used in the film grossed me out, however emphasised the chilling nature of the 'Rich peoples' savagery. Another reason why I enjoyed the film so much was how good the actors played their part, with Jodie Foster playing Secretary Delacourt, the evil, power hungry Defence secretary, defending her horrifying actions with lies, claiming that they're to protect 'her people'. She successfully gets her chilling attitude across as she kills many innocent 'non citizens' of Elysium whilst in luxury. 

Matt Damon plays Max da Costa, and After a gruesome industrial accident, Matt’s only chance is to get up to Elysium pronto. Overall I really enjoyed the film, and will be buying it on DVD.

Cold Mountain

The scene began with a Extreme long Aerial shot - this was used to establish setting and shown us that this man had traveled far, which made us want to know where he was going.

The shot tilts to show us this man's footprints, and doesn't reveal his face until the end of the shot due to the silhouette - which makes him shady and mysterious. 

We can tell that he's been traveling in the cold for a while due to his exhaustion and the frost in his beard, this makes us want to know what is so important to risk the cold environment, and it's not obvious where he's come from and where he's going.

In the parallel cut edit, it shows us that he's separated from his wife, which makes me feel sympathetic toward him - and that they long for each other because of the voice over which is reading the letter to us. This is also shown in the way that the voice over starts just before the cut, and he looks up, as if he's listening to her voice.
The low key lighting in this shot is to show her loneliness and distress.

In the next cut we see a dead deer, which has been frozen to death which shows how dangerous the environment is and are foreshadowing for the deaths that are about to happen. 

This is mainly Low key lighting, made of natural light from the fire and little fill light - this is to give the contrast of the background, which has been illuminated blue to show the coldness. The closeness of the warmth and cold shows that in this setting you're never far away from danger.
Two new characters join the shot quite abruptly due to the darkness of the environment, and they are wearing all black clothing which is commonly known as evil which signify's that they are not to be trusted. They also arrive on the shot on horses, which shows their  dominance, power and control over these other characters. 

The guy above is seen unlit unlike the other characters, and the fact that he's hiding behind a rock could show that he's cautious and untrusting of the two men that arrived out of nowhere - we see most of the shots of the characters around the fire from his point of view. The close up shot allows us to see the fear and his emotions of the other characters.

I feel like the shot where the two characters get shot is the strongest shot, as it affects you emotionally. I felt shocked when the two characters were shot - this could be due to one of the characters (Right) acting childlike and oblivious to what was going on around him, we could see this as he was smiling still when they made him cover his face. We feel empathy for this character, as well as the other character (left) as he act's like his father, and looks after him. The childlike manner of the Right hand guy makes us think of him much younger than he actually is.

After a jump cut, the next shot is of two women who are talking about the war - the woman above is mostly seen from the camera behind objects (Above). This could show her distance from the other character and her distress. The change of time from night to day could show that the evil's past, and that they're safe for a while. 

The Lone Ranger

'The Lone Ranger' might have been considered a box office failure due to the critics ratings; The $215 million budget film picked up a 30% Rotten tomato rating, which isn't very impressive - http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/the_lone_ranger/
The rotten tomatoes are worked out by votes, critics post their reviews whilst giving a rating on how bad the film was, called the 'Rotten tomatoes'.

One of the largest points made was that disney had such a high budget for the film, but in the first week in the box office, it earned only $48.9million, compared to the expected $60million. However, despite all this, the film earned a solid B+ at CinemaScore with plenty of feedback reviews from people who went to see it claiming it's action-pact and a great movie for almost anything, funny, action and western. So why didn't people go to see it? This could be due to the other films that were out at the time; families preferred to go and see Despicable Me 2 and Monsters University, as they are more popular children movies – and also family entertainment. Also, Despicable Me and Monsters University were both only PG's, The Lone Ranger was a PG-13.

People may not remember or care about the character anymore; The Lone Ranger was popular in the 1950s, so only adults would remember the highly popular tvseries, and fully appreciate the movie – so perhaps the failure was due to many people not caring about the movie because they would prefer to stick with well known franchises such as Despicable Me and Monsters rather than watch a movie they've never heard of before. Since the TV series, theres been little magazines, movies, and advertisements to keep The Lone Ranger franchise alive and well known, the 'buzz' has died since the tv series.

Unfortunately, Wild wests never seem to do that well in the box office with the slight exception of Django Unchained – theres an obvious correlation between wild wests not doing well in box offices and with the critics, it seems that peoples genre preference has moved on to more popular genres of sci-fi.

Another point to be made is that disney picked an unknown actor to play the masked man, no one has even heard of him, and as one of the leading roles, it seems appropriate to have a well known actor to attract an audience.

The poor performance of The Lone Ranger is similar to another one of disney's film's last year “John Carter” which was an even bigger flop.

Annotations of Horror's

- Horror & Thriller
- Safe world made unsafe
- Demon's effecting a happy family
- Good Vs Evil
- Dissonant music builds suspense and gears us up for jump scenes
- Feelings of helplessness, unable to escape but unable to solve the problem
- Possessed child