Our film noir opening sequence

Below is our finished film noir opening sequence, called 'Shadows Present'. Click on the video box to play it:

As the screen above is quite small and the film sometimes doesn't play very well, you can alternatively watch our film on YouTube - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wJBt-YHw140

Evaluation

In what ways does you media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?
The film noir genre has been occupying our screens since it was established by Nino Frank in the 1940’s. Through research I’ve found the genre has connotations of darkness, death, protagonist men and fem-fatales. In our film opening we’ve used many of these conventions to keep our opening within the noir genre. However, we’ve developed it by using today’s technical advances to create a stylised, modern neo-noir. For example our opening includes circular-tracking shots in the studio, synchronous music throughout and pleonastic sound effects when Chris enters the studio. Another modern touch we’ve used is cohesively referencing to ‘eyes’, with close-up shots and mentions in our voice-over. This is because eyes have connotations of innocence and truthfulness, which contrast against aspects of our narrative and characters. Through research, I’ve found that ‘whole-face’ close-ups weren’t popular in many traditional noirs, but are commonly used in films like Rian Johnson’s (2006) noir ‘Brick’, where its naturalistic style opening uses close-ups to show character’s emotions and build a relationship between them and the audience. Our stylised design idea is also in the opening to Frank Miller’s (2005) ‘Sin City’, where crane shots are used to establish the location and demonstrate power. As well as using modern styles, we’ve also included many traditional noir conventions, like using a gobo to create a Venetian blind effect in the studio scenes, and using metaphorical noir dialogue and voice-overs. So we’ve maintained and developed the noir genre by using both contemporary/neo and traditional styles.

How does you media product represent particular social groups?
Our film opening contains 2 main characters, acted by Chris and Josh. Middle-aged, elderly and young children aren’t in our film as we wanted to represent British teenagers and the ideology behind that age. Today teenagers are represented with youth crime and ‘hoodies’, specifically stereotypically associated with young males. Through mise-en-scene, cinematography and character roles we’ve recreated this representation. A knife and gun feature in our film and the bad villain (Josh) wears a dark hood. ‘Black’ has connotations of death and evil, so our villain character wears an entirely black costume. Josh also wears trainers, which are also associated with the teenage representation. As the main character, Chris is given most screen time, is shown in low-angle shots and contrasts against Josh’s deliberately concealed identity so he has additional importance. Our characters are also typical of the noir genre stereotypes, as Chris plays an innocent character who accidentally involves himself with the wrong person, and Josh plays the evil villain behind every murder in the film. These roles are found in both neo and traditional noirs, though we’ve updated them by using young actors and costumes. I noticed that fem-fatales are common in many noirs, but we haven’t included any in ours as we wanted the audience to concentrate on Chris and Josh’s characters, but if we were to finish our entire film a fem-fatale could appear later in the storyline. The main location we used was the woods, because of its scary/lonely connotations, which represent Chris's emotions. We chose to represent our characters in a realistic way so the audience could relate to them.

What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?
The noir genre is known for its cheap-budget B-grade movies. Therefore the media institution that would fund and distribute our film would be a small independent company, like ‘Verve Pictures’ or ‘Optimum’. Our film would be platform released into art-house cinemas, like ‘The Hollywood’ (Ipswich), and would be shown in 5-10 screens across the country. The cost of distributing into cinema multiplexes, like ‘Cineworld’, would be over budget, but may be possible if the platform release is successful. We could also show our film at festivals such as ‘Raindance’ or ‘Sundance’ as this would reach a large film audience inexpensively. After a cinematic release we’d screen our film on television, and aim for channels that appeal to a young audience, like E4 or BBC4, as then it would reach our target audience. Our screening would be past 10pm on a weekday as this would avoid the expense of peak-time TV. We’d also release our film on DVD as we’d follow the example from the neo-noir ‘Brick’, where it gained the majority of its profit from DVD releasing.

Who would be the audience for your media product?
Our film audience would be aged 15-24, as this is the main cinema-going audience. We’d be aiming towards the ‘Experiencer’ social category as they have the money to enjoy regular entertainment. We’d certify our film with a BBFC rating at ‘12’ as our film contains mild weapons/violence and this would broaden our audience intake. Through primary research we found males were interested in genres similar to noir (crime/thriller etc), and females enjoy action scenes and enigmas, though this wasn’t their favourite genre. We’d therefore mainly aim towards males as they prefer the noir genre style, but the action would also appeal to females. The socio-economic class that our film would appeal to would be C1 and below as they could relate to our characters and narrative. Our film would also appeal to a noir genre community: people who specifically enjoy noirs. Our audience would watch our film for ‘Active’ reasons because they’d gain most benefit from our film. The ‘Preferred Reading’ of our film is to intellectually puzzle the audience and let them work out the ‘who-done-it?’ mystery. We’d want our audience to be in the ‘Dominant Audience’ position and admit our preferred reading, and our complicated narrative requires full-attention.

How did you attract/address your audience?
To appeal to our audience we’ve used young characters and a modern filming style to keep them watching and intrigued with the storyline. E.g: smooth and stylistic editing, casual costumes, mysterious but contemporary music and shots like Dutch-tilts adding a modern atmosphere. However we’ve kept many traditional noir attributes to appeal to noir enthusiasts and an older audience too, such as shadows, darkness and murder. From watching our film audiences would get an adrenalin scare from the violence and chase scenes and mystery/enigma from the ‘cliff-hanger’ ending to our opening. They’d get both an emotional and intellectual pleasure from our film as they’d care about our characters’ fate and have to work out the ‘who-done-it’ mystery. Through initial screenings to our media class, we found they enjoyed the film though didn’t quite understand the metaphorical dialogue. Therefore we’d be aiming towards people aged early 20’s instead of 15-18 as they would understand it more easily. This isn’t too much of a problem for us as this age still fits within the regular cinema-going audience.

What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?
Many new technologies have helped me through this project. In the researching stage the Internet played a crucial part when learning about the genre. www.imdb.com and www.youtube.com were particularly useful when looking at film clips. Without internet technology it would be difficult to find current noir information and rare examples, like ‘Brick’. In the planning stage we used ‘Windows Movie Maker’ to create our animatic and a scanner to insert our storyboard into this programme. I used www.blogger.com to log my progress and view other group member’s ideas. Since I’ve never used a blog before, I’ve learnt how they allow people to share information easily. Throughout the project our group used email to communicate ideas and ensure we’re organised before shooting our footage. Email is quick and efficient, and allowed us to keep everyone up-to-date. During shooting the production we used a variety of new technology, including: a digital ‘Canon HV30DV’ camera, ‘Yoga Shotgun’ microphone, ‘Velbon DV-7000’ tripod and a ‘DV’ tape to record our footage onto. The lightweight camera and tripod made transporting the kit easier, and the camera viewing panel allowed us to play-back footage before editing. I found the equipment simple to understand and the many adjustments let us shoot the exactly as we wanted. When editing we used ‘Adobe Premiere Pro’ as although it’s a complicated programme, the different functions let us precision our footage to our exact specification. We also compressed our edit into a smaller ‘Windows Media’ file so loading it on to internet would be easier. Throughout the project I've learnt how to use each piece of technology, and how it would be difficult to create our film to the same standard without it.

Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product?
In the preliminary exercise my skills were basic and I made many simple mistakes. The cinematography involved many errors (e.g. poor framing, the 30° line rule and not leaving handles) however we avoided this in the noir opening. We didn’t capture enough footage in the preliminary, whereas in the noir we had plenty, and more freedom to select the best shots. There were still problems with the noir e.g. the sound effects and synchronised dialogue wasn’t loud enough. We overcome this issue by re-shooting/recording what we needed. There was also a problem with our first music choice (AR.Rahman - ‘Mausam and Escape’) as our film looked like a trailer rather than an opening, but we eradicated this by choosing a new piece and rearranging the sequence. In the noir we had more time to research and produce everything in detail, which we didn’t have in the preliminary. Pre-production work is an important stage in film development as we could plan what we wanted instead of deciding important aspects in a rush. More time let us make script and storyboard drafts and consider locations and music in depth before making final decisions. In contrast to the preliminary, we allocated roles and responsibilities in our noir group so everyone contributed something. In the preliminary we spent less time planning (mise-en-scene, editing, lighting), but with one person attached to a role, all areas were covered. My role was editor. I was therefore main editor and helped search for suitable noir-style music and sound-effects. In the preliminary I found it difficult to edit and required lots of help. In the exchange (a practice sequence in preparation for the noir) I improved but spent too long on rough cuts. By the noir my newly developed skills let me work with sound effects and long-take shots, and be ambitious with effects and transitions. As well as editing I contributed towards other areas, like recording sound and suggesting ideas. As editor I ensured the group were satisfied with decisions I made, and that each aspect followed noir conventions. The music adds atmospheric tension. The voice-over and flashback styles are typical in many noirs (Edgar G.Ulmar’s ‘Detour’). The title font is mysterious but modern (similar to David Fincher’s ‘Se7en’). The pace is fast, but music slows it down. These things associated with my role, plus those from other people’s roles, helped us produce a good-quality finished product in the style we wanted. Compared to the preliminary exercise, the noir opening is better planned and the knowledge I’ve developed through both the preliminary and exchange have helped to produce a higher standard film.

Screening to our media class

Today all groups showed their finished film noir sequences to the rest of the media class. This was so we could gain feedback from our potential target audience (aged 15-25) and to compare our sequences to other groups. For many people in our class, this was the first time they'd seen our film opening and didn't know the full synopsis of what our film was about. Therefore it was useful to gain feedback from them as they were watching our film under the same circumstances as our target audience would if they went to see it. Feedback is a great way of understanding people's reactions and finding out ways of improving to suit the audience. Below I've listed things that people liked and disliked about our film:

• Forms and conventions: ECMS

Editing: They liked the title font and how the 'Shadows Present' title at the end gradually changed to red before blurring away. They felt the pace was very noirey but some people felt the distinguish between flashbacks and present time was confusing at points and could have been made clearer. To resolve this we would have either applied a noise or transition effect that triggered the audience were going into a flashback, or putting all flashbacks in black and white formatting.

Cinematography: They felt a good variety of interesting shots were used and they particularly liked the tracking shots when the man is opening the package. However many people felt that a shot of the dead body at the beginning would have established that someone had died and made it more clearer to the audience. The class particularly picked-up on the shot where Chris is shot at an angle with half the desk slicing through the screen. They liked this shot and said it made the film more modern and interesting, which we were pleased to hear as this was just a quick shot we'd done from an obscure angle and had no intention of including it. But we're glad we did because it left a certain impact on our audience.

Mise-en-scene: They liked the way the characters were dressed and felt it made them look older. They also liked how the villain was dressed completely in black clothing, as this gave connotations of danger and death. They liked the woods location and felt it worked well with the running scenes, and they liked the way the studio was dressed to look like an office.

Sound: They liked the music and felt it added a noir style atmosphere to the scenes. They also liked the pleonastic sound effects as they added tension and made it seem like Chris was lonely. Many people also liked the church bells playing at the beginning and felt they also added dramatic tension.

• Characters and iconography

People liked the characters and understood the different roles they played within the film. They felt the characters represented young people aged slightly older than us (late teens/early 20's) and also how they represented traditional noir style characters too e.g. Chris played the confused man who's got into trouble and involved with the wrong person, and Josh played the mysterious villain who's out with a deadly ambition to get Chris. However the audience noticed no fem-fatales featured in our film, though this doesn't make it any less of a noir because not all noirs feature fem-fatales in the opening.

• Narrative

The class liked the narrative idea and felt many aspects of it were of he noir style, however many people didn't understand entirely what was going on, and felt the narrative was quite difficult to follow throughout the film, maybe because we'd been too ambitious about fitting too much into a short time scale. To make this clearer we would have focused on on or two key points in the storyline and not tried to over-complicate things with too many different enigmas going on at once. The audience felt the enigmas were good and would keep them watching, but perhaps too much was left un-answered and left them questioning too much instead of focusing what was actually going on. The majority of the class didn't like the dialogue and voice-over though. They liked the idea of having a voice-over as it fits within the noir style, but felt they couldn't understand what Chris and Josh were talking about because it was too 'flowery' and metaphorical. We wrote our speech in this particular way to exaggerate on the traditional noir way of speaking, but to overcome the issue we could have written it to be more understandable and appealing to our target audience.

• Audience

The class felt they enjoyed watching our film sequence and would want to watch the rest of our film, but the speech would probably make it more appealing to older people (20's ish) instead of the younger half of our target audience. This is fine for us as we would still appeal to our target audience, but could have made it more appealing to younger people as well by tweaking the speech and making it understandable for all ages in our target range.

• Within the noir genre?

The class agreed that our film was within the noir genre as many codes and conventions were addressed. They liked the running scenes and felt the studio scenes were particularly noirey. They felt the characters and locations represented the noir genre well and liked the use of shadows to illustrate the presence of a new character. They also liked the fast action against slow paced music and felt that worked well to create a tense atmosphere.

Overall the class enjoyed our film and said our film was definitely within the noir genre. We have fulfilled the brief and even with a few things we could have made clearer, the end result was still good.

'Shadows Present' script

As part of our pre-production work Josh created a script for our film. This involved the dialogue each character would be saying and a rough discription of where shots would appear in the storyline. We were each given a copy of the script to write our own notes on, relevant to our role. There were more than one versions of the script as Josh decided to change things according to what the rest of the group wanted or what we were advised to do by our media teacher. Below is a scanned version of my script copy with notes on editing, sound and titles that we could use. This script version was done about a few weeks before we began filming.


Creating a script is an important part of pre-production work as it helps to order how our film is going to appear. We took the final version of the script with us when filming in both locations as it helped us to keep on track with what we wanted to film and so that both Chris and Josh could learn their dialogue lines. Although it was Josh's task to create a script, as his role is writer and producer, everyone in the group contributed ideas and made useful suggestions for what else could be added.

Initial Feedback

On Wednesday 1st April we asked 2 people from different groups to come and view our film opening. They hadn't seen it before and didn't know what it was going to be about, so it was a good test to see if our intended audience would understand the narrative, characters and noir style as well as we all do in our group. We also took the chance to look at other group's work and compare their film ideas to ours. We asked Kamal and Laura to note down anything they liked or didn't like in our film so we could adapt our film on the basis of their comments.

Laura

• Liked the music choice and felt it was very noirey and matched the action on screen
• Didn't like the 'tumbler' effect we'd applied to our titles
• Liked the voice over as it added tension
• Understood the narrative and felt there was a good enigma

Kamal

• Didn't like the hissing sound behind the voice over and between the shots, but recommended how to sort it out
• Liked the different shots and the editing style
• Didn't like the voice over
• Liked the ending
• Hated the 'tumbler' effect on the titles as it isn't noirey at all and ruins the atmosphere

We had a week left until we'd have to finish our film, so had plenty of time to sort out what both Laura and Kamal didn't like. One of the things they both disliked was the 'tumbler' effects we had recently applied to each title. Me and Josh didn't liked the tumbler effect but agreed to allow Emily to keep it if our audience liked it. From the their feedback we decided to lose the 'tumbler' and keep a simple straight cut between titles.

Kamal's comment about the hissing noise could be fixed in two ways: either applying a fade transition between each audio bar, or inserting a recorded piece of ambiance sound between the gaps. Both methods came with the same result of continuing the hissing noise throughout but not making it noticeable to the audience. We decided on applying a 'Constant Power' audio transition that would gently fade in and out the hissing sound. This was a time consuming job but was needed to be done because it would ruin the viewing experience for our audience.

Both Laura and Kamal liked the narrative and enigmas and understood it. This was good to hear as from the presentation about our film ideas we did earlier in the year resulted in feedback about it being too complicated and difficult to understand. So this shows that even with such a complicated idea, the audience were still able to follow it.

Then there was a disagreement over the voice over. Laura liked it and said it made the film more noirey, but Kamal said he didn't like it and felt Chris's voice didn't suit it. As a group we liked the voice over and felt it added a more noirey feel and helped the audience to understand what's going on. And since we don't have much dialogue in the opening we thought the audience would be bored from just listening to the music the whole time. We therefore chose to keep the voice over as it was and hope that the majority of our audience would agree with Laura's opinion rather than Kamal's.

Both the negative and positive feedback was useful to us and we chose to act on most of it instead of ignore what our audience would want. Ideally we would have liked 3 or 4 people to look and review our film, but there wasn't enough time in the lesson. From looking at other group's openings I found that they're narratives were also good and very noirey. Compared to theirs, we've gone for the fast action-packed style noir with chases and fight scenes, whereas other groups have gone for a murderous deadly noir style with lots of blood and fem fatales. I also found that many groups had chosen music with lyrics that matched the action. Our music however doesn't have any singing in it as we entirely rely on the voice over, dialogues at the end and the different shots to tell the story. So overall I think other groups have produced work at the same standard as ours, but have used different codes and conventions to create a different style of neo-noir.