JN: Jamaica inn (Hitchcock 1939) Technical analysis

Shot Number	Camera	Duration (seconds)	Mis-en-scene
1	Close up fading into	4	Night: Aged wooden Inn sign swinging in wind
2	Establishing shot fading into MLS.	3	Shot of old, neglected, remote Inn on wild night
3	MLS slides into.	13	Man hurriedly exiting Inn – running down external  stairs and mounting horse. Cloak and hat typical of 19th Century
4	LS moving into close up slides into.	4	Horseman riding urgently down badly-made road across rugged moorland
5	Medium long shot –jumps into.	9	Man on horseback approaches lantern on cliff edge, dismounts and approaches lantern
6	MLS,jumps to	4	Man in profile, horses head in shot. Man desperately scanning the unseen distance. Lantern behind shining.
7	Long shot ,fades to	3	Foreground sea, breaking waves with white surf crashing over rocks in storm. Ship in trouble in long shot
8	LS, jump to	1	Sailor struggling with ships wheel , obvious rigging of sailing ship typical of 19th Century
9	Mid shot	1	Sailor continues battle with cumbersome wheel and against storm
10	LS from bridge, Jump cut to prow	5	Prow of ship,  prominent rigging in foreground, rough sea through spray and waves land sighted dead ahead
11	Mid shot, jump	6	Captain, denoted by white cap, helping battle with wheel as waves continue to batter over bridge/ wheel

AM:Technical Analysis - The Warriors (Hill, 1979)

HL:Analysis of an opening sequence 2

Dog Soldiers (Marshall, 2002)

Narrative

• The narrative is structured in a classic Hollywood style as it starts with equilibrium implying that the narrative is soon to change. This establishing scene, shows a peaceful woodland area, with a loving couple. Due to this being a horror film the audience immediately understands that a change in the structure is soon to happen. This is then evident as the film cuts to a romantic and intense love scene which then turns into a bloodbath resulting in the demise of the couple.
• The audience is positioned with the couples, causing the audience to think of them as the good people, however when the aspect of horror is introduced, the audience is shown how the male character is given prevalence over the female,as we are shown his reaction to her death.
• Graphic are also used in this clip to develop a feel of verisimilitude. The use of non-verbal language is used to identify the two people as a couple, not only by kissing but also by facial expressions etc. This idea mainly revolves around binary oppositions, as we the narrative being based around humans vs monsters (werewolves).
• Major themes in this narrative are identified as love, due to the couple being located in a secluded area. However being a horror the genre allows the scene to be identifiable as dangerous.
• Tension is created by the use of sound, especially the sound a zip. This is firstly shown as a source of pleasure (the women's trousers) however the sound of the tent zip over powers the other. This then creates a sense of tension as the zip is being undone slowly thus to create a sense of enigma. The idea of a monster is reinforced by the use of sound as snarls and grunts are heard.

Media Audiences

• Due to the film mainly revolving around themes of violence and gore, as well as aspects from the armed forces, we would expect the audience to consist of mainly males aged from around 16-50 years old. However there are bound to be females who would challenge the stereotype and enjoy the film.
• The probable audience reading would be seeing as this is a horror, the equilibrium is soon to shift die to a change in the narrative. The possible reading could be that even though the couple are situated in a woodland area, perhaps the change in story happens afterwards in a completely new location.
• To and extent the text can be read differently, being a teenage boy the emphasised corruptions from a love scene can be more shocking then say for a girl. And with age the area itself could be criticised and even the plot, older people may be more stubborn to believe in such myths as werewolves.

The soldiers

Werewolf

Group (AM) : Lesson 2 Outline

This lesson we were tasked with some preliminary filming. Our objectives were to create a video with:    

-          A Continuity shot through a door

-          2 lines of dialogue

After a brief revision on the rules of using a camera we set to work. Luckily we had most of our filming done in the previous lesson; however we still had one or two shots to revise. After this, we were able to start editing the video, using Premier 9.0 software. We have not completed editing, however our finished preliminary video should contain

–        2 lines of dialogue

–        Continuity shot

–        POV shot

–        Handy Cam shot

–        Pannig shot

–        Shot/reverse/shot

And so on…

HL: Analysing an opening sequence 1

Scream 4 (Craven,2011)

Genre

• This film fits into the horror genre, as we aspects of violence and gore. However in ways it also overlaps into comedy due to its truly preposterous circumstances.
• In ways the audiences expectations are met, due to the use of violence, as the audience is shown many different scenarios, resulting in death. However parts of there expectations are challenged by the text i.e. ending each characters life.
• Even though the text does conform to the characteristics of the genre, we see the  director treating these issues ironically (The girl who doesn't accept it, usually is more viciously killed), and in some ways also playfully.

Film Language

• The use of a mask and cape, hides the identity of the murderer. This connotes aspects of Noir as we see the protagonist to be mysterious, because of this it creates the sense of enigma in the audience, which exaggerates the fear created by the director.
• CU's are used to show the emotion that the character is feeling. In this instance its fear, this is then reinforced by the use of dialogue i.e. a scream.
• Sound is chosen to add a sense of tension, examples of this being the door bell, the phone ring, and the text alert (amplified diagetic sound). However the brutality of the death is also anchored by the sound made as the character is stabbed.
• Throughout the opening we learn, who is prevalence amongst the characters. All the characters are female except the killer who is perceived by the audience to be male, due to the voice on the phone. There is also a divided amongst the two females as well, one character enjoys the idea of horror and one whom sees it as a waste of time.



The mask- a symbol of the franchise


  

Group 3: Concept Developments

Group 3: Concept Development

Location:
Woodlands/ Scary area i.e. abandoned property

• Ashdown Forest or any other convenient areas

Props:
Sweets, torch, weapon, walking stick, trench coat and hat(Noir-esque)

Title:
Sweet Death/ Sweet Dreams

Font:
A Lolita Scorned/Blood Crow

Treatment:
Shot of man sitting in police cell head in hands, flashbacks to an abandoned area, the man is walking along distributing sweets along the ground. Cuts to a girl walking behind him, girl notices sweets and follows the trail. Leads to an abandoned hut where the sweets end. Knocks on the door and no answer, the door is unlocked. The girl is scarred she looks around and then follows the trail around the corner. While this is happening it cuts to a POV of the 'crazed' man (heavy breathing). The girl enters the shed to discover photographs and memorable items (i.e. hair). The last shot is then the girl with a shocked expression as the figure of a man appears over here. Cuts to an outside shot where a scream is heard.


Character:
man (creepy), girl, extras

JN:Jamaica Inn (Hitchcock 1939)

Media audiences

• The target audience is clearly an adult audience as the opening credits display the British Board of Film Censors accreditation very prominantly. It could also be seen to be aimed at a literate audience as you have to read the Cornish Wreckers Prayer to contextualise the film.
• The probable reading of this text is that these people are outside the law and operate a well organised but brutal crime ring.
• The possible reading is that these men live in impoverished conditions and the only way they can earn a living is through crime.
• My reaction to this text as a white british teenage male would be that ultimately the actions of these men are morally wrong,  yet I could understand that their poverty   might force them to wreck and kill to keep food on their tables.

Institutional context:

• The star with headline billing is Charles laughton, who also co-produced the film. He would have been used as he was a famous actor of the era and would have been a pull factor to entice more people into coming to watch the film.
• The film was distributed by Paramount an industrial film studio.
• Its pre-war release was aimed at the regular film going public. The little advertising that it had was a Poster with the faces of the two principal actors, Laughton and O'hara as well as the standard trailers that were played in cinemas.

JN:Film opening 2 Jaws (Speilberg 1975)

• During the opening credits the audience are taken underwater for a 'sharks-eye' persepctive, juxtaposed by tracking through a beach party scene .
• Tension in the clip is created and maintained, visually through the initial menacing underwater scene supported by John Williams' insistent theme rising to its sinister climax.
• Tension is also created by the contrasts shown - typified by the panic of Chrissie when attacked against the calm coastal view with the reclining figure.
• Alienation occurs because we are the 'fish out of water', in the undersea view which then changes with the view of a typical student party which we are all lead to believe would be joyous to attend.

Representation of ideology

• The beach party shows young, white,  middle-class Americans enjoying alchohol and with the suggestion of drugs and sex.
• It is a typical summer break moment that stereotypes the American college youth as care-free and hedonistic seekers of pleasure.
• The chase through the dunes is rendered unthreatening because of the drunken state of the young man.

AM: Lesson outline 1.

This was our first lesson with the cameras we were introduced to them and told how to treat then properly so they do not break, and how to operate the tripod and camera itself. The things to remember were:

-          Store the camera with the lens shut and facing upwards

-          How to insert/remove battery

-          How to insert/remove SD card

-          Not to tighten the knobs in the tripod too tightly

-          You must put the mount on the camera before you put it on the tripod.

JN: Film Opening 1 - The Grudge (Shimizu, 2004)

Genre

• The Grudge is a 2004 American horror film
• The opening shows the credits ,this immediately with a typical sinister red background which could connote blood ,with what resembles a young girls hair flowing through it ,also the thin black writing set over the red and black background seemingly coming from the blood red shows a sinister plot too come.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u-Kjg6jLgQ8

Film language:

• Low key lighting is used to give an eerie effect such as when the girl goes into the attic it makes the space she is in seem smaller and therefore gives the effect of an inescabable atmosphere.
• The main prop used by the girl is a lighter this is used to connotes a light in a dark place and gives the sense of why there is light she is reasonably safe ,yet with the encroaching darkness she seems set to have a scare.
• The set design shows a very simple family like home ,a design which horror films seem to use more than most other genres ,the family home is meant to be a safe heaven from the outside world and its the fear of the doubt we have at this that makes the family home all the more scary place to set a horror film.

AM: Opening sequence analysis – The Shining

The Shining is a Psychological Thriller starring Jack Nicholson as a caretaker, tasked with taking care of an isolated hotel, with a disturbing past over the long winter.

The opening sequence begins with a sweeping establishing shot, of a yellow beetle while the introduction credits roll; this shot could help to establish the isolation and separation between the “real world” and the hotel. This, with the use of eerie, tension building music fulfils the audience’s expectations because it sets the experience of a horror film by putting the characters in an unfamiliar environment and then watching them fall into demise, this also happens in Hostel (Roth, 2005) The Blair Witch Project (Myrick, 1999) etc.

                                                                                                                                                              The Shining conforms to the psychological Horror genre in that the location has a history of violence or tragedy, also that a character may have mental problems or diffuculty coping with life. Jack’s demon was drinking but he has since given up. However, his son develops a bond with an imaginary friend “Tony”. These issues help escalate, what would usually be a boring experience, into something of a classic.

Jack Nicholson was cast as the starring role in The Shining, already with over 25 films under his belt; he could have been used to gain media attention as he was a rising star and not the directors and caster's only choice. Steven King, the author of the novel, said that the casting was a bad idea as the plot / acting was too similar to his recent “One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest” however, due to its critical positivity he could have been cast to emulate that success.

The film is an independent film, as the production studio was owned by Kubrick himself. It did not utilise any particular marketing techniques, however unlike Kubrick’s other releases which gained attention by word of mouth, and it was released nationwide in America and then the rest of the world.

The Institutional context is quite evident as the opening sequence has quite low production values, as often Independent films do. The Shining has a budget of $19 million, however the production team were able to create the largest set ever built for a film, making a scale model of the hotel, in a British studio, which conflicts with the general low production values of the rest of the opening sequence.

JN:Conventions of horror: Amityville Horror (Douglas 2005)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hDoMgQxJMpI

.The haunting soundtrack as well as the use of amplified diagetic sounds ables the audience to understand the fear felt by the girl ,furthermore the Heartbeat sound and the emphasis on creaky doors adds to the effect.
.the location is a rural and isolated area.
.The limited dialogue makes the audience focus more on the non-verbal language.

.Muted colours are caused by a sepia filter ,which gives a more evil and haunted feel to the intro.This allows the apparent genre to be shown.

JN:Preliminary Task: Lesson one

During the lesson,i learned how to store the camera and tripod safely and efficiently.
-The camera lense must be facing upwards
-The tripod legs must be together with the handle down
-The clip must be secure to the top of the tripod.

When we made a makeshift film we used
-A medium longshot  as the establishing shot
-Aclose up to show a victims reaction
and finally we used a handy cam to emulate the action of a chase.

HL:Preliminary Task: Lesson one

During the lesson, the class reiterated the shots and camera techniques that should of been used in the preliminary video.

The shots used include:

• Establishing shot
• Close-up
• Handi-cam
• Panning shot (Static pan)

As well as this, the class went over the concept Continuity Editing. This allows are filming to come across as more realistic.

During the lesson our group was also instructed on how to assemble and pack up a tripod and a camera, safely and securely.





AM: What techniques might you use in an opening sequence? (Brick)

The opening sequence of the teen neo-noir film, Brick (Johnson, 2005) uses a shocking initial establishing shot image of the protagonist perched awkwardly, at a distance, on a curb while looking onto the body of a girl laying face down in flowing water. This shot exhibits the rule of thirds perfectly and helps to show the degree of separation, now that she is dead, between these two characters. (The rule of thirds technique is further repeated throughout the film). This then cuts to, essentially, an extended flashback of the events leading to this tragedy. The initial scene then begins again, without music at the 24:30 mark.

 

Iconography is also used in the opening sequence, as the first image the audience sees is the protagonist’s shoes, the shoe iconography extends throughout the film as the first images we see of the dead girl is her wet hair and her scuffed shoes. This acts as a visual motif throughout, and the significance climaxes when the shoes (or lack thereof) helps Brendan survive a knife attack. We could use iconography to establish the significance of a particular item and create an enigma surrounding the character(s) using it.

HL: The conventions of a Thriller


James Bond: Casino Royale (Campbell, 2007)

What are the generic conventions are in this clip?

• The opening of this particular thriller, is very much in a Noir style.
• This is mainly noticeable from the use a sepia filter, showing the audience a solely black and white image.
• The use of a counted angle also reinforces the genre the sequence is shot in.
• The audience also shown aspects of Noir, from the use of low-key lighting and flashbacks.
• However the main genre of thriller is still noticeable due, to not only the introduction of the character 'James Bond' but also the inter-cutting flashbacks. This adds a sense of enigma into the clip causing tension between the two characters.

Daniel Craig

AM: Analysis of three film openings

1.)The Shining (Kubrick, 1980)
2.)The Last Exorcism (Stamm, 2010)
3.)The Omen (Moore, 2006)

Group 3: Idea 1

As a group we have decided on the genre of horror, perhaps branching off into a sub-genre such as a psychological-horror.
We should consider the use of POV shots,as it gives the audience a sense of verisimilitude. A great example of this being 'The Blair Witch Project' which has been posted below, early today.
Is this the sort of genre we as a group are aiming to emulate?

HL: Analysis of three film openings

1. The Blair Witch Project (Myrick & Sanchez, 1999)
2. Memento (Nolan, 2000)
3. I Am Legend (Lawrence, 2007)

HL: The conventions of Teen Noir

Brick (Johnson, 2006)

What are the conventions of the genre?

• Focuses mainly on the useage of low-key lighting, however the focus is more on the light, where the darkness is referring to the protagonist. Connotating the stereotypical veiw of an 'outcast'.
• The use of candles are also relevelant to film noir, and again the shadow is being utilised by the main character.
• A femme fatale is also introduced, how we see the introduction of different subsiduaries of this role. These characters  allow the storyline to develop.
• Graphic and signposts are alot more widely used in teen noir, as it links in the different lines of action. This means that in a flashback no sound bridge is needed, however music is usually used.
• Shallow depth of field are also used to focus on specific objects in a scene, but also account for other action that are going to emerge from the backgroud.

HL: The conventions of Film Noir

Double Indemnity (Wilder,1944)

What techniques might be used in this film?

• The use of low-key lighting is evident in this piece, as we see them used to add obscurity to the main characters. This can also be done by the use of mise-en-scene, where a character is wearing a hat or 'popping' up their collar of a jacket.
• The use of shadows can also be seen, mainly from the use of banisters and/or venetian blinds. Again to influence the level of light being fed into the scene.
• Dialogue is also relevant, many of the lines are spoken fast which connotes ideas referring to crime. The stereotypical  view of a vigilante, some one under pressure.
• Techniques such as the use of flashbacks and flash-forwards especially are very clear conventions of film noir.
• Not to mention the introduction of the femme fatale/ spider women who is renowned for beauty but also he deviance. This shows the audience how her morals are ambiguous.
•  Even though she is often presented as empowered, their character type rarely survives the whole of the film.

The Femme Fatale



HL: The conventions of a Horror

The Amityville Horror (Douglas, 2005)

What generic conventions are in this clip?

• The graphics placed in the corner of the scene, show the date in which the apparent incident happened. This gives a sense of verisimilitude as the font used connotes the genre the film is set (in this case 'courier' is used).
• The haunting sound track, as well as the use of amplified diagetic sound furthermore constructs the specific genre by putting emphasis on sounds such as heart-beats, foot- steps and creaky doors.
• The weather is bleak and dull, and the scene is set during the evening. This is one of the main generic conventions, as the audience will immediately associate darkness with horror.
• The location is a rural and isolated area.
• The dialogue in the intro is also very limited, causing the audience to focus much more on non-verbal language of the character given prevalence.  However some lines are used, mainly to play with the audiences emotions. In this instance the words 'I love you' are used. Followed shortly by a sound bridge (the sound of gun fire).
• Muted colours are caused by a sepia filter, which gives a more evil and haunted feel to the intro. This allows the apparent genre to be shown.