my initial ideas for this project is that i really like the idea of subverting the meaning of an familier subject. which can be seen in the following clip and other re-cut trailers
this trailer takes selected sections from the horror thriller 'The Shining' and re edits it to look like a buddy movie. the key to the success of this in its use of generic conventions like the happy voice over.
due to the short duration on my film i need to set the scene in the first couple of seconds. so i need to be making strong use of these conventions in the establishing shots. i could manipulate the generic conversions by juxtaposing them with the content of the frame e.g. shooting a the scene of a murder in high key lighting with happy noises.
when i sat down to think about this project the opening sequence of 'City of God' came to mind. in particular the first 2:30 of the film. which you can see below.
the drama and narrative that are in this opening sequence are exactly what i am aiming for with my project. the long build up of the slows opening titles creates a suspenseful atmosphere so when the very fast shot of the knife appears on screen you can really feel the sharpness of the blade. the use black empty time between the knife shots helps maintain the initial sharpness the first knife shot has by leaving you in suspense. then the sound bridge of the happy carnival style music is a strong juxtaposition to the knifes which leads us away for the sinister uneasy feeling with which the film starts. when you get the shot of the worried looking chicken and a carrot being peeled and chopped you know exactly what the knife is for and the scene is set. the narrative comes from the look on the chickens face which looks as if it is actually scared, worried as has worked out its fate and wants to do something about it.
the fast paced editing and interesting angles create a metonym for them celebrating and having a good time while also keeping us interested and allowing us to slowly picture the scene in our minds.
another element which helps this style of editing work is the handheld camera which moves has a large amount of movement within each shot. this moving camera style can also be seen in the opening sequence of the latest James Bond film 'Quantum of Solace'
both this and the opening of 'City of God' use alot of very dark shots to build a mood at the start of the sequences. Unlike 'City of God' however the James Bond sequence starts with a wide angle shot of the landscape of which it is set in, which then moves closer in to reveal a tunnel which you could just see the card driving through. this very overtly sets the scene so that your focus is on the fast paced action of the car chase instead of on discovering the mood and location of what you are seeing. this is also backed up the the soundtrack and relatively slow paced editing which build to a crescendo followed by several shots very quickly edited together showing him switching into gear and speeding off.
This first part of the fast paced action seems to follow an editing pattern of Cause and Effect, where the Cause is a short fast paced sequence of actions and the Effect of those actions is shown in a wide angle shot with a longer duration. this is something i feel that i will be able to use in my project.
another thing i am interested in is the Hollywood Formula, an outline template of which can be downloaded here http://www.stewartferris.com/pages/Movie_formula.htm.
The Hollywood Formula is basicaly a pattern that a whole load of films follow. it goes a little something like this.
- persons situation
- person needs to change situation
- situation begins to change through conflict (high point)
- it fails (turning point)
- person tried to change situation a different way
- it fails (low point)
- radical change to situation or point of no return
- situation builds to a climax (highest point)
this works with Archetypal characters to produce most of the films we see.
it can been seen in these spoof 1 min versions of 'Top Gun'.
i am interested in this because of the short nature of out film, 15 seconds, we can not possible have all of these elements. so i can just take a segment of it to display to leave the audience wanting more, this is done in film trailers.
part of the restriction of the brief which i didn't mention in my last post is the use of sound. the brief states;
you will use single individual noise events (crash, bump, bang etc) not a continuous soundtrack of pieces of music. This can be based on the sounds recorded while filming and or/sourced by not copyright sound effects.
my mum told me about the British Sound Archive, sounds.bl.uk, which has thousands of sounds but i am not sure about the copyright of these sounds so i have emailed them to find out more information.
Archive.org is another source that i could possibly sample sounds from. thinking of archive.org made me think that i could possibly incorporate some vintage footage into my short piece in some form or another or i could make some practice pieces using vintage footage.
when i was looking into the copyright on archive.org i found this in the FAQ section
If the work was made in 1923 or earlier, it is probably public domain and can be uploaded. NOTE! Restored versions of the film or new soundtracks for silent films can have more recent copyrights that are still valid - usually a copyright notice for a new soundtrack or restoration will appear in the film.
This means that i am likely to be able to use very old footage and sounds that i find. however i would need to carefully consider how vintage footage will sit with its low resolution with the high resolution footage i will be filming.
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