Film Reviews

 

 

 

 

 

I have recently been reading film reviews to get an idea of what actually makes one!

I looked through a few issues of ‘Empire’ magazine and there were some goods reviews which i found very useful, it was useful in terms of layout, getting a grasp of what a film review looks like on a page. I read a review on ‘New Moon’. I then went onto empireonline.com, to further my research. I found the two formats very different.

 

 

 

I read the ‘True Grit’ review, as it was a film i had recently watched, and was interested in comparing what i thought about the film, and what they had written about it.

It look like this:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The ‘New Moon’ review is what i decided to focus on, as it was what ultimately i needed to do my own versions of.

 

Here i have annotated the film review, highlighting the key characteristics of that review.

Andrea Arnold’s Fish Tank (2009)

In the claustrophobic flats which incubate family dysfunction and rage, and the wild beautiful spaces thereabouts, where the urban sprawls out into the country, film-maker Andrea Arnold finds a powerful story of betrayed love.

One of three British movies in competition at Cannes this year, Fish Tank is a powerfully acted drama, beautifully photographed by cinematographer Robbie Ryan, who intersperses bleak interiors with sudden, gasp-inducing landscapes like something by Turner. Arnold takes elements of tough social-realist drama which are, if not cliches exactly, then certainly familiar — but makes them live again and steers the movie away from miserabilism, driven by a heartfelt central performance.

After watching Fish Tank, I found my self relating and comparing with it out film opening. For the main reason that it included beautiful shots of the countryside, something that we wanted to include our sequenece.

 

As a follow up from ‘Red Road’ i thought Fish Tank is brilliant as it buzzes with life, ansd offers its very own take on the world. It delivers in spades attitude, humour, sadness, love, anger and hope – all wrapped up in a way of telling stories that is very much the director’s own. It’s realism, but it has an intimacy, an immediacy and a dash of poetry that offers a new spin on familiar territory.
Arnold has a keen eye for the border between danger and fulfilment when it comes to sexual feelings, and here she trains that eye on one vulnerable but strong adolescent teenage girl, Mia (Katie Jarvis), who you can’t help but feel for and understand – even after we watch her call a friend’s dad a ‘cunt’ and headbutt another girl so that the blood pours down her face.

I really like the fact Arnold chose the main character to be a girl who is strong, and very much a three dimensional character. There are not many hollywood films where we can see that.

Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it- to full product?

When filming and editing our preliminary task, we realised many mistakes we had made and were making.

We totally rushed into it, and there was hardly no planning what so ever.

You could see this in the extract. The lighting blurred Ellie and her outline. We hadn’t even thought about lighting, but as I have developed throughout the course I have witnessed the importance of lighting and the development of different types of lighting equipment which have both expanded the range of lighting methods and effects. Thinking about our media product Ellie and I had discussed our lighting options, we decided that we would use natural daylight as the main source of illumination, which would provide visual clarity in our opening sequence. We knew it would not allow many opportunities to create dramatic effects as artificial lighting does, but still decided to keep it simple, as our equipment was also not suffice.

We did try to include match on action shot/reverse shot and even an establishing shot, but as i hadn’t done media at GSCE and i was totally new to it, it was a bit of an experiment.  From this, i have learnt how important planning is, even though you may not stick to your original plans and initial ideas. We didnt want our film opening to be controlled by plans, however they were there to stop mishaps happening, they were always something to refer to. I understand how thouroughly films how to be thought through, specially as they will be pitched to a company. They will want to see every last detail, and how you will create every last detail. I experienced this when as a class, we were set the task of pitching a film idea. I realised that if you were not prepared, and not 100% dedicated to your film idea, it would all become apparent in the 10 minutes you spend sat in the chair. You needed to know your pitch like the back of your hand in order to be able to answer any question which could be asked.

I first created storyboards of intial ideas. from storyboard to storyboard my ideas changed. Never the less i found storyboarding a fun and visual way to create a feel of what i wanted to achieve. It was a good way to show who we wanted to represent in our film.  When Ellie and I decided on the plot/storyline, i drew a storyboard and title sequence timeline, to put the storyboards into some sort of form, sequence. I found the visuals made it alot easier to clarify ideas in your head. They seemed alot more real than just words on a page, however during the course i have written, pitches and screenplays. I found the screenplays inparticular make you think about camera shots, setting and stage directions, as you have to collaborate them with description of the scene.

I found these little tasks really important in the learning curve, leading to our end product, as they allowed you to realize what you could and couldn’t do, what looked good and what didn’t. Giving you targets and areas to improve, and learn new techniques.

As im sure ive mentioned before, being able to use the final cut express programme is where i have learnt the most. When we had the footage filmed for our preliminary task, i then had to edit it. To be perfectly honest i didnt have a clue where to start.  But as they say practise makes perfect, and for our final piece our editing was much more efficient. We learnt short cuts which helped make the process easier such as Apple and ‘B’ for blade or Apple and ‘A’ for arrow. Its amazing how much easier it made the process, knowing these short cuts.

What have you learnt about technologies from the process of contructing this product?

From constructing this media product, I have learnt that the use of technologies have made the process of making a film much more doable and manageable, than first expected.
We used a digital camcorder to film our footage.

The advantages of this are that they are small, compact and lightweight, making it easy to transport and means that they can be used more or less anywhere! As i had not much experience using one, i found them easy to use, which saved time, by not having to learn loads about their operation. A disadvantage being, the lack of battery life, but this was easily overcome by not wasting battery by leaving it on, and ensuring it was fully charged.
We used a Video microphone to record the voice over for our film opening. This again was easy to use and made the audio clear and crisp. We could take this anywhere, so we could find a quite destination to record, I learnt that this piece of equipment would improve the quality of the audio massively.

I think the area where i have learnt the most, was from editing and using final cut express, a programme i had never used before starting the course. To begin with i felt it was very much a trial and error way of working. We knew how we wanted the film opening to look it was just a case, of trying and experimenting with different things, and from doing this we discovered a wide range of effects we could use that we were unaware off. Which resulting in so some of our initial ideas changing.

Tripods are essential! (unless you wnat the  the hand-held effect for realist/documentarys)  Its harder than you think to keep a shot steady. We wanted most of our shots to be filmed with a camera that was not moving, so that the option was there to make the use of movement an effective exception to the norm.

During the course i was introduced to live type, this was the programme we used to create our title.

I raelly enjoyed learning how to use this programme, it made titles reletivly easy to create, and ment we could be creative… To an extent we weren’t limited with what we could do. We were able to create the style we wanted for our social realism genre.

We played around with the different fonts, live fonts, textures and effects until we were happy with what we had acheived.

I also used these programmes whilst contructing my media product:

Garage Band – We didn’t use the sound, but we used this to play around with different sound effects and to see if we could create a melody to go over our opening.

WordPress – This was one of the newest programs I had to learn how to use, but once I got to grips with it I found it relatively straight forward. We use this program to do all of our blogging for our coursework.

Blip TV – I had to create a Blip TV account to upload the videos we had created and exported, so I could then have the code used to embed the video in order to put it on my blog.

MySpace – This was the website I used to find Andy Steele, the artist we used for our music, and I asked for his permission vis an email, to see if we could use one of his songs ‘sensible Living’.

Google – This was the main search engine I used if I needed any additional information  or if I needed to research anything about social realism, camera shots, films etc. I also got alot of infomation about Shane Meadows from a media magazine, which i have enjoyed reading throughout the project.

How did you attract/address your audience?

Our main aim, was to ensure that what the audience were watching, the audience believed was real. We had long takes, so that the actor could semi improvise, just to create that feel of real life. We used long held camera shots, slow pans and tracks; as we believed if the camerawork was fast paced it wouldn’t work as it would draw attention to the fact there was a camera there, and subsequently what you were watching wasn’t real. We were aware that many films of this genre had a lot less non-diegetic sound in them, we challenged this convention and had diegetic sound (mood music) over our whole sequence. We felt this was a key attempt to attract our audience. The song had that feel, and the lyrics made the audience wounder, and ask questions.

When it comes to style i understood, that British social realist texts were associated with exhibiting a distinct preference for content over style (This may be considered as ‘naturalism.’). This led to the label ‘Kitchen Sink’, a somewhat derogatory term used to describe their percieved drab representations of working class settings and characters. Social realist texts are often decribed as ‘gritty’, a term which can be applied to describe the surface realism of the landscape which characters inhabit, the way these landscapes and chacacters are filmed and charcter attitudes and behaviours. This genre of film is commonly associated with an observational style of filming which tends to produce a distance between text and spectator.  By filming the sequence in the countryside i hoped that it would make it pituresque, and more intreging, breaking a conventions of your average social realism film.

What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?

Distribution is the selling and advertising of a product. The distributor is the link between the production of a film, the exhibition, circulation and the marketing of the film. Distribution is extremely important to a film as it can make or break it.  I believe that an independent company would distribute our media product. There is a fair possibility that an independent company like film4 would distribute my product due to their reputation of taking on unique, British films (E.g. This is England, Slumdog Millionaire and Lovely Bones).

The reason Film4 take on such films maybe due to  Channel 4, who really invigorated the British film industry in the 1980’s. This time was important in the movement of Social Realism films, and to really understand it, its crucial that you are aware of the social, political, and economic climates, and their impact on the alrealy ailing British film Industry. Thacherism shaped many social realism films, and not just the films made them, films that are also made nearer to date. ‘This is England.’ Channel 4 was there in the thick of it commissioning these films.
Using film4 specifically, the company would be more likely to distribute my film (When fully filmed) due to it being a completely British film (E.g. British Director, Cast, Producer). A second reason an independent film company would distribute my film could be due to the possible ease when advertising it – my media product has a fair few USP’S (Unique selling points) such as: the gritty,  sensitive situation at home and the unusual characters. A third reason could be the wide fan – base that already exists for the social realism genre, the fan – base alone could bring in potential viewers and with that money.

How does your media product represent particular social groups?

Our Film Opening (media product) represents ethnic minorities as our main characters is a young portuguease boy, the storyline evolves around Juan and his struggles with life, up until the day he dies. The opening is a kind of montage of the last couple of days of the young boys life, flashing backwards and forwards to events which become clear later in the film. The film begins after ‘Juan Goncalvez 1994-2009’ white on a black background appears. We know the boy dies, and the film then tells the story of why and how. The rest of the film would represent the younger generations of  21st century England, but the film would also paint a broader community feel, depicking many generations. As football comes into our storyline, it becomes an easy way to show people from many aspects of society. People from many backgrounds coming together to watch a game! The film wouldn’t really show any aspects of a high socio-econmic/ upper class background; but it would depick police officers and the emergancy service, as they have first hand experience with society. My aim for the film would be to show an honest as possible account of real life Britain, and how people can effect other people’s lives.

What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?

Distribution is the selling and advertising of a product. The distributor is the link between the production of a film, the exhibition, circulation and the marketing of the film. Distribution is extremely important to a film as it can make or break it.  I believe that an independent company would distribute our media product. There is a fair possibility that an independent company like film four would distribute my product due to their reputation of taking on unique, British films (E.g. This is England, Slumdog Millionaire and Lovely Bones).
Using film four specifically, the company would be more likely to distribute my film (When fully filmed) due to it being a completely British film (E.g. British Director, Cast, Producer). A second reason an independent film company would distribute my film could be due to the possible ease when advertising it – my media product has a fair few USP’S (Unique selling points) such as: the gritty,  sensitive situation at home and the unusual characters. A third reason could be the wide fan – base that already exists for the social realism genre, the fan – base alone could bring in potential viewers and with that money.

Other distributors such as the British Film Institution may distribute our media product. The BFI National Archive has one of the most extensive collections of classic films in the world, including feature films, short films, animation, avant-garde films and documentary. The collection includes work from such diverse masters of cinema as Jean Cocteau, Ritwik Ghatak, Alfred Hitchcock, Akira Kurosawa, Vincente Minnelli, Michael Powell and Ousmane Sembène. Recent re-releases include Citizen Kane and Les Demoiselles de Rochefort.

Who would be the audience for your media product?

We know that not all films are for everyone. In order to communicate effectively we needed to establish the people for whom we were making it. We aimed it at 15- 21 year old. For our Media Product, the target audience would be definatly be  teenagers and young adults. I was unsure whether it would be certified 12 or 15. But after looking into the boundaries of a 12 certificate, i think our film content would fall into this catagory. We would aim for this as it opens up to a larger audience/ market.

The BBFC permits the following within the bounds of the 12 certificate:

Theme: Mature themes are acceptable, but their treatment must be suitable for young teenagers.
Language: The use of strong language should be rare and must be justified by context.
Nudity: Nudity is allowed, but in a sexual context will be brief and discreet.
Sex: Sexual activity may be implied. Sexual references may reflect the familiarity of most adolescents today with sex education through school.
Violence: Violence must not dwell on detail. There should be no emphasis on injuries or blood. Sexual violence may only be implied or briefly indicated and without physical detail.
Imitable techniques: Dangerous techniques (examples include: combat, hanging, suicides) should contain no imitable detail. Realistic and contemporary weapons should not be glamorised.
Horror: Sustained threat and menace is permitted. Occasional gory moments only.
Drugs: Brief and occasional references to, and sight of, ‘soft’ drug-taking (eg cannabis) are allowed, but must be justified by context and should indicate the dangers. No instructional elements are permitted.

With many of these genre films, as you have to be carfeful with its content,  it can be on boardline Certificate 18. This will reduce the market for your film. For example, Shane Meadows wanted This is England to be certifcated 15, as he belived it raises issues, which todays teenagers should be aware off, but it was given an 18 certificate, as it was deemed unsuitable for any audience younger. This prevented Meadow’s initial target audience from watching it. The film’s production team said the movie highlights important issues such as the dangers of bullying and racism, and deserves to be seen by a younger audience.

A total of 152 British films received final certification in 2009, up from 104 in 2008 and about the same number as the 154 recorded in 2007. The great majority (144 out of 152) of the finally certified films in 2009 were Schedule 1 films. My film would pass the tests, and be a schedule 1 film as it is a British film (UK films are films made by British companies and shot wholly or partly in the UK and/or films that qualify as British under Schedule 1 of the Films Act 1985 or under one of the UK’s official co-production treaties).  (Schedule 1 films are British films certified under Schedule 1 to the Films Act 1985. To qualify under this definition, films commencing principal photography on or after 1 January 2007 must pass a UK Cultural Test awarding points for UK elements in the story, setting and characters and for where and by whom the film was made.)

We thought marketing would be hard for our film, as we didn’t in particular have an attractive protagonist for the audience to fall in love with *(kissing jessica stein), or a good source of material as it wasn’t based on a real event, or best-selling novel ie. Titanic

Our main Marketing aspects would be its subject matter, and special interests such as its football/culture content. This is a mature approach, we aimed to send out a message in our media product.

In What ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

When we started to look at different film genres in preparation for starting our group piece, we looked at different film genres and the conventions of each of those genres. For example rom-com would be very high key (lighting) and would usually have younger attractive people falling in love, with a struggle separating them. Then there was drama; using fast paced editing and lots of action to keep the audience enticed. Then we began to look at realism, and the more we looked into in the deeper we focused in on it. Typical films within  Social realism are gritty, urban dramas about the struggle with daily life. We wanted to capture this by sticking to most of the conventions but to break some convntions, just to experiment and push the boundaries, to put a film out there that was different to most. So we set out film in a  rural setting. Conventions of the genre include the use of naturalistic lights, and  most scenes include hand-held shots, the narrative of a social realist drama usually includes conflict either through large scale i.e. political conflict or on a smaller scale between individuals. We went with these conventions. We used similar iconograpghy, to that of similar films, these included costume, naturalistic lighting, make-up  and we went with the theme of bullying, and loneliness, with a sense of reedemption. Unlike many aspects in films of social realism, we didn’t want to introduce lots of modern technology. We had a mobile phone on the table in part of our sequenece just to give a hint of what era the film is to be set in. But other than that we kept it to a minimum (not representing facebook, msn, the internet, television etc.) to  really give  a sense of loniness and isolation, the main charcter is experiencing now he is living in a foriegn country.