09/10/13 RESEARCH: FILM NOIR

I used these books to do some research into film noir and what we were going to do for the film opening and from these books I noticed that the key things with film noir are

• low key black and white visual style
• roots in German expressionist cinematography
• derives from crime fiction of US Great Depression
• central figure often an private eye (THE BIG SLEEP 1946)
• or a plain clothed police man (THE BIG HEAT)
• an ageing boxer (THE SET-UP)
• a hapless grifter (NIGHT AND THE CITY)
• or simply a victim if circumstance (D.O.A)
• film noir nearly always have a strong female character who resist and disturb the male ordered world
• gives us pleasure by making us uncomfortable: anxiety vulnerability and fright are all part of the thrill
• characters faces often partially shadowed to create hidden threatening spaces
• often sleazy, milieu of claustrophobic alley ways or destered spaces alternating with gaudy night clubs and swank apartments
• high contrast lighting

08/10/13 PLANNING: LOCATION

Production Log

08/10/13 single lesson

In the lesson we carried on with writing the treatment which we started in the last lesson.  When we got to the end we looked back over the treatment to see if there were any parts that didn't make sense or could be improved upon.  After we had looked over this we decided to start discussing locations for where we could possibly film the opening and what would be happening in each of the scenes.  We decided to look up old looking train stations to see which one would go best with our time period.  We looked at using Paddington station and also St Pancras.  We decided on having it that we possibly use the outside of St Pancras and the inside of Paddingto.

08/10/2013 PLANNING: TREATMENT

Film Noir Treatment

The film opens with a CU of a hand wrapping a package of a box wrapped in brown paper tied with frayed string.

Cut to the outside of ST PANCRAS STATION of a YOUNG WOMAN.  She wears an iridescent tan trench coat tied at the wait with her hair tightly crimpled into a bun.  Cut to the inside of the station.  A train departs from the station signalling this by the WHISTLE and HORN of the train.  There after the young woman walks along the platform of the station with a small tan leather handbag hanging from her right hand, carrying a package covered in brown paper with white string tied around in her other hand.  The CLIP-CLOP of the young woman's HEELS is heard.  News of a murder is depicted.

A SUSPICIOUS LOOKING YOUNG MAN  walks behind the young woman.  He wears a light tan trench coat with a dark coloured fedora on his head.  The young woman drops the parcel from her left hand and falls on the ground.  THE young man picks up the parcel off the ground of the station.

Cut away shot to THREE MIDDLE AGED MEN wearing dark trench coats and fawn coloured fedoras acting furtiverly.  One of the men throws a cigarette butt onto the ground and stamps his foot on it to put it out.

THE young woman walks out of the stations with the man following behind her.  She approaches a vintage car parked outside the stations;she gets into the car with help of the DRIVER who opens the door for her.  The woman notices that the driver isn't her normal driver and asks where her usual driver is, followed by the CAR DOORS LOCKING.

Next, the THREE MIDDLE AGED MEN are seen discussing a newsworthy, debatable topic.  While discussing, the three men are pushing around a picture of the young woman seen earlier in the opening and portray a reflection of mysteriousness amongst them.  It then pans back to the young woman in the back seat of the car.  Followed by the loud sound of a GUN SHOT.

02/10/13 RESEARCH/PLANNING: TREATMENT

production log

02/10/2013 double lesson

I started the lesson by checking my blog and editing previous posts with print screens and hyperlinks.  After I had done that we got into our groups and started to work on our treatment.  We started by doing our own research into what a treatment was and then collating all the data back to the rest of our group.  We then started to discuss some of the finer details about the treatment before we typed it up.  We discussed things like camera angles, background music, props and filming locations the more of which we will do in the next lesson.  We then went onto one of the macs and started to type out the treatment.  We had to keep going back and changing things because we either thought of something better or we decided that something didn't need to be there.

01/10/13 PLANNING: TIME, PROPS AND STORYBOARD

production log 01/10/2013

Single lesson

In the lesson today we discussed what time period the film opening would be based.  We discussed it for a while and had to decide between it being based in the 1920's or the 1940's in the end we decided that the movie opening would be in the 1940's.  We then started to discuss what props we would need to get for the opening.  All that is needed to be done now is the storyboard, to actually get the props work out were we are going to need to go to film and then I believe we can start filming.

29/09/13 RESEARCH: SCOOP IT

Scoop it: film noir

I did research into film noir and all the information i found I put onto a scoop it page.  I found websites completely dedicated to film noir and then others that had parts to film noir but I put them all on to scoop it

http://www.scoop.it/t/film-noir-by-thomas-stevens/curate

Scoop it: thriller codes and conventions

I also created a scoop it page for the codes and conventions of the thriller genre.  It contained info about the genre and what people believe are the codes and conventions of the genre

http://www.scoop.it/t/thriller-codes-and-conventions/

25/09/13 RESEARCH/PLANNING: FILM NOIR AND PROPS

Production log 25/09/2013

Double lesson

Today I started by going through some film openings which I had watched from a week ago and improved on what I had written for them.

Then once we had finished doing that we got into our groups and started to do some more research into our possible film opening.  So we discussed more about what we needed to do before we could start the more advanced work for the opening such as getting props, making a story board and working out what else we would need for it outside of props.

After we had done this we did research into film noir which is what the film opening is going to be. We all did our own seperate research and then showed it to the rest of the group everything that I researched is on a scoop it page.