Main Task- Finished Film Opening

Main Task- Final Music Choice

The music we chose was from an album called 'Tomorrow Begins Today' by Roy Todd. Its pace is slow and fits well with our film opening. Its able to create tension with only a few notes. It has a chilling melody and gradually speeds up as it goes on.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zGZ6YResVuc

Main Task- Evaluation

Question 1

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

I think our film uses the conventions of a psychological thriller with the type of music we chose. Most thriller films don’t have very complex music scores because they don’t want the music to take away from the dialogue. But because we have one bit of speech in ours, we didn’t have that issue. I think the music is good with the film because it has a slow pace that matches the edits of the shots. It slowly builds tension and gradually starts to speed up further into the opening. At one point it even peaks which is at the point when the baby starts to cry. So it fits in well with what is happening in the film as well. The starting notes are very deep and foreboding, which allows the audience to tell that the film isn’t going to be cheerful. The weather also does the same and pathetic fallacy is used to show us that the mood is very bleak and almost hopeless.

Our films uses a lot of different camera angles which thrillers tend to use, for example; close ups show the audience only what the director wants them to see. Our character is revealed by a series of shots that are very ambiguous. Close ups of her feet, hands and mouth start to unravel the identity of this person. She even says her name and the camera is focused on her mouth, but because the audience still hasnt seen her eyes, they still don't know who this person is. I think we develop the ideas of certain shots because we used some shots that are not typical for thriller films, such as; wide shots to reveal locations, high angle shots to make the audience feel safe, only to be shown low angle shots, so that the character walks past them. This would allow the audience to feel part of what is going on and make them uneasy.

I think our film challenges the conventions of a usual psychological thriller because it tends to be a male protagonist and we chose to have a female one. This could make the audience think that our main character is harmless when in fact she is a murderer. She looks like an average teenager which could create a sense of uneasiness because it shows the audience that anyone is capable of murder without seeming like they are.

Main Task- Evaluation

Question 2

How does your media product represent particular social groups?

I think our media product represents particular social groups by the main protagonist being a teenager. In today’s society, some people believe that teenagers are hostile and moody and the way the girl has been portrayed and shown through the camera lense supports this idea. Our film involves female antagonist alongside a baby. This could be interpreted for women being associated more with children than men. In thrillers, men tend to be the main protagonists so it was a change for the main character to be female and to commit such a shocking crime.

In our film, the girl looks very antisocial and withdrawn into herself, which could be compared to the thrillers, ‘Don’t Say a Word’ and ‘Girl, Interrupted’. Both of these films have similar protagonists as the main characters but all are disturbed because of different reasons. I think that when women are associated with mental scarring, it is to show the audience that men are stronger than women, mentally and physically.

In our film, we don't really represent men because we don't include any in our shots. The idea of the film was meant to be that the interviewer is male and even though you can't hear or see him, he has a sense of power over the girl still. And he doesn't even need to be seen on screen to show his dominance.

Main Task- Evaluation

Question 3

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

I think that our film would be distributed by production companies that specialise in the thriller/horror genre. FearDriven films would be interested in distributing our media product because they are the chosen production company for our film. FearDriven films specialise in the type of genre that our film is as well so it would be easy for them to promote it and have audiences that would be interested in watching it. Don’t Say a Word was produced by Village Roadshow Pictures and Girl, Interrupted was produced by Columbia Pictures, so these companies might also be a possibility if the film became popular enough to be produced by a mainstream company.

http://www.feardrivenfilms.co.uk/ 

Main Task- Evaluation

Question 4

Who would be the audience for your media product?

I think the audience for our film would be people aged 15 years and over because our film includes themes that would be unsuitable for anyone under that age. I also think that they would have a hard time understanding what the film is trying to convey and because some things have to be read between the lines, it would be difficult for someone who doesn’t understand. There wasn’t a particular target group of gender that we aimed the film at because it can generally be enjoyed by anyone who likes watching psychological thrillers. Our film, alongside the other two, is rated 15. This is because some scenes are not suitable for anyone younger and misunderstood by others.

http://www.bbfc.co.uk/classification/guidelines/15-2/ 

Main Task- Evaluation

Question 5

How did you attract/address your audience?

We attracted our audience by word of mouth and social networking. We created a survey on Facebook and sent it to our friends, along with the link to our video. This helped us to receive feedback and find out what people liked and what they didn’t. We also created pie charts from the results, which can be found posted on our blogs. This made it easier to see how it was received overall. We found from the feedback that not everyone was able to follow the plot and found it confusing as to what was going on.