Kick the Bucket - Film Site

The next film is coming.

Pulp Fiction and The Big Lebowski: Masculinity

PLEASE CRITICIZE RIP ME A NEW ONE

A short video essay on the theme of masculinity in the Big Lebowski and Pulp Fiction. WATCH UNTIL THE BIG LEBOWSKI. I wanted to do these films because I wanted to do a similar film with seemingly funny dialogue but some serious themes.  I made a few mistakes (such as calling it The "Great" Lebwoski) and broad statements during the documentary, but that's what I take from the film. 

Step Outline

1. Logline: Fights happen all the time, but not like this.

2. Genre Reference: Thriller

3. 2 Reference Films: The Outsiders, The Warriors

4. Step Outline:  Create a t-chart for Action/ Dramatic Intent

THEMES: -extra personal theme- A criticism of gang culture (wats the deal with the gangs fighting?)  -interpersonal theme-friendship? -intrapersonal theme: Freedom brings pain, the importance of the mentor parent but lack thereof -yearning for structure in life -violence is useless

Action	Intent
Films begins with the  fight between Mack and the baddies and short expositional narration	To be  expositional and set tone, but still be a simple story
2. Flashback - Does something that angers enemy gang, strengthens his friends Johnny (nice guy)  and Dallas (stern older mentor)	2.   Character Development, critical mistake that begins tragedy
3. Comes home late to find his older brother waiting (also stern older mentor), brother gets mad and hits him,	3.  Drama (but not action), tension at home? Incites freedom that brings death, reinforces themes, violence  has no gain
4.    The Stabbing - As Mack hangs out in the parking lot with his 2 friends, they are jumped by enemy gang, where Johnny is being drowned and back broken either Dallas or Mack stabs Bob the Baddie (flee scene)	4.   Action creates
5.   Running - Trying to get johnny to hospital on foot avoiding baddies	5.   Action
6.   Running - Johnny is dead, what do we do?	6.   Moral Question, tension
7.   The Last Stand - Mack watches Patrick rob a liquor store, and get shot as he pulls out as they pull up in car,	7.   Existentially ends the film with the narrator protag being disillusioned with society at large, but personal issues is resolved for the sake of classical narrative

Location as Character Project

This is the part where i talk.

WHITE THUNDER Production Portfolio

Production Portfolio
IB Film HL
Session: May 2013
Rationale
I chose to do White Thunder because I really wanted to make a cheesy movie and experiment
with the lost art of zooms. I think that lowballing rather than super serious can be quite an
advantage with the audience. I also notice it is easier to get a reaction from the audience if you
make them laugh rather than feel bad or emotional, and my bitter reaction to my last super
serious film, the bitter tragedy of it being comedic to the audience. After seeing the film black
dynamite, I knew what I had to do for my next film.
Word Count 100

Trailer
It is a rational trailer. First, I set open framed shots in the beginning to create questions in the
viewer. The car shots and mechanized sound effects represented speed, and the zooms
accentuate fast feelings. Afterwards, I introduce Thunder and his qualities such as violent, being
a “loose cannon” and needing a partner. Panama is introduced characteristics of being cocky.
Using Andy, we establish that they are both cops down on their luck. A shot of Panama and
Thunder disagree on musical taste explains their relationship, and ending shots conclude the
bad guy’s role, Dragon Wang.
Word Count 98

Written Commentary for White Thunder
I had always wanted to do a really fun film. I had made a White Thunder short before, and
I wanted a to expand on the character. Once my co produced project Epic Roll , I knew that a
comedic cheesy fun film was something I had to make. The idea for White Thunder came from
my love of Buddy cop movies and the recent explosion of parody blaxploitation and cheesy 70’s
parodies. The plot itself is a cliched buddy cop story, present in many films from Rush Hour to
Running Scared to Bad Boys. They would always begin with introduction to the characters, how
they were forced to conform to each other, find how different they were, mess up, take the case
into their own hands, and become friends. And thus our plot was created as so.

The script began as a treatment that was created at the end of sophomore year basically
outlining the events that would transpire in the full version of White Thunder. A short “pilot
episode” screentest proving ground for the show was shot later that year but not a full version.
With the help of 3 different screenwriters, a continuous edit and a 2nd draft, we completed the
majority of the major scenes, and I was very happy with actually having a almost full script by
the time of actual production, unlike many of my other productions. Unique characters would end
up being the most important part of this film, rather that could have been an intimate relationship
between Panama and Thunder. For better or for worse, this was the influence Jonathan Nievera
brought onto the project, and this would lead to the notorious marketing campaign. My “dual
meaning backhand” blunt style of writing was somewhat present in this project, as in the intro
scene, which was loosely scripted. For example, Thunder says “ Stop being a pansy, Jet. You
know I love you...” which at first glance is not inherently obvious, but under tighter scrutiny is
clearly recognized. The script was a marvelous thing, it created not only cohesion and efficiency,
but direction on the project., and was very beneficial.

Setting the film as a period piece was really a challenge with this film. Having to amass
the wardrobe, sets, props and even vehicles for such a large project was quite an undertaking,
but I think it was a really good learning experience. Even behind the scenes our film was a period
piece; This type of practical effect, home movie blockbuster production harkens back to the 70’s
Super 8 genre style filmmaking usually identified with Spielberg’s early works, and homaged to in
the film Super 8. To that end, each character in our film was uniquely characterized by their
wardrobe and choice of props. For example, White Thunder uses a large .45 Colt, and Panama
Jack uses a small, almost insignificant .22 revolver. Thunder is a brash and hulking fighter,as
well as speaker, whose large and flamboyant style may not actually relate to his actual
effectiveness. Panama, on the other hand, is a small and sly guy, he can hide his secrets until
he wants to strike. However, most of the Panama direct characterization didn't make it through
the first few drafts, and his character is very flat, letting the script focus more and Thunder’s
epiphany. Dreyfus has suspenders to suggest his maturity and wisdom, and the “Other Buddy
Cops” wear Hawaiian shirts not only to address the era, but to also suggest their laid back
nature, contrasting with their reactions later, creating ironic comedy. Dragon Wang Chan wields
a large, blunted sword to suggest his way of getting things done; he is a doppelganger to
Thunder, in the egotistical sense, he is the dark side of Thunder, brutal, blunt, and violent. The
setting of the film was important as well, many of the assorted sets we tried our best to adapt it
to be period acceptable or try to not face the camera towards such things as flatscreens and
cars. Modern cars are however a major error in the film, but are very luckily very subtle. The
choice of Penn School seemed to fit with it’s Cold War Era Architecture, the rest of the locations
were time period anonymous. The use of cars in films seems to be ramping up. Our usage of a
the 1976 red Chevelle was a little different. Because our car was restricted by time, driver, and
the fact that it was old, we decided to go with the green screen route rather than practical.
Conversely, practical effects were an interesting but briefly used in our film. The blood spurts
were created from a air compressor and fake blood in surgical tubing, clogged at the end with a cut piece of a rubber glove. The dummy was a old scuba suit, filed for hours upon hours with newspaper “salvaged” from the neighborhood, and the head was an equally laborious process. I wrapped Jon’s head in an old cloth, and then duct taped its crevices (of course with breathing holes) , and filled with newspaper as well. It was promptly thrown from the roof as a test.

My job on the film was Cinematographer. I really wanted to experiment with zooms in this
project, a sort of underused art. In my research, I found the reason that zooms were so prevalent
in the 70’s was because they had just reached the mass market and were now “new”. Films
during the era had used so many zooms to simply show off their new technology, but as a result,
prime lenses not being used and smaller aperture of zooms led to more exterior day shots and
less low light shots. White Thunder had to have a lot of light pumped into it, as present in the
Andy Litili scene, because most of the film was actually shot at f/8. Stopping down the f stop also
helped with the zooms, as being at a lower aperture meant less depth of field, meaning easier
focus between zooming. Similarly, I found it to be increasingly annoying that short films shot with
DSLR’s made shallow depth of field almost cliche, many shooters rarely stopped down manually
and as a result had trouble pulling focus.

The DSLR revolution has let even the smallest budgeted film maker capable of capturing great images, but as a result the “market” you could say was over saturated with shallow depth of field films. It is quite interesting that zooms were originally the new craze, just coming to market, and now filmmaker are rediscovering, and in some cases overusing the prime lenses of old.

Another aspect I noticed was people who do not use primes shooting at the widest FOV
possible, say 18mm on a T2i. While this is not a bad thing, in fact I quite like it’s epic sweeping
feel, its not what I wanted to do with White Thunder. I used the Panasonic GH2, a smaller name
than the widely used and trusted Canons, to represent not only the reaction, but as reference to
the era itself. The GH2 has a smaller sensor, but more sharply grained noise camera that is
widely regarded but rarely used by the filmmaking community. Even buying this camera was my
reaction to modern filmmaking: everyone had Canons, and if i wanted to I could borrow those at
any time. Why not try something new? White Thunder, at its core, is a BMovie,
and at that time they were shot on 16mm film, smaller than 35mm cinema; therefore, shooting on smaller sensor would make sense and add to the overall period feel of the film. Making White Thunder was my
antithesis to the modern DSLR filmmaking age, as this is clearly present in the zooms, stopped
down aperture, lack of sliders, longer lenses, and usage of smaller camera sensor. However, I
am not completely immune to falling into such self set pitfalls. As exterior scenes and naturally lit
scenes became darker as night approached, I was forced to open the aperture to, I dare say,
blasphemous f/4.5. This, paired with my innate ability to not sense when things are slightly out of
focus, led to some shots being blurry, which I take complete responsibility for.
And score. Indie production is not without its difficulties, but the film scorer is always the
worst. I must say, working with Jonathan Nievera was very beneficial in bringing another mind
onto the intellectual property of the film, but relying on him to do score was the worst experience
of my life. Numerous times he checked out the audio gear and not once did he return with
anything. Not even loops, and despite devoting and promising he would deliver, he did not.

My critical analysis of the film was that it was a fun adventure buddy cop film but with
some issues in pacing and sound. The film was deeply influenced and teat genre research
shows throughout the film, with very good attention to detail in costumes, sets, and ways of
speaking. The acting was a little underdone, but it kind of fit with the B movie style and era piece.

The Cinematography also represented the era with zooms and lack of depth of field, but there
were some issues of inexperience with the zooms that made them choppy. Editing was very
compressed and kind of sloppy, leading to some bad pacing during the Informant scenes. Sound
design and score was very lacking in this project and the weakest link overall. Overall it was very
fun to shoot and the actors play it out, leaving the audience feeling the same.

Word Count: 1600
Marketing Campaign
https://www.facebook.com/WhiteThunderShow

Contemporary Media Analysis

1. What does the media say about the world we live in?

Media creates a shared reality in our society. It projects the feelings of its creators as well as the needs of the audience to create an image of reality that we crave to see, whether we fear it, lust for it, or wish to experience it without discourse. Furthermore, a shared cultural attitude, it seems, creates the media we consume legitimate and acceptable. Media presents us with what someone thought was acceptable, and we consume and decide. Not only does it reflect ideas in a society, it can propagate these ideas, influencing a society and around and around and around. Media defines what a society thinks about, but not necessarily what it is.  Media is revealing that lines between the good and bad (transferred over from wars)  are blurred, such as Walt in breaking bad trying to gain money for his family, or the many possible protagonists in Game of Thrones.  There are also more positive things such as an increasingly accepted homosexuality in society (like on Glee) and the acceptance of Nerd Culture in Big Bang Theory. Furthermore, we are seeing more  sexuality and especially more violence on TV and in movies as part of medias increasingly inferiority complex.

2. Do you notice any one trend that keeps resurfacing through multiple media forms?

A trend that continually resurfaces itself  through multiple media forms is the idea of blurred lines. This can apply to the distinction of the protagonist and antagonist, and even to the distinction between good and evil in a protagonist, such as the anti-hero, which seems to be present in almost every work ever since the 70’s. Almost every modern TV show a new edgy “anti hero” who either conflicted about what he does because of his own morals, or we question his decisions by our own moral standards.

3. What do you see as the best and worst of what media portrays?

Media’s best usage is at its core, a tool. A tool of expression and consumption. As such, people feel the need to consume McDonalds Burger Meat when they also have Fillet Mignon with Salad on the menu. The worst of media is the stuff that ends up on TMZ, and I’m sure everyone is a likable person, with the benefit of a doubt, but acceptance of the hick culture or late with Duck Dynasty and Honey Boo Boo is for me a success and a failure. Its the acceptance of a culture, but is that appropriation and propagation a positive? Furthermore,

On the flipside, Media has been opening up to accept many things lately. Of course, the hick culture as above, but also Homosexuality and nerd culture have come to acceptance. Homosexuality, in particular, has been getting alot of play in many modern shows, for one, Glee is a landmark in teenage homosexual fiction, and its popularity brings its closer to mainstream.

Nerd culture has particularly come into play, not only on the TV circuit, but on the Internet Media as well(if not mainly). Big Bang Theory in the mainstreaming of nerd culture on a major television show where general audiences pretend to understand references that the cult followers really appreciate. On the internet, many what would be considered “geeky” web shows have risen to popularity, in a direct correlation with the mainstreaming of video games.

4. Where do you see yourself contributing to the conversation?

I see myself as a person obsessed with pushing the envelope. Continually film class creates an environment where healthy competition creates an ever innovating environment, leading to new boundaries to be broken with every film. I've worked on the first war film at Cappuchino Film, a sexually charged noir film, and a film that sets new standards in violence through comedy.

Media always needs ways to excite. And in the ever growing capitalist society we live in, media because raunchier and more violent every year. I feel like this trend, like all expanding trends, lead to a depression or inflation of the market and then to collapse. Therefore, I feel that media needs to come to grips that they can't always outdo last season; but more importantly: the consumer needs to do the same.  If I ever do contribute to the media itself, it will be the consumers who define what they want and how I can entertain them.

My Top 5 Film of All Time

I think many people cant pin down their favorite film. For me I'm sucker for any one of these tings:

• 1930's-1950's Period Piece
• The Cold War
• A great film score
• Medieval Fantasy 
• Rallying speeches/ Monologues in film
• A bunch of friends go on an adventure
• Revenge
• good production design (Mis en Scene)

What Makes a Good Film

Hint: Its not one thing

Asking "What Is a Good Film?" is very broad. A film can succeed in pleasing on different levels, visually, in sound design, in writing, in acting... and every other award show category. But unless the film as a sum of its parts can achieve your reception of the intended feeling and message in a exciting way, it wont resonate with your audience like truly great piece of cinema. 

There are no rules in filmmaking. Only sins. And the cardinal sin is dullness.

- Frank Capra

To start simple, a good film, you might say, is one that excites an audience. Whether it be as simple as an engaging relationship drama between that pale girl and an Abercrombie vampire, a deranged serial killer running amok the back roads, or a intergalactic saga of Farmboy bravery , different films speak to and excite different people. And how does one excite an audience? A well crafted film is one that makes connections with the viewer, relations in the subconscious that stimulate psychological and metaphysical existence .... blah blah blah.  And explosions.

Dig me this, why is a film good? Because you want to be Indiana Jones. 

Tell me more.

End of Year Reflection

Independent Film Research:

What do you feel are your strengths in approaching the research required in the class?

I think that in terms of research that I am not very strong but am able to conjure a lot of resources, work depending. For example, I can go on EBSGO Host  and find tons of articles and scholarly writing but it never has good implementation, my analysis resulting from it is lacking.

What areas do you feel you need more support or training with?

In terms of film research and analysis I need more support with the analysis aspect of research. I can find the sources, but its hard for me to find the proper elements in my writing that connect to the topic. I tend to also feel writing from opinion of a film, as it is art, and art is definitive of usually having a “how do YOU see it” subjective meaning. In writing my opinion, I feel like sometimes it turns more into a critical review then a critical analysis, and it affects my writing.

What suggestions, support or additional training could you use from me to help you accomplish this?

I would say make sure that they know that they not making a review, but an analysis. They should try and focus your analysis to certain aspects of the filmmaking process; and focus on understanding them deeply so they know what you’re talking about. I also dislike how blog posts are so close together in such sequence. I wish that the blogs were more spread out and I think requiring students to turn them in the day they are due will greatly increase their will to do them. I would probably make it so that after you watch a film each semester that the blog posts were more structured (not internally but externally) so that their submission and release would create an easier CREATE TURN IN mechanical proccess.

Oral Presentation Experience:

What do you feel are your strengths in approaching the oral presentation in the class?

I think my ability to talk more from myself rather than talking from a script is a vital ability in presenting your material. If you know what you’re talking about, you can think of things on the spot that would have never occurred to you before, but that requires more work beforehand because to successfully pull this off you need to know a lot more about your material.  

What areas do you feel you need to work on in your preparation for this assessment?

Ironically, I think that I need to work on more planning of outline that I was going to follow: structure. The structure is what was lacking mostly in my oral, and I felt that creating a deeper outline of what I were going to do and transitions between my topics would have created a more cohesive and easier to classify presentation/podcast thing. In hindsight I also could have created a stronger

What suggestions, support or additional training could you use from me to help you?

I wish that the recording process was more streamlined and not as fragmented, just so that students would be forced to record on a certain day making them feel more need to prepare and turn it in.

Production Experience:

What roles did you feel you accomplished well this semester?

I think I was a good director and a good cinematographer.

What areas do you feel you need to work on in your productions?

I think I need to work on directing, editing and structuralization. I think that my directing could be more structuralized, that is more fitting to a planned routine and also more planned out. This brings me to the idea of forcing students to create a shooting script and a new style 2 column. As a director, I think I made huge steps for film when I created a full script for White Thunder, but I applaud Mr Max Mak for taking a giant leap for filmkind by creating a rigid shooting schedule and sticking to it.

I also liked that the films were due before finals.

What suggestions, support or additional training could you use from me to help you accomplish this?

Give those ones that really care about Film ample time to create their script. In fact, I think you should force people to create rough scripts and just suggest storyboards a little stronger. I think that that would require a major change to the idea of the 2 COLUMN SCRIPT. Let me explain. In my experience, making a 2 column script has been an awful experience. People mainly BS the audio part. I think that it should be revised (or rephrased really) to have the treatment on one side a dialogue script on the other, not including sound effects as it does now. Thats what we did on WHITE THUNDER and I really enjoyed it. Its more important to tell the student that its a Script ON a Treatment to get them more enticed and less beleaguered by the idea of writing a Script.  I think EL CAMINO would have been amazing if we hadn't written the majority of the script on the spot. I think you should also FORCE IB FILM STUDENTS to create a shooting script to complement their (new) 2 column. In an extreme extent, I think you should try to weed out people in the beginning with blog posts and then find those that are interesting in film.

I liked and wish I could elaborate on this Wiki article.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shooting_script

WHITE THUNDER Trailer

The web series about "The man who gets all the ladies, the man whose "Thunder" never strikes in the same place twice, who's faster than thunder, the one and only; White Thunder."

Hailing from the streets of Harlem, Thunder is a smooth cat. Once a part of the Black Panthers, Thunder is trained in martial -fu and weaponized arts. Now he must unravel his greatest foe: Hao Ciao Mein, the Asian crime lord who owns a monopoly of Italian Noodle shops across South Central LA.

Created by Conner Ward and written by Jonathan Nievera and Michael Harris

Like WHITE THUNDER on Facebook
https://www.facebook.com/WhiteThunderShow

:UPDATE:
White Thunder has been accepted into the Capuchino Film Festival!
https://www.facebook.com/pages/Capuchino-Film-Festival-Cap-Oscars/459240524157516

70'S Whitesploitaion Buddy Cop Treatment

70's Blaxtiploitation and 80'S Buddy-Cop Movie (w/cliches) "Frantic Cutting”
Brought to you in High-Fidelity Mono-Sound™!
Its blaxploitation, but he is white and it's a buddy cop.

A cop, dressed in an open collared shirt and a leather jacket, WHITE THUNDER™ and his partner JET HURRICANE™, arrive at a “toy factory”. They are in pursuit of the asian crime syndicate lead by mob boss Hung Lo, who has been poisoning kids with lead paint action figures since ‘62. Thunder notices boxes being moved and Thunder stops. They exit the car. Thunder tells Jet that he can take on Hung Lo alone. Jet says he can try, he takes out two and loses to Dragon Wang Chan he dies because he is inferior. Thunder tries to open the door, but he can’t, he notices the shots but is too late. Thunder takes the badge and cut to next scene.

4 years later, and White Thunder’s loose cannon actions have resulted in the distribution of bootleg toys and that causes hundreds of kids to get hurt/sick. Black police chief Dreyfus calls Thunder into his office. He tells Thunder that he's a loose canon. He needs someone to keep him in line. Dreyfus tells Thunder that his new partner will be Panama Jack/Joe, an equally ego-centric detective. Dreyfus  explains that Panama is a straight cop that grew up in the ghetto and vowed to take crime off the streets. Thunder resists, however, and says that he only "flies solo". Chief Dreyfus says the partner is not optional. Either that, or Thunder loses his badge. Chief Dreyfus softens up a little and says that he knows Thunder still takes blame for his partner's death. This case has links to the unsolved murder. He calls Panama into the room. His feet can only be seen. The door knob twists, and as he walks in, he gets one look at Thunder and goes "heyll nah!" He explains to Thunder that he is as resistant as Thunder and he doesn't want to be partners either.

White Thunder and Panama stroll out of the office. Standing around the water dispenser is two other cops, Thunder’s rivals, Darrel Roebuck Marvin Searzinski, taunt the pair about their new partnership, with gay undertones. Thunder and Panama feel like separate entities.
In the car they talk. [CHARACTERIZATION]

Thunder barges in to the Hispanic informant’s house, who usually gives Thunder information in turn for letting him slide a little. Panama slyly just walks in. Thunder questions him, but he won't give in this time. Thunder going around the house and knock things over, sarcastically telling him things like “this looks like an expensive vase. To bad its broken.” Panama starts to disagree with Thunder on his ethics and tries to take the lead. Eventually the Nicaraguan guy caves when panama speak spanish and tells him where Hung Lo’s hideout is.
We cut to the lair of Hung Lo, Pier 69, Hung Lo briefs Dragon Wang Chan. He tells Chan that he must eliminate Thunder like he did to Jet Hurricane, he says Dragon Wang is his most loyal servant and trusts him to take care of White Thunder who has been on his case ever since.

While on the stakeout, they talk about Hung Lo. After they see crime they decide to sneak in.
They get to the hideout and Thunder wants to stick together. Unfortunately are caught after they fail in a kung fu fight. At shotgun point they are confronted by Wong and his henchmen. Thunder gets a "Thunder Sense" and looks at two of the henchmen. After a small looky loo, Thunder notices something isn't right. Suddenly, the two odd henchmen punch out the other henchmen, and Wong runs. It turns out that the 2 "henchmen" were actually agents undercover. They had to blow their cover to save Thunder and Panama, They are angry because they had been working on the case for 8 months infiltrating Hung Lo’s ranks.

Chief Dreyfus calls them into his office. He is furious and scolds them and calls them "irresponsible" and takes their badges and guns. Thunder suggests that he ask first to take them off the case. Panama says that the situation is "hella wack." Disgruntled but hopeful, they separate for a while.

One day Thunder gets a phone call: Dreyfhus has been shot. He calls Panama and they put aside their differences and decide to track down Hung Lo. They track Hung Lo to his new lair and try to arrest him, at which point Thunder's love interest, Destiny Jones, comes forth as a hostage of Wong's. As Dragon and Thunder are about to fight to the death and there is a flashback with Thunder running through the jungle and hears a man yelling in agony. Thunder runs toward the man and notices he is part of the Vietcong and in attempt to shoot him Thunder couldn’t kill wounded man so he rips a piece of his jacket/shirt and wraps it around Dragon’s eye. The final confrontation ends with Wong dying. The two have become friends, and they finally accept each other. Thunder gets the girl, and Panama goes on to become the police chief with the lowest crime rate in a century.

IB FILM Sample Oral - Psycho

There is a coherent, incisive, insightful and richly detailed evaluative interpretation of the
extract, displaying an excellent understanding of how meaning is constructed through the use
of film language, with an excellent awareness of the extract’s relationship to the film as a
whole. There is a persuasive explanation for the selection of the extract. The critique shows
an excellent awareness of the film’s genre, its place in a broader sociocultural context, and
gives an insightful analysis of the director’s intention. Simple description will be negligible and
analysis will be clear and thorough.
21-25 Marks


For my Practice Oral, I did Alfred Hitchcock's film Psycho. By listening to myself  I could accurately assess and see weaknesses and strengths in my presentation. 

I think I talked too much about the setting and visual design of my extract and did not talk about the cultural pressures on the film as much as I wanted to. This was because I felt my extract adressed these sections more that others. I also kind of stumbled on the speaking section and could have been much more prepared for the oral in terms of content and organization. For example, I should have paused and thought about what i was going to say rather than stuttering and being incoherent. I did not write notes as large as I wanted but I thought that did fullfil the oral.



CAS Film:
Fallen Tear Productions 

Film Step Outlines

Knock

Logline: An ignorant girl hears a tapping on the other side of her wall, only to find bliss knocking.

2. Main Character Description: Ignorant girl, teenage

3. Setting- In a single house over the course of several nights

4. Inciting Incident: She hears knocking at her wall and finds out it inst her brother

5. Rising Action #1-  Tries to tell parents but they wont listen or are occupied

6. Rising Action #2- Younger brother innocently tells her about the knocking and trying to talk to the being

8. Climax: She cant stand the knocking anymore and tears down the secret door near her room in the basement. 

9. Resolution: Finds the monster and it points to a leaking gas line

A Game of Logics

Logline: A Jehovah's Witness and an atheist take shelter in a bunker during the nuclear holocaust.  

2. Main Character Description: (include name, physical and emotional description.

3. Setting- Where does the story start or take place. 

4. Inciting Incident: What is the first conflict the character is confronted with?

5. Rising Action #1- Describe the first complication or challenge the character confronts 

6. Rising Action #2- Describe the second complication or challenge the character confronts 

7. Rising Action #3- Describe the third complication or challenge the character confronts 

8. Climax: What is the final moment that must win or lose? 

9. Resolution: How does the story end?

Genre Research: Journey Movies

I decided to research journey movies for my genre research. I used Cast Away, Life of Pi, and Rescue Dawn as my role models for journey films. 

In terms of narrative and structure, usually such films are psychological or ideological journeys from start to finish. Sometimes they develop a partner, such as Wilson the ball or Steve Zann's character in Rescue Dawn or the tiger in Life of Pi. They encounter hardships through their journey, usually with the environment,  but overcome them , sometimes loosing this partner. And thus, many times these journey feel a lack of fulfillment by the end of them. In terms of chacrter acting and style, the main character usually has strength when everyone fails, such as the plane crash during Cast Away or Pi's escape from the ship or Christian Bale's escape from the crashed airplane. They eventually also stabilize their motivations. 

In terms of setting, they are usually set in a hostile environment such as a forest or jungle, but they make their way out. In terms of cinematography,  many wide angles are used to accentuate loneliness. Similarly the sound design is ambient music to also create lonesomeness.

A man goes on a journey with his friends to get rescue from the forest before the sun goes down.

Film Language and Representation Post

Film Language and Representation

Using your choosen 5 minute extract, tie the particular details of the scene back to your broader research.

My extract takes place at 1:30:32. So far, the audience has come to see Marion be killed in the shower by Norman Bates, a, well, psycho, and subsequently having an inspector then Marion's sister Lila and boyfriend Sam investigate what happened to the previous person. In the extract itself, Lila sneaks into Norman's house while Sam distracts him with small talk in the lobby of the motel. The intensity increases, and suddenly Norman ca't take it anymore, these insults to his mother, and hits Sam in the head, running after Lila. Lila is exploring the house during these events, first examining the mothers room and its intricacies, and  then later looking at Norman's room and its simplicity. As Norman enter she house, she goes down into the cellar,  unknowing of the truth. My extract ends with her seeing the mummified remains of the  mother and her screaming horridly as Norman descends on her. The characters and issues are represented in my extract through Norman's fight with Sam, well as Lila's meeting with the corpse. The issues here are that Norman is now for sure having some kind of identity crisis over his mother, becoming overtly suspicious when he becomes offended by Sam's every remark. Another issues is what Lila finds in general. Firstly, she finds a bed with a deep imprint, meaning someone has slept there very recently (throwing off the viewer). Secondly, Lila is in Normans room and it appears as a kids room despite the fact Norman is a grown man. This mystery and suspense culminates as we reach the final issues, the fruit cellar, where Norman's mother turns out be be nothing but a taxedermised corpse.  And  the Norman appears in drag.

The performance of Janet Leigh, Anthony Perkins, and John Navid Gavin very dramatic.
From the screams, to the more subtle insinuation of Sam (Gavin), to the stuttered talking of Norman, all the characters interpretation of the dialogue is appropriate and complementary to the scene. It is interesting to note that the dialogue between Sam and Norman (Perkins) is under different subtexts for the both. Norman thinks that Sam is trying to blame his mother for something  but the fact of that matter is that Sam is only wondering where the money is and hasn't even thought that Marion could have been murdered. Both Sam and Lila are obvious to the truth, as Lila even tries to nudge Norman's mother  and address's her. Its also interesting to note that Anthony Perkins also changes his facial expression drastically depended what character eh is playing. For example in teh photo above he has a huge grin on his face, whereas Norman is usually always in a  slight sorrow.  

Speaking of this shot above, this shot uses cinematography and proxemics to create meaning. Lila is situated lowest and the cameras is at an low angle, looking up to Norman (as his mother). This creates an inferiority of both Lila and th audience and we feel threatened.  Similarly, Sam comes up from behind Norman and again repeats this same usage of proxemics: he is then the most dominant in scene and therefore overpowers Norman.  Another example of this proxemics and cinematography meaning,  is when Sam and Norman are talking, they discuss  the fate of Marion. Again, when Norman is lower in frame  he seems to be defensive. Similarly when Norman becomes more aggressive  he shirfts to a higher plane of eye axis than Sam asserting his superiority. And finally, camera moves are used to emphasize certain things in frame. For example, A slight dolly in to Norman being restrained by Sam and the knife in his hand suggests there inherent importance in the scene. Lighting plays a small role in creating more creepiness to the mother, as overhead eighth sources are usually so. 



The editing style used is one of a combination of realistic and classic styles of editing; present in the dialogue scenes is realism, and present in the more action intense scenes is cutting that adds to teh pace of the film, quick cuts, and there fore, classicism. The use of realism in the scene with Norman and Sam reveals the Norman nature of the scene.
The film uses setting very much so in this extract  The film uses set design to create entire characterizations of the characters for example, the mothers room is full of archaic and old funriture, giving it the creepy haunted house feeling. Light is obscured byt eh stain glass windows, and black angel statues fill the halls. The film makes use of emptiness in the cellar to suggest just that: emptiness and alone... -ness. Just the very fact that it is ins a cellar really does make it that much creepy-er.

Psycho: Narrative and the Film Extract

My extract takes place at 1:30:32. So far, the audience has come to see Marion be killed in the shower by Norman Bates, a, well, psycho, and subsequently having an inspector then Marion's sister Lila and boyfriend Sam investigate what happened to the previous person. In the extract itself, Lila sneaks into Norman's house while Sam distracts him with small talk in the lobby of the motel. The intensity increases, and suddenly Norman ca't take it anymore, these insults to his mother, and hits Sam in the head, running after Lila. Lila is exploring the house during these events, first examining the mothers room and its intricacies, and  then later looking at Norman's room and its simplicity. As Norman enter she house, she goes down into the cellar,  unknowing of the truth. My extract ends with her seeing the mummified remains of the  mother and her screaming horridly as Norman descends on her. The characters and issues are represented in my extract through Norman's fight with Sam, well as Lila's meeting with the corpse. The issues here are that Norman is now for sure having some kind of identity crisis over his mother, becoming overtly suspicious when he becomes offended by Sam's every remark. Another issues is what Lila finds in general. Firstly, she finds a bed with a deep imprint, meaning someone has slept there very recently (throwing off the viewer). Secondly, Lila is in Normans room and it appears as a kids room despite the fact Norman is a grown man. This mystery and suspense culminates as we reach the final issues, the fruit cellar, where Norman's mother turns out be be nothing but a taxedermised corpse.  And  the Norman appears in drag.

Socio-Cultural Influences in Psycho

Cultural Themes

Despite the fact that Hitchcock was British, the film address's American themes. The themes of corruption by money, lack of privacy, and multiple identity are all resultant of Hitchcock's reaction to American Society of the late 1950's.  At the time, the American Society was booming. However  this economic growth and prosperity would eventually lead to a growing corruption, and Hitchcock is warning of this growing threat, and Marion's death is directly linked to her stolen money. The theme lack of privacy comes from from the communist paranoia of the era, and the resulting intrusion of neighbors and government into the personal lives of  the people. Similarly, the theme of multiple identity comes from the idea of the apparent two faced nature of the "communist spies" that pervaded the era.

Geographical Context
The film takes place in Arizona, and was shot in the Universal Backlot. 

Historical Context
The messages from WW2 were clear: no matter how heroic your men, how skilled your generals, how staunch your supporters on the Home Front, at the end of the day it was technology that counted. Bigger. Better. Deadlier. Like the atom bomb. The horror films of the 1950s are about science and technology run riot, an accurate enough reflection of reality for a confused populace, wary of the pace of technological change. The 1950s are also the era when horror films get relegated well and truly to the B-movie category. The studios were too busy incorporating technical changes such as widespread color production and trying to meet the challenge posed by TV to have much truck with making quality horror pictures.

Also, Psychology was beginning to develop as a legitimate study at the time.  Interestingly, developmental and child psychology were major schools of thought at the time and relates to the plot of Psycho: Norman Bates witnessed his mother in bed with her lover and brutally murdered them for it. His mother also kept him very sheltered and was his only interaction for much of his life. As a result, Norman is a quiet but psychologically deranged man because of these events.  His childhood development negatively effected his ability to deal with fatherly and motherly figures.  I would say personally that the film fell under the revisionist point in its genre at its time. Before this film many horror films were creature features. The non conformist storytelling structure and new techniques used would have made it a completely new style of horror at the time. However, it could be argued to be a classic. In the current state of the horror genre today, Psycho has influenced an entire sub genre (which has become one of the most popular), the slasher genre. It set the standard for many films to follow and 

Cited http://www.shmoop.com/1950s/economy.html
http://www.horrorfilmhistory.com/index.php?pageID=1950sa