Shot list

Marketing Strategy and Distribution

This is a short sequence of how we can display our film and get publicity for it.

Shooting

The film opening sequence will take place in my house as we decided the layout will work particularly well with the camera angles and we can use it to build tension. It will need to take place in a house as that is the setting in which burglaries tend to take place, as apposed to an outdoor area. The main issue with filming at my house is the number of family members I have, as they will create background noise and difficult to get out of the house to film. To overcome this, we will have to film whilst they're working and at school or we may have to bribe them.

It should be fairly easy to control the lighting as we will be inside the house. On our first attempt of filming we found that the lighting was quite dim and the character looked more of a silhouette. We wouldn't be able see what she is doing or picking up so to improve the quality of light we will place a light from all angles to capture every aspect in the shot. We also decided to shoot at about 3 in the afternoon as it will be around dusk which is the exact atmosphere we need to match the genre and plot.

There will be two characters in the title sequence. Laura will play a highly experienced and well known thief who has their own mark which they leave to show it was them. She will be wearing all black, with a cat mask and black boots. I will be playing the innocent and unknowing victim of the burglary. I will be wearing a white top as it shows purity and innocence, contrasting to the villain which shows the clear difference between the two characters. The thief will be moving quickly and smoothly as she is professional in thieving where as the victim will be walking slow and hastily around as they are scared and could be in danger.

Title Planning

Diary Entry 27/01/2014

Last week we started our filming for the opening sequence, however the lighting was too dark as we had thought the light was just right but it turned out to be darker than expected in the playbacks.

These are stills from some of the clips we have from our filming. As you can see, it is quite dark and hard to see the subject. To overcome this, we have decided to reshoot it earlier on in the day so we have more natural light to make it easier to see. I don't think the use of artificial light will be very effective in the film as it doesn't go with the plot. What I mean by this is that there is a burglary taking place and the victim was asleep, so lights around the house probably wouldn't be turned on and it's easy to tell the difference between natural and artificial lighting.

Props list

Most of the props we will be using in the title sequence will be for the burglar to steal, eg. Earrings, watches, phones, consoles, money and jewellery. These are the common items which thieves would typically go for in a burglary. Some props will be used either by the burglar or the victim for attacking or defence, these include baseball bats and knives. We will be using a poster to show the antagonists story, eg. That she's wanted villain and there'll be a reward for her capture. Another prop will be a cat mask as the antagonist will be some kind of Cat burglar.

Marketability

Setting

This is what my landing looks like, one which will be used as the burglar creeps around the house. I think it's quite good as it's somewhat open so using different lights will be fairly easy. Also, it is a good layout for the action that will be used. For example, you see the end of the landing is a T shape, to the left and the right there are 2 more doors which cannot be seen from this picture. The burglar could sneak from the right and the silhouette of the burglar will go to the left.


TBC

Change of plan

Our group have decided to change the idea of our opening sequence as we felt the kidnapping idea would go no where and we wasn't as interested in it as we'd hoped.

Our new idea will be based in a house, as it is easier to control lighting and background noise. This would make it better to create the atmosphere we'd like in our opening sequence. It's also good to do it in a house as it fits with the storyline.

The plot to the opening is that a masked woman breaks into a house through the downstairs window. She takes picks up valuable items such as jewellery and mobile devices then makes her way to the stairs. She happens to stand on a creaky floorboard which causes another woman to open her eyes after having a nap and notices her phone or something valuable has disappeared. She cautiously moves around to see what's going on, without making too much noise as she knows she could be in danger. The burglar goes into the bedroom and we see the woman also go in to the bedroom which becomes quite tense as she is in danger by being near the burglar. The camera pans round and we see that there is nothing in the bedroom so the tension begins to die down. The woman then moves and we see a bit of the burglar behind her, our aim is to make the audience jump from this. The burglar continues taking money from draws and goes out onto the landing. The other woman is in the next room, we can see she is there but the burglar is unaware. She slips into a closet and holds it tightly shut. The burglar creeps slowly to the closet and we hear the victim breathing heavily and her heart pounding. The burglar slowly opens the door handle and the door flies open. The screen then cuts to black and the title appears.

We had thought about including wanted posters in the opening scene as part of the mise-en-scene to add more backstory to it, as the viewer will be able to tell that the character is a master thief and one not to be reckoned with.

The genre of the film will remain the same despite the change of plan. The characters will have the same sort of roles as Laura will still be the villain and I will still play the victim.

The rest of the film could go on to be a documentary about the burglars life and how she came to be a burglar. A bit like Banksy's Exit through the gift shop film which describes the life of Banksy and Thierry Guetta (Mr Brainwash).

This clip from This Means War is a good example of how we could use camera angles and action to make it flow effectively and create the tension. The only difference being that the music and lighting will be different to make it less comedic.

 

Screenplay

Marketability

Our target audience is for people of both gender aged 16 and over. We decided this because there will be some violent scenes which won't be appropriate for people younger than this age. The higher end of our target audience will be about 30 year olds as people of this age seem to be quite interested in fast paced action thrillers. Anyone over the age of 30 may have less interest in our genre of film so this will be the highest end of the target market. 

Despite our target market is 16-30 year olds, people outside of this range may still watch the movie as our movie may have aspects which interest younger or older people so we cannot generalise it to a particular age range.

Action films were the most popular in 2012, mainly due to the release of the recent Bond film, Skyfall. Thrillers aren't quite as popular, coming 9th on the table produced by BFI.

Research into genre