Prop List

We decided that we didn't want to use loads of props, just a few small, important props which would add to the storyline massively. The main props we used were:

Prop List:

• Rope
• Purple Ribbon
• Journal
• Photos
• Newspaper clippings

Danielle was the one in our group to create the journal. It took a lot of time to make it, but she wanted it to make the audience question what was going on when they saw it. She took a lot of inspiration from the film Se7en, as she wanted a lot of what was put in the journal to make the audience feel unsettled and uncomfortable. These are some photos that she took of the journal:

We also needed to use some rope for the hanging field. We borrowed this from our geography department at school, with their permission.

Lastly, the purple ribbon used by the murder to symbolise himself. We used the colour purple because it is a bright colour, but it is also associated with royalty, which contrasts heavily with the killers views.

Casting Shots

We knew that a lot of decisions needed to be made in regards to the casting of our film, but we also knew that the actors/actresses needed to suit the part they were playing. We knew that we needed a strong male character as our murderer, someone who could hold themselves, and firmly keep their character in mind whilst filming. We also needed females who were all brunette, in order to follow then trend that we had set within our film.

Below are the headshots of the actors used in our opening sequence:

Emily Ramsey - Katherine Smith

Emily Board - Hannah Jenson

Caoimhe Kelly - Amelia Wood

Danielle White - Millie Campbell

Ryan Witchell - The Killer

Risk Assessment

Possible Risk	Who does it affect	Control Measures
Cutting themselves on scissors	The actor using the scissors	This is quite a small risk, so we simply explained to the actor that they could possibly hurt themselves whilst using them, and also kept plasters on hand to help if necessary.
Furniture that falls over	Actor/Film crew	We filmed a shot where the actor has to shove back his chair in anger. This could hit him, or the film crew, or objects around the chair, so we made sure there was enough space and also made sure no film crew were stood in the way.
Risk of falling into stream	All who are on filming site	We will warn any cast/crew beforehand of the risks of the stream. We will also need to ensure the ground is safe before we film in this location, so we will have to do a sweep before we film there.
Falling out tree	Actor/Actress in the tree	When filming the hanging scene, we will ensure the person is sat on a low enough branch that they are reasonably close to the ground, therefore if they do fall, it means that they won’t have a long fall. They will also have someone stood just behind them, encase they fall backwards. There will also be someone on hand to help them in and out of the tree when necessary.
Injury from hanging rope	Actor/Actress	When setting up the rope for this shot, it will be tested multiple times before use. We will also need to test the ground area around the rope, because if the floor is slippery they could easily fall and hurt/choke themselves. When we tie the rope we will ensure that the rope comes undone if any pressure is applied to it, so that it doesn’t choke anyone. When filming this scene, we will ensure there are enough people there so that someone can get help, and there is still someone there with the injured person.
Slipping when climbing in or out bathtub	Actor/Actress	We will ensure the actor/actress is helped in and out of the bath if necessary, and the crew will be cautious when doing so. There will also always be a first aid kit and a phone nearby if extra help is needed.
Paper cut from the journal	The actor using the journal	As this is quite a small risk, we simply explained to the actor that it was possible he could get a paper cut, and we also had plasters on hand encase it did happen.

Planning Shot Locations.

Before we could start filming our opening sequence we knew that we needed to plan out where our shots would take place first. We knew this would help us better with the actual planning of our film, so we did them in conjunction with each other. We needed to assess the practicality of a lot of the shots, so we decided to do this before we shot our film. Here are the following locations that we used in the filming of our opening sequence:

Year 7 Gardens:

We felt like this was a great location to films shots of the girl being stalked, because we could use a variety of angles whilst filming, so it wouldn't look like the same place, and there were also lots of places where we could have the girl walking, and then the murderer following closely behind, which looked realistic. 

Mrs Kelly's Office

We chose this location because it looked like an office that could be inside someones house. It was also bright enough to film in with the lights off, but it also looked dark enough to make it quite scary. 

Bentley Woods

This wood is next to our school, so easy to get to in order to film it. We used this location to film the hanging scene, and it was very easy here to pick how we would film it.

Other Woods

This wood is at the bottom of our school field, and we decided to use this as another shot location for a murder. Having previously used the bridge, we knew it was safe to film on. We also liked the atmosphere of the area, and there were lots of angles we could use to film the body.

Bathroom

This is the bathroom of one of our classmates. She agreed to let us film in it, to create another murder destination. It was useful because it had a variety of angles that could be used, but it was also quite a dark room, where we could create atmosphere.

Script

In our opening sequence we decided to not have any speech and instead have non-diagetic sounds instead. Because of this, we didn't need a script for the actors to say, but we did have a voiceover, so we needed a script for that.

We decided to have a news reporter explaing what had happened regarding the murders being spoken in the background. Here is the script we used for that:

An urgent search has commenced in north Wiltshire for a serial killer as women are advised not to go out at night alone.

Women are being warned not to walk alone at night after a spate of murders in Wiltshire.

It is thought that the murders are not random but everyone should be cautious. Three women have been attacked over the past fortnight and the police believe that the murders are connected.

The first victim is 22-year-old Katherine Smith. The murder is thought to have taken place on Friday the fifth of December.

The second murder took place on Tuesday the ninth of December, the attack on 23-year-old Hannah Jenson, resulting in her death. 

On Saturday the thirteenth of December a third murder happened within the same area. The victim was 20-year-old Amelia Wood.

Police are looking for a suspect described as white, five foot ten inches, aged eighteen to twenty, an athletic build with brown hair. He wore dark clothing. 

Anyone with information should contact DC Logan Miller on 01380 735 735.

I haven't decided if I'm going to add more speech in the background of my opening sequence yet.

Narrative Theories

Narrative

In Media, Narrative is the continuity given to a series of facts. The human mind needs narrative in order for things to make sense. The brain connects events and makes explanations based on those connections. In everything, we seek a start, a middle and an end. We understand and construct meaning using our experiences and of previous texts. Each text becomes part of the previous and the next through its relationship with the audience.

Narrative and Story

Story: "a narrative, either true or fictitious, in prose or verse, designed to interest, amuse or instruct the hearer or reader; tale."

Narrative: "a story or account of events, experiences, or the like, whether true or fictitious.

Media 

Reality is difficult to understand, and we struggle to construct meaning our of our everyday experiences. This is very different to media texts. Media texts are better organised, as this makes it easier for the audience to engage with them without too much effort. Normally, also, the audience expects the text to be constructed in a certain way. Media texts can also be used to create a story which isn't present in reality, so people can experience the feelings behind it. Here are the basic elements of a narrative, according to Aristotle:

"...the most important is the plot, the ordering of the incidents; for tragedy is a representation, not of men, but of action and life, of happiness and unhappiness - and happiness and unhappiness are bound up with action. ...it is their characters indeed, that make men what they are, but it is by reason of their actions that they are happy or the reverse." (Poetics - Aristotle(Penguin Edition) p39-40 4th century BC )

Successful stories need actions which drastically change the lives of the characters within the stories. They must also contain some sort of resolution, where the change is registered, and this then creates a new story for the characters to be involved in. We must also remember that narratives are not just what we encounter in films. They are in news stories, advertisements and documentaries, and we must interpret them.

Narrative Conventions

When creating a narrative, there are conventions that need to be followed. When we look at a narrative, we examine the conventions of:

• Genre
• Character
• Form
• Time

We then use knowledge of these conventions to help us interpret the text. Something that is quite easy to understand as a convention is time; narratives do not take place in real time, but may slow down or speed up depending on the film. 

It is because we are used to reading narratives from a very early age, and are able to compare texts with others that we understand these conventions. A narrative in its most basic sense is a series of events, but in order to build the meaning from the narrative,  it is vital that the events are linked.

Barthes' Codes

Roland Barthes describes a text as:

"a galaxy of signifiers, not a structure of signifieds; it has no beginning; it is reversible; we gain access to it by several entrances, none of which can be authoritatively declared to be the main one; the codes it mobilises extend as far as the eye can read, they are indeterminable...the systems of meaning can take over this absolutely plural text, but their number is never closed, based as it is on the infinity of language..." (S/Z - 1974 translation)

A basic summary of this is that a text is all tangled up, but it needs unravelling so we can separate out the different parts. Once we start to unravel it, we discover a huge variety of potential meanings. We can then start by looking at a meaning from one viewpoint, using one previous experience and therefore create one meaning for that text. You can then continue to unravel different parts to create different meanings through and throughout. This can happen an infinite number of times, if you wanted it to.

In summary, Barthes believed that a text could be open, where lots of different meanings come from it, or closed, where there is only one obvious meaning for it. Barthes also decided that the texts you try to unravel are called narrative codes, and that they could be categorised in the following ways:

• Action/proiarectic code and enigma code (I.E. Answers and Questions)
• Symbols and Signs
• Points of Cultural Reference
• Simple description/reproduction

Narrative Structures

There are many ways of breaking down narrative structure. You may hear a movie described as a "classic Hollywood narrative", meaning it has three acts.

Our Opening Scene

We decided from the beginning that we wanted a voice over in our film opening, so that the story would make sense to the audience. However, we decided that we didn't want a normal voice over, we wanted a news report, as this is quite a simple thing, and the majority of humans can understand what is happening when they hear a news report, hence why we decided to go for this approach. We also wanted the story to be quite complicated so that 1. The audience could try and work out the storyline for themselves, and 2. They can come up with various theories for the film. There is also a series of events that link together in ours, the events being the murders, and the link being the murderer. This links in various ways to different ideas of Narrative Theories.

Eight - Point Story Arc

There is a book called Writing A Novel and Getting Published which was written by a man called Nigel Watts. Within this book he wrote about the Eight-Point Story Arc, which is the structure he believes needs to be used in order to making a story successful. The 8 points are, in order:

1. Stasis
2. Trigger
3. The quest
4. Surprise
5. Critical choice
6. Climax
7. Reversal
8. Resolution

In it, he explains that every "classic" plot passes through these stages. I, however, don't think that every story goes through these stages, so although I'm keeping them in mind when writing my script, I think there is a lot more to a story than this basic structure.

Stasis

This is "the every day life" in which the story is set. An example of this is Harry Potter living with the Dursleys. This is used within my opening sequence, as we watch the killer flicking through a journal, a journal which documents all his killings, as he flashbacks to all the events, in his ritualistic manor.

Trigger

Something beyond the control of the protagonist is the trigger which sparks off the story. For example, the Fairy Godmother appears to grant some wishes. In my idea of the film, the murderer sees his abusive Mum for the first time in years. His Mum looks like his previous victims, so he can't help but want to hunt her down. 

Quest

The trigger results in a quest, both positive and negatives quests can be used here. 

In my head, the murderer kills his Mum at this point in the film, and ties his famous purple ribbon around her neck.

Surprise

This stage involved not one, but several elements, and takes up most of the middle part of the story. This adds complications, obstacles, trouble and conflict to the story line.

For my film, I imagine the murderer going to his childhood house to discover that his Mum has a new husband, who just so happens to be a high up detective, and a new family. He sees a picture of his Mums new daughter and instantly realises that it was a girl he once dated, but she dumped him because he was obsessive.

Critical Choice

At some stage, your protagonist needs to make a crucial decision; a critical choice. This is often when we find out exactly who the character is, as real personalities are revealed at moments of high stress. In this scene I decided to make my main murderer go on a rage, and murder 7 people in one night, but in doing so he hasn't planned enough, so things start to go wrong. 

Climax

The critical choice made by the protagonist needs to result in a climax, which is also the highest peak of tension.

In this part I want the murderer to wake up to discover CCTV images of his face plastered all over the news. He's been discovered, and a witch hunt is about to begin. Then his Mums new husband, the detective, appears on screen, saying he would do everything in his power to find him. The murderer goes on the run.

Reversal

The reversal should be the consequence of the critical choice and the climax, and it should change the status of the characters.

Whilst out on the run the murderer is spotted by a little girl. When he threatens to hurt her unless she shuts up, she screams bloody murder, until eventually the police are called. A chase happens through some woods, until eventually he is overrun after being shot in the thigh.

Resolution

The resolution is a return to a fresh stasis - one where the characters should be changed, wiser and enlightened, but where the story being told is complete.

In this, I want a shot to 3 months later. The murderer is in jail with a bible. A priest sits with him, but leaves him, blessing him. The murderer then gets out a thick purple ribbon, and ties a noose. He writes a note in his original murder book, explaining that he doesn't believe he deserves to live after all the lives he's taken. Final shot of his legs hanging and twitching.

Institutions and Distribution

An institution is an organisation which produce, distribute or exhibit films. Some institutions need to merge with another institution to strengthen their distribution. The bigger the institution, the higher the chance a film has of making it globally.
Distribution is the idea of film institutions making their products avaiable for their prime audiences to view. They use multiple marketing campaigns to achieve this.
Before making the film, the directors of producers can go to an institution to pitch their film idea, where they ask if the institution would fund the project. Popular institutions include:

• BBC
• The UK Film Council
• Vertigo Films
• Film Four

The UK Film Council

This institution has backed more than 900 films which include feature and short films. There goal is to make the UK a global centre for films amongst the worlds competitive film industry. They support many upcoming film directors, by funding their British films to attract a wider audience. The Film Council has money provided by the lottery. They also are in partnership with BFI (British Film Institution), Skill Set, First Light, Film Club and Regional and National screen agencies.

BBC

BBC Films are the forefront in producing British Independent films. They produce many feature films. They are commited in finding and developing new talent. However, they are very picky about the films they back up.

Vertigo Films

Vertigo Films is a UK media company which creates and distributes commercially driven independent cinema. They use new technology and they pay attention to the budgets, this is to address their audience in the most care to produce films that the audience approves of; that they are authentic to what they are trying to represent.

Film 4

Film 4 showcases a wide-range of British made films and international films that come from all over the world. They don't just show films, they also produce many films. Film 4 is partnered with Warp X Films where they challenge British and International films and create new ones for a lower budget, with the intention of expanding the niche audience.

Hollywood film institutions are companies that produce and distribute films annually and command significant shares in box office revenues. They have huge budgets for their films and have extreme marketing techniques. They not only use social media, like Twitter, Instagram and Facebook, but they also use merchandise, billboards, websites, online ads on YouTube and other websites. Hollywood has continually been able to act upon a changing markey and use to their advantage new technologies to help their film thrive.

An independent film is a film which has been produced completley or with little contact with outside major film studios. Being produced and distributed by independent entertainment companies limits the ability to make a film successful worldwide. However, independent films can also be partnered with a major film studio such as Universal, Paramount and Warner Brothers to improve the performance of the filn. A large majority of independent films are seen to be arty and indie, this is for these films would have a select, smaller audience and independent companies would be able to deliver these audiences with no need to go global. Independent films are made with a considerably lower budget than major studio films. A large majority of british film companies are independent as they don't have the money to create big set pieces and other extravagent scenes.

Key Elements - Crime/Thriller

The Crime/Thriller genre is a sub-genre to Crime. This means it is a typical crime film, but it includes a bit more thriller in it. The plots tend to be quite similar, with someone who has committed a crime (normally a murder) being hunted down by a powerful detective who just keeps missing the criminal.
In order to be able to create a realistic Crime/Thriller film, there is are a few key elements/conventions that need to be followed to make the film more realistic. These are:

• The main plot is focused on an investigation that needs to be solved, normally quickly.
• Suspenseful, non-diagetic music needs to be playing in a lot of scenes to build the tension and create atmosphere.
• The antagonists plans must originally be a lot more intelligent than the plans of the protagonist.
• The characters need to be realistic, so the audience believe them.
• Various scenes of action, and also psychological issues build tension and suspense, so need to be used frequently.
• Both the antagonist and protagonist face a personal issue which they both need to overcome in order to defeat the other.

Textual Analysis - Sherlock Holmes

Sherlock Holmes (2009) is a British - American Action mystery film based on the character of the name "Sherlock Holmes" created by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. The film was directed by Guy Ritchie. Robert Downey Jr portrays Sherlock, and Jude Law portrays Dr John Watson. In the film, Sherlock and his companion, Watson, with aid from a former friend Irene Adler, investigate a series of murders connected to occult rituals. 
The opening to Sherlock is various shots from the film which then transform into cartoon drawings. It is meant to be quite a comedic opening sequence, as there are various shots of Sherlock and Holmes getting hurt by various villans. 
The music in the opening shot is very quick paced and quite jumpy. It is also of quite a high pitch. The staccato of the notes makes it very interesting to listen to, and it's quite playful, which the opening of the scene is also. It draws the audience in, because the music has quite a fast tempo, its an exciting piece of music which then makes the audience excited to listen to it.
As I said before, the editing of the opening sequence is very interesting. It is a series of short clips from the film, which move, are turned back into cartoon, and then turn back to life again. It is very visually interesting to watch, and because it shows shots of what is going to happen in the film it makes the audience very interested to watch it.
The font of the credits are meant to look hand drawn, maybe to represent Sir Arthur Conan Doyle writing the stories of Sherlock Holmes. It sets the era that the film is set is also, as the writing is very posh.
The audience are drawn in to watch the film because of how realistic the drawings in the opening scene look. There are ink blots over slighly yellowed paper, and this makes the audience feel like the drawings were drawn specifically to link to the story, which draws them into the plot.
The colours in the moving images are quite dark, normally black and white with a hint of colour. This makes the audience believe something exciting is going to happen within the film, due to the lack of colour, and draws the audience in to watch the film.

Film Brief

For our film we decided that we wanted to do the crime-thriller genre. Crime-thrillers are crime films, that have a slightly scary edge to them. So normally there is a criminal, which is the crime aspect of the film, but the criminal doesn't do normal "criminal" things like stealing, they tend to murder people, and they tend to do it in obvious, creepy ways.

We wanted to use this genre for our film as we did a crime theme for our preliminary task and we really enjoyed making it. When we were thinking up ideas for what we could do as a film, we decided we wanted to do a murder, as it made the film a bit more interesting to watch, but also quite specific to the genre.

In order to do a crime thriller, we knew we needed a murderer, and we knew we needed people who had been murdered. We looked around for places which look quite creepy, like the woods, and we decided we wanted the girls killed in a variety of ways, so we needed to think up ways in which they could be killed.

We learned about different film shots and decided we wanted jump cuts with quick edits and dramatic music, in order to build the tension and create atmosphere. We also decided that we quite wanted to have a voice over, of a news report about the different girls that had been murdered which eventually built up and was just white noise, until it suddenly stopped. For this we had to learn how to use audacity, and try and make it sound quite crisp without background noise.

An example of on of the biggest box office hits for the genre of thriller is The Dark Knight Rises. It had a budget of $250,000,000 (estimated). In it's opening weekend, it made $160,887,295 in the United States. It made a gross of $448,139,099 in the USA, and this was calculated on the 13 December 2012.

An example of the most critically acclaimed thrillers of all time is a film called North by Northwest. Directed by Alfred Hitchcock, it is about a man who is mistaken for a spy. It 100% on the Tomatometer on Rotten Tomato, and 94% of audiences enjoyed watching the film. It comes 17th in the list of best movies of all time.

One of the most acclaimed thriller director and producers of all time is Alfred Hitchcock. He was nominated for 25 awards, and he won 31. Thats in total 56 awards for his works. These are from Golden Globes, Emmys, BAFTAs and a few other less known awards. Below is a list for the number of things he has been credited for:

• Director (69 credits)
• Producer (28 credits)
• Actor (38 credits)
• Writer (22 credits)
• Miscellaneous Crew (13 credits)
• Art Director (9 credits)
• Assistant Director (5 credits)
• Soundtrack (4 credits)
• Editor (3 credits)
• Production designer (1 credit)
• Set director (1 credit)
• Thanks (23 credits)
• Self (41 credits)
• Archive footage (87 credits)

Thats 344 credits in total. He was incredibly acclaimed.

An acclaimed thriller actor is Kevin Spacey. Hvaving stared in 22 Crime/Thriller films, he's kind of an expert on playing the part. Out of all of his films he has recieved 55 awards, and has been nominated another 50 times. These are academy awards, golden globes, emmy awards, BAFTAs and loads more. 

9 key shots of a crime-thriller film: Se7en.

This is the first shot that the audience see. It is a Medium Close up of a book, and the book is mainly of a black colour. The black signifies mystery and also evil. Because the audience so far know nothing about the film, this shot makes the curious about what is in the book.

This shot is a close up of someone cutting off their fingerprints with a razor/blade. This shot is quite disturbing, and instantly makes the audience wonder what he's done so that he has to cut off his fingerprints. 

This is a close up shot of a baby being tortured. This shot was put in here to scare the audience, but it is only up for a flash of a second, so only there if you're really looking for it. This is primarily here to scare the audience.

This shot is an extreme close up of the main character writing in the journal we saw at the beginning. Nothing is really in focus, apart from writing at the side of the journal, and it makes the audience curious as to what is being written in the journal. This shot has a lot of grey in it, and I think it represents how reserved the film makers want the character to seem. 

Because this shot is quite dark, it makes the shot very mysterious. The audience want to know what photo he is cutting up, and why he's cutting it. 

This shot is a brilliant shot because it makes the audience really want to know whats going on. They can see all the writing that the character is putting into the journal, it makes the audience think he's either planning something or confessing something, and you can see that he is still writing, so it's obviously important.

Its in this shot that you start to wonder whether or not the character is a murderer. He starts by crossing out the eyes of this child, and then it snaps to him crossing out his whole face. This symbolises the death of this person. The shot is also souly focussed on the picture, which makes it seem like it's important information.

In this shot you see the character sewing up the journal that he was just writing in. He's sewing it together, which shows the audience he's finished his task, but again, makes them wonder what he's doing.

This is one of the final shots of the opening. In it, you see rows and rows of different journals, and the audience then realise that he's been journaling something, and making a variety of journals, so whatever it is that he is documenting, he has done a lot of times, and will probably do again. This then creates a storyline.

Target Audience Research

 All films need a target audience to watch them, because not every person is interested in the same things. Film companies tend to generalise people, in order to pitch their film for the right people to watch. For example, not a lot of elderly people would want to watch a cartoon, children, however, would like to watch cartoons. Because of this we needed to do some research into target audiences for the crime/thriller genre.

A target audience is normally defined primarily by gender and age range. However, the can define it also by race, special interests, rural or urban.

These are the statistics that we discovered from our primary research:

70% of crime/thriller viewers are between the ages of 15 and 30
65% of crime/thriller viewers are male
50% do not enjoy a romantic sub-plot

We also decided to use audience profile data from websites online for 3 films which are similar to ours, to see the target audiences they received, so we can make our film appropriate for those people. Here are the results I received.

1. Gone Girl

The audience profile for Gone is largely female, and mainly within the age range of 15 to 34, but does include a significant amount of people aged 35+, so it has a large variety for age range.

2. Now You See Me

The audience profile for Now You See Me is equal male and female viewings. The main portion of people watching are from the ages of 15-34, however there are quite a few who are 35+ and a small percentage who are 7 to 11. 

3. The Equalizer

The audience profile for The Equalizer is mainly male viewings. The same as the other two, the main age range is 15 to 34, with a small percentage of the viewings being aged 35+.

Most thriller films tend to be 18+ due to the violence that is in them, so I would probably need to generalise my audience as mainly being 18+, however some people will watch it younger because they can easily watch it online, or if their parents buy the DVD they can watch it through that. However, I think my opening would class as a 15, because it has strong violence. If you go to http://www.bbfc.co.uk/what-classification/15 to justify my decision, and my film would probably have most of the categories on the list, but nothing above that. The categories are:

•   strong violence
•  frequent strong language (e.g. 'f***').
•   portrayals of sexual activity
•   strong verbal references to sex
•   sexual nudity
•   brief scenes of sexual violence or verbal references to sexual violence
•   discriminatory language or behaviour
•   drug taking

I do however think that these kind of films can be split equally for both genders, if I were to add a love interest to my film, for example, a lot more women would probably want to watch it, stereotypically. Therefore I think my target audience is anyone over the age of 15 and of either gender.

Preliminary Task - Prop, Costume and Equipment List.

For our original preliminary task, involving a criminal and a police officer, we needed props, costumes and equipment in order to make the shots believable.

Props:

• Lamp
• Desk
• Glass of water
• Chairs
• Folder

Costume:

• Police hat - for police officer
• Leather jacket - for perp

Equipment:

• Camera (we used an iPod)
• Tripod
• Storyboard
• Script

Without all of these things, our preliminary task would not have been as successful as it could have otherwise been.

CRIME

Conventions:

Crime develop around the actions of criminals and/or gangsters, particularly bank robbers, hoodlums and underworld figures (somebody who can't be traced for their actions). Normally the criminal is a man, but it can occasionally be a woman.

Crime stories often highlight the life of a crime figure or a victim of crime. They can also glorify the rise and fall of a particular criminal, gang, bank robber, murderer or lawbreaker in personal power struggles or conflict with law and order figures, an underling or competitive colleague, or a rival gang. Rivalry with other criminals in gangster warfare is often a significant plot characteristic. The plot also include questions such as how the police will capture the criminal, and whether or not the criminal will succeed in their plans.

Gangster/crime films are usually set in large, crowded cities, such as LA or New York, which provides a view of the secret world of a criminal. Dark nightclubs, or streets with neon signs. Fast cars, piles of cash, sleazy bars, contraband, weird living quarters.

A chase, usually a car chase often happens within crime films. There's also a lot of involvement with props, such as knifes, guns, and weapons that can harm people. The villain would normally have some unidentified problems which normally get resolved at the very end of the film. The hero, who saves everyone, normally has a partner. This partner is normally incredibly intelligent, or really stupid. Crime films are normally a murder, drama films are usually to do with the family of the hero, like the wife or the children. There is often a head police officer who doesn't agree with the views and the actions of the hero, and often someones private life becomes public. There is also often some form of betrayal within the film.

Target Audience:

Crime films are typically stereotyped as being aimed at men, purely because of the use of violence, weapons, villains and the justice system. More often than not the main hero tends to be a strong dominant male, such as Christian Bale in Batman Begins. However, when films like “Mr and Mrs Smith” came around, because there was a strong dominant woman who was on the same level as a strong dominant man, a lot more women liked that film. It gave the film a sense of gender quality, so it appeals to both genders. Normally, the film is a 15+, so it probably appeals to audiences over the age of 15. I think people between the ages of 15-24 are the most likely to go and watch a crime film. Overall, the general target audience is males between the ages of 15-24 due to the weapons, violence and the strong dominant men, but as more women start to be involved as strong dominant women within the films, more women are going to watch the films.

Production Techniques:

Depending on the type of crime film depends on how the script is typically written. For example, 22 jump streets script is written very differently from the script of The Godfather. However, the films are about the same thing, crime. This means typical language is used within the film. There's a lot of conversations about contraband, such as drugs and weapons, and there's also police terms that are used through both films, to try and show that with everything illegal, the police will get involved.

Again, depending on the type of film depends on the setting. Where The Godfather is quite dark throughout the film, 22 Jump Street is quite light hearted, however, there are scenes that are set in basements and dodgy street bars in both the films. This is to portray to the audience the shadiness of the situation, whether that is through a jokey way, or through a straight quite scary way. There is often always a crime film.

Lighting in crime films tends to be quite dark and dreary. This is to create the illusion that something that isn't quite right is going on. Also, if there is an interrogation room within the film, these tend to either be really bright, or only have one light on the criminals face.

In crime films there is very reoccurring sounds throughout. The sound of gunshots, the sound of police sirens, the sound of women and children screaming. Again, this creates the illusion that bad things are happening.

Film examples:

The Godfather

22 Jump Street

The Green Mile

'Jelly Baby' task - Final video

We had to film a mini movie using jelly babies in order to understand shot use better in a film. I have screen shots from the final film of the shots we used, and I'm going to explain the shots we used.

We used this Long Shot to express to the audience how alienated the jelly baby to the left is. It sets the story, and shows the audience what the film is going to be about, through this one shot.

This close up shot makes the audience focus on the character in person, but also shows the name of the production company too. We used this shot because we liked the focus on the character.

This very long shot shows us again how alienated the red jelly baby is from the rest of the jelly babies.

This over the shoulder shot is focused on the black and orange jelly babies, with the red jelly baby out of focus in the background. This shows the audience again that the red jelly baby is obviously pushed out by the other characters and made to feel unimportant.

We used another over the shoulder shot to try and show the audience that there is a conversation going on between the black and orange jelly baby, and they're purposely excluding the red jelly baby.

In this three shot we wanted to try to get the audience to empathize with the jelly baby, as it is trying to talk to the other two, but they're still trying to ignore her.

We used another three shot as we wanted it to be a confrontational shot. The black jelly baby is now shouting at the red one, so we empathise with her, until later on, when she starts to eat the black jelly baby.

We wanted this shot to be a final shot. We decided to use an over the shoulder shot to focus on the green jelly baby to show the audience that the green jelly baby is in love with the red jelly baby, but he is now heartbroken that she killed the black jelly baby so he faints.