Lenny Nero deals in dreams. Formerly an LAPD vice cop, he now deals in illegal 'squid' recordings - recordings made directly from the cerebral cortex of the participant, which allow the viewer to feel and experience everything the participant experiences as if they were there. One of life's perpetual losers, he ekes out a lonely, miserable existence at the end of the millennium, still pathetically yearning for his beautiful ex-girlfriend Faith, a beautiful singer, and is dependent on his friend Macey, who both loves him unquestioningly and despairs for him completely, in equal measure. But Lenny's life is about to be shattered; when he is anonymously sent the recording of the brutal rape and murder of a prostitute he is acquainted with, he and Macey soon find themselves reluctantly embroiled in a dark web of murder, blackmail and intrigue amid the civil unrest surrounding the suspicious death of an influential, politically active rap singer. Lenny and Macey are soon running from Faith's brutal manager, Philo Gant, and a pair of menacing police officers, as they try to uncover the connection between the two and stay alive long enough to see in the millennium.
Strange days is the film in which we took inspiration from for our plot. A man (Lenny) now deals these recordings which allow a person to experience other peoples experiences. This is the basis for the beginning of our film, where our main character, Vera, deals these tapes to different clients so they can experience whatever they want. The trailer briefly explains what these recordings are going to do to the client in less than a minute, which is what we aim to do within out film.
Strange Days also includes many handheld shots, particularly when an individual is experiencing the recordings. We will use this within our own films when the viewers are experiencing the playback tapes.
Lighting is an extremely important part of the film making process, in that it not only makes the film look more professional by exposing an image, it also can be used to create atmosphere. When considering lighting we need to look at the effect the director is trying to create and look at the meanings certain lightings create. Three Point Lighting Three Point lighting is the most basic lighting setup. As the name suggests, there are three lights involved, the Key Light, the Fill Light, and the Backlight. The Key Light is aimed at the object, or individual, and is the brightest of the three lights. The Fill Light is a softer light, which is usually placed opposite the Key Light. The Fill light is used to cut down on the amount of shadows created by the Key Light. Finally the Backlight is placed behind the object or individual, and its purpose is to separate the subject from the background. Basically, it creates a sense of depth.
Fill Light Fill light may be used to reduce the contrast of a scene to match the dynamic rage of the recording media and also to reflect the same amount of detail in which can usually be seen by the eye in average lighting. If we use normality as the baseline, the amount of fill light used can make shadows seem lighter, darker or normal. The use of more or less fill light will cause the audience to react in different ways, because of both environmental and moods clues given by the tone of the shadows. The positioning of the fill can affect the overall appearance of the lighting.
High Key Lighting When a director of photography uses a high level of fill lighting, it is referred to as high key lighting. The effect of this is that it makes the scene look brighter than real life. This kind of lighting is usually used in musicals as it shows a sense of liveliness, or it may emphasise intensity of a situation in dramas.
Low Key Lighting Low Key lighting is basically the opposite of high key lighting, as it is used to create more shadows. Due to the extra shadows this lighting has become a convention of horror films.
Backlighting
Backlighting is when the object or individual is lit from behind. The light, natural or artificial, and the viewer face each other, and the object or individual is in between. A glowing effect is created around the edges of the subject.
It can create a sort of halo effect.
Four Point Lighting
Four point lighting is exactly the same as three point lighting, just with the addition of the Background light. The light does as the name suggests, therefore lighting up the background area. This adds distance between the background and subject. The use of a background light adds a sense of depth.
Top Lighting
Top lighting is the use of a light above the subject, and it highlights the subject.
Under Lighting
This is just the opposite of top lighting, where the light is placed underneath the subject.
Substance abuse : Is the excessive use of any substance, especially alcohol or a drug.
(Found on http://www.medicinenet.com/script/main/art.asp?articlekey=24405)
Substance abuse can be seen in many films, whether it be abuse of alcohol or the abuse of drugs such as cocaine, heroin, and cannabis. Here are just a few films which deal with substance abuse of some form;
Pulp Fiction
Pulp fiction shows the abuse of many different drugs, namely cocaine and heroin. This is a very popular film, which handles drugs (especially in the scene above) in a tasteful and not too graphic way. When filming our scene, we will take inspiration for this part of pulp fiction, however it will be shot from a point of view. This film is that it almost romanticises drug use, which is in a way what we would like to do, to give our film that gritty and dark feel to it.
Trainspotting
Train spotting is a film about a group of youths who turn to heroin in an attempt to escape reality. However they later discover the consequences of using, and find there is no escape. This cult film has also been accused of glamourising the use of drugs, despite depicting the crash and the withdrawal. The characters all decline in terms of trust in eachother and morale.
Requiem for a dream
Requiem for a dream probably contains the more realistic portrayal of drug abuse, as the film is probably the grittiest film on the list. This movie exposes four paralleled individuals and their menacing addiction to heroin, cocaine and diet pills (speed). During the film, we witness the addicts loose control of their lives and we see the ugliest parts of the underworld addicts reside in. The scenes in which the characters are taking drugs is very fast paced, which I believe shows the urgency and reinforces the character dependency on the drugs. I think these scenes are clever and deal with the difficult subject of drug abuse without dragging it out too much.
Rape is a very conterversial sudject, and should be handled in a subtle and sensitive manner.
Many films contain rape within them, usually rape of a woman, as it is statistically more likely for a woman to be raped than a male. This allows the film to evoke real life fear within the audience as it is more relatable to. However we should not forget that rape is an issue for both sexes.
Rape is seen in many modern day films, and is seen as a lot less shocking than it would have say 50 years ago, due to the desensitisation of the audience, therefore it became less of a horrible thing to be shown. Films such as The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo, The Accused, Irreversible and I Spit On Your Grave all have scenes of rape within the film.
To deal with Rape in a way in which shows we do not condone it, more like raising awareness and by showing the disgust on Vera's face when she sees the tape, we believe this will portray our personal beliefs on Rape. We will portray the scene in a way which shows it is not acceptable and never allows the audience to empathise with the protagonist, just the victim. I believe if we tackle the subject in a way which isn't too graphic, but is suggestive of rape, this will allow us to keep our rating at 15. We will use rape as a plot device and we will in no way portray this as enjoyable and we will certainly not condone rape.
Today we will be shooting the opening scene of our short film and recording the voice over of the protagonist via a zoom recorder. The scenes we are shooting is in the location of the 19th century underground toilets, we will film Morgan sat in the toilet cubicle experiencing a playback, we will also film a male character doing the same thing. The next scene we will shoot is the point of view perspective of someone injecting heroin into themselves. We will then edit the footage and prepare for the next shooting day. As we are shooting in a public place it was important to ask permission from the cleaners who maintain the toilets as we did not want to disturb the public. In order to ensure the public's safety as well as ours, we have been given permission to have the toilets for thirty minutes, this means we will have to film efficiently in order to finish in the allocated time.
I created a scene breakdown to assist during the production to ensure that we know what props we need for each individual scene and to make our production run smoothly.
In the short film we have a point of view perspective drug taking scene that was inspired by the film Pulp Fiction. We did not want to glorify drug taking in anyway and therefore we cut out the method of how the heroin is injected and demonstrate the negative effect of the drug use on the character rather than portraying the character as joyful after the experience. We did this to ensure that the age rating of our film would maintain a 15 certificate. In order to understand the props we would be using and the way we would portray it, I researched into films that feature drug taking and identify whether it was a negative portrayal or a positive experience for the character, I also wanted to see how the drug taking had been displayed, whether it was suggestive or you could see the character doing a step by step taking of the drugs.
Disorientating effect
Our inspiration for the drug scene came from Pulp Fiction where Vincent takes injects a needle into his arm and pulls back the needle and extracts a small amount of his blood in the process. The Pulp Fiction drug scene cuts from a step by step procedure to Vincent looking relaxed and 'out of it' and is accompanied by a chilled sound score to suggest the drug taking is an enjoyable and relaxing experience for Vincent. I did not want to reflect this sort of message to the audience and therefore I added an effect which disorientates the viewer in a series of flashes and white noise is layered over the top of the scene, the scene itself is uncomfortable for the audience to watch and therefore wont encourage them to participate in drug taking. Visually I did like Tarantino's depiction of the drug scene as a focus pull of a flame allows it to transition to the injecting of the heroin. The whole procedure is pulled together with a series of close up shots and shallow depth of focus. I particularly liked how during the drug taking, we only see close up shots of hands and infer that it is Vincent taking the drugs due to the cutaways to him during and after the drug scene. Similarly within our short film, we infer that Morgans character is the one experiencing the drug taking due to the camera tracking into her and fading black and then coming out, she also holds her hand in the place of the heroin shot to indicate this further. When we came to shoot the drug scene I identified that we couldn't replicate the Pulp Fiction scene entirely as our drug taking is one continuous shot of point of view perspective, we did however, emulate the use of props which included, a spoon, lighter and needle and emulated the extraction of the blood using red food coloring for the blood. We originally shot a similar scene to Pulp Fiction where we use the lighter to heat up the makeshift heroin, however, due to the limited time of our film(5 minutes), I decided to cut it out and have it cut to the injection of the drug, but kept the heroin, spoon and lighter within the scene for mise-en-scene purposes. The scene in Pulp Fiction also has a dark background in which casts shadows and gives the impression of melancholia as it is dark and an obscure setting. Within our film the scene is in a darkened room, however, the light source is low key but close to the camera giving it an element of brightness, to control this I added a blue filter which has made the final product look depressing and raw, it almost gives the feeling of being on drugs, it is harsh and distorted filtering.
Ambient sound of needle head clicking into place
Cross Fade from the lighter to heroin on the spoon
Vincent is paying no attention to the road.
Pulp Fiction
Short Film:Playback
Research into films with drug taking in them
I researched into various different films and identified the way drugs has been presented within them. On the BBFC website it states that films depicting drug misuse has been a major concern since the 1900's as it was thought that drug on film would arouse curiosity, in recent times, the concern is glamorizing the use of drugs in film. At a U and PG certificate there must be know portrayal of drugs and if referencing it must be in an educational way. From a 12 onward there may be a portrayal of drug misuse in a 12 however it must not provide instructional details. The same applies for a 15 rated film which was important to research as our film consists of a drug scene. Trainspotting Requiem for a dream
Drug films tend to consist of either drug distribution or drug use, films range from ultra realistic to the utterly surreal, some films can be unabashedly pro or anti drug, while some others can be less judge mental. Drugs that tend to be shown in these type of films are usally higher class drugs such as
crack cocaine
lSD
Heroin
cannabis
There is convincing evidence that the media influences individuals behaviour, things such as smoking in films promotes uptake of the use by adolescents, this has lead to the use of rating and to restrict access to films that have this type of content. Drugs gave played a substantial role in film narratives, it is clear that the way drugs have been presented on screen has varied over the past century, shifting from positive to negative drug usage and different representations, all of which are often a reflection of greater societal and cultural trends.
The on screen popularity of Cocaine reflected the high usage among the starts and grew in the use of upper class and the elite.
up in smoke
Marijuana
cocaine
drug users in this film are portrayed as lazy 'stoners' that have unrealistic solutions to the on going problems and commit crimes such as driving under the influence of drugs.
Trainspotting
this film is another film that shows drug use of high class drugs such as
Heroin
marijuana
The drug users are shown as lower class citizens that have a difficult life and under go consequences such as death, neglect and jail/court.
Clean and Sober.
The main character is a successful real estate sales man but is addicted to cocaine, he embezzles $92,000 from his company from a escrow account and looses $50,00 due to his cocaine addiction, he wakes one morning with a girl who has had an heart attack in result of a cocaine addiction and he tries to cover up the fact drugs have been used. The police do still find out what has happened and then Daryl tried to flee the country but he has no cash and his card gets declined he then attends a drug rehabilitation program which lasts about a month and guarantees anonymity.
For further information about drug use in films i have looked on the BBFC website and this is some information I have found. The BBFC prohibit detailed portrayal of drug use that could cause pubic or mental health problems even at 18 level, and particularly children. Any misuse or glamorization of drugs maybe cut out of films that show misuse of drugs or any danger that they could be showing.
In our film, we have come up with the idea to have a number of experiences that effects a persons life in some way. These experiences range from having a physical disability to committing a murder (to reinforce the thriller generic conventions of our film), however we also thought of a subtle rape scene to be included in our film. From this idea, it has allowed us all individually to research into rape scenes of films that handled the situation in a appropriate way and some that may be seen as inappropriate.
OUR FILM
In our film, we have decided to handle the rape scene in a low key way, which gives enough evidence to suggest what is happening without actually showing anything inappropriate. We have chose to do this by having a point of view shot from the criminals perspective, showing the victim laid down on a bed, struggling and panicking hysterically. from this we see nothing but the unzipping of each persons trousers where the scene cuts off back to our original film. We have done this so we can portray the thriller side of our film; whilst also maintaining the content to be appropriate to our age rating/ audience of 15.
1. I SPIT ON YOUR GRAVE
Storyline (description taken from IMBd)
Writer Jennifer Hills takes a retreat from the city to a cabin in the woods to start on her next book. But Jennifer's presence in the small town attracts the attention of a few morally depraved locals who set out one night to teach this city girl a lesson. They break into her cabin to scare her. However, what starts out as terrifying acts of humiliation and intimidation, quickly and uncontrollably escalates into a night of physical abuse and torturous assault. But before they can kill her, Jennifer sacrifices her broken and beaten body to a raging river that washes her away. As time passes, the men slowly stop searching for her body and try to go back to life as usual. But that isn't about to happen. Against all odds, Jennifer Hills survived her ordeal. Now, with vengeance, Jennifer's sole purpose is to turn the tables and inflict upon them every horrifying and torturous moment they carried out on her... only much, much worse.
I Spit On Your Grave has the power to show rape in a realistic way, due to the high budget and age rating of the film; meaning they can show the audience a more gruesome and detailed attack. Because of this, I Spit On Your Grave has been rated one of the most controversial films to be released; which further can be argued how well they handled the storyline. The directors appropriately rated the film according to the graphic content of the film (nudity, violence, sexual assault etc) therefore suggests that this film overall handled the rape attack appropriately, however from further research into the film and looking through comments from the audience of the film, it can be argued that many people saw it to be inappropriate, where one individual dubbed it as 'pornography'.
For our filming on Friday we are planning to complete our chase scene. This is one of our biggest scenes to shoot consisting of Morgan running through an old car park before we see a horrific accident take place.
A photo storyboard is very similar to a regular storyboard, however a photo storyboard includes actual photos from the short film/film that is being created.
Photo storyboards can include:
location photos
character photos (placed in location)
give a more accurate picture in terms of timing
Regular storyboard
Regular storyboards are significantly useful in planning/creating an image of what a film could look like. These types of storyboards can be used for almost any type of media that is being planned, however only give a certain amount of detail of what is happening in a film/music video etc.
Photo storyboard
Photo storyboards are essentially a large comic of the film or some section of the film produced beforehand to help film directors, cinematographers and television commercial advertising clients visualise the scenes and find potential problems before they occur.Photo storyboards also be used when planning music videos in order to 'map out' timings which makes it a lot easier to piece together the overall desired piece of work. Furthermore it gives an in depth look at what a director has created in terms of characters, setting, timing etc. therefore is much more beneficial when reviewing an overall piece of work as it allows an early account of the potential outcome.
Advantages of Photo Storyboards:
1. Allows other workers/crew members visualise an idea by looking at shots of location, characters etc.
2. a problem can be easily be identified when each scene/shot can be seen (makes it easier to mark changes etc)
3. In depth ideas can be presented as it allows images of desired shots or character costumes in comparison to ordinary storyboards where they don't show as much planning.
The short film begins with a diegetic sound of shouting, this is accompanied by a title set against a black background. The image we first see is of a pixelated video, presumably footage from a mobile phone of teenagers running and shouting.
The image is of a low quality and the camera movement is disorientating, indicating that it is handheld and again is shot on mobile phone. The aim of this is to create a sense of chaos and confusion for the audience and links with the footage of the teenagers as teenagers are more than likely to be using mobile phones.
The image becomes steadier as it follows the teenagers down an alley to a group bullying a school boy. Those bullying the boy are dressed in the stereotypical youth style, with the majority of them wearing black hooded jumpers, often having connotations of trouble making and another teenager, a male, wearing a white tracksuit which signals him out from the rest of the teenagers.
It suggest that he is the leader of the group/gang and evokes this via the contrast of his white tracksuit and the groups black hooded sweatshirts. The teenager in the white tracksuit repeatedly hits the boy in the uniform, it then transitions to a celluloid shot that contrasts the opening footage of the mobile phone video. The contrast is further presented to the audience via a high angle shot of a quiet street of houses, the lack of commotion and stillness within this scene contrasts the footage before with the youth shouting and screaming. The diegetic sound of the birds tweeting provides a calm and serene quality to the scene that further juxtaposes the shouting of the teenagers in the opening scene.
A teenager is presented to walk downstairs, we can identify that is a teenager due to the upbeat music. The teenager quickly reverts from going downstairs as someone comes through the door.
The man who walks into the house, seemingly the teenagers Dad shouts up to the teenager. The man then proceeds to make a cup of tea, only to find that there is no milk. The medium close up shot here presents the concentration on his face, yet does not reveal the character straight forward, the camera shot does not reveal much about the character.
The man asks his son Tom to go and get milk, the response is the same teenage upbeat music. The facial expression of the Toms Dad is presented as disbelief and turns around to leave the house.
A tracking shot follows the man down the street, we can not see his facial expressions, however, we can infer he is displeased with his son.
It then transitions to the mobile phone footage, this time it is of the same teenagers, however they are beat-boxing through a traffic cone.
It then transitions back to the man, in contrast to the youth, his clothing demonstrates his class and somewhat authority. The long shot of the man walking down the street indicates the length of time he has left till he reaches the shop, the shop in which the teenagers are stood.
The teenagers behaviour is again demonstrated via the mobile footage of the assumed leader scaring a pedestrian. The representation within this film of youth conforms to the stereotype of them due to their hooliganism behaviour.
The teenagers are then presented to be playing with a red balloon, shots of the man is parallel to the teenagers, indicating that he will shortly approach them.
The man walks into the vicinity of the teenagers who then scare him by popping the balloon as he walks into the shop.
The youth laugh at the man, in turn the man mocks them by sarcastically laughing, the youth respond by stating they will knock him out.
An over the shoulder shot presents the leader blocking the mans path out of the shop.
It transitions to the mobile phone footage again, indicating that it is the teenagers territory and will do something to the man. They shout at him and make him stop to listen.
The leader in white kicks the man to the floor, he gets up and walks away.
A tracking shot presents the youth following the man home, it equally presents the mans facial expressions, seemingly anger.
The tracking shot from behind presents the spit on the back of the man and also indicates that he is being followed.
The man enters the house and checks his face for blood, it then cuts to his son who is revealed to be the boy from the opening who was getting hit by the same youth as his Dad. The medium close up of the boy indicates his apprehension of seeing his Dad. We can only see one part of his face, we can assume he has a bruise or cut the other side.
A shallow depth of focus presents the son to walk in behind his Dad, blurring out his face where the assumed cut is, yet it focuses on the mans face, we can infer he is angry yet fearful.
Scott tries to pursue a conversation with his Dad, so he can notice his face, however, his Dad does not turn around, a medium close up reveals Scott's bruised face.
A medium shot reveals his Dad's expression as he notices his face, Scott explains he got into a fight today.
A two shot shows the fear as the youth who attacked them both are outside the window. Scotts' Dad tells him he should have retaliated despite him always telling Scott to never fight.
The teenagers begin to taunt Scott and his Dad by sitting on his car, a medium shot reveals it is the leader who is doing this.
The youth taunt the father and son more by placing his penis through the letter box, after the father and son fight about being scare, Scott opens the door and steps outside.
An extreme close up presents the fear of Scott's Dad as his son steps outside to face the youth.
A tracking shot presents Scott's Dad leaving the house and turning to push Scott back into the house.
It then transitions to the mobile phone footage once again to reinforce the idea that the youth have control over the situation.
The leader hits the man and proceeds to do a dance move as a sign of victory, however, Scott comes out of the house with a cricket back and aims for the leader.
As Scott makes contact with the leaders head, the footage reverts back to celluloid to indicate that Scott has triumphed over the gang and reclaimed control.
A medium close up indicates the disbelief on the youths face.
A wide shot establishes where they are as Scott aims to hit the other gang members.
A point of view shot of Scotts foot stamping down onto the youths head is well executed and cut to present the stomping.
The Dad then stops the car alarm ringing which added to the commotion of the scenes in which Scott fought back. The car alarm ending signifies the end of the gang hurting either of them again and restores peace to and equilibrium.
The credits play over a high angled shot of the calm street presented in the opening scene.
Strange Days also includes many handheld shots, particularly when an individual is experiencing the recordings. We will use this within our own films when the viewers are experiencing the playback tapes. 
