I have recently watch a film called "An invisible Sign".
Tuesday 24 January 2012
Inspiration 2
Jess had watch a film called 'Speak', starring Kristen Stewart, and this inspired us to research the topic of sexual abuse and rape.
The film deals with a teenagers struggle to talk about how she was raped. We liked how the director portrayed the rape scene. They did this suggestively, rather than giving a detailed visual. The director suggests her rape through sound, and close-ups that fragment the scene. All the audience can hear are her screams. The visuals show no nudity, but it is a series of close ups that only show the character's facial expressions and her arms trying to get him off her.
After watching Andrea Arnold's work, we saw that she used many establishing shots of nature, and landscapes. We thought that we could film establishing shots of the surrounding environment, and have the sound of the rape. This would be more disturbing to the audience, and would create a tenser atmosphere.
We started planning thoughts and opinions on the topic.
I researched the opinions of the rapist. I felt that not many films focus on the other side's opinion. I found that many teenage boys rape their girlfriends because their friends are picking on them, accusing of being a homosexual. Instead of ignoring these childish remarks, they sexual abuse their girlfriends, and force them to have sex with them.
Jess had also analysed a film at the beginning of our course based on the same topic.
We liked how the rapist talks directly to the audience. This created an eerie, awkward feeling for the audience. The actors tone is also cocky, and almost friendly. This adds to the awkward atmosphere is creating. The first shot, is a close up of the rapist, Gordan. His face is not completely visable. This suggests that there is something about his personality that has been hidden from the audience. I liked how the character was surrounded by darkness, and how the director has already implied that Gordan is a dark, misleading character in the plot.
We could not find any teenage actors that were comfortable with the idea of acting within a film of this strong theme. We therefore needed to research and find other ideas.
The film deals with a teenagers struggle to talk about how she was raped. We liked how the director portrayed the rape scene. They did this suggestively, rather than giving a detailed visual. The director suggests her rape through sound, and close-ups that fragment the scene. All the audience can hear are her screams. The visuals show no nudity, but it is a series of close ups that only show the character's facial expressions and her arms trying to get him off her.
After watching Andrea Arnold's work, we saw that she used many establishing shots of nature, and landscapes. We thought that we could film establishing shots of the surrounding environment, and have the sound of the rape. This would be more disturbing to the audience, and would create a tenser atmosphere.
We started planning thoughts and opinions on the topic.
I researched the opinions of the rapist. I felt that not many films focus on the other side's opinion. I found that many teenage boys rape their girlfriends because their friends are picking on them, accusing of being a homosexual. Instead of ignoring these childish remarks, they sexual abuse their girlfriends, and force them to have sex with them.
Jess had also analysed a film at the beginning of our course based on the same topic.
We liked how the rapist talks directly to the audience. This created an eerie, awkward feeling for the audience. The actors tone is also cocky, and almost friendly. This adds to the awkward atmosphere is creating. The first shot, is a close up of the rapist, Gordan. His face is not completely visable. This suggests that there is something about his personality that has been hidden from the audience. I liked how the character was surrounded by darkness, and how the director has already implied that Gordan is a dark, misleading character in the plot.
We could not find any teenage actors that were comfortable with the idea of acting within a film of this strong theme. We therefore needed to research and find other ideas.
Rough Edit/Why we decided to re-think our film project
As the cinematographer, I felt that the story did not allow enough ways for me to create stylistic shots when shooting the dialogue in the kitchen. The set was very cramped and cluttered, which made it harder to maneuver around the characters. The lack of space meant that we didn't have enough room for the tracking. Using the tracking would have made it easier to create stylised shots. Without this, the shots became static, and dull for the audience.
We also felt that the house did not fit the character or story-line. This was the only location that we could find to shoot within, so during filming we desperately tried to fit it in. This showed on the final product. While we liked the shots filmed in the bedroom, we did not like the shots throughout the rest of the house. This was because there was a homely, warming feel throughout, that we struggled to eliminate.
Our teacher suggested that we filmed the conversation outside, keeping Sarah's bedroom scene. We felt that the whole point of our story was to create the idea that Sarah has been trapped within her house since she married her husband. Filming outside would have lost this feel of captivity.
We therefore decided to re-plan our project.
We also felt that the house did not fit the character or story-line. This was the only location that we could find to shoot within, so during filming we desperately tried to fit it in. This showed on the final product. While we liked the shots filmed in the bedroom, we did not like the shots throughout the rest of the house. This was because there was a homely, warming feel throughout, that we struggled to eliminate.
Our teacher suggested that we filmed the conversation outside, keeping Sarah's bedroom scene. We felt that the whole point of our story was to create the idea that Sarah has been trapped within her house since she married her husband. Filming outside would have lost this feel of captivity.
We therefore decided to re-plan our project.
Sunday 8 January 2012
Makeup
Due to character changes, we couldn't rely on natural looks of the actor. We wanted Sarah to look worn out, ill, and stressed. We based our make-up on Twilight character, Bella Swan. In Breaking Dawn the character because ill. Here is an image below.
Here, the make-up artists have pulled her hair away from her face so that her features are exposed. We felt that Sarah would hide behind her hair. She isn't around people she trusts, so therefore would not want to be exposed to them. Sarah's hair will therefore be covering her face.
They have highlighted the main lines of Bella's face. They've wanted to portray the fact Bella has lost a serious amount of weight, so they have use a dark brown/black powder to highlight Bella's cheek bones. Usually they use a pink/rosy blusher to make the character look healthy. By using a brown/black they are making her look starved, but also making her look pale and weak.
We did not want Sarah too look starved. We did however like the eye make-up used to make Bella look tired and weak. Here they have used the brown/black powder again lightly under the eye, smoothing it out to create bags under her eyes. They have then added a slight layer of purple to make her eyes look red. This portrays her exhaustion and implies the character has been crying.
Below are images of Jess' transformation into Sarah.
Saturday 7 January 2012
Changing Plot/Characters
Due to Nicola Stewart pulling out of the project due to personal reasons, we needed to find another actress. Unfortunately we could not find any one within the age range we first intended to have Sarah. We went back to the original short story.
In this, Sarah is in fact younger than 40. She is a 20 year old woman. Because one of the actors, Simon Oxley, is Jess' father, I suggested that Sarah becomes Richard's daughter.
We then went back and re-created Sarah's character.
Sarah Mallard:
Sarah is a 24 year old woman. From a distance, Sarah looks like an attractive young woman. Close-up you can see her tiredness and exhaustion. She married at the age of 18. While her friends moved on to uni, experiencing life to the full, Sarah was forced to stay at home and look after her husband, and house. Instead of taking the role of a caring wife, who would gladly look after her husband, Sarah feels forced, and often takes on the role of his slave.
Her father admires Brett's hard-working job, and respects him as Sarah's husband. Brett was his choice of husband for his daughter, so forced her to accept his hand. Sarah longed for a romantic, carefree relationship. Instead, her father forced her into a miserable, terrifying situation. She blames her father for the years of misery she has had with Brett.
In this, Sarah is in fact younger than 40. She is a 20 year old woman. Because one of the actors, Simon Oxley, is Jess' father, I suggested that Sarah becomes Richard's daughter.
We then went back and re-created Sarah's character.
Sarah Mallard:
Sarah is a 24 year old woman. From a distance, Sarah looks like an attractive young woman. Close-up you can see her tiredness and exhaustion. She married at the age of 18. While her friends moved on to uni, experiencing life to the full, Sarah was forced to stay at home and look after her husband, and house. Instead of taking the role of a caring wife, who would gladly look after her husband, Sarah feels forced, and often takes on the role of his slave.
Her father admires Brett's hard-working job, and respects him as Sarah's husband. Brett was his choice of husband for his daughter, so forced her to accept his hand. Sarah longed for a romantic, carefree relationship. Instead, her father forced her into a miserable, terrifying situation. She blames her father for the years of misery she has had with Brett.
During the production of our film we have advertised our filming days on twitter to gain interest in our product. When the first full rough cut is completed we will post it onto twitter, facebook and tumblr to gain feedback. This will gain audience interest, and this will also give us the opportunity to know what our audience wants to see.
Filming from 17th December 2011
The video below shows the footage from our first filming day. We cut together a rough idea of where the footage will go so that we could plan which shots to film on our next day.
Uploading this footage was helpful because we will are now able to see how effective the locations, costume, sets and props look in the overall outcome. From these sequences we found that the sound was very tinny, and not as clear as we would like it. We will need to re-record this in a more controlled environment. On our next filming day, we will also try recording with a boom mic, and see the outcome of this.
We found that the colours within our location were quite bright and warm. We had de-saturated the footage to make a colder look. For the bird sequence we wanted the world "outside" to look brighter and more positive when Sarah is looking out of the window, we therefore increased the saturation for these shots.
We will also add sound effects such as the doorbell, bird noises and footsteps in post-production.
We will also add sound effects such as the doorbell, bird noises and footsteps in post-production.
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