Film openings

Snatch


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TXfdOgTWoxM&feature=related


I like the opening of this film because it really throws you off, when you see the four men dressed in typical Jewish dress you really don't expect them to be a team of gun toting thieves. I like the opening of this film because it goes straight into the action now long storyline to get into like in other films. It also introduces the characters in a comical fashion giving it the feel of a sitcom almost.


Goodfellas

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nJmbvcYKXdI

I chose this particular opening because it is one of my favorite films and also because it has extremely good opening. Some people call this one of the most violent openings to a film ever. with a character being murdered within the first two minutes of the film. I like it again because your being thrown immediately into the action without even knowing anything about these characters. I think this is the direction i would like to go with in my film opening.

The Exchange

This is my exchange, in my group were Jamie Brittain, Yasmin Ryan, Martain Osbourne and Emily Stansfield. In this Exercise we were asked to go out and film an exchange of anything between two characters. Our group decided that me and Jamie would be the actors and that Martain, Emily and Yasmin would film it. The basic storyline of the sequence is just a basic drug deal but we wanted to give it a more edgey feel so used some shots of texts and police helicopters etc.

When we had shown our piece to the class we got some feedback from them about it. The class for the most part enjoyed our exchange, saying that we had good shots; our overhead extra long shot of Jamie walkin to the meet and the fact that we got footage of an actual police helicopter.

We chose to use to different songs for background music in our sequence. We firstly used a song from a video game called; Grand Theft Auto 4, this song went down well with the group. Our second song was a grime song called dealers by Devlin; me and other members in my group thought this song was perfect for our piece due to the fact that the lyrics relate to what was happening in the action. The group gave us mixed reactions about the song choice but i believe this is purely for the fact they didnt get the lyrics and therefore didnt see the relevance.

When asked if our piece fitted the brief we got a good reaction from the class that we had done what we were asked of.

Preliminary exercise

This is mine and fellow student Yasmin Ryan's preliminary exercise. We were given a quick brief on how to use the camera equipment and told to go out an film a short sequence of shots of a conversation between two people. I think that overall our sequence went quite well but we did come across two stumbling blocks; we forgot about the 180 degree line and there is a shot mismatch when our first female character leaves on the left hand side of the screen and then re-enters on the right. Our second mistake was a jump near to the end of the sequence where we simply just didn't shot the shot properly and had to cover it the best we could with our limited amount of shots we had taken. These mistakes were not major though and didn't affect us terribly, these are things that i will make sure don't happen in my main project and is a lesson learnt.

Definition of Contemporary Noir

Contemporary or Neo-Noir is a genre of film that uses the same stylistics as classic film noir but with up to date themes and now usually not in black and white. A film is usually classed as a contemporary noir if it was made after 1970 but still retains the classic noir style. Although there is a much wider range of story lines used for Contemporary noir ranging from android hunters in the sci-fi neo-noir; Blade runner, to a group of colour named bank robbers in Reservoir dogs. During film Noirs hey day most of the films were independently made, this is also true of most contemporary noirs. Some of the more famous neo noir films include:

• Blade Runner



• Pulp Fiction (also another name for the books that Noir films originated from)



• L.A Confidential



• And Taxi driver

3 examples of classic film noirs

The Maltese Falcon
Sam Spade (Humphrey Bogart) is a private detective investigating the murder of his partner. He is then approached by a woman called Ms Wanderly (Mary Astor) who asks him for protection. Sam then becomes involved in the criminal underworld meeting dangerous people all in the quest for a statue called the Maltese Falcon.

The film features dark locations, henchman, criminals, money, double crosses and murder.

Director- John Huston
Released- 18th October 1941 (USA)

Double Indemnity
Walter Neff (Freddy MacMurry) is an insurance salesman that meets a woman named Phyliss Dietrichson (Barbara Stanwyck) an instantly falls for her. She then tells him about a plan to kill her husband and claim on his life insurance for a big payout. Neff then learns that Phyliss is seeing another man behind his back. Neff ends up killing her but only after being shot himself. The film ends with Neff admitting his crimes and collapsing in a hallway.

The film features double crossings, money murder, a femme fetal, jealousy and Investigators.

Director- Billy Wilder
Released- 24th April 1944 (USA)

Strangers on a train
Guy Haines (Farley Granger) is a famous tennis star that meets Bruno Anthony (Robert Walker) on a train. Bruno offers Guy an exchange of murders, suggesting that a complete stranger can get away with a murder. Bruno thinking the deal is sealed kills Guys wife; who he was in the middle of a messy divorce with. Bruno expects this favour returned and when it is not he threatens to frame Guy for the murder. The film ends with a fight between the two characters, with Bruno being killed and then being identified as the murderer.

The film features Murder, fights, police, frame ups and guns.

Director- Alfred Hitchcock
Released- 3rd July 1951 (USA)

3 examples of contemporary noir

The Spirit
Murdered policeman Denny Colt comes back from the grave as the spirit, a hero on a warpath with the film’s villain the Octopus. The octopus’s mission is to wipe out central city which is foiled by the spirit.

The film features femme fetals, dark locations, double crossing, henchmen and murder; all features of the film noir genre.

Director-Frank MillerJanuary 2009

Blade runner
Set In the future humanity has created replicants; robots that look like humans. Deckard is a Blade runner, whose job it is to hunt down replicants. Blade runner is the film of Deckard hunting down 4 replicants that escaped and are trying to hunt down the creator.

Blade runner is a film set in a dystopian future filled with dark rainy locations, mystery and murder.

Director-Ridley Scott
9th September (UK)

Reservoir Dogs
Mr. White, a professional criminal; Mr. Orange, a young newcomer; Mr. Blonde, a trigger-happy killer; Mr. Pink, a paranoid neurotic; Mr. Brown; and Mr. Blue are 7 men hired to pull of a bank robbery. When they fail they realise 1 of them is a police informant. But who?

Reservoir dogs is a story of double crossing murder and money.

Director-Quentin Tarintino15th January 1993 (UK)

Vengeance: storyboards

Storyboards done by Caroline Chicken