Original Story Board

This is the original story board of our movie, this was made at the beginning of production, and changes have been made since then, which can be found near the beginning of my blog.

McCheese and Callaghan progress: Final!

Hurray! Its been a while, but finally ( actually 5 days ago) me and Elizabeth finished editing the voice overs, and fitting them into place, for the final cut of McCheese and Callaghan!
We spent a few hours fiddling around, importing, cutting, watching, and fitting clips to get what we think was a decent outcome for the McCheese and Callaghan film.
The final copy is now on DVD and has been marked.
Overall I believe this has been a good experience in my opinion, and I have gained new knowledge and experience from it, which will help me in future projects, hopefully improving the quality of my marks in the future also.
Thanks to all the filming, and use of premiere, I am confident enough to step into my next coursework project, and make a better quality piece because of the new knowledge gained, and learning from my mistakes from this piece.
This has been a good experience for me, and I'm glad the filming and editing process is finally over, and the film is finally on DVD.

Thomas Gamble.

Analysis of our final piece

Here is an analysis of our final film, using camera angles, camera movements, editing, mise-en-scene and sound to show representations of action comedy policeman. This post was meant to be added to my evaluation of our final product, but I think this stands out more, and helps get the point across easier. Here I'm going to explain how our final product showed those representations... or didnt, using the specifications listed above. The start of the film opens with a non-diegetic musical soundtrack and a fade in of a picture of both McCheese and Callaghan, with their faces together with flames surrounding them. The music is a kind of rock/ heavy metal song, with lyrics over it. This gives a slight representation of cop comedy, but not to its fullest extent. We could have used a more 70's style soundtrack and done without the lyrics to give it that authenticity, that cop comedies posess. But a the same time itshows the high regard these two characters are held to, and also how high of an opinion they have of themselves.

Then the scene cuts, and there is the diegetic sound of Callaghan saying "Go!" there is a little action then a mid shot of McCheese throwing a shoe. From the expression on McCheese's face, you can see his determination to stop whoever they are chasing. But also you can see the comedic side of it, as it is a shoe that is thrown, there is also a mid-shot of the hencman getting hit by the shoe and falling comically. This shows some representation of comedy cop films, but not as much as it could, there could be something more humorous, like a little fight seen, and the vigilantes actually accidentally knocking them out, as seen on Rush Hour 2. But it makes quite well for a representation of action comedy through the mise en scene and camera shots. There is then the diegetic sound of dialogue which shows you what types of cops they are, Callaghan showing to be more caring, forgiving type, whilst McCheese seems a lot more sarcastic, harsh and straight to the point. There is not very many shots or transitions that really show off how they are cops or their status, which was a flaw in the filming, and planning that didnt really help create the representation of cop comedy, that we should have created, which made it a pretty poor shoot.

The dialogue for each character isnt really detailed, and doesnt really create the stereotype that needs to be there for the representation of cop comedy. Also the sound isnt very good, and doesnt help toward the fact that the dialogue was lacking sophistication and whit. We were trying to achieve the affect that these cops are of a very old school kind of background, and that they are determined to get the job done, such as the representations shown in films such as Rush our and Bad boys. But the dialogue didnt exactly lend itself to this stereotype, making the sound a very poor aspect when trying to create a representation. We agreed that we would haev changed some shots and angles in the film; For example the scene where McCheese throws the shoe out of the door, we would have used a low angle shot, to show his power and authority over the other characters, giving it greater moral toward the representation of action comedy through camera angles. Also if we would have made the dialogue more direct, it would have helped create the representation once again. We think that using more iconography, with a slapstick element which are popular, but also explain more of the exterior characters, as they would have explained more about the characters, making it easier to anaylse stereotypes and the representations of the action comedy used here.

One of the biggest things that went wrong, was the choice of location, In my opinion we should have chosen a realistic location, like a real factory, as the scene is set in a factory, but because we had to film it at school, the mise-en-scene really didnt fit, and you could tell straight away that it wasnt a factory. I would have changed the setting to a more eery and dark warehouse to show some kind of metaphor such as; crime is dirty, or crime is hard work. But mainly show how dedicated the two buddy cop's were to justice and their job. Also in my opinion the dress code which is the mise-en-scene was slightly screwed up, we were wearing casual clothing, which totally through off any stereotypes and steered away from the representation. I think suits would have fit the characters better, or shirts and ties, to give it more of that cop look, helping give the representation and stereotype of a action comedy. Our original idea was to have facial hair, which was soon scratched because it was hard organising fake facial hair, having this aspect would again have created another stereotype, thus helping contribute toward the representation of action comedy. All in all I believe that if we changed alot of the camera angles, dialogue, and mise-en-scene, we would have created a more successful action comedy, but because of our flaws, we failed to create one, but on a plus side, we did get some aspects such as some of the humor toward the end where we are talking to the curator (which is also another stereotype of an action comedy, a damsel in distress) where McCheese mentions Cheese, and Callaghan begs that he doesnt mention it. This was a good representation, the dialogue and body language, which was probably the best part of our film, as it actually helped create the representation for the audience, using comedy and typical story lines.

Shot list.

This is the original Shot list, which was made at the start of production. Things have changed, so this isnt accurate. Locations etc. have changed due to complications in filming and disturbances, previous posts explain the complications and resolutions of these problems. But without further a due, this is the original shot list:

Shot #1
Duration: 10 seconds
Notes: Inside, black background
Cast: McCheese and Callaghan
Camera Angle: Extreme close up
Camera moves: No movement

Shot #2
Duration: 30 seconds
Notes: outside, in the grass
Cast: McCheese and Callaghan
Camera Angle: close up
Camera moves: The camera will slowly zoom out from this shot.

Shot #3
Duration: 5 seconds
Notes: outside, urban, bean bag being thrown at Housley by McCheese
Cast: McCheese and Housley
Camera Angle: Mid shot
Camera moves: No movement

Shot #4
Duration: 45 seconds
Notes: outside, chat between McCheese and Callaghan
Cast: McCheese and Callaghan
Camera Angle: Long shot
Camera moves: Moves backwards as the characters move forward towards the camera

Shot #5
Duration:10 seconds
Notes: McCheese talking to Callaghan (Callaghan not in shot) 180 RULE
Cast: McCheese
Camera Angle: Mid shot
Camera moves: No movement

Shot #6
Duration:10 seconds
Notes: Callaghan talking to McCheese (McCheese not in shot) 180 RULE
Cast: Callaghan
Camera Angle: Mid Shot
Camera moves: No movement

Shot #7
Duration: 15 seconds
Notes: McCheese talking to Callaghan (Callaghan not in shot), hitting a Housley 180 RULE
Cast: McCheese, Housley
Camera Angle: Mid shot
Camera moves: no movement

Shot #8
Duration: 15 seconds
Notes: Callaghan talking to McCheese (McCheese not in shot) Leanne approaches, taps him
Cast: Callaghan, Leanne
Camera Angle: Mid shot
Camera moves: no movement

Shot #9
Duration: 20 seconds
Notes: Leanne talking to M&C (M&C not in shot)
Cast: Leanne
Camera Angle: mid shot
Camera moves: none

Shot #10
Duration: 10 seconds
Notes: MC ask her to calm
Cast: McCheese, Callaghan
Camera Angle: mid shot
Camera moves: none


Shot #11
Duration: 20 seconds
Notes: Leanne explains
Cast: Leanne
Camera Angle: mid shot
Camera moves: none

Shot #12
Duration: 5 seconds
Notes: M&C agree
Cast: McCheese and Callaghan
Camera Angle: mid shot
Camera moves: none

Evaluation.

In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

Our film "McCheese and Callaghan" is a comedy action based movie, similar to that of Rush Hour, Men in Black and Bad boys.
First of all the name "McCheese and Callaghan" Sounds like two stereotypical american policeman names, such as Starsky and hutch, its catchy and rolls off the tongue.
In the heart of our opening McCheese and Callaghan our walking along talking about random things, only to be interrupted by one of the henchman, which is quickly defeated, like nothing happened, and the conversation continues as per usual. This could relate very closely to a scene from Rush Hour 2, where they're walking on the boat. In the beginning we are shown McCheese throwing a shoe at a henchman, this random opening brings enigma into the film, like that of most action comedies, where either like in Rush Hour where there is a random robbery, or kidnapping, or a random fight scene, and our film shows that covention of typical comedy action openings.
Another way our film develops conventions is the "Damsel in distress" idea, in our film we have a museum owner, who has had a emerald stolen from her, and as per usual the protagonists go and take up the offer of getting it back. This again is another convention of action comedy, as in most comedy action movies there is always a woman who needs help, one way or another. Aside from that, there wasnt anymore conventions we added to our film, it ran smoothly, lots of witty dialogue, and action, just how it should be, keeping close to the conventions, and themes of Action comedy.

How does your media product represent particular social groups?

In our film, the mise en scene shows a typical action comedy setting, and casual clothing that any one varying from a teenager to an adult could wear. For example McCheese wears jeans, a t-shirt and trainers, thus showing him to be a laid back, casual and cool looking guy. And Callaghan, is shown as the more nerdy, uptight type, as he is wearing glasses, a v-neck shirt and has a slight comb over. These two characters, seem to be quite stereotypical in terms of the comedy side of action comedy, as there always seems to be a cool laid back guy, and a nerdy guy that is alwyas in a fuss. Overall, our film focuses on two particular social groups, Cool - Jock like, and nerdy, but even though Callaghan is sometimes portrayed as nerdy, he seems quite confident at times, making him part of a cooler social group at times, rather than nerdy.

What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?

Earlier in our research, we had to research figures made from our genre of film, and what institution would best fit our genre, and my conclusion was to use the institution known as "Columbia". I made this choice because it seemed to be the main distributor of the action comedy genre, and after previously watching these films for myself, such as men in black, and bad boys, the company seems to be highly successful in terms of comedy action. Our film has alot in common with that of badboys, the vigilante scene, the mission, the woman and the bad one liners, this is why I believe Columbia would be a good choice, because they produce similar films to that of what we created, so choosing them would be a perfect fit for our film, as they manage to pull off comedy action films so well everytime.

Who would be the audience for your media product?

The social groups conveyed in the film, reflect the kind of audience that would watch it, and also the mise en scene of the film would affect the kind of audience also.
The social groups as previously explained are jocks, cool kids, and nerds. Which makes it seem like the audience for the film may be centered around a young adult, teenage group. But then when it comes down to the mise-en-scene, and witty dialogue, it seems to widen the barrier of age a large amount, then varying from teenager, to middle-aged adult. This is because, the clothes worn in the film are typical everyday clothes that you see people wearing, clothes, t-shirts, shirts with logos, and trainers. Also the witty comedy, and action is something that not only teenagers, but adults would enjoy also. This is because it is something everyone can familiarise with, its not like a teenage comedy, where only teenagers can really relate, its a film that most age groups can relate too. And also the clothes worn, are clothes worn by anyone, of any age group, yet again showing the wide range of groups involved. So because of such a wide spread theme, and mise-en-scene, I believe the audience for the film would be anyone varying from young teenager, to middle aged adult.

How did you attract/address your audience?

We attracted our audience in several ways, one of the ways was by using a setting that would be seen to fit the genre of action comedy. Our setting was a typical evil mastermind/ evil genius compound, which was being infiltrated, and instantly, the audience gets a feel for this, knowing what genre there is, and knowing what to expect. Secondly would be the enigma, like all action comedys, or just action, in the beginning there is an action scene, with random occurences, no briefing on where they are, whats happening, who they are, or what they're doing, and this gives the film enigma. This is a key aspect to any action comedy, as audiences love and hate this at the same time, they want answers, having to watch more and more to finally found out the answer, but keeping them on the edge of their seats at all times, trying to figure it out for themselves, and this was another way we attracted our audience. Also as previously mentioned, the humor and casual clothing is something that any audience can relate to, they have it, they use it, so seeing it in a film, is something they can relate to, the random jokes, the bad jokes, the sarcasm, the dress code, its all there, bringing in the audiences attention, as they feel connected, and can relate to a number of things in the film.
In conclusion, all these key things are what we used to attract the audience, and as it spreads out to such a wide range of interests, and social groups, we were successful in applying them to attract an audience.

What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?

I have learnt alot about technologies from this process, alot more from our preliminary task, and I feel more experienced in terms of technology.
As I acted through out the whole production of this film, I feel like I have learnt alot about how the camera works, the angles, the positioning panning, as I helped set up and position at times, and it was crucial that we got the levels right, rather than us messing up and randomly flailing around with a camera. I feel more confident handling a camera, as I have learnt alot in terms of positioning, zooming,panning, and fitting bits in to make it run smoothly.
For our film, we needed an opening title sequence, and because everyone else didnt feel up to the job, I decided that I would take up the job of making a poster/title for the film. I used photoshop, and before this, my experiences with photoshop were lacking a bit, I was confused with the interface, and tools, and had no clue what to do. But after doing research, and discussing with my group, I soon got into the swing of things, experimenting with different, fonts, effects and layers.
In the end I came up with the idea, of taking both mine, and Nathans faces, and putting them side by side, but with one side of their faces cut off, creating a new face, I believe doing this made it quite symbolic, giving it a hidden meaning of comign together, and being team, in a corny kind of way. And in the background were flames, which I made by using a brush tool to draw random lines, then the smudge, sponge and burn to make it look like they were flickering and more aesthetically pleasing. And at the top the font is a kind of military font I had found and messed around with, to stress the genre of action, thus bringing out the comedy side of the film within the title, through irony.
In the end I learnt alot, and was able to make an aesthetically pleasing front title. I have learnt how to use Photoshop to a better standard, and how to create certain effects, which may be really useful for future projects.

Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product?

In our preliminary task, I believe we didnt have enough experience, we were newcomers in terms of film making, and because of that it gave us a disadvantage, but it also gave us a chance to learn from it. In our preliminary task, we were given specific guidelines, we couldnt expand, but it gave us a chance to learn, and to gain knew knowledge to use in the future. And that is where this new piece of film came in, when we were given the new task, we had the experience, even if it wasnt alot, from the preliminary task, and the research and work done before hand to prepare us for this bigger task.
In the full product, we were free to do more of what we felt was interesting and right, the guidelines werent as narrowed down, but we still had to use the 180 degree rule etc. But from progression from the preliminary task, I learnt alot in terms of conventions, and stereotypes, and the interests of the audience. This was good, because we could pick a genre, and instantly know the conventions that went along with it, so when we chose action comedy, we as a group knew what to do right from the start, but only because we had learnt all of the information and techniques from the preliminary, up until then. Which was great, because it helped so much in the production of our full product. So conventions was a big thing we learnt, and how we could encorporate them into the actual film making itself, to follow the chosen genre. finally was the mise-en-scene, in our preliminary task we had just started learning about mise-en-scene, but as we came along to our full product, we learnt more about it, learning how to adapt it into our films, thus giving us new knowledge, and ideas. Which we instantly used when drawing up our storyboards. Locations, props, dress code etc.
So another term learnt helped put things into proportion, and most importantly, into action.
Because of all the new terms being learned, and watching clips from all different genres, and researching, i learnt much more from my preliminary task, I also learnt about the different use of camera angles to portray stereotypes and conventions, which is another thing we used in our full product, the prime example being the start, a low angle shot to show the power of the two vigilantes. All these terms, and techniques have all been developed and used, and I believe that I have learnt alot more since the preliminary, encorporation of terms, and camera angles, all of which we didnt know in the preliminary, thus giving us more knowledge and experience to really let us go wild, and produce a more interested, fun, and creative piece that uses the correct technical features that are needed, the same conventions, and the same mise-en-scene.

What kind of media institution might distribute your media project and why?

Our media project, McCheese and Callaghan was based around the genre of Action comedy, a very perculiar yet funny brand of genre in the film industry, and after doing some research into action comedy distribution I found out the following things. Similarly themed cop/vigilante comedies were very popular with audiences. BoxOfficeMojo.com which is a website dealing with the amount of money movies make) was a useful tool to gauge the popularity of the genre.

Rush Hour: $244,386,864 - New Line
Men in Black: Columbia - $250,690,539
Tropic Thunder: $188,072,649 - Paramount (Dreamworks)
Bad boys: $65,807,024 - Columbia

These figures showed me that this genre is very popular with audiences, depending on the success of the film itself. The top 30 action comedies on the website earned more than £20 million dollars. Although the costs to produce an action comedy vary from high to low (given the amount of special effects and costly shooting locations), there is a mixed cost to profit ratio, varying from low to high. Even so, the distribution of the genre is popular with a lot of studios, producing several action comedies a year, raking in alot of profit for the production studio of each film, as you can clearly see from the amount made from each film shown above.

There were so many distributors of the genre that I had to do a little bit more research to find the best studio. My movie has a typical action comedy storyline so it was obvious that a more creative and dangerouslly minded distribution company would have to be found. I would say that a good production company would be Columbia, as it has a bigger ratio from the figures shown above, they seem to be a realible industry when it comes to action comedy. And seeing as I myself have seen several films from this company, I would say its a safe bet choosing a company such as Columbia to produce the film, because of the way they create their action comedy movies; With a really good mix of comedy and action, keeping the audience on the edge of their sits, and their ribs hurting from countless amounts of laughter.

Rush Hour is the closest action comedy to the one that we developed. It also deals with dictators and a corrupted government and the comedy is mined from the main characters clashing with these groups and trying to bring them to justice, which is, again, very similar to the way our film works.
As well as their previous record for developing successful mainstream action comedy movies, they seem to be very successful in the theme of genre, with films such as minority report, Evolution and A Knights Tale, this distributor seems to be very skilled at mastering the genre of action and comedy into successful box office films through that skillful editing, and hilarious comedy through the action, and violence, and funny script writing that is portrayed throughout. No other distributor seems as skilled to the art of action comedy, so Columbia would be the best fit for our action comedy, McCheese and Callaghan.

McCheese and Callaghan Progress 6..

We had finally finished editing the film, and we were happy with it.
We were then told to create surveys for other students to fill in, so we collected students from the common room in the main part of sixthform, and asked them to watch our film. The students filled in the surveys and our group reviewed them. We got good results but under the heading that had suggestions for improvement, the majority of the students said "The quality of the sound". So we spoke as a group, and decided to go back and watch the film, and whilst doing so, record the voices for each of us whilst watching the film, to make theq quality of sound much more professional.
We got a hold of a microphone, and an MP3 recorder and found an empty room in the sixth form area, and we recorded the voices as the movie went along, as if we were performing a play.
We recorded it several times, and decided on 3 clips that were pretty decent in quality, and we returned back to our classroom and uploaded them to the computer, and we have now started to fit them in with the pieces of film. We still need to slot in little bits to make it look decent, rather than making it look like a foreign film with terrible english dubs.
Another post will be published soon reporting on the final copy of the movie, fitted with the voice clips.

Shooting Schedule 2

SHOOT DAY 1
Tuesday 9th February 2009

10:40 – 10:55
1
Ext/Day
Housley attacks and McCheese hits him.
Outside
McCheese, Callaghan, Housley
N/A

10:55 – 11:30
1
Ext/Day
Lots of Housleys attack.
Outside
Housley
N/A

11:30 – 11:50
1
Ext/Day
Fight scene, still shots.
Outside
Housley, McCheese, Callaghan
N/A

11:50 – 12:00
1
Ext/Day
Leanne Riddlesex calls for help, McCheese and Callaghan run over.
Outside
McCheese, Callaghan, Leanne Riddlesex
N/A

12:00 – 12:20
1
Ext/ Day
Leanne explains to them whats happened. Fade out
Outside
McCheese, Callaghan, Leanne Riddlesex
N/A

Shooting Schedule 1

Here is the Shooting Schedule created for the McCheese and Callaghan filming:

SHOOT DAY 1
Thursday 5th February

10:40 – 10:50
1
Int/Day
Face close up shot.
Black background room
McCheese, Callaghan
N/A

10:50 – 11:10
1
Ext/Day
Hiding in the grass.
In the grass
McCheese, Callaghan
N/A

11:10 – 11:30
1
Ext/Day
Bean Bag thrown.
Outside
McCheese, Housley
Beanbag

11:30 – 12:00
1
Ext/Day
McCheese and Callaghan talk then hit a clone.
Outside
McCheese, Callaghan, Housley
N/A

12:00 – 12:20
1
Ext/Day
When McCheese and Callaghan talk. 180 Degree rule.
Outside
McCheese, Callaghan
N/A

McCheese and Callaghan. Progress 5!

We have finally finished editing, it had taken some time because of certain circumstances, but we have finished all the editing, thanks to Nathan and Matthew.
As they were both working on the editing, me and Elizabeth were doing the logo for the film, which we may upload and show. Also through the process of editing, we found some copyright free music from the website given by school, and Nathan sang along to it and made a theme tune for the film, which is at the beginning of our 2 minutes.
There were some problems at the beginning of editing, due to some clips being lost and we were scared that the dialogue couldnt be heard. But we pulled through and resolved all problems, and we are pretty much happy with the finishing product.
I will soon upload the story board, and give an explanation of changes made to it, the shot list and shooting schedule. But about the script.
We have decided not to do a script, as we improvised through out. We as a group agreed that things run smoother when its a spur of the moment thing, its more natural, and there isnt the whole thing with forgetting your lines and making things more complicated. So a script wasnt in our process, we improvised as we felt more comfortable with this process.
But overall it was a good outcome, the editing went okay, the titles look pretty decent, and the opening song is of good quality, and all together it makes a good quality video in our opinion. So we are happy with the ending result.
We have finished production.

McCheese and Callaghan progress 4.

On the third day of filming, we had decided to film everything inside, and change the storyboard so that the whole scene was set inside of a warehouse in Belgium, rather than outside, or outside going inside.
We did this because we decided it would have been easier, and more efficient, with less disturbances because there were quiet places to film that werent a hassle to adjust continuity too. At the start this time, McCheese and Callaghan are stood behind a door, peering through the two windows, shown as a mid-shot, and burst through the door and McCheese throws a shoe at the "Housley". This is another change that took place in our storyboard. We then walk over the Housley as planned, and is still shown as a mid-shot, and we discuss the same as previously planned, about wives and kids, but this time it is filmed in a hall way, and is more of a long shot. We then follow the same idea as we previously tried, by walking up the stairs, and the Housley runs at us, but this time we push the doors open and walk through, talking about our job, but this time McCheese pushes the "Housley" over, rather than hitting him. We believed this ran smoother, and looked much better than a cheesy fake punch that makes the film look shabby. And after that, the same as previously filmed happened, McCheese and Callaghan talking, and Elizabeth running in asking for our help. These new set of shots were a big improvement on the others. Although we still had to reshoot the second half of them. Mainly due to a door closing and wrecking the sound, you could not hear Nathan and me speak. Also we had discovered that the footage from the newer camera is alot sharper and doesn't have the black bars at the top and bottom of the screen, which ruins the continuity. So we have decided to do a voice over, over the original. This will make the sound sharper, and make the contuinity of the film better, making the quality equal, rather than one better, and one worse. And we are refilming the parts with better quality, and without a black bar, with another camera, one with less quality to follow the continuity of the whole thing, making it all flow again, and making the quality, and resolution equal.
This will be happening on tuesday, and further information will be uploaded soon after we have filmed and uploaded the new footage.

McCheese and Callaghan Progress 3.

On our second day of filming (or attempt), we went back and refilmed the failed scenes, because of the disturbances and shabby filming we had done previously.
Some of the snow had melted, but not all of it, there was still enough snow to keep the continuity of the film flowing, which was a good outcome and lucky for us. But because of the disturbances we had last time, we decided to film the conversation between McCheese and Callaghan inside. We then decided to change the storyboard so that the two of them had infilitrated a warehouse where the enemy had been spotted. As they talk, they both are walking into the building, with a midshot of the two. But there was a problem when it came to re-watching whilst uploading: The other camera was in the shot. Also we filmed another mid-shot which was McCheese telling Callaghan that he doesnt have kids or a wife, we then later realised that it didnt follow continuity, and was off angle, which made it look shabby. The main reason for re-filming was to get Elizabeth to talk to us, about her museum being robbed of the emerald. But as the film got to that part, we noticed that on the 180 degree shot, that the other camera was in shot, which made things worse. Everything was fine until we noticed the little mistakes that werent as obvious until rewatched.
So we decided that because of all the problems, such as disturbances, shabby film work, and lack of continuity, that a refilm was the best option again.

McCheese and Callaghan. Progress 2.

On the first day of filming it had snowed the night previous, so we changed our ideas a little bit. Our plan from the start was to film me and Nathan lying in the grass waiting for the "Housley" henchman to pop out and attack us, and Nathan would throw a beanbag, but because it had snowed, we thought it'd be more efficient to use a snowball to adjust the humor and irony of the situation. We filmed it all outside, from where Nathan threw the snowball, and me and Nathan talking about the job, and relationships. It took alot of time and effort, to only realise when it came to editing and uploading, that it wasnt good enough. There was too much disturbance, for example people coming from lessons, and cars driving past. And the occasional odd scream, or shout from children in the lower part of school.
Also the continuity of the film wasnt that good, and some of the shots were off center, making it look like a really shabby film. In the end we came to the conclusion that another try at filming should be put forward, and we then discussed how we would fix the mistakes, and improve the quality of the film.

McCheese and Callaghan progress 1.

On the first day of planning, we were split up to take up certain tasks to plan out certain key parts to the filming.
Me and Elizabeth wrote the script for the 2 minutes of filming, Matthew did the shooting schedule for the day of filming, and Nathan did the shot list for the film.
We later that lesson organised which cameras we would use, and charged them ready for the day of filming.
I will soon upload the script, shot list, and shooting schedule that were put together, by the individuals in the group.

Treatment - McCheese and Callaghan.

McCheese and Callaghan are two ex- cops that are now vigilantes taking down villains, now they face their biggest rival, as Evil N appears a super villain, planning on stealing a very precious and priceless jewel to buy a flying tank. It is up to McCheese and Callaghan to bring him down and return the jewel back to the museum.


In the beginning the screen shows the two faces of the protagonists, and fades to black. We both see them hiding in some grass looking for villains, they are both discussing their work, and arguing over relationships and discussing future jobs and relationships. They both notice weird figures moving around in the distance, they are all the same, and they both find this suspicious, and begin crawling closer to the weird figures to investigate further. McCheese realises that these people are henchman because of their similar uniforms, but they dont understand why they are the same. McCheese realises that its not the right time to discuss this and jumps out and see's a henchman, and throws a beanbag at his face, knocking the henchman out comically.
They both look up at each other and laugh, as Callaghan makes fun of McCheese's throw, commenting and saying that he could have done better. As they quarrel over the beanbag more of the henchman (Housleys) arrive at the scene, and leap out of the trees and bushes and run toward the two, spinning nun-chucks and screaming at the top of their voices. The two of them respond by standing in a stance and waiting for the henchman to get closer, as they do, they both fight off the henchman, kicking and punching them, making them fly all over the place in every direction, sometimes doing comical things such as hitting them over the head with a banana. This finally ends as there are dozens of henchman scattered along the ground unconscious. The two vigilantes look at each other and pull big grins, and high five each other in celebration of their victory.

The two vigilantes begin to walk away, as they discuss the possibilities for a meal at noon, but the two are interrupted by a cry for help by a woman. They run toward the scream, and see a woman there, who happens to be the curator at the New York City Museum of history. The two rush and stop McCheese stops too soon and trips over his feet and lands face first on the floor telling them that he is okay. He then gets up and brushes off the sand covering the front of him.
They ask her what is wrong, and they are told the story of the henchman getting away with a priceless jewel that she had found on an exhibition, which was meant to be placed in the museum for safe keeping. But it turns out an evil villain by the name of "Evil N" has stolen it for his own plans to cause chaos in the world. The two vigilantes respond by pulling horrified faces at what was just said about the jewel. Callaghan pulls McCheese aside to discuss something with him in private, he informs McCheese that this good be their big break, but McCheese is too busy eating his block of cheese to notice what Callaghan is telling him, eventually McCheese realises, but not because of Callaghan, but because he is slow and announces that this could be their big break. Callaghan sighs, and they both turn around smiling, they tell the curator that they will help her retrieve this priceless jewel, and take down Evil N and get him locked away for good. McCheese is still eating his giant block of cheese, and Callaghan asks the curator what she wants them to do. She is too busy staring at the peculiar site of a man eating a whole block of cheese, but finally looks at Callaghan and tells him that they must go to New York as Evil N is planning to strike there next, and as people have mentioned sightings of him around the destruction derby track in the New York area. The two vigilantes agree to do the job, and the curator agrees to meet them at the Museum. They both head back to their hotel and pack their luggage, forgetting that they have no money to pay for the room, so they decide to climb through the air conditioning vents to get away without the hotel staff realising. They both fall down in the kitchen of the hotel only to be greeted by the kitchen staff using sharp knives to cut food. The staff realise what they're doing, and the two vigilantes run for their lives, and jump out of the window which happens to be on the 20th floor of the hotel, and they both land luckily on top of an open truck with hay in it.
They both do rude gestures to the staff, only to realise that Callaghan has forgot his mobile phone.

The two of them arrive at the airport and present their tickets to the woman at the desk, she asks if they have packed their own suitcases, and they both smile and say no we packed each others. The woman stares at them, looking very scared, and asks them to hold one minute. The two vigilantes look at each other confused and shrug, suddenly two security guards rush out and tackle the men to the ground in an instant. After an hour of hassle and re-packing cases, the two vigilantes are aloud on the plane. Behind McCheese is an annoying 8 year old girl, who keeps insulting their facial hair, and keeps kicking their chairs. During the flight McCheese decides to tie her shoelaces together when she doesn’t notice, the girl gets up to go to the bathroom, and falls over, at this moment the plane is experiencing turbulence, and she slides down the path hitting the hostess's pushing them over and making them flail all over the place, the little girl ends up hitting the pilot in the face, and the plane starts to lose altitude. Luckily in the end everything is sorted out and the flight is back on track.

As they land in New York, we see another scene with Evil N laughing in his giant chair, stroking his pet henchman that for some strange reason has a collar attached to his neck. the villain laughs hysterically and speaks to himself about his evil plan with the use of the jewel, which happens to be to sell it to a black market to buy a flying tank to fly to his favorite destinations, and destroy towns and villages that he doesn’t seem to enjoy that much. He then hysterically laughs again and his butler walks in staring at him confused, and asks him why he is talking to himself. The Villain goes bright red and stands up and slaps the butler around the face, and pushes him into a angry wild boar pit for him to be eaten by. We see Evil N smiling as the butler is screaming for help and the boars are squealing, it then leaves the scene as we see Evil N laughing hysterically stroking his henchman’s head.

Then we see the two vigilantes leaving their hotel in New York as they are riding hired bikes to the museum, on the way they nearly get hit by a crazy taxi driver, and decide to give him some hassle. The taxi driver isn’t impressed and chases them down the street with a crow bar, shouting at them in Italian. Eventually the two of them reach the Museum safely, and meet the curator outside. The three of them walk inside, and start discussing the plan to capture Evil N and replace the Jewel. As the curator is walking along with Callaghan, McCheese shouts to him and tells him he is going to inspect the museum. McCheese walks around, eating a giant block of Swiss cheese as he stares like a little child at the different exhibitions on display.
McCheese reaches the bones of a T-rex, and decides to reach to touch it, but before he can poke it, the security guard grabs him and throws him to the ground, punching him continously in the face, until the curator and Callaghan arrive to stop him.
McCheese stands, ready to fight the security guard, but Callaghan stops him. They discuss the plan and the two vigilantes agree to meet at the destruction derby track at 6pm, as the curator has planned for them to race in it to get closer to the villain.

The two vigilantes leave the museum, and stand there for a minute clueless, they both scratch their heads and turn to each other and suggest a massage. They both go to a massage parlour as a montage begins, McCheese gets an attractive young woman to massage him, and ironically Callaghan gets a fat old woman to massage him. Then the two of them get fitted for suits, they try on some weird and wonderful colours varying from green to pink, but both eventually get normal suits with ties. At the end of the montage they come out of a bar, tipsy, and realise that they should be at the destruction derby track in 45 minutes. They both rush for a taxi, but before they can, they are stopped by 3 of the henchman, reaching for their guns, they realise that they left them at the store where they purchased the suits. The two of them look at eachother, and then run to safety, they both run around the streets of New York, jumping over taxis, and stealing bikes to get away as fast as they can. The henchman chases them on motorcycles, so they decide to go down alley ways for safety, they both end up at a dead end with the henchman laughing and walking toward them slowly. McCheese starts to cry, but Callaghan realises that there is a gate next to them, and opens it and runs through, McCheese is still crying but eventually catches on.
They both run in through the door only to be in the place they were meant to be at, the destruction derby arena. The two of them run toward the main entrance to meet the curator, as they look behind them they realise that the henchmen have gone. They get to the entrance and see no sign of the curator, suddenly they hear a roar of an engine, and they see her standing there with two helmets and a beat up car next to her, she smiles at them. And they both laugh in disbelief, they both laugh at her and ask her if she expects them to drive it, the curator nods, and they both argue over who will drive.
Eventually the scene skips as we see Callaghan at the wheel sulking, and McCheese grinning, and patting Callaghan on the back, telling him that he'll have more luck next time. The announcer of the derby doesnt realise he is on the microphone, and is having a phone call with his wife, telling her vulgar things that the audience can hear, the audience all look up at the speakers on the poles, and the announcer see's them all looking up on the jumbo screen. He quickly puts the phone down, tidies himself up, and announces the event. Everyone is still staring at it in disgust, as the announcer counts down, Callaghan starts the engine and McCheese gets pumped up, shouting abuse at the other drivers, one of the rival drivers makes a kissing gesture at him, another slides his finger across his throat and points at McCheese.
The derby begins and Callaghan and McCheese are doing okay, McCheese starts shouting references from cowboy movies, and Samuel L Jackson movies, as Callaghan concentrates on avoiding the other cars and making them collide with another. In the end its just the two vigilantes and another car left, they both laugh, only to be interrupted by three black cars bursting and wrecking the final car. The two vigilantes stare at this and gasp, as they see henchman in each car, carrying semi automatics. Callaghan and McCheese panic as they are unaware of what to do, they check under the seats for something useful to use against the henchman. McCheese tells Callaghan to check the glove compartment, because there’s always something useful in there, he tells McCheese that it’s useless, but cannot finish his sentence as he opens it and finds a semi automatic fully loaded in the compartment. McCheese grabs it quickly, and tells Callaghan to drive; Callaghan drives around as McCheese shoots at the Housleys, hitting their wheels, hitting the engine, causing road blocks. McCheese starts screaming insults at them and laughing, and is interrupted as he sits down and realises that a car is heading straight for them, he turns to Callaghan only to realise that he is too scared to do anything, and has frozen. McCheese tries to turn the wheel but it is jammed, just before they collide, Callaghan and McCheese dive out of the car, as the two cars collide and explode. They both stand up, staring open mouthed at the car wreck, and quickly brushes them off and run toward the stands, but before they can do anything else, Evil N appears on his newly purchased flying tank. Again the two vigilantes stare opened mouthed at this ridiculous contraption as it hovers above the audience high in the sky. McCheese pulls a confused face and asks Evil N if that is a flying tank, Evil N stops laughing instantly, and responds angrily telling him that of course it’s a flying tank. The two of them argue over the stupidity of a flying tank, as Callaghan runs over to the curator, they both laugh and stop suddenly and stare at each other, they both then slowly kiss each other, even though there is a giant uproar about flying tanks. They stop kissing and laugh, only to find Evil N laughing hysterically, soon after the curator does, and Callaghan stares at her in disbelief and asks her why she's laughing. She responds by telling him that she isn’t the real curator, and that it was her plan to the lure them to New York so Evil N could get rid of them once and for all. Callaghan starts to cry as he is heartbroken by this, and drops to the floor in the fetul position rocking back and forth sucking his thumb. The (now fake) curator laughs and spits on him, and kicks him a few times, but he ignores this and carries on crying regardless. McCheese tells him to get up, but he is too busy crying and feeling too sorry for himself to notice. McCheese starts shouting at Callaghan telling him that he is pathetic and useless, only to be stopped as the bandaged up butler whacks him around the head with a brick and knocks him out. They are both put in a cage, as the flying tank takes them away to Evil N's Casino dungeon.
In the jail of the Casino dungeon, Callaghan is still crying and whining about the curator, saying that he loves her and saying that he knows because she grabbed his crotch. McCheese slaps Callaghan around the face with a conveniently placed book. McCheese keeps slapping Callaghan around the face, and reminding him of the time in gym class where he peed himself and the school nerd didn’t realise it was there and slipped and landed on his face, and the time where he had a date with a cheerleader, and he ended up grabbing her breast when he was meant to kiss her, but was too nervous and his mind screwed up. McCheese suddenly stops, as the key rolls out of the book, and screams and shouts that they are saved. Callaghan is in the corner shaking and bleeding from the nose and mouth from all the hits from the giant book. Callaghan stands up and drop kicks McCheese getting pay back for the book slapping. Callaghan picks up the key and opens the door, letting them both out, only to be welcomed by the curator. Callaghan lowers his head, and McCheese begins to yell, but Callaghan tells him to stop, and tells him to run to Evil N and arrest him. McCheese puts a thumb up to Callaghan as he bites a giant bit of cheese.

As McCheese runs away, the curator runs at him with a mace, swinging it around and screaming random battle cries. Callaghan calmly stands there, and before she can do anything her grabs her hair, and slaps her around the face. The curator looks at him angrily, and swears at him furiously. Callaghan tells her to shut up, and hits her around the head with a chair leg. Some how the two of them end up in a wrestling ring, as they brawl with eacother, scratching and biting and pulling, and punching. Eventually the curator is on the floor, and Callaghan climbs onto the ropes shouting things at the curator, Callaghan prepares to do a 450 splash, and as he does it, the curator tells him that she was never evil, she was just undercover trying to help, and that she loves him, and that she's sorry for what she did, but at this time Callaghan is somehow flying through the air in slow motion as she is still in normal motion. Eventually he lands on her, and a loud cracking noise is heard. He cries out for her, and turns her around, he's confused at the fact that she's dead because it wasn’t that brutal, but through further inspection he soon finds out that a fork was stabbed through her somehow, and it was the fork that killed her. Callaghan sits there crying and hugging her, and sucking his thumb.
After this we see McCheese coming out of a bathroom, zipping up his fly and whistling the Indiana Jones theme tune to himself, as he looks up he see's Evil N playing on Viva Piñata, McCheese shouts at him, and notices that he isn’t wearing anything but underwear. Evil N quickly puts his outfit on and laughs hysterically, jumping onto his flying tank and starting it up. We can hear the tank stalling a bit, as McCheese stands their staring at it in confusion, eventually it starts after all the stalling and foul language coming from Evil N. McCheese leaps on the tank as it flies away crashing through the ceiling. Evil N's pet charges at McCheese, but McCheese steps out of the way, and the pet falls off of the tank yelling "I regret nothing!”
Evil N comes out of the tank with a longer moustache for some reason, that touches the floor, he then throws a sword to McCheese, and stops and looks at his hands only to realise he just gave his weapon to the enemy, he then smiles as he pulls out a hand gun. McCheese does a roll to dodge the bullet, and the sword falls off of the roof of the tank, Evil N looks down at McCheese and laughs hysterically asking him if he has any last words, McCheese hesitates, and see's the control panel that moves the barrell of the tank. He thinks to himself that he only has one chance, and throws his last remaining cheddar cheese at the control panel. The Barrel picks Evil N up by his cape, and swings him around a bit, giving him wedgies, and revealing a tattoo of Dora the explorer on his left cheek. The Tank then sucks in, and Evil N's bum gets stuck on the Barrel, which leaves him a tough spot, with no where else to go. McCheese stares at this in disgust, and laughs hysterically at the outcome. He climbs inside, and somehow pilots the tank back to the roof of the building, to be greeted by Callaghan standing there waiting. McCheese gets out of the tank, and laughs and jumps down to high five Callaghan for their achievement. They find out that the jewel is actually still there, and that the tank was stolen, they find the jewel hidden under the garbage bin in Evil N's pool area, which seems to be quite ironic. They both laugh, and are interrupted by sirens and a police helicopter light shining on them. As both of them are blinded by the light, they drop the jewel, and it falls off of the building, and lands on a stray cat, crushing it from the pressure. The police rush in handcuffing Callaghan and McCheese, and they are dragged away and placed into police cars. We then see a montage after their arrest of them in the questioning room, being interrogated, we see funny clips of Callaghan crying, and McCheese spitting on the cops, and him eating random blocks of cheese from every nation, as the montage ends we see them leave the police department, as they both discuss that they are glad that their story was finally believed by the police department. They both stand there staring at the floor shuffling their feet, and ask each other what they should do, after a minute of discussion, suggesting SeaWorld, Wendy’s, or Starbucks, they decide to walk off into the sunset, to Florida, to see Shamu at SeaWorld performing her show. We then see them walk off into the distance as the sunsets, and as they fade away, we see the angry Italian taxi driver come into the scene chasing after them with a crowbar.

Storm Breaker and The Woman in Black.

Im going to analyse Storm Breaker and The Woman in black, and then compare the two, and see how they differenciate from one another, with conventions titles etc.

First of all Stormbreaker, was a slow opening, but quite fast paced as it went along. It starts with a blank screen, with titles, and there is then a sound bridge of a man speaking as the shot fades into the class, panning over the students. The camera then pans onto Alex, and we hear the diegetic sound of the teacher asking Alex to come to the front, and Alex responding. We can hear tense non-diegetic music in the background, we see Alex speaking, and it then cuts to his uncle (Ewan McGregor) light a fuse, this is shown through a low angle shot. We then see Alex speaking again, and from his dress code we can see that he is a typical middle aged teenage boy. We can see from the other students reactions that he is disliked because of his looks and dress code, as one particular girl. This film is mainly aimed at teenagers, as there the protagonist is shown as a teenager in a secondary school, and alot of teens could relate to his struggle etc. The yellow lettering on the bottom of the screen, connote action and adventure, as it is what you'd expect to see in an action film. Its a very engaging opening, keeping the audience interested, and fits perfectly within the spy genre.

The woman in black starts directly, and the media language portrayed automatically tells us that we are watching a thriller/ horror. The titles are white and simplistic with a black background, the white starts to fade and as it does this we can see little chunks of the words start to dissapear. Also at some points, there are really noticeable things occuring in the opening, the thing that is most apparent is a visible black shadow/cloud effect moving across the words on screen.
The weird corrupt font, connotes the fear, and the mysterious atmosphere, something wrong. This will be immediately recognisable to the audience as iconography associated with the thriller genre. A typical teenage or adult audience would find this opening interesting, as they enjoy the intense and pumped up atmosphere created by thriller/horror movie openings, and they could watch this and enjoy it.

Storm Breaker and The Woman in Black differ greatly, Storm Breaker is a young teen spy action film, and The Woman in Black is a thriller/ horror movie.
In Storm Breaker the conventions and titles connote an action movie, due to the computer type text of the titles, and the dress code, accent and body language of the protagonist of the story. From this we can tell it is a more, fast paced, and exciting film that may keep the audience at the edge of their seats all the way through.
Where as in The Woman in Black, it is aimed at an older teenager to adult age range, the conventions and titles connote fear, which gives us the impression of a thriller/horror movie, due to the black background, and eerie non-diegetic soundtrack added to the opening, merging with the mysterious white font fading in and out. From this opening we can tell that The Woman in Black is a more involved,slow and involved psychological film, which will take more of an understanding for the audience to indulge themselves into, that is why it is aimed at an older teenage, adult age group, being more sophisticated.
This how the two films compare, Storm Breaker is more fast paced and exciting, most enjoyable for the younger teens, and The Woman in Black, a more involved more complex film for a older teen/ adult age, which takes some understanding and patience to get into.

Tropic Thunder.

Today we looked at an example of an action comedy that has recently been released, known as Tropic Thunder, we analysed the titles, convention, representations and audience of the film.

Titles : The titles are very simple, and try to avoid a complicated way of opening a film, to keep the audience interested, the titles show the name of the film, in a rugged, worn style of writing, this connotes the idea of things being war torn.
This engages the audience immediately, as it gets straight to the point, and the audience can read the signs, and understand that this is not a sombre and serious look at war. We may take in this method, and encorporate it into our own ideas, and maybe film, to follow to the methods that this comedy action film uses to keep their audience interested.

Representations:
The representations in Tropic Thunder vary, and are all men.
There is mainly a stereotypical representation of men, which means arrogance, rudeness, anger, stubborness, violence and persistence.
Some of the men are also represented as scared, weak and timid, which is associated with the typical nerdy character that we see in most films.
Finally some of the men are shown as confident, yet slightly fearful, and the leader kind of character that we see in most action films, but because of the comedy element, fear is added to show their soft side.
We can use these representations in our film to create characters that follow the typical ways that actors are in most comedy action films, using the stereotypical representations to put forward humor, and violence, sticking close to the comedy action genre, making a successful comedy action opening for a film.

Audience:
The typical audience for a comedy action film, would mainly consist of Older teens varying to middle aged men, and for those who enjoy that kind of mindless comedy, with vulgar references, violence, and humor. Which would be a typical teenager.
We can follow the typical audience and their interests, and formulate ideas that consist of their likes and dislikes, and encorporate these into our films, to help follow the tastes of todays normal audience, making a successful film opening, that pleases the audience, using representations that they have a liking for.

Conventions: There are many conventions of comedy action in this film, some small things, but alot of obvious ones that are easy to notice and are clear to the audience.
These consist of: Guns, explosions, tension, music, camouflage, men, fire, blood, helicopters and Death.
We can use these conventions to makea successful kind of comedy action opening.

Action Comedy.

Today we have researched the genre of action comedy for our set coursework, we have found out certain things that will benefit us in our project of creating the 2 minute film opening.

First of all we researched the kind of narratives that one might see in a comedy action film.

Some include:

Wars, Gangs, sports, and police investigations.

These are the main narratives in an action comedy film.



Secondly, we looked at the settings.

The setting usually used in an action comedy consist of; War grounds, such as the jungle, Schools, streets, Bars, pubs and clubs.

We can incorporate this into our ideas, and maybe use some of these settings as a base of our film.

Next, the stock characters. These are the characters in the film that you either hate or love, and they are all mainly stereotypical.

The typical stock characters in an action comedy are: The stupid one, the smart one, the leader, the foolish one, the naive one, the seductive one, and the bad guy.

We will also use this research on the characters, in our planning, and filming to follow the genre of Action comedy correctly.

The main Iconography's of action comedy movies are;
Bad guys
Gun fights
Violence
Suits
Car chases
Explosions.
Yet again, we may incorporate these into our ideas, keeping to the genre as much as possible.

The audience for films such as these may vary, but they would mainly be of a teenage age, stretching out to middle aged. Maybe the more nerdy, sarcastic and in scene kind of audience may enjoy this film genre more than anyone else.

For the films that I have researched, I found these statistics, based on the

income of the film. These were ther results:

Tropic thunder - $188,039,665
Pulp Fiction - $213,928,762
Drillbit Taylor - $49,686,263

Snatch - $83,557,872

Action Comedy films use a wide range of editing techniques and shots, to create complex, funny and fast paced scenes. They dont stick to a few, they dont keep it simple, they make it complicated, but this makes the film more exciting for the audience.

The main techniques used are:
Fast pans, cuts, zooms, headshots, establishing shots, low angle shot, high angle shot, long shot, and mid-shot.