R&P post 10: Reflections so far/ looking ahead

Reflections so far

I think that our group has worked together very well. From the first meeting, we immediately delegated roles and tasks for individuals to do. We researched existing films' codes and conventions in our own time and made decisions as a group in our meetings regarding titles and the script etc. Our group has worked efficiently to finish the timeline, storyboard and animatic. We spent a lot of time brainstorming ideas and trying to come up with creative ways to film. For example, we established earlier on in our meetings that Alex and Olamide had GoPros that we could use to film surreal shots. I suggested that we could pour cereal onto the GoPro as a part of the character's daily morning routine. Many of our initial ideas did not make it to the final cut because we were constantly communicating with each other about new ideas and critiquing films like 'Submarine', 'Beautiful Thing' and 'Elephant'.

Looking ahead

I look forward to shooting our film opening. We will experiment with the logistics of filming, bearing in mind space and lighting. I particularly look forward to editing, which I think that I am most comfortable at doing as I know the basics from my previous experience with the preliminary task. I think that it will be interesting to see how our research will affect the rest of our sequence and whether or not our inspiration will be apparent in our finished piece.

R&P post 9: Our script

We wanted to introduce our main character to the audience in a direct way that would immediately reveal his personality. We felt that a voice over would do this effectively. 'Submarine' heavily influenced our script for the voice over as Oliver Tate's character was easily identifiable. We deliberated over the script for a long time because we had to take into account the timings and how the visuals would correspond with the voice over.

This is an example of something in Submarine that influenced what we put in the script:

Olamide wrote the treatment and our team gave critic. We will edit the treatment as time goes on but for now, this is the first draft for our script:

After revising the script many times, Olamide wrote this script which is the final version that we used in our main shoot.

The script was a difficult aspect of our planning process because we all knew how important the script was to conveying Craig's personality to the audience. We wanted to avoid making Craig appear weak or vulnerable due to his sexuality, as this would be a negative representation of sexuality. On the other hand, we tried to make it clear that it was part of his character as a socially awkward person. We also wanted to make the bullies authentic and used slang that would typically be used in order to add to the realism of the situation. Whilst many British indie films are known for their gritty portrayal of realistic events and often would contain swear words, we tried to omit as much offensive language as we could and replace them with milder words.

R&P post 8: Our opening sequence idea, to include sound and titles

Opening sequence idea

Our main character Craig gets ready to leave the house. We show his house which has props to show his hobbies and interests. As he walks through the forest and the lake, he writes in his notebook which holds his most intimate thoughts. By the end of the opening sequence, he stands up for an openly gay person who is getting bullied.

Sound

We will use a voice over for the character to directly communicate with the audience. This will reveal his introverted nature and his awkward personality. There will be dialogue at the end of the opening during the conflict with the bullies. We have scripted the voice over and the dialogue.

For the soundtrack, we chose the accoustic instrumental of 'Let it go' by James Bay. This song reflects the indie genre and adds to the atmosphere and ambiance. We will edit the footage so that shots cut to another shot on the beat. Alex has been learning to play the song and we will him playing the instrumental on the guitar. This soundtrack will start off as diegetic sound; Craig will place a vinyl on the record player and the song will play. Then the song will change to non-diegetic sound as he leaves the room but the song still plays. We chose to have white noise playing in the background, which would synergise with the vinyl record player and connote the indie genre.

You can listen to the instrumental here:

Titles

We will use conventions of film opening sequences. We researched existing films and the general format for their titles. I used the website Art of the Title for reference and I was particularly inspired by the opening titles to CAMP festival 2015. It is neither a film nor a TV show but the opening titles have similar conventions to that of a film. You can view the opening title of CAMP festival by clicking on the photo below:

This is a mood board that I created for title styles:

Click the photo to enlarge

Our titles will include the following:

• In association with film 4 and the BFI film fund
• QUAK films presents
• Reuben Woolley
• Alex Brock
• Olamide Ajisafe
• Georgina Harper-Dennett
• Alex Harris
• Phoebe Hung
• [AGLET]

R&P post 7: Our film's title and plot outline

Our film's title

An aglet

The title of our film is Aglet. An aglet is the thing at the end of your shoelaces that prevents the shoelace from fraying. Our interpretation of it is that it seems irrelevant, but without it, the shoelace would come apart and be useless. We wanted the title to represent how Craig feels hopeless and under appreciated yet will come to be comfortable as who he is.

As a group, we deliberated about the title of the film for a long time. We considered naming the film 'Craig' as there are many existing films which are named after the main character. However, we felt that it would be too cliche. We also thought about naming the film 'Surreal' in order to express Craig's confusion as he goes through a bizarre time in life as a closeted gay. In the end, we decide against the name 'Surreal' because the word has connotations of of psychological thriller and that it would take away from the realism of the film.

Our plot outline

Our film follows the conventional 3 part structure. In the beginning, he is in the closet and extremely introverted. He meets David and they develop feelings for each other but they also struggle with problems that come their way. They have to deal with society's reaction to their relationship and Craig has to deal with his family and their expectations of him. Craig develops as a person and becomes more mature. At the end of the film, Craig comes out as gay. He and David live a happy life as an openly gay couple and they learn to focus on the more positive things in life.

R&P post 6: Our chosen genre and how we plan to connote this

Our chosen genre: coming of age, romance, drama, gay, British indie

We plan to connote the coming of age genre through our characterisation of the main character Craig and the theme of sexuality.

Juno faces criticism from people
in society because she is a
pregnant teen

Coming of age films 'focus on the psychological and moral growth of the protagonist from youth to adulthood', meaning that the character development is essential to making a successful coming of age film. Craig starts out as an introverted individual who focuses on his hobbies rather than socialising with others his age. This changes as he stands up to bullies and forces himself to be exposed to strangers for the sake of what he believes in. He will develop as a character as the film progresses by becoming comfortable as who he is and eventually coming out as gay.

Coming of age films commonly revolve around a controversial theme surrounding teenagers and young adults. For example, 'Juno' is about a pregnant teen who considers abortion. The pregnancy is unexpected and unplanned. The film focuses on her decisions to give birth to the baby and to give it up for adoption in a light-hearted manner.

Sepia effect in 'Submarine'

We aim to connote the British indie genre by use of our aesthetics - grading it to have a sepia effect like it does in 'Submarine', giving it a more authentic, grainy effect, unlike the glossy finish of Hollywood or other mainstream films. Much of our opening sequence is inspired by 'Submarine' as we felt that it was true to the indie genre and that the aesthetics played a big part in connoting the genre.

Oliver Tate's awkwardness

We also drew inspiration from the voice over in the opening as it created a surreal effect. The disembodied voice combined with Oliver Tate's strange personality perfected the indie vibe that we wanted. Our voice over will convey Craig's personality to the audience using dry British humour and a sense of exasperation with his generation.

R&P post 5: How we plan to attract/ address our target audience

Our target audience

• The LGBTQ community
• Fans of British indie films
• British teenagers and adults over the age of 15
• Fans of romantic dramas
• Fans of the coming of age genre

How we plan to attract/ address them

Our audience would have expectations of what they would see in our film. We would use the uses and gratifications theory to satisfy their needs. We aim to educate the audience about sexuality and to entertain them with humour and drama. 

We plan to attract the LGBTQ community by having two gay protagonists and addressing the theme of sexuality. The LGBTQ community is often underrepresented or inaccurately portrayed in the media. We hoped to appeal to the LGBTQ community by portraying the two gay characters as normal people with interests and personality. We understood that gay people do not necessarily conform to the stereotypes and that the LGBTQ community disliked being labelled so we made decisions about our characters accord
ingly.

The main character, Craig, is still unsure of his sexuality and whether or not to come out as gay. As a result, he is awkward and unsociable.  When he defends another gay character, he overcomes his fear and develops as a character. The audience would be able to empathise with Craig's situation and he would therefore be more relateable to the audience. David's confidence in his sexuality would appeal to the audience as this is a positive representation of gay people.

Fans of British indie films would typically be British. Our characters would be played by British actors who would have British accents who'd talk about British themes and use British humour etc. Fans of indie films tend to be indie themselves, they enjoy doing things that are not the mainstream and being alternative to others. Craig's personality would appeal to them as he is like them - he collects vinyls and writes his life in a notebook and goes on long walks in the countryside.

R&P post 4: Representation of social groups in our opening sequence

Representing the LGBTQ community

In our opening sequence, the social group that we chose to represent is the LGBTQ community. It was important to us that we accurately portrayed them as developed characters without the usual stereotypes such as being camp, metrosexual or over-emotional. Examples of characters from films and TV shows that we identified include Kurt Hummel from 'Glee' and Damian Leigh, who is 'almost too gay to function', from 'Mean Girls'. Both characters enjoy talking about clothes, fashion and gossiping about the other girls in their school. They provide comedy and wit with their sassiness which is a positive representation of their sexuality but it meant that they were considered the comic relief characters.

Damian Leigh

Kurt Hummel

Jamie Gangel and his love interest Ste

Craig's situation is similar to Jamie Gangel's from 'Beautiful Thing'. Jamie is not openly gay but his dislike of football which is perceived as a masculine sport and his introvert nature means that he is picked on by his classmates. In our case, Craig's obsession with writing in his notebook, his interest in indie music and his collection of vinyls sets him apart from other people in his generation. He already is a victim of bullying and he fears that coming out as gay would put him in a worse position.

Craig's love interest is introduced in the opening sequence. By contrast to Craig, David is openly gay. His confidence in his sexuality is a positive representation of sexuality. However, in our film opening, he is a victim of bullying by a schoolmate who is aware that he is gay. Despite being a victim, he is able to defend himself, showing his strong personality.

In our initial idea, we were aware that we may not portray the LBTQ community well so we made changes to the story. We wanted to break the stereotype that gay people went out in search for love. Instead of meeting at a gay bar or club, we decided that they would meet by accident and that Craig's intent on helping someone would go humorously wrong.

R&P post 3: Our production and distribution institutions

As our film is a British Indie film, we decided that we had to have British institutions that would produce and distribute our film. We researched existing British production companies and distributors so that we could choose which would be suited for our film

Production companies

For the production company, we created our own independent production company that is based in London. QUAK films focus mainly on films that represent the LGBTQ community. I created the logo for the company and Alex made it into a gif that would represent how the final product will appear in our film opening. Click on the photo or gif below to enlarge:

We chose BFI as the main institution that would fund the production of our film. The BFI supports and develops British films such as ours by using the National Lottery funds to provide a stable platform for filmmakers to produce and distribute their film. The theme of our film corresponds to the BFI's aim to 'record contemporary life and manners ... and their impact on society'. By having a British gay protagonist, we hope to convey British values and tradition, as well as the effect on society. Our film will be set to premiere at the British Film Festival.

Distribution company

We chose Film 4 to fund and distribute our films. Film 4 is an established British production company that has produced existing British Indie films such as 'Beautiful Thing', 'Submarine' and 'Frank'.

R&P post 2: Our target audience

We decided that our film would follow a teenage closeted gay protagonist as he falls in love with an openly gay teenager.

Primary audience: LGBTQ community

The primary audience of our film are members of the LGBTQ community who would be able to relate to our main character and the hardships that he would face as he comes out of the closet. The LGBTQ community are made up of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer and people of various more sexualities.

Throughout the years, representation of the LGBTQ community in TV shows and films have been limited to comic relief characters. However, more recently, there has been more representation of the LGBTQ community in films such as 'Beautiful Thing' - a film about an introverted gay teenager would is bullied by his peers, 'Weekend' - a film that revolves around two gay protagonists and the difficulties they face after a one night stand and 'Milk' - an biographical film about the first openly gay politician to have been elected to a notable position in office. All three films were well received and were critically acclaimed; 'Milk' earned numerous accolades and 8 Academy Award nominations. This proves that there is a large target audience of the gay genre which would most definitely consist of members of the LGBTQ community and fans of the genre.

Secondary audience: fans of the genre

The secondary audience of our film are fans of British indie films and fans of the romance, drama, and coming of age genre. These people are not likely to conform to the mainstream, instead preferring the alternative, indie vibe that our film has. Examples of films of these genres are 'The Perks of being a Wallflower', 'Submarine' and 'Me and Earl and the Dying Girl'. These films tend to revolve around controversial themes that would otherwise be overlooked by the mainstream films. For example, the main character of 'The Perks of being a Wallflower' was sexually assaulted by his aunt, and 'Me and Earl and the Dying Girl' is about a girl who is diagnosed with leukemia and dies later on in the film.

Tertiary audience: british audiences and over 15s

British people are going to relate to the film more as it is a film that features British settings and British actors with British accents, humour and themes.

Our film will be rated a 15 due to swear words and direct references to sex and sexuality. Therefore, the audience would be limited to teenagers and adults over the age of 15.

R&P post 1: How we intend to work as a group

In our first meeting, our group decided to meet for two hours a week in order to plan our project. We chose to meet in the media department where we had access to equipment and technology we could use for research, planning and production.

We decided to meet at these times each week:

Wednesday 3:55 - 4:55 pm

Friday 3:55 - 4:55 pm

We all agreed that we would turn up to meetings on time with research and planning that we carry out in our own time so that we could use our time in the meetings effectively. In order to keep in regular contact, we set up a Facebook group and exchanged mobile numbers so that we could inform or ask each other anything immediately.

The brief: to produce a 2 minute opening sequence for a fiction film. All video and audio material must be original, produced by the candidate(s), with the exception of music or audio effects from a copyright-free source. It should be clear from your sequence who the target audience is.

I look forward to completing the project, along with learning new skills, and using the theory that I have learnt in class.