Initial Sound Ideas - Dom

One idea for a soundtrack light hearted guitar rift for example. Something to convey a uplifting mood and then get more deep and romantic when needed. I.e when he meets the girl the same music could be played to symbolise. Also when the character takes a snapshot, we are likely to use some non diegetic sound to symbolise. Not necessarily an obvious camera noise, but possibly a subtle click, kept consistent throughout.

As we are in a large town by the coast, diegetic sounds such as seagulls, cars, crowds, horns etc will need to be added to get a sense of the bustle around him. they could also be quietened when he is capturing a scene to emphasise the way he picks out things other people would miss.

Their will also be a monologue over our film. the main character will be describing why he is taking these shots. Ideally his voice should be cheery and not too harsh to fit the uplifting mood

Narration voice and style would be similar to this virgin media short peoples choice award winner. PJ lucky 13: Tiny Planet Explorer

These are few examples of the kind of soundtracks we are considering.
Example 1

Alternatively, if copyright is a problem, our friend is a musician who has been playing guitar for many years. He has agreed to help out in the production of a soundtrack. This holds advantages such as we can  tailor our own soundtrack to the film. However it would have to be all composed after the footage had been edited.

Here is an example of his music.

Another possible style of soundtrack is something like the one used in Little Larry. It reminds me of routine and the monotonous working life our character is in.

Synopsis - Dom

We follow one day in the life of our main character who see's the world a little differently from the rest of us. He focuses on the positive points of his day and the things around him that make his day special and  remembers them. He  'captures the moment' as a memory.  we show his way of seeing the world around him, by looking through his hands  and 'taking a snapshot' of the moment. Whether this be people places or events that occur that make his day that extra bit special, despite the omniscient monotonous 9-5 outlook on life. Our character captures, memories and cherishes them that make his day that bit brighter. However, he still feels he hasn't found the one event that will not just make one day brighter, but every day brighter.

The character starts off in an opening shot on top of a large hill overlooking the valley beneath: where the film is set. His occupation is a dull going nowhere admin job, for a small data collection firm: we will show this via costume and props, hence why he escapes by capturing moments and focusing on the good points of the day. Travelling, from work with, he envisages and captures little things that make his day. For example, one is a picture of a beach the other an old couple on a bench or another idea is the beach and waves crashing against the pier etc. So basically, he is commuting, and he picks out things that make his day special, yet he is looking for something that will make everyday brighter: this is at the end when he meets the girl which he previously saw through his hands.A monologue explaining his 'frames' will help the audience associate the main character with not being a bit of a stalker. soundtrack when he see's the girl will also get across the point its a romantic thing not a stalker thing.

Essentially, he captures the special moments on his commute that make his day amazing: concludes with meeting the girl on way home from work. Possible switch between saturated colour and vibrancy to show this.

Inspiration from american beauty: the idea of taking images.

The monologue in Love Sick  gave us the idea to use it in our own film because it gives a more in depth reason to why he is capturing memories.

Also, we want our monologue to be in a similar style to this and Tiny Planet Explorer

First tests for the hand camera - Josh Brown

For our short film, we had an idea that our main character, could use his hands as a camera. He could simply hold up his hands in a square shape, and just take a photo of the object he is admiring. In order for the picture to stay in the square shape made by his hands, we had to do some tests. Below are our first tests using a green screen, trying to get the image to stay inside the hands.

 This was our very first test. We stuck a small square of green card to the back of Josh's hands and moved them around the frame and tracked them with the camera. We then imported this movie file into Final Cut Pro to see what the clip would look like if the image behind the hands would move with the hands on the green screen.

This was our first attempt at trying to move the image with Josh's hands. As you can see from the clip, the image moves around inside the hands, this looks very unprofessional. Our media technician said if we used Adobe After Effects, we could anchor the image to my hands, meaning we would not have to use the green screen which is much easier because even during our very first test we found it hard. 

As you can see in this clip we did not use the green screen as a base for the image in the hands. After Effects allowed us to simply anchor the image to the hands. We noticed a significant improvement in image movement. This looks far more impressive.

Josh Brown

Evolution of our Plot - By John

Our plot has gone through several different versions incorporating the idea of capturing memories. We decided against making the main character be on his death bed, looking back over life. The original idea was for him to go back to key moments and remember them, as though his life was flashing before his eyes. A similar idea we had was of someone who looked back on all the things he couldn't do, and tried to relive them in his head.

The plot line we decided to stick with is far more feel good. The main character goes through a day of his life and frames parts the wants he wants to remember with his hands, much like a photographer would if they wanted to see what a scene might look like. He does this throughout the film, and highlights what he enjoys, what he likes about his day. Midway through, we would have our protagonist walk passed a girl whom he admires. He would frame her like the rest of his enjoyable moments, and move on with his day. Right at the end, in the last scene, they would cross paths again, and this time they go to frame each other at the same time.

Originally, the protagonist and the girl would be going around taking these hand pictures of each other in alternating scenes. However, this didn't make much of a plot, nor did it leave any feeling of feel good. If anything, it was far more creepy than romantic. We were going to have them meet and frame each other in the end, just like our final plot line.

Our plot then evolved into just following the protagonists interaction with this girl, and taking "pictures" with his hand. This, however, gave off the completely wrong idea and made the film seem far more creepy than feel good. In an attempt to fix this, we decided that a monologue would be needed to portray the main character's emotions correctly - which we eventually kept in our final idea as well.

The process that we have gone through has been extremely helpful for the evolution of our plot line, without it we'd be stuck with a story that just wasn't gripping enough, or we couldn't get 5 minutes out of. Going through several iterations of the same idea has created more and more ideas and has, when brought all together, after trimming off the excess, has given us a relatively good plot for our film.

Ideas and inspriation

We had an idea that took inspiration from the latest Motorola Razr UK advert.Motorola RAZR UK Commercial. The last clip in the advert shows a woman's hand acting as a camera taking pictures of a running dog. We had similarly the same idea but instead of a solid hand we would make a hand shape like this, and use the empty space inside the hands as a viewing screen.

Applying 5 key concepts to short films - John Hodge

Dream Girl - By Alice Seabright

The film follows a young man on the subway, who promptly gets into a usually "awkward" situation - a passenger falls asleep on him.

There is lots about this film I love - the realism, the sound, the camera work - it just portrays so much without even having the characters talk.

Representation

Daily commuters appear to be the only consistent social group represented in this short film. As they travel by train, presumably daily, this situation might be quite common - especially having the seating the same way they did in the film. Stereotypically, the reaction would be of annoyance, having the person who was fallen asleep on either getting up and moving, or just pushing them off. On the contrary, the male is very gentle when he attempts to push her off his shoulder when he arrives at his stop. This, however, is quite stereotypical in the fact it's a woman he's dealing with - but as she was sleeping it could either be trying not to wake her up out of courtesy, whether or not she was a woman.

The situation feels very real - the diegetic sound, setting and actors all contribute towards this. It's almost like a constructed documentary, if I had to label it. Because the situation is a familiar one for most of us, there's no need to add anything extra to put the situation into context. Thus why we are dumped into the scene as though we are also sitting inside the train.

Because this situation is one we are familiar with, and have witnessed, the seat we are given in this shot feels very similar. It seems as though Dream Girl is trying to take a (relatively) common situation, and spin it in it's head.

It appears like this film is trying to question how some of us react to others on public transport. Rather than with delicacy and understanding, we seem to jump to conclusions that they are being inconsiderate of their situation. Much like in this scene, except the passengers react differently. It's more of an "Oh, now what?" reaction, rather than one of distaste.

The faces pulled are meant to give off a sort of comic effect, in addition to portraying the fact that they aren't too fussed about it, and could be also from familiarity of the situation as well.

Narrative

The story consists of all that happens within and just outside the doors of the train, so we have no idea where the woman was before she got on the train. We have no idea why she's tired, but that's because it's not an important aspect of the story - all that we need to know is that she is tired and accidentally fell asleep on someones shoulder. Obviously, one implies the other, we just do not know any specific details.

A linear narrative also helped with the realism of this film, time flows like it should.

Todorov's theory of narrative structure can be applied to this short film. The equilibrium is before the woman falls asleep on the guys shoulder, with the falling asleep on the shoulder being the disruption. It appears that this short film has multiple equilibrium's and disruptions, as when the guy pushes her off and leaves, he decides to come back into the train and let her keep lying on his shoulder, meaning that the original disruption became equilibrium, making the guy getting up to leave the disruption, leaving the resolution being the moment he sits back down and pulls her back over.


Genre

This film, from my own knowledge, appears to bring something slightly new and quirky to the table. It is extremely realistic, with only a few camera shots of outside of the train, whereas the rest are inside. It also feels as though you are jumping around to different people's points of view, instead of just viewing it from to the side or above as an all-seeing all-knowing spectator.

Audience

As I found the film on VirginMediaShorts, I'd expect those who are passionate about film to watch this. In addition to this, any other short film makers might be interested. In addition to this, those who daily travel on public transport may appreciate this more than those who commute by car - sharing a train with someone as opposed to being alone in a car on the way to work.

The fact that this film plays on one very well known and extremely embarrassing event that could happen on public transport would be very appealing to the viewer. The ending also, the fact he goes back into the train and lets her sleep on his shoulder again - the social norm would be to just go to your destination, but the guy made a decision to stay with the girl.

• Tivo Award Winner 2012 (VirginMediaShorts)

LUCKY 13: PJ, Tiny Planet Explorer 

"A boys journey through the universe to find a wondrous new planet to explore."

Another winner from VMS2012, I chose this film because it's story telling was fantastic, and personally appealed to me in it's references. While a simple premise, the film maker does a lot to make it stand out and make it entertaining.

Representation

Only one social group appears to be portrayed in this film - the late teens early twenties young male. This is clearly portrayed through the use of props, such as many things a child would have had in the 1990s. This male is in a situation where he wants to move planet, which is an exaggerated version of moving out of home and into their own house. And in this particular representation, he is shown to be indecisive, as having a lack of direction and above all completely unprepared. The edited shots of the "small planets", showed him going from one play to another after something about the planet he had found didn't sit well with him. "My new home was made not by choice, but by lack of preparations." The changes made to the film, and having them loop around to meet each other, completely warps out perception of that world. They use the distortion of the characters figure to help portray the fact that it wasn't particularly easy being on these planets, with his "molecular structure" being messed around with.

The style, overall, is very quirky and comedic, which was influenced by the audience, which was in turn influenced by the moral. By having a young man play a role where he goes to move to another planet, you are trying to appeal to an audience who were kids in the 90s - thus the reason for the 90s references, such as the Gameboy, Zelda Ocarina and Mario underwear. This is popular culture that would be recognised by the target audience. This also appears to be aimed at just females, if going by stereotypes. All the "pop culture" references in the props are from video games, which may or may not be more likely to be identified by the males.

Narrative

We are thrown straight into where he makes the decision to leave, leaving the back story up to the audiences imagination. We are also cut off by the time he is forced to settle down, having taken too long to find any suitable place. In relation to Todorov's theory, it appears that the film starts just after the disruption, causing him to leave (if there was one). It also finishes with a seemingly meager solution, being nothing more than settling with what he had found, thus leaving us with no closure. Does he go off to find a new planet after he's become more prepared? Is he stuck their now with the provisions he bought? We wont know.

Genre

This film is clearly Adventure (with it being labelled so on VMS) and comedy. The comedy seems to stem from the voice over from the characters, and the various conversations over the phone he has before he embarks on his adventure. Typically, short films use genre to set a tone for the whole film, and make it somewhat predictable in what it's going to be like. In this case, its going to involve adventure and comedy - exploration, and potentially funny moments. Already, this paints a picture in the audience's mind of what the film is going to be like, so they are not too shocked because they expected something completely different.

Audience

As mentioned when talking about representation, this film is aimed at young males who are around the time of leaving education or entering university or just looking to live on their own / away from where they would usually live. The references also mentioned in representation may please the target audience, who are presumably young males born in the 1990s. 

5 key concepts of 4 short films by Josh Brown

The 4 short films I will be analyzing are:

·         Future.INC

·         Crush No.472

·         FINAL ARMAGEDDON DOT COM

·         Love Sick

FUTURE.INC

FUTURE.INC is a 2 minute 20 second short film that I found on Virgin Media Shorts. It is about a woman living alone in the present time. She works in cardiac science or a similarly related job. She sees a news story on a brand new futuristic dating website that puts you in touch with people from the future. In the end, the woman attempts to freeze herself for 300 years so she can be with the 24^th century man she met using the new website. However, the film leaves us in a cliff-hanger as it never reveals if her plan works. Directed by Martin Sterling.

Representation

·         This short film attracts a wide range of social groups. If there were to be specific groups targeted, it would have to be technology lovers. This is because the application used in the film on the woman’s tablet PC is full of futuristic technology.

·         The main character in the film is well presented. The audience is allowed collect parts of her identity to figure out what kind of person she is. The woman is young and single, living in an apartment and whose work seems to be long and dull according to her reaction at the start of the film. From the young and single parts, we can guess that maybe the woman is seeking a relationship. She seems eager to meet someone, especially when she hears about Future.Inc.

·         The representations are mostly positive because the woman is portrayed as loving and very selfless that she is trying to be with this man form the future by freezing herself. However it might represent her as a bit too eager and needy as a result of her drastic measures, unlike most woman in reality.

Looking at he image above, there are clear traditional semantic codes of femininity and romance seen here. The woman is in pajamas, eating ice cream in bed whilst talking to her future man. These codes can also be seen in other romantic movies during the equilibrium or development of the story.

Narrative

·         The chronology of the film is linear. There are some shots in the middle of the film which seem to skip to a moment and back again. For example the woman is seen to be exercising, then runs to answer a message. The shot then goes to a clip where she is paying her rent for the next 3 centuries and then finally back to her exercising again.

·         The plot has an unrecognizable theory. The story seems to be nearly completely linear. Todorov’s theory on plot can be lightly applied. The equilibrium is the girl is young, single living alone; the disruption could be the idea of dating 24^th century people. The recognition could be that she wishes to be with the man but she can’t. The attempted repair part seen is where the woman decides to freeze and then shock herself when she is in the 24^th century. However the last part is the re-equilibrium cannot be applied because we never see if her plan is successful and if it was, then it would not be the same as the beginning.

Gender

·        On Virgin Media Shorts, this short film is classed under Science-Fiction.

·         Rick Altman’s theory of semantic codes can be traced in this film. One example of a semantic code could be when the woman is tucked up in bed eating ice cream in her pyjamas. These collected characteristics can be gathered and used to represent to woman to the audience.

·        

Audience

·         On Virgin Media Shorts, this film is classed under Sci-Fi. This film could then expect future loving and/or social networking audiences to watch it.

·         The film is clever, quirky and fast paced. This keeps the audience’s attention high. I was pleased with the film mainly because it made me wonder if her plan could be possible. This means it pleases audiences if they think about it more.

Media Language

·          

Crush No.472

Crush No.472 is a 2 minute 20 second short film on Virgin Media Shorts. It consists of a man standing in a queue at a cafe when he spots a pretty woman at the front. He starts talking to himself in his mind. From her actions, he attempts to figure out what type of person she is. He over-exaggerates a lot of his thoughts which ads comedy to this film. I thought this short film would be great because he is collecting her identity to figure her out by the way she is being presented which is what I am doing in this work. Directed by Jess Scott Hunter.

Representation

·         This film could attract a more social audience and cafe users. The film is clearly identifiable as a comedy. This is a result of the actions, expressions and thoughts of the man in the queue.

·         When the woman approaches the counter, the man begins to panic because he thinks they will part before they even meet. The man continues to quickly process thoughts in his head until he realises that the woman has been at the till for a while. Then he starts to begin to seem angry and patronising. This is partly stereotypical as men look down on women and see them as incompetent and incapable, however we know this to be false.

·         The representation of the man could be a negative and misleading representation because it portrays him as weird, freaky and needy. He seems to care about getting his order more than meeting the girl.

·         The representation of the woman is positive as she seems like a legit, regular person. Some semantic codes concerning her dress and shoes show that she is a well presented higher working class woman.

·          

Narrative

·         The chronology of Crush No.472 is completely linear.

·         Todorov’s theory of narrative and event happenings can apply to this film. The equilibrium is the man standing in the café like he does regularly. The disruption is when he spots the new pretty woman standing ahead of him in the queue. The recognition is when he realizes that the woman is taking her time at the register and that she has in fact been to the café before because he sees her loyalty card. The attempt to get back to the equilibrium state is when he shouts at the woman and finally the re-equilibrium is when he resumes as normal standing in the queue.

Genre

·         The film is categorized under comedy on Virgin Media Shorts. This is because the film comes across as quirky to the audience.

·         David Buckingham’s theory of constantly changing genres can be applied the Crush No.472. There is no argument that the film was intended to be comedic, however there is a slight hint of romance. This is due to the man analysing the woman. “He well-moisturised ankles”, “So intoxicating is your beauty”, “With your infectious sense of calmness and serenity”.

 

·         These quotes firstly portray the man as romantic until things change for the worse. This film almost comes off as a rom-com as a result but not quite because the couple never fall in love. So it falls between comedy and rom-com.

Audience

·         I would expect more social people and café users to watch this movie because they can relate themselves to this situation although possibly not as quite extremely shown in this film.

·         Others would find this short film funny because it is quirky and enjoyable. The man’s thoughts entertain the audience because he comes up with extreme and unlikely thoughts.

·         Crush No.472 was Jess Scott Hunter’s first short film shown on the internet. They have made another short film about French parkour staring David Belle.

Media Language

·         One shot that I found particularly interesting is the point of view shot when the man is being slapped by the woman.

·         This shot gave a sense of action from the man’s view. It was a hint of action that the audience were enabled to experience that made the scene a little more interesting.

FINAL ARMAGEDDON DOT COM

• Final Armageddon Dot Com is a 2 minutes 30 second short film found on Virgin Media Shorts. WE are introduced to a father who appears to be saving his family's life from a great flood. He has built an arc, and persuades his family to come aboard and live their lives on the water. I thought this movie incorporated the use of sound effects very well due to the continuous thunder and rain soundtrack. I liked it because it was unusual but clever. Directed by Rob Spence.

Representation

• From the dialogue, the audience assumes that global warming has gotten too high and as a consequence, the earth is beginning to flood. One social group that may be interested in this film could be environmentalists and other such hobbies or jobs. This is due to the included themes of the environment.

• In the film, we see the main character Sam, trying to save his family from a soon arriving flood. Sam is seen to be a bit mental by us the audience. The way he has built an entire wooden arc seems a bit dramatic and his partner Christina describes hm as “Not well”. So from these few clues, we begin to think has partially lost his mind just because its heavily raining. However his representation all becomes clear at the end of the video when his prediction of a flood was true.

Narrative

• The chronological order of this short film appears to be linear because we start before the flood and end after the flood.

• Todorov's theory can't be applied to this short film. This is because at the beginning of the film we don't see an equilibrium or a re-equilibrium because we never see what their everyday lifestyle is like. It could be said that when they are on the arc floating on the water is a re-equilibrium. However, it's not what like the situation was like before the disruption (the storm).

Genre

• This film is classed under Action & Adventure on Virgin Media Shorts. I would class this film as an adventure film only because the family are doing something probably never done before and so they are adventuring into the unknown. I could not Identify any other clear genre's in this film.

Audience

• I was pleased with this short film because I found it clever an uncommon. I have never seen this type of short film before so it was nice to see something very different.

• I would expect enviromentalists and people who care about various aspects of the natural world to watch this filmThe fact that Sam is obessed with global warming and even went to the measures of crushing his family car could attract this audience.

Media Language

• A theory I found hard applying to this film is Rick Altman's theory. His ideas of semantic and syntactic codes couldn’t be found here. One big object is the arc, but the rest of the film doesn't relate to the story of Noah's arc, or anything else along the lines so semantic codes were difficult to find.

Love Sick

Love sick is a 4 minute 31 second short film that I found on YouTube. The film is all about a man looking for a relationship. He chases a number of women around a city until the moment comes where they have to separate as a result of a dispute. There is no dialogue in this film, only a voice over which we can identify as being the main character's. Directed and written by Kevin Lacy.

Representation

• Whilst watching this short film, I could identify two noticeable genres. The story of this film can be identified as a romance because the character is trying to find and fight for love. To accompany it, the plot and some events in the film seem comic. This should equal to a romcom (romantic comedy). On the other hand, there are qualities to the movie which makes it seem different.

• This movie breaks the stereotype because traditionally, it was females who would usually be chasing men. We know that in the more modern times this is untrue and females are more independent. But if we were to put this in a traditional perspective, the stereotype has been switched over because the man now seems like the needy dependant person.

• Social groups relevant to this film could be people who are looking for relationships, people already in relationships that could relate to this film as partially what they went through to get a partner.

Narrative

• From the film, we assume that the chronology is linear. There is a possibility that we start and end at different. We gather that it is all in one day because he is wearing the same clothes throughout the film and so is the boy introduced to us as “Justin Beiber”.

• Todorov's theory is again challenging to apply to this short film because it's difficult to identify what the equilibrium and disruption is. The equilibrium could be when he just gets rejected by a woman and is again on the lookout, or it could be when he is chasing a new woman. The disruption could also be either of these.

Genre

• This movie to me mainly seemed like a romance because the man is trying desperately to find his one true soul mate, despite him losing interest in a woman as soon as he find another. There are also conventions of a comedy too, for example the relation to Justin Bieber is funny because the name calling is unexpected. If this movie were to be a romance and a comedy, that would result in a romcom. However, there are qualities missing from this short film to make it a romcom. Such as the toned down amount of comedy and the contrapuntal music in the background.

Audience

• Love Sick is a very popular and successful short film that has over 490,000 views on YouTube. It has won the following awards:
• WINNER - Fringe Film Festival 2011 - Grand Jury Prize
  WINNER - Fear No Film 2011 - Utah Short Film of the Year
  WINNER - CityWeekly Artys 2011 - Reader's Choice Award
  WINNER - Salt Lake Comedy Festival 2012 - Best Actor - Josh Cameron

OFFICIAL SELECTION - Action on Film Festival 2011
OFFICIAL SELECTION - HollyShorts Film Festival 2011
OFFICIAL SELECTION - Who Likes Short Shorts Festival Spring 2011
OFFICIAL SELECTION - Film-Sharing Festival (Germany)
(Evidence taken from the video page on YouTube)

• In my opinion, I think the audience for Love Sick would attract a teenage onwards age group and a mixture of male and female views. I would also estimate the social class viewing this short film would be higher working class and lower middle class people. This would be due to the attitude and dialogue coming from the main character.

Media Language

·         In love sick, there are a few semantic codes that I spotted. Just after his second rejection, he goes to the park and sits on a bench. Audiences usually see this in a romance, when a couple break up, the chances are, one of the two will go sit on a park bench to think things over.

           

·         For this small clip of the man on the bench, they used a tracking shot simply going from left to right behind him. I thought this shot was interesting, especially the direction in which the decided to track. Going from left to right made it seem like a timeline. He was going along it and suddenly he ends up and stops there.

Good morning Mr tucker: a few notes on represntation- Dom

Representation

• The two characters in the film belong to a number of collective groups. they are homeless, one has a memory disorder, gender and race. However, I wont talk about ethnicity because it seems irrelevant in the context of the film
• 
  
• Firstly, The establishing shot shows the man walking towards the bench. from this shot alone we can see a shopping trolley full of belongings, the woman sleeping on then bench and the man walking into the shot. We instantly assume they are homeless and poor.
• 
  
• The woman says "good morning Mr Tucker" implying she knows him, and they are a couple. The smile on her face also shows they are happy
• 
  
• A mid close up is used showing the male character  pouring some "2010 vintage  in 2 wine glasses. This shows the romance between them. Although the drink is juice  there is still the romantic element of a dinner for tow. Traditionally here, the male character is getting the gifts.
• 
  
• We then find out its their anniversary after a series over shot reverse shot OVTs shots.

Night Walking 2008 – Daniel Cormack, BBC Film Network - Dom Hockaday

A woman is afraid she is being followed when she takes the shortcut home, when she turns around there is no one there but a mobile on the floor.  We then see the ‘attackers’ perspective and his completely innocent nature; he feels awkward because the women thinks he is a “rapist”. The man  is on the phone calling ‘mum’, not concentrating he falls down a hole in the pathway, leaving just his dialling phone.

Watch the short film here!!!

I chose this short because it is a situation that nearly everyone has experienced and the thoughts of the characters are similar to what my own would be, and found it funny.

Representation

I would consider men/women the main social groups associated with this short film. At first, the two groups (especially men) are represented in a very stereotypical way. To begin with, we instantly assume the woman will be a victim. The setting is a dark alleyway with high contrast/back lit lighting and unnerving non dietetic music is also heard. Almost immediately we associate this with a thriller/horror, where stereotypically, the woman is the victim and the male is the villain.

The situation in the short film is common and therefore we can relate to the feelings of the characters and react to their way of dealing with the situation.
The woman character is shown to be the victim. Wearing High heel  boots and a fur coat, it makes her seem more vulnerable:, compared to if she was wearing more practical/work clothes.

Plenty of mid close ups and close ups, accompanied with ‘dialogue’ (her thoughts) show us she is scared and anxious. Once again, it conforms to stereotypes as the woman being a victim and more emotional, not with a ‘stiff upper lip’ etc.

The male character is often in black and white picture to make him seem threatening and show (from the woman’s point of view) he is a malicious, slightly mad stalker. Jump cuts and non diegetic scratches portray him this way.
I think this could relate to maybe previous iconic and popular thrillers (i.e  Alfred Hitchcock – Physco 1960), in which the woman is also the victim, and it’s in black and white. However, the date should be taken into account as well as women’s and men’s role/place in society was very different then as opposed to nowadays and more modern times.

In a way, I would say it’s a negative representation, mainly because it is very stereotypical for a woman to be the victim, panicky and a ‘damsel in distress’. However, for the next part of the short to be effective and funnier, this stereotype is necessary. As the woman’s character shouldn’t really be scared at all of the male character as we see later.

The male character is harmless and innocent; completely the opposite of what the woman thinks. The actual camera work, lighting and sound (minus the dialogue) are very similar.
In my opinion, the man’s dialogue is the most important factor in showing the non-stereotypical male character. First off, his actual voice isn’t threatening or rough. He says things such as “Its embarrassing” and “Oh now she’s speeded up, Jesus” and “Ill call mum”. This clearly shows that he isn’t any danger and that he doesn’t want to come across as threatening. Which may be considered the opposite of what a male character would stereotypically want to appear.

I would say this is a positive representation because it shows that some men don’t want to scare people or come across like a thug etc but to be honest, I would say the use of representation is more for comedic purposes. I.e. the male character wouldn’t be as funny if the female didn’t stereotype him and we didn’t expect the female to be the victim of this “rough thug” in the first place.

Narrative

The plot of the film is fairly simple. A woman is being followed at night; she is scared as she stereotypes the man to be a thug/rapist. The man however is harmless, and whilst trying to call his mum, to appear unthreatening, he falls down a hole. I am not really sure at all what the story is as it seems these characters cross paths by chance. So I guess the story is their individual lives?

Plot of the story is a very common situation, so the audience can relate and find the 

humour in it.
The plot starts at the beginning, finishes, and the starts again from another perspective, so I think you could describe it as a multi strand circular narrative as it is shown from different perspectives, but starts and finishes at the same point in time.
Subjective and restricted narration because its being told through the characters view points. Creates dramatic irony (especially for female).
I’m not entirely sure what narrative theory this conforms to, maybe David Bordwell and Kirsten Thompsons theory of plot and story. The story to be honest is unknown but the plot of the film is very short, so there must be a much larger story behind these two characters. However, I think they crossed paths by chance?

Genre

Officially the Film is considered a comedy, possibly a black comedy. At first however, it has all the archetypes of your typical thriller. In fact, until the second part with the man’s perspective shown, I genuinely thought it was a thriller. The comedy genre is identifiable when the male character beings to talk. There is no tension because we see how harmless the male character is. It then turns into a comedy as the plot progresses.

Short films, typically use genre to attract an audience. The audience recognises a genre through familiar codes and conventions and are reassured. Authors depend on recognition for communication with the audience. The audience will know what to expect if they are familiar with the genre

This short is interesting because it’s similar to a hybrid of comedy and thriller. For half the film it’s a thriller for the other half it’s a comedy. However, the setting, lighting music and body language all suggest the thriller genre. We only really associate it as a comedy when the male talks or thinks.

Although it’s hard to class this films genre.
According to rick Altman’s genre theory, the semantic codes, i.e thriller iconography locations and characters, (female ‘doll’ victim male villain , dark urban alley etc)  all point towards a thriller. We would therefore expect the syntactic codes to be the women gets attacked/ is the victim. However, we see from the man’s view, and the syntactic codes, what we would expect to happen, don’t. This unexpected twist points towards a comedy and entertains the viewers.

Audience

The BBC film network is primarily there to help discover new and upcoming talent. Therefore, it would be expected that the audience will be film enthusiasts, other authors and young people interested in film. Short films tend to have a very wide audience that appeal to everyone. This film was rated a 12 by the bbfc, so the film must have been aimed at 12 and above. Teenager, middle aged maybe. Young to middle aged male and female, possibly students, with an interest in film, perhaps even filmmakers themselves.
The audience may be pleased by the film for a few reasons, firstly the twist or hybrids of genres that occurs surprises the audience and makes the film more entertaining: i.e it’s not the same repeated and expected syntactic codes that we are too familiar with that they are now not effective.

The creativity could inspire other film makers or perhaps be recognised by an institution willing to fund the author. Short films are very low budget and often the authors use them as a showcase of their talent to secure funding.
The short won the best Merton film maker award at the Wimbledon short film festival

Moreover, it was in the top 15 of the virgin media shorts competition (where it is also shown) but was not considered for the top prize because technically the BBFC considered the film a 12a as they said the humour was strong enough to lift the tone of the film, therefore it didn’t count.
Daniel Cormack, had several shorts before hand and established Actaeon Films

Media Language
For this concept Ill mainly talk about how the short film consistently uses thriller techniques to shunt the viewers idea of what the genre is. Making the comedic section even more effective. So, the codes and conventions of a thriller, which misleads the audience off the real genre for effect.

First of all, the digetic sounds of the woman’s boots on the ground are a great way to show her pace picking up as even slight increases can easily be heard. As her paces get quicker we expect something to climax: she gets attacked... but she doesn’t. There’s just a dialling phone on the floor. This also creates enigma.

Moreover, there are the quick cuts and tracking shots. The quick cuts give us the idea that something is drawing in closer to her and the tracking fairly clearly gives us an impression she is being followed. Which we know, but it just adds to the thriller archetypes (syntactic?).
The lighting as mentioned before is high contrast making shadows appear darker and conceal and distort facial features making characters, particularly the male seem more threatening.
In the second part of the film, media language is used purely to show us the males view and make us empathise with him.

When he falls down the hole at the end, the film is resolved (in a way),  and everything makes sense so there’s a new equilibrium according to Todarov’s Narrative theory... but without the male character.