Actors

This is our main actor Jordan Howes, the image above shows Jordan before the transformation from being a successful businessman with a family to being a moneyless scrounging scumbag. The suit gives Jordan the sense of authority and formality that the character needs in this scene. He will also have and expensive phone that he will be using to reinforce the sense of successfulness that is needed in this scene. In the photo above he has curly untouched hair, in the actual filming he had combed back hair to make him seem more professional less causal and scruffy. The main point of the slicked back hair, suit, expensive gadgets and smart shoes is to contrast as much as possible to the second scene in which Jordan is dressed completely oppositely to the first scene.

In the second scene Jordan is meant to be a homeless penniless scumbag. We told Jordan what we wanted in his costume and he came along to the shoot in this, after a few adjustments to the cloths (such as ripping the jeans and rolling down a muddy hill) we took the picture. We wanted to show the characters gradual decline into the sate he is now in by his cloths. We also asked him not to brush his hair as he did in the first scene; this was to create the rough look that we wanted fro him. We also asked him not to shave for a week, but this didn’t show out that much in the filming sadly. The main objective in this character was to strongly contrast the same character in the first scene and show the decline of the character just by his costume and look.

The last character is played by Tosh Goldspink; he does A level theatre studies so he was perfect. He also had all the correct attire for the part (the jacket, shoes, trousers and shirt). We didn’t really need to worry about what he looked like to much because we were not showing his face to create the sense on mystery and enigma. He does need to look a little build up. But we could just pad out his jacket more. The reason we want him to wear the expensive smart cloths is to create the look of him looking like he earns a lot of money but from something sinister. I think his jacket and his stance reinforce this idea.

Shot List

1. Long/Medium shots of the area (Location One)
2. Tracking shot of Main character walking down street, camera pans as he walks past.
3. Long still shot of Main character walking into the house.
4. Low angle shot of feet on the floor in the living room.
5. Tracking close up shot of hand on banister.
6. Close up over the shoulder of sink.
7. Medium/Close up shots of bathroom and objects in the bathroom.
8. Shot of mirror, pan down to close up shot of hands coming over the camera.
9. Over the shoulder shot showing the Main character in the mirror (Location Two)
10. Mix of outside and inside shots looking at the location, Long/medium/short (jerky, unstable shots)
11. Still long shot showing back and side of Second character.
12. Close up of feet standing next to car, maybe standing on a cigarette.
13. Low angle camera, Pan up to torch (smooth steady shots)
14. Scene change to Main character, multiple angle shots of Main character in the house.
15. Scene change, Medium shot of Second character getting a phone call, (Camera behind Second character, very slow zoom)
16. Scene change to Main character, close up of hands, fast pan up to his face when he hears something.
17. Distant light on Main characters face, close up.
18. Tracking shots, still, pans, zooms, lots of angled choppy shots of the Main character running around the location and hiding from the Second character.
19. Smooth shots of Second character looking for Main character. Some long tracking, still and pan shots.
20. POV or over the shoulder shot of the Main character, Second character finding the Main character, Close up of Second character’s feet, jerky pan up to torch. Scene end.

Costumes

For the first scene the main man is a successful man. In the story he is returning home from somewhere. If he was returning back from work then he could be wearing an expensive suit. Or he could be wearing other expensive garments that imply that he is a successful man. In the second scene he has to be wearing scrappy and dirty cloths. But it’s a cold winter’s evening so he will we wearing a coat of some sort. This has to be worn and dirty. Also lots of hoodies under the coat add to the idea that he is homeless. Some fingerless gloves will also be needed. For the second character he has to look smart and well dressed. So an expensive jacket will be needed, smart trousers and some smart shoes. This makes the contrast between the two characters very apparent.

1. jacket of the second man with the torch.
2. smart trousers that the man with the torch can be wearing.
3. the type of cloths the main charicter shoud be wearing after the change. (without the kife)
4. type of smart casual cloths the man would be wearing before the transformation.

Props

In our thriller we need a couple of props. In the first scene the unnamed man id a highflying family man with a good job and earning a sufficient amount of money. We thought we could have the first scene in a shop were the man is on his way home. For this we would have to have some sort of edible or drinkable item that he could be eating/ drinking on the way home. When he gets into the house we might need him to trip over some child toys or we could actually use children instead, but for the ease we might use a child’s toy to signify he has children. For the scene where he is in the bathroom we need normal bathroom props such as toothbrush, soap and hairbrush (which could suggest he has a wife, if it was a hairbrush that was feminine). The most important prop we need in the bathroom is the mirror. We also need a different mirror that dirty and maybe got a crack in it. For the man who is looking for the main man in the opening he needs to be smart and most importantly he needs a big torch that would be powerful enough to light up a warehouse. This is our main source of light in the second part of the opening. For the man looking for the main man, he could have a posh phone such as a Blackberry. A Blackberry is a businessman’s tool. This would make the man seem professional and contrasted to the scraggy, dirty man who he is pursuing.

Location

For our opening of our thriller we would like to film in two locations. The first location is a family home. We haven’t decided whose home we are going to use yet but it needs to have a white bathroom. This white bathroom connotes clean and happy, this is what we want because the white clean bathroom sharply contrasts the dirty, messy house in our second location. The second location is an old abandon farm. It has an old cottage and 2 warehouses and one stable house with a smaller warehouse inside it. The biggest warehouse is huge, the second one has a very run down roof. This looks really cool when it is sunny and it implies a sense of danger when inside because of the jagged and sharp roof. The old stable is extremely run down, in one room the roof had had collapsed in the corner (we didn’t go in that room). In the old stable there is a hole in the wall looking into another room. This hole could connote lots of things such as claustrophobia and someone watching what’s in the other room. The cottage is a 1970’s built house that is very messy. There is dust everywhere and rubble in most rooms. There is an arch in between the living and dining room. We walked up the stairs but when we got to the top the whole top floor was collapsed so we didn’t explore the top floor. The farm is situated at the top of a hill. The old farm land was used as a landfill site in the 1980’s so it cannot be built on. The farm is situated on the outskirts of the city, to the south. Just behind the farm the A47 rumbles past, and about 100m so does the busy Norwich-London train line. I like the way it’s quite isolated from civilisation but it has the fast moving traffic and trains that would not stop, so it is quite isolated. Also near the farm there are some small woods on a steep hill, a pond (which could be frozen over if it is cold enough), lots of abandoned fridges, and because its an old landfill site, the grass that is covering the festering landfill makes the rolling hills resemble something like Teletubyland. Around the grassy hills there are air outlets where the methane produced from the landfill can escape. These outlets are made out of solid iron and look basically like air vents in the middle of the field. Overall this location is perfect. It’s not to far from the city to make it rural but it’s not to urban either. It’s perfectly situated and the added things like the pond, wooded hill and the fridges add to the amount of ideas we could use.

1. the big werehouse

2. what it looks like from the bottom of the hill

3.the archway in the cottage

4.the stables

5. abandon fridges

6.the house

7.the second werehouse (with nice roof)

Women in film noir

scarlet street (1933)

Females in Film Noir sparked a new way of representing women in modern film. Before film noir women were shown as damsels in distress and a bit hopeless at defending themselves. So they often relied on the main man in the film to come and save her. So film noir started to show women as independent strong minded. It was the film noir genre that first started using Fem-Fatal’s. This became used in normal mainstream films from then on.

film noir classic double indemnity has classic examples of women in the fim.

The conventional characteristics of women in film noir are that they often have something to hide which is a crucial to the whole movie’s plot. Like for example in the movie “The Third man” the woman in the movie knows about what crimes Harry Lime committed but would not tell the main character about this. But later on in the movie the main character finds out about the truth of his friend and realises that he is a monster because he was selling faulty medicine to hospitals which ended up killing the small children. With Fem-Fatal’s they often have something crucial to hide from the main male character which is fighting for the triumph of good rather than evil. Another characteristic of a Fem-Fatal is the elaborate costumes that they were. In the movie scarlet street (1933) the woman in it has extremely elaborate costume which included lots of feathers and netting. She is also sexy with her long dress that is cut almost above her thighs. Another characterises of women in film noir is that nearly all of them smoke. This is because in the heyday of film noir it was seen as sexy and classy. Often the cigarette is lit by a mans equally classy Zippo. Since the heyday of film noir smoking has been found to be unhealthy and has been de-glamorised.

smoking in film noir.

The openings to “Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels” and “Layer Cake”

The openings of Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels and Layer Cake have some fundamental differences but they also have many similarities. The difference that is the most apparent is the budget. Layer Cake had a massive budget stretching into millions of pounds. The most obvious sign of this is the main star of the movie, the name of the character is not known throughout the whole movie but he is played by Daniel Craig, who later went on to be the next James Bond. He would have cost a lot of money to be in the movie. Whereas Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels has relatively unknown actors some of whom it is their first movies. Many of who went on to bigger things. And at the time Guy Ritchie was an unknown film director he had only directed one movie beforehand. But for the director for Layer Cake Matthew Vaughn it was his first movie ever. But the Matthew Vaughn was a producer for many of Guy Ritchie films, such as Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels and Snatch. I am not sure how he got such a big budget for his first movie but he might have made good contacts while he was a producer. Another reason you can tell the difference in budget is that the opening of the two movies is that Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels does not have any expensive locations or any shots that would need anything more than some rails. The opening is on an east London street that would be easy to get and inexpensive. Whereas the opening of Layer Cake has lots of expensive CGI in the drug shop, and crane shots which would cost lots of money to use in the street outside the flat. But the shot that emphasizes this point is the shot of the powerful Audi speeding up a long drive in the countryside towards a big golf clubhouse. It has been filmed by a helicopter which would be very expensive to use.

But they both have similarities too. For example they both have a voice over from the main character. In Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels the voice over comes later than Layer Cake which is on from the first shot of the movie. This convention is used in many British gangster movies and is effective because it sets the scene for the rest of the movie.

The opening credits are used to create an effect in Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels it breaks up the picture to create an effect to make the viewer wonder what’s happening because you can hear what’s happening but not see it. This creates an expectation for the viewer. It also gets people switched on and they are more likely read who funded the movies which is a good thing for those companies. Layer Cake uses the covenantal use of the credits which is putting the words over the shot so you can still see the picture but it shows you the credits as well.

Overall both movies have some big similarities like the use of a voice over. But they also have some big fundamental differences like the budget. This is very apparent in both films. Even though Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels is much lower budget than Layer Cake I much prefer the movie Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels because it’s more quirky and interesting than Layer Cake.