Occupation: Daytime waitress in cafe, evening dancer in adult club.
Previous Jobs (if any): Worked in a different cafe.
Residency: Apartment with boyfriend.
Family life: Speaks to parents by phone regularly and sees them bi-monthly, has healthy relationship with boyfriend.
Close friends: Connor Martin (boyfriend), Alexis Renner
Where is this person right now?: Hospital
Why is she there?: Her boyfriend, Connor, was on his way home when he was mugged and has been badly injured. Sophie has arrived at hospital to learn that he is in critical condition.
Who are they with?: Connor (who is being treated)
Where were they at 10pm last night?: Her apartment
Who were they with?: Nobody
Where do they see themselves in 5 years?: Sophie would like to be studying abroad in Rome, but realistically believes she'll probably still be where she is now.
"Stranded" is a short film directed by Alex La Riviere for their A2 media coursework. I thought that instead of look into a professional short film, this time I would look into something which is a bit lower down the spectrum. I'm not saying this is bad, I'm merely stating that it could use improvements, though I have seen worse.
So, what's this about? "Stranded" seems to be about three girls (that consistently look at the camera) who are travelling to an undisclosed location for no apparent reason. Along the way, one of the passengers attempts to turn on the radio (probably) and this miraculously causes the car to break down. The driver gets out, angrily, and lifts up the bonnet (which is later closed for no reason) and inspects the damage which clearly isn't there. Then they all sit in the car and the driver phones for help. The driver then gets out of the car while phoning, walks ridiculously far away and is taken down by a "Mystery Killer". The other girls, who're in the car, decide it's too dangerous to stay in the car and then go out into the area which they are unfamiliar with and run towards the danger, completely disregarding their own safety and their friend's well-being. At this point one girl runs away from the other for no clear reason and is probably killed. The other girl appears to have done a complete loop around the area (why did she bother?) and returns to the car. She then turns around to see that the killer is in fact in the car with her! DUN DUUN DUUUUN! The car then drives away, leaving it unclear as to whether the girl was killed or actually working with the killer, in which case they lived happily ever after. Which, as a twist ending, would probably be more exciting than the killer just driving away. The lack of reasoning and motives behind the characters is probably why this film hasn't won any awards. On the plus side, it's taught me a valuable lesson about how character should drive the story, not just follow it.
The sound in this film is mostly diagetic with lots of background noise... Such as wind. Lots of wind. So much wind that the characters can barely be heard at points. But apart from that it's ok, I guess.
The non-diagetic sounds are mainly music, copyrighted music. Which, despite being used without the copyright holder's permission, is actually well fitted. The opening credits are complimented with the use of the song "Stranded", the same name as the short film. It sets it up to be rather promising, as you can get a sense of what the film is about through the song lyrics, it's almost foreshadowing, if the title didn't give it away already.
The next bit of non-diagetic sound is, what I believe to be, radio static. I think. Static is often used with broken TVs and radios, which helps the audience to believe that the car is broken.
Creepy tension music plays in the build up top the first victim being taken. It makes the audience anticipate what is to come and makes them edgy, as they know something will go wrong. They just don't know when. It actually does set the scene well.
While the driver goes to take her phone call and the girls talk about her behind her back, the editing takes advantage of cross dissolves and fades to show the passing of time. This is combined with dramatic music to build tension.
Occasionally there are short jump-cuts. While these are likely to be due to poor takes, they could also show slight passes of time or used for comedic effect.
In the beginning, "Stranded starts out with a good establishing shot. This allows the audience to get an idea of the location, however, the duration of the shots does last for what seems like a small eternity and makes you want to shout "just get on with it!".
The part of this film which I particularly enjoy is the tripod in-shot at around 2:53. I feel like it really adds to the feel of the film.
But seriously, the only mise-en-scene in this film that was thought about appears to be the clothing of the "mystery killer". The black clothing and the hood make him look dangerous, black meaning death and the hood makes the character look like they're hiding something.
This week me and the team (The Thunder Cats (I haven't discussed the team name with the others yet)) have been recreating a scene from "The Chronicles Of Narnia: The Lion and the Witch in the Wardrobe". In this scene, Lucy meets Mr. Tumnus. We followed directions from a script, but had to make a few changes as we went due to the lack of recources... and umbrellas. More info about this will be released in video form, for your entertainment!
Instead of being psychological or action-y, I thought I'd have a whirlo in the comedy genre. This idea is based around the idea of holding a grudge and getting revenge. It starts with two boys, around the age of 12, playing games and stuff. One of the boys decides to trip the other up. The other falls and is clearly embarrassed. He stands up and says "I'll get you back for that".
The next sequence is like a montage of the boy planning a way of getting revenge on the boy who tripped him up. This takes years and years of planning. We're talking decandes, nearly a century. They're old men now . While one's been leading a normal life and has completely forgotten the incident, the other has been inside scheming his whole life.
The story now goes in one of 3 ways, either the build up is fulfilled and there is a highly elaborate prank, there is a let down and the revenge is literally tripping up the other person, or the avenger emerges, sees how much the world has changed and has a heart attack. Pretty dark, I know, but that's what you get for obsessing over something so small.
Me and my totally sweet crew were set the task to recreate the iconic scene from "Narnia: The Lion and the Witch in the Wardrobe" in which Lucy meets Mr Tumnus for the first time. As you can see, below is a story board which I totally didn't rush and finish within 20 minutes. It actually took 40.
We were given a script of the scene and the task was to simply to focus on camera angle more than anything else.
The location we chose was some nearby woods, because of the high availability and mild resemblence, despite the lack of snow. The many trees made it the best location for this, considering the short time we had to film and edit. Around creating this masterpiece of a storyboard, characters had to be forged. Despite having seen the film already, it was decided that we would have our own take on the characters. This did however make Mr. Tumnus a really creepy fawn who may or may not have had ulterior motives. Unintentional, yet creepy and hilarious.
In my mind, Mr Tumnus was a Fawn who suffered with social interaction and is desperate for attention and friendship. In seeing Lucy he instantly sees an opportunity to make a friend and comes across as desperate and creepy, yet strangely lovable... After the creepiness. He has good intentions, but they don't always appear that way.
Lucy is a little British girl who has just stepped into the wondrous land of Narnia, and doesn't seem to really question why there is snow and a stupidly large amount of space in the wardrobe, which she originally went into to hid in a game of hide-and-seek.
It's because of this that we wanted her to come across as a bit dippy and easily lead, which she was. Her curiosity gets the better of her and she seems to lack common sense. Still, completely innocent if a bit annoying.
Unlike traditional films, which are usually shown in cinemas and DVDs, short films are consumed in other ways. Some similar, others not so similar.
In my own experience, I've seen short films screened before feature length films at the cinema. My example of this is "PJ, TINY PLANET EXPLORER". Yet another short film by PJ Liguori. This was screened before Peter Jackson's "The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey" in Cinema City.
DVD & Blu-Ray extras are another way of broadcasting short films, as well as other material like gag reels and commentaries. Amoungst The short films released as extras this year, a popular short film was placed in the extras of the "Avengers Assemble" movie. This short film is a spin-off of the feature film and is called "Item 47". It
features a couple who discover a piece of alien weaponry and then decide to rob a bank.
The BBC Film Network is an online platform for hosting short films. Though it doesn't accept all entries, it allows the better films that are sourced to be displayed on their homepage. This could also push film makers to produce the highest quality content they can.
Short film festivals are a popular way of consuming short films. Like the BBC Film Network, though, not all entries are accepted.
I still believe that YouTube is the easiest way of sharing content. It's not the best way of promoting it, but it's highly accessibly and therefore easy to consume. When integrated and shared through social networking sites, like Twitter and FaceBook, it can be an effective way of sharing content.
Building on what was previously posted, I've been thinking. What if, instead of 2 people (A and B), it was one person all along? A person lays notes out for a past version of their self to find. I think it would be a better twist and therefore have greater pay off. Obviously, it requires tweaking the story a bit to make some form of sense.
So, this person keeps finding notes and messages throughout points in their life, just like last time. The difference this time is that instead of a random word, it's a series of initials, with maybe even a symbol too, at one point. We don't know what this means and neither does the past character.
Over time, they get grow older and become familiar with these messages and eventually attempt to seek out what they mean. After lots of research, they find something which matches the initials and symbol. This is some kind of group, society or company or something (I haven't decided yet).
This character then joins this company and works their way in well, up to the point where they're introduced to the leader of the group, society or company. This leader takes the character to one side and tells them the big secret of their people... Time travel! Ta daa! (Bet you didn't see that coming).
It's at this point when the character laughs and says "So it was you who left me all those messages".
The leader looks confused "I never did, nor do I plan to do such a thing".
"But then... Who?"
The leader moves closer "my boy (or girl), you and I are the only ones who know of this time travel".
Reaction shot of the character's face. End.
There are some flaws and loopholes to it, as with any time travel related stuff with no rules, but it's implied that the character laid out the messages for their past self. And the character should put a message in a locked combination safe-box, which only they know the code to, to reinforce the idea that it was them. Just to make things clearer.
