Fantasy Film Making Part 1

In lesson were given the task of fantasy film making. In groups of 3 we were had to pick a Production company, budget and scenario all at random. We were given Hollywood flix, 30 million dollars, and a scenario of: "An action adventure about a British lab technician who has a super alter ego". From these factors we has to decide on a synopsis and a title for the film.

Narrative

We had decided on several narratives for the synopsis. But we want to slightly adapt the synopsis a little, our first idea was to create 2 technicians, a husband and a wife. But we had decided that it would be quite difficult to find a matching target audience. Our second idea was to go for Todorovs Film structure (Equilibrium, Disruption, Disequilibrium, Resolution, Equilibrium), We had had came to a conclusion this would be an ideal layout for our film, in terms of engaging the audience and also it would make the film flow better. So our final synopsis was like this :"Starts off in 21st century laboratory, where 2 brothers are attempting to find a cure for a deadly pandemic, during their investigations both of the brothers has an accident which chemically alters their abilities, one of the brother takes advantage of the power and holds the other brothers wife at ransom. This where the adventure takes place. The Good Brother takes a while to control his powers and trains himself so he can defeat his brother and try to turn him to good. The Bad brother manages to hold his wife at the tower bridge along with other civilians. The good Brother find his counterpart, and an epic showdown is performed on the tower bridge. The bad brother is right on edge to kill his sibling, but the love between them is too strong for him to do so. They shake hands and the wife is saved. The Good brother teaches his sibling to be good, and they go back to trying to cure the disease.

Narrative and Audience

We decided to choose two brothers instead of one character, to make the audience choose sides, and to establish a moral in the story therefore making it more creative. From Our research we had found that most British action/adventure films include a heroine in order to carry the plot along, to try and establish that narrative within our story , we thought it would contribute to the Britishness of our film . This technique also is effective in terms of age range, from previous media texts, we have noticed that fairy tales usually include a heroine as well, has well has two villains, so our film targets our younger viewers as well our older ones has well. Our location is set London, which is highly multicultural, this helps to vary our ethnic audience, while displaying to the world a accurate version of Britain, has London is the capital, in terms of targeting our gender, we decided to include a female as one our main roles, many films in this decade have produced some very good actresses who have starred in heroine roles, this had an impact has the heroine is usually associated dumb blond, so our film will show the male and female audience that heroines are regarded has important roles, In comparison to previous films.

Location

The second part of the task was to choose our locations for our film, we had 30 million dollars to spend so we decided not to choose massive location that are heavily priced but we need to pick famous locations in order to represent our selves has a Hollywood production company.Our first choice was Central London, this was important for us to represent Britain in the most accurate way possible. We also chose the Tower bridge has our main scene in London, for our battle, the bridge is quite long and therefore provided us lots of space and area to four effective camerawork. It cost us 1 million pounds not a huge fund and therefore providing us with enough money for the rest of locations. Our second choice of location, was a British town centre, we had figured we would need scenes has intervals for our action scenes, these could include crimes, mugging or displays of superpowers, we would need illustrate the culture within the story and a town centre can demonstrate that best, at £100,000 it wast too expensive and became very cost effective. Our third choice took us some time to decide, but we chose to create our location, our purpose for this was, that many supernatural films need location that meet the style of character, and it would be very costly if we used a real town, and demolished to our liking, therefore creating a location helps us to express the creativity and also helps to create our layout more accurately according to the narrative, examples of this would include the lab or destructions, at 100,000 pounds it would be cost-effective. We couldn't just show one city in the whole of England, to represent us, we had to show other parts in order to give us a more accurate representation. So we choose to film other parts of Britain, to show the world what the nation really is like, we also need other places to demonstrate our characters abilities, these places could include Scotland, Wales or Northern Ireland. Our last choice was "Anywhere in the world", we thought this would be a wise choice in order to convey the multi-cultural ideology that Britain provides, this also ties in with the fact that our characters need to display their abilities, not only in Britain but across the world, we would also be doing other countries a favour by promoting their famous landmarks, and therefore gaining money. At 1 million pounds it could be a risk, but with most large box-office film making similar decisions, we had to compete with them in the tight market. Our overall cost was 2,220,000 pounds, a reasonable price providing that we have other factors to finance.

Characters

The main factor contributing with our film was the amount of experience our actors had. So we made sure that we have the ultimate that connect with the audience has well has the narrative too, we chose Michael Caine to play the role of the father, we thought this would would be a good choice has he is a well respected British Icon, who is an experienced actor that has been in several major film productions, we also thought that playing the role of the father gives him a lot of respect and the wise role fits him perfectly, and at 1 million pounds he provides experience at a low cost.Our second actor was Jude Law, his Style and individuality makes him a big role in any film, and this film he plays the role of the Good Lab technician, his creativity will provide an ambience aspect to the film, and at 5 million pounds he is healthy bargain. The Villain, now needs an actor with ruthlessness and a sort of "Swagger" approach, we thought that Daniel Craig would fit this role. Has a Previous James Bond star, his laid back, ice cool nature, makes him an ideal role, and 5 million pounds definitely portrays that.Our Heroine needs to be stable and not ditsy, and needs to have a hint of hero ability has well, we thought Kate winslet would fit this role quite nicely, has a previous actress in Titanic, she shows stability and leading female domination(survives over husband), this shows a bit of decision over what will happen if she is rescued or not. This provides good entertainment for the characters, at 1 million pounds this a decent price for an experienced actress. Our last choice of actors were for a role of the Henchmen, now the henchmen doesn't necessary need a large role, but just someone who can fit quick witty comments like, Filch in Harry Potter. We chose Vinny Jones, we were going to choose Ross Kemp, however Vinny Jones provides slightly more popularity and more charisma to the role and plus intimidating demeanour , whereas Ross Kemp is known for TV dramas, and not big Hollywood films, so he doesn't have that reputation and status. Our characters names were quite simple in order to grasp the characters personality better, Dad= Stuart Wright, Good Brother= James Wright, Bad Brother= Philip Wright, Wife= Mary Wright and the Henchmen, Steve Jackson, we chose the surname Wright has a simple connotation for morals, the film basic attempt is to explore the themes of good and bad, so the name "Wright" is a clever little pun used to demonstrate that.

Sound

The sound is a big impact in any film, and for 30 million pounds we had to make sure our film met the standards of our target audience. The first choice of music was to have Orchestral music. Atmosphere is a key aspect of our film, and the music manages to explore that better then any of the other the factor of movies, this sound has been used in films such has "Star Wars", "Superman" and "Indiana Jones". We have also decided that we use this at the beginning of films, has from our research most Hollywood films have this music at the beginning of films has well, we concluded that it is used to enhance the atmosphere of the film to catch the Viewers attention, right from the very start, this is not only used at the start but also used at the end of films to conclude all narratives and also the music is slightly calmer, so we decided to use this type of sound twice, for the credits and Beginning, all for a cost of 500,000 so a real bargain, considering the fact that most films use the same orchestral production. We also have decided to use Evanescence has one the main groups for our music, we chose this group because of their climatic music productions i.e songs like Bring me to life, have a slow start then really pick up the pace, we have decided to use this for our emotional parts of the song to really enhance the Tension between the characters for example when James Wright(Jude Law) realises his wife(Kate Winslet) has been held hostage. We also have chosen Fight Club has our main song for fight scenes, we chose this song to make the it seem slightly more pacy and suspenseful and also in coordination and camerawork as well the direction for the film as well. We decided to choose these different types of sound productions, to target a vary of age ranges, the orchestral apply s to mostly to classical, which is considered mostly with the older generation and the Evanescence and Fight club are slightly more contemporary. The cost of all these music production was 700,000 pounds a reasonable price considering the fact that they apply alot to theme of the music.

Representation

I think This film is heavily based on the Britishness of this decade. Some Audience would say that the film doesn't portray the Britishness, because the culture of this time period keeps changing, and therefore production companies have to keep with the constant ethnicity and culture popularity. However different styles and techniques from previous decades come into culture from time to time. So our film has to maintain those factors and express them to the audience in an original and unique way.Our Films main positive is that it takes into consideration the different techniques that independent films use and try to combine those with the techniques we use. All of our actors are mainstream and are British, I believe that this film fits right in the market if you analyse the different British films that have been produced in the last decade have included mostly British actors "The last Duchess" and "Harry Potter". Both films have been quite successful harry potter (£49,136,969 (UK) and The Last Duchess ( £6,360,913 (UK). Both films have been produced over 3 years ago making this 4th year a possible success for us, has we could fit right into market for all British films. The location of our films were mainly directed in London and famous British areas, this represents Britain quite accurately has London is the Capital of the Country and is therefore playing a big role in representing Britain. Over the past decade has associated Britain with Crimes and hooligans( a negative representation), this film is meant to show other nations, that crimes do happen, and that no country can be perfect. So our film does discuss some dark issues with Stabbing(a recent crime activity) and Burglary and the villains do convey the activity, but also commit these crimes in other parts of the world, which connatates that these crimes happen all over the world. London is a highly multi-cultural city compared to others in Europe, this gives Britain a positive representation respect different cultures and ethnicities. Overall I believe that this film has a positive representation on Britain has it manages to convey the different contemporary issues of this Time.