Reflective Analysis
Pre-production
Production
Research for the film consisted looking at existing action
short films and looking at the way they are composed, this meant looking at
narratives and camera work. The usual narrative of an action film was set out
in the Todorov structure which sets out an equilibrium then a disruption
usually an antagonist who is trying to get something in the protagonists
possession, this usually ends in an attempt to repair the equilibrium and then
a new equilibrium is established. In our short film we decided to follow this
narrative structure, which meant having the protagonist captured and
interrogated by the antagonists. Having the protagonist kill the antagonist and
escaping and getting to the briefcase creating a new equilibrium. The structure
was set out a little different because we had the protagonist in a disruption
then solved the disruption with a new equilibrium.
In my film I was working with Liam Potter, I worked on
Editing, Screenplay and writing the scripting for the short film. Liam was
working on filming and location hunting as well as producing the storyboard. I
also produced the animatic for the final planning stages of preproduction. When
working on the screenplay it was difficult to create because Liam who was
supposed to work on the storyboard did not do it correctly and so this impacted
on my creation of the screenplay. This did not impact too greatly on the final
film however it did greatly impact on the preproduction stages of the film. The
final film was also impacted because Liam did not manage to get the flashback
scene filmed and so I could not edit the film properly and so this made a huge
impact because I had to change parts of the film to keep the intended meaning
of the final film.
The camera angles were chosen to have the audience reflect on
what the characters were feeling. The camera angles were made to show the
audience restricted views of the characters to show the audience only certain
parts of the action occurring. Action in particular the punch scene is zoomed
in upon with the camera and remains a central part of the video. When filming
the final scene it was important to look at what impact the audience was
expecting to get and then play with this emotion, the extreme long shots
contrasted against what was happening in the previous tight and claustrophobic
scenes. The scenes have a manipulative feeling because the audience never get
to find out what is inside of the case and the manipulative camera angles
reflect this as they never show what is inside of the case.
The editing was one of the most important parts of the film
sequence, I edited the entire short film, this included changing the actual way
the film panned out whilst still including the main narrative structure of the
film. When editing I had to change the way that the film was composed
completely, the film was missing the main flashback sequence because Liam who
was supposed to film the sequence did not get the sequence filmed within dates
close enough to the deadline to allow me to edit any footage, no footage
existed of the flashback sequence so it had to be completely removed from the
sequence without destroying the sequence or the narrative structure already
laid out. The edited sequence changed the way the audience viewed the film.
This included the speed in which shots were shown increasing the intensity of
the film and changing the audiences understanding of what was occurring.
Sound was crucial in creating audience understanding for
what sequence what was occurring, the soundtrack featured at the end of the
sequence was found from YouTube sound base. The soundtrack reflected the more
relaxed feeling of the final part of the sequence. The sound occurring in
earlier scenes was also important because it showed the emotions impacting the
characters and helped to reflect this on the audience. The sound was paramount in adding action to
scenes requiring it. The sound also filled in for when the audience could not
be shown what was happening such as when the protagonist was choking on blood
although blood is shown falling onto the floor it is never shown leaving the
protagonists mouth this is instead left to the imagination of the audience,
allowing the audience to create something that would have been difficult to
show.
The audience feedback was largely positive facing the film,
this included audiences understanding what the film was about. Audiences got
the overall narrative of the story, however because a key scene was missing and
the film restructured in editing, it was difficult for some audiences to
understand the actions of the protagonist, some audience members also had
problems seeing the motives of the antagonists and overall what their aim was,
it was later however resolved when watching the sequence a second time allowing
them to pick up on dialogue explaining the antagonists motives. Overall however
audiences liked the sequence and enjoyed the action portrayed to them in the
sequence, this included the punching scenes as well as the ride on the
motorcycle at the end of the film. Audiences understood what genre the film was
through props and costume as well as fast paced editing usual of the genre.
Overall the films production ran into problems when filming
however through editing I was able to restructure the film whist allowing it to
still make sense. The films production did take longer than expected because I
was relying on Liam to film which wasn’t always easy organising the cast to all
be available on the same day to shoot this delayed editing times and the
overall production however time was quickly made back with multiple editing
sessions changing the film until the final edit was achieved.
