reflective analysis

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.