Film Openings
Observations
Before start our coursework, we did some research about what is included in the first two-minutes of a film opening from the three different film openings that I studied.
A Man Called Otto
- Production informations
- Establishing shot of where the main character at
- Shows the main character in a grocery shop called Busy Beaver
The Irish Man
- Production informations
- Shows inside of the hospital while playing jazz music on background
- Starts with an old man's soliloquy
Hustle
- Production informations
- Establishing shot of a man closing down his sports shop
- Shot moves to other important characters, showing what they are doing while the man closing his shop
One thing I noticed while I was observation, all three movies started with their production informations first, and then showing what the main character was doing in first two minutes. Also all three movies started with showing certain places, such as Busy Beaver shop, the hospital, man's own sports shop.
Idea Generation
We started to generate ideas about how we will fulfil the brief. We did many ways to do this, including mind mapping, brainstorming and discussion.
Reflection : Deciding Genre
After we finished our idea generation about the coursework, we split into groups, and I become a group with Phan. As a group, we shared some initial ideas about choosing genre of the coursework. After a few discussion, we had common thoughts and ideas about certain genre, we decided to be an
Action Comedy !
I think our group's choice of genre was quite excellent. Rather than choosing the horror and thriller that everyone chooses, although it is difficult to film, the special action-comedy genre seemed like it would produce a great work if filmed properly. Based on educational based filming, we would like to make an action movie to relieve stress that can be enjoyed lightly by eliminating drugs, severe violence, or a narrative with strong sensations, and adding a bit of comedy.
For the safety of the actors and us, we will not be filming dangerous scenes, such as car chasing scenes or falling scenes.
Codes & Conventions
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Fights - Actions
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Weapons - gun, knife
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Chasing scenes - Can add tension and thrill to enhance the overall experience
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Massive Destruction - Makes audience feel powerful
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Explosions and Crashes - Gives a sense of accomplishment
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Comic Characters - Can enhance comical ambience by its silliness
Symbolic Codes:
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Bright Colours - Red, yellow, orange which can add sense of humour and brightness
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Showy Colours - Can attract audiences' attention
Colour Codes:
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Film Techniques - Using High & Low angle to show and emphasise a character's situation.
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Canted Angle - Can make the situation much funnier
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Whip Pan - Adding pace and tension to the progression of the film
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Bright Lighting - can lighter the ambience
Technical Codes:
Written Codes:
Basic informations - subtitles, date, etc
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Loud noises - explosive sounds
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Up beat nerve racking music - Can higher the sense of immersion
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Caricature - Using random sound effect which doesn't matches to the situation
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Special Sound Effects - Adding funny or silly sounds as amusement feature to enjoy
Audio Codes:
Genre Convention
Light actions and narratives not including some serious and grim storytelling.
Physical actions produced by funny falls, heightened stunts, and bizarre circumstances.
A light joke or humour to break up an awkward or serious atmosphere
Narrative Convention
Serious Problem occurs: Protagonists will have a problem that breaks their equilibrium that they should solve.
Unusual Setting Starts: Putting the protagonist in a strange environment opens up storylines for drama and hilarity.
Setting Convention
Exaggerated Features: Using well-known components to produce humorous absurdity.
Regular places like businesses, schools, or small towns are transformed into hubs for frantic action and hilarious accidents.
Character Convention
Buddy Comedy: Two improbable friends with diametrically opposed personalities go on entertaining escapades together.
Dull Villains: More foolish and less intimidating than scary villains, with slapsticks and witty jokes.
Research :
9 - frame analysis
9 frame analysis
No Time To Die
AVENGERS: ENDGAME
The King's Man
9 - Frame Analysis :
No Time To Die
NO TIME TO DIE
2021
Genre: Action, Adventure, Thriller
Bond has left active service and is enjoying a tranquil life in Jamaica. But when his old friend Felix Leiter from the CIA asks for help, he finds himself facing off against a mysterious villain armed with dangerous new technology.
9 - Frame Analysis :
The King's Man
The King's Man
2021
Genre: Action, Comedy, Suspense, Thriller
As a collection of history's worst tyrants and criminal masterminds gather to plot a war to wipe out millions, one man must race against time to stop them. Discover the origins of the very first independent intelligence agency in The King's Man. The Comic Book “The Secret Service” by Mark Millar and Dave Gibbons.
#1
The film starts with a deep focus of extreme long shot of showing South Africa, which is telling the audience where the main story will be set.
The written codes of this frame suggest the narrative will be in South Africa, with a time period of 1902. From this, audiences may can assume that this film is related to racism, considering its location and era.
Moreover, the non-diegetic music started to play with the first scene, the classic orchestra. This classic orchestra exaggerates the sense of immersion to the film and also gives splendid and important feeling about the following frame.
#2
The film moves to the next frame, still with a deep focused extreme long shot but focusing more on the group of old horse carriages, with classic orchestra music plays on. This focusing and non-diegetic music can demonstrate that those carriages are doing important job or mission, which can possibly be delivering objects or take someone to the certain place.
#4
The scene moves to the establishing shot by upward tilt of The Red Cross' destination, with a leader's appearance from back. The non diegetic music emphasised as the destination revealed.
By this, we can assume that they were going to the place which might be the military base to deliver some aids. The emphasised music also tells that the main story will be set or about that base.
#3
The third frame continues with the same non-diegetic music, but with a medium shot of the black man in the lead of carriages group. While they were going, suddenly his face got serious, stopped and called "your grace" who is a white man and well dressed which tells he is in high-class and important.
Within this frame, we can know that they are The Red Cross by the sign on the bag and flags. The Red Cross delivering medicines and food to people in need, so the reason why group of carriages was going to certain place was to deliver aids. Also it is presumable that they reached the destination by a black man's words, and possibly the white man is the leader of The Red Cross or from more higher classed organisation.
#5
The shot changes to eye level shot of the man with a shallow focus, who's holding a binoculars to facilitate reconnaissance. The shallow focus on him gives the audience complete clarity in a shot, allow them to focus on him more detailed.
By this, we can know that the man is having little smile on his face, which means that they reached the correct destination and satisfied about what he seeing.
#6
The shot moves to the next scene, showing the inside of the base through the binoculars, which is the POV of the man.
In this shot, we can assume that something serious happened before The Red Cross arrives. Many graves and corpses on the land and soldiers are moving them, also the non diegetic music suddenly changes to a more downbeat.
#7
This shot-reverse-shot shows the man's reaction from the last shot, which is quite negative as his little smile has gone compared to when he sees the base first time. By this, we can assume that something unexpected bad situation happened on the base or to him.
#8
The shot moves to the downward tilt angle, shows two soldiers be on sentry duty. They let their guard down a bit but suddenly straightened up and their faces get serious and tense up as if they had spotted someone or something. Through this, we can guess that it is a remote area where people usually don't visit and far from war. This means that the graves and corpses seen in the last scene are not those of their comrades, but the corpses of enemy prisoners.
#9
The last scene is a medium shot of showing a man visiting a military base that he was looking at through binoculars. Saying that he is representing The Red Cross as we guessed, hoped to see the general Kitchener. His tone and confident voice indicate that he is there on legitimate business and that his goals are clear.
9 - FRAME ANALYSIS :
AVENGERS: ENDGAME
AVENGERS: ENDGAME
2019
Genre: Action, Adventure, Drama
After the devastating events of Avengers: Infinity War (2018), the universe is in ruins. With the help of remaining allies, the Avengers assemble once more in order to reverse Thanos' actions and restore balance to the universe.
FRAME 1:
The movie starts with an extreme close up of a sharp arrow pointing at somewhere. Behind that, From her father's advising voice and the natural ambience sounds including birds, we can tell that this is the countryside and the father is teaching his daughter how to shoot a bow.
Moreover, the fact that there is a scene of aiming an arrow from the beginning of the movie and shallow focus on an arrowhead means that this movie has a clear goal to aim for, which can be inferred that the Infinity Saga and Avengers series will end with this movie.
FRAME 2:
The frame moves to the next scene, showing the father and his daughter in a two shot. While the daughter is aiming an arrow, the father is holding rest of arrows. By this, we can know that the father is teaching his daughter how to shoot an arrow, and this also means that father is quite an expert in shooting arrow.
The leading room makes the scene looks much more naturally, and making clear what she's aiming for.
FRAME 3:
The frame moves to the close up shot of father and his daughter's feet. Which is a scene where the father fix his daughter's posture. From this we can see that her daughter is just starting to learn how to shoot an arrow and needs her father's help.
Furthermore, we can see that father is wearing an electronic anklet, which tells us that her father has committed a crime in the past, is a dangerous person, or is being watched by someone. Therefore we can possibly assume that her father committed a crime of shooting arrows in the past or did something dangerous related to arrows.
FRAME 4:
After the cut, the frame shows a two shot of the father and daughter. The father teaches his daughter poses, jokes around and laughs with her. From this, we can see that even if a man is a dangerous person, he is a harmonious and affectionate father to his family.
Again, the leading room in front of the daughter and following the rule of thirds makes more natural and comfortable to watch the scene.
FRAME 5:
Then the scene moves to long shot of him and his daughter, shows the target that she tries to shoot and the place where they are at. We can see that the place is quite peaceful with very few number of people.
The natural ambience sounds gives and enhances the audiences the peaceful and calmed feelings.
FRAME 6:
The sixth frame shows a woman who appears to be the daughter's mother in a medium shot. She has a light smile and the sound of clinking utensils suggests that she is out on a picnic with her family.
Natural lighting started from the beginning of the film gives and enhances the audiences sense of warmth, secure, comfortable and more.
FRAME 7:
This scene is a long shot of two brothers playing catch, and their mother is preparing lunch behind. Judging by the diegetic sound where she is talking to the father and daughter who are shooting arrows, it seems clear that her family is on a picnic.
FRAME 8:
After a cut, this medium shot shows the older kid got the ball from smaller kid by smooth hand held, and shows his mother asking father and daughter whether they want mayonnaise or mustard or both on their hot dogs. This daily family situation allows audiences to imagine or remind their youths or their family.
FRAME 9:
The final scene continues with the daughter asking her father who puts mayonnaise on hot dogs, with an expression full of doubt.
The natural ambience sounds that can still be heard and the harmonious but funny conversations between family members provide and enhance a deeper sense of comfort and stability in the audience watching this scene.
GENRE HISTORY:
ACTION COMEDY
1980 - presents
The 1980s saw the rise of action comedies with bigger budgets and more special effects, like Beverly Hills Cop (1984) and Die Hard (1988).
Franchises like Men in Black (1997) and Rush Hour (1998) combined action with buddy cop humor, while films like The Matrix (1999) incorporated action choreography with philosophical themes.
Recent decades have seen superhero films like Guardians of the Galaxy (2014) and Deadpool (2016) blend action with comedic elements, along with animated action comedies like Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse (2018).
REPRESENTATION
The Witty Action Star:
This figure is an accomplished fighter who finds humour in even the most perilous circumstances. Despite their common cynicism and weariness, they are good-hearted people. James Bond and Starload are two examples.
The mismatched buddy duo:
The mismatched buddy duo: Two people are completely different from one another in terms of personality, skills, and background. Their divergent approaches create amusing scenarios as they are frequently compelled to cooperate in order to accomplish a common objective. Consider the characters of Jackie Chan and Chris Tucker in Rush Hour or Will Smith and Tommy Lee Jones in Men in Black.
INSTITUTIONS
Initial Release Date: August 13, 2021 (USA)
Genre: Action-comedy
Running time: 1 hour 55 minutes
Budget: $100 million
Box Office: $331.5 million
Producer: Shawn Levy, Emily Reynolds, Greg Berlanti, Adam Kolbrenner
Director: Shawn Levy
Actors:
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Ryan Reynolds
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Jodie Comer
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Joe Keery
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Taika Waititi
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Lil Rel Howery
Production Company: 21 Laps Entertainment, Maximum Effort, Free Guy Productions, Chernin Entertainment
Other films produced by the studio:
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21 Laps Entertainment: Arrival, Night at the Museum series, Real Steel
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Maximum Effort: Deadpool franchise, 6 Underground, The Adam Project
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Chernin Entertainment: Planet of the Apes trilogy, Ford v Ferrari, The King's Speech
Awards: Nominated for several awards, including a Golden Globe for Best Motion Picture – Musical or Comedy and a Critics Choice Award for Best Comedy
Fun fact:
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The film features cameos from several celebrities, including Chris Evans, Hugh Jackman, and Channing Tatum.
DIRECTORS
PAUL FEIG
Background and Entry into Film:
Born in Mount Clemens, Michigan, Feig's initial career path steered towards journalism. However, during college, he discovered a passion for comedy and began performing stand-up. This led him to Los Angeles, where he transitioned into writing for television shows like "Pee-wee's Playhouse" and "Sabrina the Teenage Witch." His comedic talent shone through, paving the way for directing opportunities.
Notable Films Directed by Paul Feig:
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Freaks and Geeks (1999-2000)
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Bridesmaids (2011)
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The Heat (2013)
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Spy (2015)
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Ghostbusters (2016)
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A Simple Favor (2018)
Awards and Recognition:
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Golden Globe Award nomination for Best Motion Picture – Musical or Comedy for Bridesmaids
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Critics Choice Award for Best Comedy for Bridesmaids
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BAFTA Award nomination for Outstanding British Film for Bridesmaids
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Numerous awards and nominations for individual actors and actresses in his films
Distinctive Style and Techniques:
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Character-Driven Humor: Feig builds humor around relatable characters and situations, emphasizing their flaws and eccentricities in a way that audiences find endearing.
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Fast-Paced and Energetic Storytelling: His films often have a lively pace, keeping the audience engaged with sharp dialogue, quick cuts, and witty observations.
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Physical Comedy: He effectively utilizes physical humor, slapstick, and visual gags to complement the verbal wit.
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Collaboration with Actresses: Feig is known for his successful collaborations with talented actresses like Melissa McCarthy, Kristen Wiig, and Sandra Bullock, giving them space to shine.
SHANE BLACK
Background and Entry into Film Industry:
Shane Black was born in Santa Monica, California, in 1961. He had a passion for movies as a child and wrote screenplays during his high school years. After graduating from UCLA, he struggled to break into the industry, initially working as a parking lot attendant and security guard. His big break came when Joel Silver, impressed by his script, bought it for $50,000. This script became the iconic action film Lethal Weapon (1987), establishing Black as a talented screenwriter.
Awards and Recognition:
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Black was nominated for the Saturn Award for Best Writing for Lethal Weapon (1987).
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He received the Edgar Award for Best Motion Picture Screenplay for Kiss Kiss Bang Bang (2006).
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He was nominated for the Golden Raspberry Award for Worst Picture for Iron Man 3 (2013), while the film itself achieved significant box office success.
Notable Films Directed by Shane Black:
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Kiss Kiss Bang Bang (2005)
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Iron Man 3 (2013)
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The Nice Guys (2016)
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The Predator (2018)
Distintive Style and Techniques:
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Sharp and Witty Dialogue: Black's characters are known for their clever and often quotable lines, filled with pop culture references and dark humor.
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Non-Linear Storytelling: He often employs flashbacks, unreliable narrators, and twists to keep the audience engaged and guessing.
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Buddy Cop Dynamics: Many of his films feature mismatched duos with contrasting personalities who develop a grudging respect for each other.
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Blending Genres: He seamlessly mixes action, comedy, crime, and noir elements to create unique cinematic experiences.
To better understand our potential audience for my coursework, I did basic audience survey, asking to some countries to research potential audiences' interests and desires, and luckily I got 59 people participated to my survey.
AGE GROUP
I find out the age range of our targeted audience is important in order to limit and make our movie explicit. The results shows that the age range from 10-15 (25.4%) and 16-20 (39%) are the highest. Therefore, we've decided to target the 10+ age group, and it would be great if the main narrative set in school life.
ONLINE VS OFFLINE
Majority of people said they do not watch movies at cinema, but using OTT services such as Netflix, Disney Plus, Apple TV, etc to enjoy movies. It seems better to target multiple OTT service companies rather than theaters.
SOCIO-ECONOMIC GROUP
As my most of potential audiences are fit into the middle class (83.1%), we could target audiences in middle class, the narrative would be the hero relies on a diverse group of highly skilled members of the lower class, making their success against all odds even more hilarious, or needs the assistance of a single eccentric billionaire, which would exaggerate the ratio of upper class people.
REASONS TO WATCH MOVIES
I asked my potential audiences the reason why do they watch movies, and nearly every responses (87.9%) said they watch movies for entertainment. For example, kill-time, just for fun, stress solution, because of hobby, indirect experience, etc. So we could leveraging the desire for entertainment and indirect experience to release stress, by consider incorporating fantastical elements, exaggerated stunts, and comedic mayhem.
MOST PREFERRED GENRES
According to the data, Majority of people preferred romance (55.9%), action (54.2%), drama (47.5%) and comedy (44.1%). We decided our genre to be action comedy, so we could possibly add some love lines on our narrative to attract more audience.
MOST PREFERRED OPENING SCENES
Thanks to the data, we could narrow down the opening sequences, as the result tells us 'Character Introduction' and 'In Medias Res' is the most popular opening among 7 types of opening scenes. As we're doing action comedy as our main and sub genre, using 'In Media Res' is the most suitable opening scene for us. We can throw the audience right into the middle of the gunfight, creating intrigue and suspense.
VIEWER PROFILE
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Target Audience: Teenagers (10+), people who enjoy movie as entertainment, stress solution, indirect experience, etc
Demographic: Middle class
Psychographics: Moody, rebellious, energetic, humorous
Media Habits: Entertainment, identity formation, high sensation, coping, and youth culture identification.
Geographic Considerations: Online platform, not on cinema
EQUIPMENT RESEARCH
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Camera
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Tripod
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Wireless microphone
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Lighting
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Script
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Storyboard
Research
Summary
In Conclusion...
By doing so many research about our genre, sub-genre, target audience and other basic informations, it became very clear how we should start film our movie in the near the future. Research allowed me to fully understand all about Action Comedy's codes and conventions, first 9 frames and opening sequence. Not only that, I learned eye-catching cinematography, dynamic camerawork, and special effects can elevate the action and create visually comedic moments. Moreover, the balance between Action and Comedy is the most crucial in our movie. Thus, research gave us more clear goals and the clear direction we should take in the future.