by Jack Willoughby
This is a full evaluation of my short film, I will talk about the short shot by shot and explain what went into putting it from script to screen. But on my Blog there an article specifically on the explanation and evaluation of my choices and methods when editing in post, that will cover the software i used and what i did. But this article is mainly covering the pre-production work that went into the film.
A vast amount of sound effects are used immediately in the material to create the atmospheric tone, emotion of the film, and give in-sight to the contextual influences within the film. Within the first few seconds, the soundtrack begins which is:
ARCTIC MONKEYS - DO I WANNA KNOW
I do not own any rights to this song but I'm not making any profit from this film as it is completely educational.
There also is diegetic sound being heard in this opening shot, which is the sounds of Police radios and shouting of Police officers. Information of where i accessed all my sounds and stock footage will be found on my blog: BLOG- additional
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| Robbery shot #1 |
This is the shot after the two "goons" burst into the bank workers room demanding the money, the action of the door opening is done to the beat of the song. the main influence that music has in cinema is to catalyze an emotion to the audience or sway them in certain way. In this case, I aspire the audience to instantly create a collective view of the characters, before the film continues. Our eyes are drawn towards the two antagonists, barging forcefully, through the door therefore, intriguing us as audience members. So they feel quite confident and relaxed considering the activity they are taking part in, so i want the audience to feel the same and seeing the actions pulse to the music makes the viewing of this whole action scene much more of a relaxing experience to them.
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| Robbery shot #2 |
The fake money is printed £20 note faces on top of a block of plain paper, which i soaked in tea water to give it the money look. I then went to my local bank and asked for money slips and i got given them free of charge, those are what you see around the money blocks holding them together.
very cheap homemade prop which i think worked perfectly and looked the part.
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I filmed this part on an I PHONE SE and there was a specific reason for doing this mainly because it was easy to maneuver the camera and run around with the actors to make a much more involved experience for the viewers. it would be much more difficult to do this chase scene with the Canon DSLR that i used to film the rest of the film with. In the future i could use equipment like a stabilizer but since this part of the film was completely spontaneous and put in last minute i didn't have access to such thing.
Now one thing i wanted to have is to always make sure that my actor Kieron (GOON 1) would always be seen to the left side of the screen and i anted to do this so it would make these two characters seem more separate from one another, instead of the audience seeing them as equals as they're not and we see this near the end when Luke (GOON 2) gets shot for not doing his job right. But there is repetition of this throughout the film but most noticeable later on in the film because when they meet the Boss they sit in the same positions as they are seen in the chase, with Goon 1 on the left side of the screen and Goon 2 being on the right side.
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These were the most difficult shots to get because lets face it, there is nothing too difficult about running around a building with an I phone but these few seconds of my film were slightly challenging. This is what we'd count as the first big stunt of the film. I had to figure out a way to show that the two characters weren't particularly good at being criminals and that they didn't even want to do anything bad to begin with. Firstly i did this through the use of props, particularly the guns, they are seen holding them throughout the chase but when they are faced with a threat they choose to use their fists rather than their weapons. This is a subtle way of letting the audience know that these two people aren't wanting to do any fatal harm to anyone because if they did they would have used their guns no problem. In addition to that i wanted to show sloppiness in their fighting style so it furthermore lets the audience know that they haven't done anything like this before and that they're new to this. Making us even more feel sympathetic for them and wanting them to get away because the audience most likely haven't had much experience in robbing banks either.
To add on to the point i made earlier on you can still see that in a few more of the shots i have still had the same characters on the same side of the screen.
Doing the "stunts"
I had to find a safety mat first because i didn't want my actors to be flinging each other backwards onto hard concrete, even thought that would have brought some realistic emotion to my actors. I had no problem using the mat and gaining access to it but i didn't realize till editing that you can see it in the background of one of the shots that its not even used. so in future i will remember to make sure that equipment is not seen on camera, I should have made a continuity list to keep track of this but lesson learnt.
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These were last two shots of scene 1.
There is'nt much to say about the shot of them running except that its still repeating the idea that Kieron is on the left and Luke is on the right but there are countless other ways that the film lightly gives off the idea that Goon 2 had been doomed from the beginning
He drops his bag in the very first shot of the chase scene which is one reason that he loses some of his stolen money which we come to find out that that was a very big mistake later on in the film.
But another thing to consider is how most of the time running Goon 2 is spent running a little bit behind the other Goon, meaning that he spends most of the time nearly going out of the frame, co-notating that he isn't going to be in the picture much longer anyway.
I really wanted to try and do a lot of foreshadowing visually in this film, after all i take inspiration from Edgar Wright and his films are jam packed with visual hints that please the audience.
choosing to end scene 1 with the exact same shot that i used to establish and open the film with was a big decision but then i think that it is such a powerful image that it could be used to commence the action and to also end it.
At this point as well we hear the sound of a car door shut followed by the sound of one driving away. the screen cutting to black.
cutting to black from this shot to tell us that we are no longer in this area and our characters are leaving to a new location, this illusion is also furthered by the sounds of police and the soundtrack to fade away. But the black is also a way to let us know that where they're going is somewhere dark and evil as dark colours in film represent such things and the audience will understand this subconsciously and prepare for the next scene with anxiety and worry for the characters, perfect since that is exactly what them two characters will be feeling also.
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This is the main sequence of the film, where the real tense story comes into play as we are finally introduced to the boss. Now the boss is a crucial part to this film because She as a character explains so much of the narrative, for example we find out because of this character why a robbery even took place to begin with, so initially the boss has a lot of power as she can get people to rob banks for her. Then within the first few seconds of the scene we absorb so much information and we see these two goons didn't do this because their free will, they did the robbery through fear not loyalty so as the audience gathers this we no that the boss is a force to be reckoned with.
This scene is full of codes and relating to the crime genre of film and confirms that this film is truly a Crime Thriller, which is really what i was going for. The main first one to point is the style and cinematography that is being placed on screen and why. There is a lot of low key lighting and wide shot angles and this is done to add the effect of a dark entity, AKA the boss accompanying the two protagonists. The wide angles shows how deserted the pub is but how it gives the idea that the pub is isolated from society, away from the police and help so it creates a more tense feeling for the characters, as well as the audience.
This is the first shot of the scene and its the establishing shot of not just the scene itself but the character of the Boss, which i believe made perfect sense because this whole scene revolves around the boss so i let the audience know this by having the first thing they see to be this character. The boss is the Darkest thing in the shot as she looks like a silhouette so we can initially see that the very nature of this character is to be a very gritty, mean and sinister component to the lives of the goons. There is another code and convention to the Crime genre spotted in this shot which is the use of alcohol, alcohol and drug use are sometimes vital parts to many other films, shows and stories that belong to this genre as they convey a certain criminal and illegal message to them which further more projects the Boss as a negative antagonist.
This is the the shot where we can see what the boss was staring at when the scene began, i used the 180 rule when filming so the audience are fully aware of the environment that the scene is taking place in and know the action that as taking place out of the first shot. Again i wanted the Boss to not be fully identified yet so that the character still remained this mysterious figure, so i positioned the actress' feet in shot so that we can still have the presence of darkness that the boss brings but still keep it a mystery to the audience. But this shot was mainly used to paint the full picture of what is happening in the scene and so the audience understand what and who this sequence involves.
Once again the boss' face and identity remains a secret from the viewer and also Goon 1 is still seen to the left of screen furthermore making the two goons seem separate and complete opposites of one another. Now both men wont even look at the boss in the yes which promotes the emotion of fear even more towards the audience which builds up the anticipation and we as viewers begin to worry even more. This was all intentional because i wanted to make the reveal of the boss a very dramatic experience. Misc-en-scene in this shot is that we can gather some information of the time that this film is set in, but the set did alter the idea that the film took place in the 1920's because of the speakers and televisions on the walls, but i didn't have authorization of the owner to change the layout of the pub.
This shot was actually made me think of Jim Carrey's "The Grinch" film because the boots were in the way of the actress' face but i never did this because of that mind. I did this because the Boss does not make the Goons feel welcome at all when they walk into the pub because why would she first of all because we can clearly know shes a mean character. So since she does not speak at all for the first few moments of this scene all we can get from the character is what we can absorb from her body language. Her body language is very relaxed as she has her feet up and compared to how the goons are sitting make the boss seem more of the dominant figure and also show that this pub is her "home" to speak and because in this tense scene she is not even slightly disturbed by it can furthermore show how dark this character is, another thing we can get from body language in this shot is the Goons' compared to the boss, The goons sit with respect ( or fear ) towards the boss and the boss shows no sort of respect in this scene as she sits with her feet up and this is what really shows the dominance in power between the characters that we see on screen.
These two shots are from the sequence of when the money is handed over and the Boss starts counting it. The first one is a close up of the money because money is a very key prop of the film and has great significance to the story, so i wanted to make sure that the audience were reminded of this so i included a close up of the passing of the money for that reason and so the audience also had more information about what was taking place.
This is where the build up of the entire film finally pays off, the tension finally breaks and the reaction is taking place. The soundtrack becomes slightly louder from this point which amplifies the intense fear that the character is experiencing. Now the Boss in elevated and is above the other characters in the shot, the camera is laced on a slight low angle so that psychologically informs the viewers of the Boss' true power and dominance over the others. The Goon to the right faces away from the boss which when partnered with the choice of cinematography also conveys the intensity that the Boss brings. Now the one thing that i wish i did differently was actually use the Tascam Microphone because the audio from the scene before this point was extremely difficult to hear so i had to tweak it in post production when editing.
This part of the film is one of my favourite parts of the entire film because from the very beginning i knew i wanted someone to get shot, it was just an essential part to my film even when i didn't know if it what genre this film would be in i knew that i wanted someone to get shot. So it was so satisfying whilst editing to see it appear on screen but it also adds a lot of value to the film and narrative. I used practical and post production effects for this gun shot to take place, since the filming was taking part in a pub's function room we used the lights in the pub to give off the effect of the muzzle flash from the gun, because without this the effect seemed empty and didn't have much impact to the eyes of the viewer. Plus I'm a firm believer that practical effects work perfectly in films because if you can film something in shot it looks more realistic than adding in post but there will be an explanation of the special effect added in the editing process in my blog.
These two shots are to confirm the audience of the loss of a character, the blood is a practical prop. Now i wanted the actor to be covered in the fake blood but we tested the blood on fabric before shooting and it slightly stains clothing and my actor did not want to ruin his clothing with it.
we see here how insignificant the money was to the Boss and that we understand more about the psychology of the Boss. That she really just wanted an excuse to kill someone and that she gives the money away after doing it. Money is a very important prop and component to the film just like it is in real life so to see that a character would just fling it away after all this trouble. Meaning that the Boss is more about giving a message to the other Goon and to the audience that she does not care about the money because maybe she already has so much wealth to begin with, and power comes with wealth so it is perfectly linked to the ideology of the character of the Boss. 
