PRODUCTION, DISTRIBUTION + EXHIBITION

Pico Pictures is a London-based production company who have made 13 award-winning short films since 2008. They produced a short film called School Portrait in 2011, produced for £200 and released instantly online. The film was picked as a Vimeo Staff Pick and was featured in news articles in Huffington Post, Gizmodo, The Metro, The Evening Standard plus 100s of other blogs. The short film had a million views in ten days.

Now the films has been shortlisted for a 2012 Webby (an internet awards scheme) in the viral category. Vimeo have also now selected the film for their screening as SXSW.

The company would be perfect to produce our short film as they produce both low and high budget short and feature films. They are a small-time production company and are London-based.

Brass Moustache is another independent  UK production company. They write and produce in house and accept thematic commissions. It is made up of professional producers, editors, directors and writers working at a high level in the UK. They collaborate to write and produce factual and fictitious short films, many of the short films they have produced have been featured on the "Editor's Pick" homepage of the Independent newspaper.

Artificial Eye is a UK distribution company that has been distribution European and World cinema since 1976. They release mainly theatrical films (around 20 a year) as well as DVD and Blu-ray titles (around 30 a year). This is on top of purely digital releases via Curzon Home Cinema, Sky Box Office and Sky Player, iTunes, Virgin Filmflex, Lovefilm and other platforms. Its library includes more than 300 titles overall.

Artificial Eye has released more winners of the Cannes Palme d'Or than any other UK distributor, including films such as We Need To Talk About Kevin (2011), Winter's Bone (2010) and more recently The Great Beauty (2013).

 

Our short film, if exhibited at cinemas, would be most likely to be seen in a Curzon or Picturehouse cinema before a showing of a feature film. These two cinema chains are both more likely to be showing indie films and are known to often show short films before feature films.

 

 

 

It is more likely that to start our short film would have its debut showing at a short film festival, where it would then be picked up by a cinema chain who wanted to exhibit it. Small-time short film festivals in London include the Soho Short Film Festival, and the London Short film festival. This is as well as showing in the shorts sections of the London Sundance Film Festival and the BFI Film Festival. Short films can be entered into the festival and then are picked by a board as part of the selection to be shown. This is from where short films collect awards and people choose to exhibit them in their cinemas.

 

 

 

TB

BBFC CERTIFICATION

Our short film will be a PG.

We had originally thought that the film would be more of a 12 certification, however having carried out more research we don't think that this will actually be necessary. Though the film is about an autistic child with a single mother the film won't be too upsetting or depressing. The film could be difficult for young children to understand which is why it is not rated U. The BBFC says that PG films can explore difficult issues however it must be clear that no child should copy any poor behaviour, in other words it is clear that the poor behaviour is in fact not a good thing.

Overall our film is about a mildly hard-hitting subject but will be shown in such a way that it can easily pass as a PG film.

TB

LENS FLARE

As mentioned in a previous post on visual aesthetics I explained how Rust & Bone had used lens flare to emphasize the main character's leaving of the house. To test if it would be possible to do in our film and to work out how I did a short recce.

This video is using normal exposure simply seeing the effect on the lens that having the sun centered in the frame had. As shown the sun created only a few lines across the lens and caused part of the frame to be blindingly bright where the sun is.

These videos show how movement of the camera and zooming in affects the sun's effect on the lens. As shown there was little to no change in effect and when zoomed close in on the sun the shot was ruined by the entire frame being overly filled with light.

This video was to see how the sun shining through a tree would change the effect. As shown the tree was very thin and therefore the sun was never fully obscured by the tree, this meant that once again there was little change in effect on the lens.

In this video I tried using a larger exposure (+2) to see how that changed the effect. I found that because the larger exposure let more light through, too much light was actually captured and the screen was far too full of light allowing for very little definition of anything else. However I also tried in this video the how the sun changed when filmed through a thicker tree. I found the effect of this to be that the sun flashed in and out of view giving some variation between a frame filled with light, and one without where it was easier to distinguish other objects in the frame. The flashing also meant that there were far more streams/lines of sunlight crossing the lens.

Finally this video shows lens flare when using the manual focus on the camera to shoot slightly out of focus.

To conclude, this recce has shown me that if we are able to use lens flare in our film it is important that there is camera movement to get the effect of the sun flashing in and out of view. And it is also important to leave the exposure on 0 (providing the sun isn't behind the clouds) so that the frame is not overfilled with light.

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SYMBOLISM

In Act 2 of our film we want to show that the mother feels trapped and enclosed by the responsibility of having to look after her autistic daughter, this could be shown not just through the acting but through the use of camerawork and framing. For example in using the corridor connecting the hallway and kitchen. This corridor has high ceilings that loom over the character, it quite dark and therefore has a sort of 'light at the end of the tunnel' effect. This could be used towards the end of the film when the mother has changed and is going to leave out the front door. She leaves the house to escape from her responsibilities, without the audience knowing if she is leaving temporarily or for good, the 'light at the end of the tunnel' symbolism works well in this situation as that is exactly what she is thinking, and this can be emphasized through the camerawork.

We could also have a shot in the film right after she has managed to calm her daughter down and she is on her way to change, where she pauses in this corridor and leans against the wall as she sighs. She could also then glance over at the door before she goes upstairs. to change.

Whilst we will use the cereal boxes to show that the daughter also feels imprisoned due to her condition which holds her back, we can also show this in other ways too. For example a moment when Amelie stops on the stairs and looks out through the bars of the banister. This is done in the film Casablanca when the wicker shades over the market are used to look like prison bars over Bogart and Bergmann.

The exterior location out the front of the house, where the film ends with Emma standing outside having a cigarette with the photo from when she was younger, can also be used to symbolize how Emma feels trapped.

Filmed at a low angle and using the front gate to fill the edges of the frame the composition of the shot is very symmetrical and well-considered. The lines of the pathway that lead up to the door create a heavy sense of perspective and help to stretch the depth of field. If Emma was to come outside, close the door behind her and lean with her back against the door I feel this would create a very nice long shot that could be used for a reasonably lengthy time as it show the whole of what Emma is doing. Her leaning with her back against the door would also symbolize her turning her back on her responsibilities. This next shot shows how it would also even be possible to film through the plants to create the 'imprisoned' look with lines cutting across in front of the character.

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UPDATE #3

We made the decision to change our actor of the child to a young girl called Amelie. Amelie is Rachael's daughter which will help add to the chemistry between the two actors making it far easier for them to play a mother and child. It makes no difference to our film whether the child is a boy or girl and therefore we feel that it is a wise decision to change the actor to someone with a bit more experience, who looks more the age we were going for, and will find it easier to build a relationship with the mother. This also means that during the meltdown scene there will be less pressure on our camera work to show good acting as Amelie will be better at acting out that scene.

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CHARACTER AUDIENCE FEEDBACK

We spoke to the same Male & Female pair that we had for narrative feedback so that they understood the development of the film, we asked them this time about our choice of actors and tips they had.
They thought that;

"the choice of mother and daughter is apt, it should work well I guess, using an actual family"

"I think having a young child will be hard but if you spend some time working on their relationship and explaining what the child has to do, should be good"

"The best thing to do is rehearse as much as possible, it's the only way you'll get the effect you want, it's great but using kids is hard"

"I can't wait to see it! Both the actors are so pretty, hope it goes well"

From their feedback it's clear that we need to rehearse 'as much as possible' and focus everything on the child, something we definitely plan to do! 

HH

SCRIPT

Here we have consolidated our short film narrative into a finalised script that details everything happening in our short film. We have separated the sections into dialogue and acting direction. Whilst also trying to provide an idea of what's happening around them. It should read as much as a story as it does a piece of direction.

First Draft - Untitled Short Film from Harry Hancock

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ACTORS: RACHAEL WATKINS AS EMMA

Rachael Watkins

37yrs

5"6

Large, Blue Eyes 

Tanned,  White Skin

Looks Younger Than She Is

Medium Length, Blonde Hair

Rachael is a working mother of one 5 year old. She's worked as an actress for a large part of her life, working in plays mainly but has taken lead parts in plays such as 'The Deep Blue Sea' by Terence Rattigan.

She has experience with children and has worked for a children's music company that puts on classes for children under 5 around local schools. She has lots of smart work outfits, as well as casual clothes so can will have suitable costume for the film.

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ACTORS: ADAM FINN AS JACK

Adam Finn

14yrs

5"4

Slim Build 

Large, Brown Eyes

Dark Brown, Long Hair

Pale White Skin

Young Looking Features 

Well Defined Facial Structure & Cheekbones

Adam looks slightly younger than he is and so would be a good playing age for someone age 12. He has experience with autistic children from volunteering with the group Fun Fizzical, a thursday evening playgroup for young disabled children.He has very clear eyes which as a character makes him more innocent and believable. His messy hair also works for the OCD nature of the child, he hasn't allowed his mother to cut his hair in a long time.

Hopefully this experience will aid him in being able to play the role of Jack although we do actually plan to leave almost all of the acting down to camerawork.

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COLOUR DESIGN IN FILM

Colour in film is not all about style and aesthetic, it is also often used in such a way that symbolises different things, a director who is known for doing this very successfully is M. Night Shyamalan. His most famous film for doing this is The Sixth Sense, in this film the colour red is used to warn the audience that something ominous was about to happen. The audience however is not so aware of this until it is explained to them, it isn't obvious when watching the film yet subconsciously the audience will associate the colour with bad things. Shyamalan uses the colour red to indicate a connection with the world of the dead.

The film Lady in the Water, also a Shyamalan film, uses the colour of the heart-shaped swimming pool that changes from blue to black as the mood in the film changes. This is also a recurring theme through the film using the bright blue colour to invoke certain moods.

An idea for a recurring theme we could use in our short film was not a colour but an object - the rubiks cube. We had an idea where the boy could always have the rubiks cube in his hand throughout the film and then when he has his meltdown he loses it, however it could also be a device his mum uses to calm him down.

tb