Font Ideas for Poster & Magazine

Photoshoot for Poster & Magazine

 

 

Above are some photos that I took of our main character Shaun against a backdrop that I decided best fit the aesthetics of out film narrative, with it being set in a urban environment, following  the conventions of the British Film Drama genre. The brick wall connotes the feeling of the city as it makes people think of buildings and big working class constructs. Additionally, the reason he is looking down at the ground is to hide his face and the shame that he feels for going down the path he goes down. The outfit he's wearing is what people identify as a typical roadman and mischevious youth. As you can see his clenched fists represent the aggression and fury he feels inside, trying to hold onto it and prevent a violent outburst.

Filming: Day 1

Our first filming session commenced on the 30th of December. We decided to shoot all of the scenes with Shaun in first as the actor playing him is the most available of our actors and was willing to spend the whole day filming with us. Shaun also appears in the majority of the trailer and so it made sense to complete all the shots with him in it. For one of the shots we had another friend  near by who was willing to play an extra holding a knife. Sams dad was also available for the shot of Shaun's dad we needed.

We divided the shots up equally between us so we all had involvement in the production of our trailer. To begin with Sam Warren  filmed at shot of Shaun getting out of bed, which took some time to position due to the orientation of the room and height of the bed. It was also important to get his facial expression in shot, to show how he is feeling having just woken up to a life he dislikes. To go along with the conventions of British Film Dramas we closed the blinds to create a low key lit shot. These two shots took only a few minutes to film, with minimal difficulty.

After filming these two shot we moved onto the shot of Shaun snorting cocaine or the implied shot of this act. To simulate cocaine we used flour and a met ticket to divide and make lines. To make this shot appear darker we placed a curtain over the window, to help give off a gloomy and depressing vibe. We had a few problems filming this scene trying to make it look as realistic as possible without Tom having to actually snort flour. It took 3 tries but in the end we got it looking as close to the real thing as possible. This was filmed by James Scott, along with a point of view shot from Shaun's perspective, looking at a photo of his mum and dad. To show how Shaun feels about his father he covers up his dads face with his thumb. To end this shot there is a tilt towards the ceiling, which will move into a transition.

The last shot we filmed in the house was a shot of Shaun walking past his dad, who's sat drinking on the couch. I had to retake this shot a couple of times to get Toms body in the shot and the hand gripping the alcohol in a particular way. I also filmed a shot outdoors where the main character is being followed by another teenager with a knife behind his back. We recruited a friend who lived nearby to play the knife wielding teen in this shot.

The last bit of outdoor filming we did this day, was originally supposed to be filmed inside a gym, however we decided that filming Shaun exercising outdoors in his local park would seem a lot more motivating, showing him why he needs to get better and escape the area. Doing his workout outside in the dreary rain and cold weather makes him seem a lot more hardened and that he is willing to feel momentary pain for a lifetime of happiness.

Casting Choices

We have looked around for people that fit the descriptions of each of our character profiles or those that share similar characteristics of the characters in our narrative. After 1-2 weeks of looking we have finally decided on who we are going to cast in our trailer.

We have decided to cast:

Daniel Mclaughlin as a drug dealer













Anna Gravette as Sarah (Shaun's girlfriend)













Tom Chapman as Shaun                                                                                            












Peter Warren as Shaun's dad

I have posted detailed character profiles of each of the characters in our trailer in order to show their significance in our narrative. Moreover, we have managed to gather a group of around 6 candidates who are available to play an extras if we need them in the trailer.

Signed Talent Release Forms

Talent Release Forms

Character Profile: Dad

Name: John
Surname: Smith
Age: 49
Occupation: Warhouse worker

Background:

The father of Shaun, he lived a relativley happy and healthy life with a rewarding and well paying job in a managerial position at a local textile factory. He always put his family first shown by his decision to move his family from the inner city to the suburbs of Manchester where there were safer environments for children and schools close by to parks and fields to play. This is a lot different to his harsh upbringing in the city giving his children a childhood he never had.

For a period the decison to move to the suburbs seemed like a good and beneficial idea. The business he worked for allowed him to keep his job, his wife was happy and had flexible working hours allowing her to be home a lot when John wasn't. His son was turning into a respectable, hard working young adult with good school reports term after term leading up to his GCSE's.

Although this wasn't to last when he started to notice slight changes in Shauns attitude and behaviour, getting in late at night smelling of smoke and alcohol occationally. When he confronted Shaun he was met with aggression and denial. This was the begining of Shauns decline and end of his dads close relationship with his son. The straw that broke the cammels back was the unexpected death of his wife just a month after their argument.

Filled with grief from the loss of his lover and guilt from the loss of contol over his son John turned to Alcohol to dumb the pain he felt. This made him aggressive and viloent destroying any relationship he had left with his son and friends from work due to a lack of social contact. This resulted in the loss of his job at the textiles factory and him getting a part time maunal labourer job at a Warrington warehouse. Most of the money earned goes towards drink and bills leaving Shaun to his seemingly wanted independence.

Character Profile: Dealer

Character Profile: Sarah

Character Profile: Shaun

Research Popular Camera Angles and Shots

One of my roles in my group was to research into conventional camera shots and angles used in British Film Dramas. Here is what I found:

Location Moodboard

Production Schedule

Storyboards of our Trailer

After discussing what narrative we would use for our film, comparing each of our individual narratives and combining ideas that we thought were quite good, we than started to create a storyboard around it showing camera shots, angles, editing and the types of lighting we would use. It is imperative that we follow this order when filming as the trailer will be laid out in non chronological order, and if we make one  mistake it could confuse our audience.

Change of BBFC rating for our film

Initially we had decided that the rating of our film would be 18, due to it being a popular BBFC rating for films in the Britsh Film Drama genre, however we have decided to change this to an age 15 rating instead. The reason for this is that we would like to reach a wider audience, and a lower rating will allow this and since more and more youths are exposed to adult material at a younger age the majority of the viewers will understand and relate to the content in our trailer. Also, we have chnaged this due to the ages of members in our group not being that of the 18 rating themself , which goes against the purpose of the rating itself.

Group Roles

To make the production process a lot easier on our group  we have delegated certain jobs we must each complete, to gather the knowledge we need to create a trailer of high quality.

Me: camera shots & editing

James Scott: Props & lighting

Sam Warren: Location & Costume

I will be looking at past British film Dramas and the popular shots and camera angels used in them to give me and my group an idea if what we could include in our trailer, whether we should follow all of the conventions or not. I will take some test shots that could potentially be used in our trailer and discuss the usefulness of them in the type of trailer we wish to do, whether it is in chronological order or not. For the edititing, I will look over the texts I have already analysed again and list the transitions used and the effectiveness of suitable ones for our narrative.

By spreading out the responsibilities this will make the workload more manageable and less stressful as we all have a clear idea of what we are supposed to be doing. This will also make our ideas more coordinated and aimed when it comes to sharing ideas and creating the trailer.

Production Company

We have decided upon Film4 as our production company due to their past success with low budget films, specifically British Film Dramas like: East is East, London Kills Me, Nowhere Boy.

Since most of the films produced by this company go unknown and are created with very little money, it makes them ideal for our film, with it being independently made. By choosing a more low key production company it gives us the ability to entice the viewers that have more respect for quality films produced using short cuts or alternative creative methods whilst maintaining the appearance of professionalism.



Background of Film 4

It is a British television channel only available in the United Kingdom, owned by the Channel Four TV corporations. The channel was created in 1982 but has been off and on in past years. It is available on Freeview for 'free', meaning it reaches a larger quantity of the population than say films on Sky Movies. This extremely beneficial as some people may be restricted to watching films on this channel and come across our film by accident, find out that they like it and then spread the word of it to friends, expanding our audience. There is also a high definition version of the channel that viewers must pay for improving the reputation of our film, making it seem more prestigious as well as generating more money for the film as people who have the channel are paying more to see it. This channel is also available in Republic of Ireland and in Switzerland further broadening our films reach. The channel frequently has themed nights based around specific actors or genres and this could be very beneficial to us of we release the film when one of these nights or weeks occur that are relevant to the British Film Drama genre.

Comparison and Analysis of each of our Narratives

Decided Film Narrative

Sam Warren, James Scott and I met up and shared each of the narratives we had made up. We looked at the benefits and drawbacks of each and combined our ideas to create a single narrative, leaving out aspects that were unsuitable or unachievable for our budget. After deciding this we started putting together a storyboard and I will upload pictures at a later date. Combining our ideas gives us all some involvement and makes us more self invested in producing something of good quality. I feel as though the death of our main character at the ending makes our film stand out from other in the genre because real life doesn't always have happy endings. Usually in British film Dramas the female character is the cause of some violence, however in our narrative she is more of a saviour and helps Shaun get clean.

The main character is a 17 year old male who attends his local high school to study for A levels. However he leads a troubled life as early in his teenage life his mum died, driving his dad to alcoholism and an abusive relationship between father and son. They would constantly argue and bicker over the drinking and most issues that faced them, the petty arguments eventually led to physical confrontations that would ensue whenever the main characters father would drink heavily and as the months passed on this became every night.

Originally Shaun was an A grade, punctual and attentive student at school. He had a large group of close fiends with similar but also different interests to himself which complimented his ability to communicate with anyone no matter what background they had and this made him a very likeable character. It was unlike Shaun to get into trouble for anything with anyone, always did what he was told and finished classwork and homework on time with the occasional late hand in. He and three of his friends were very active together going to the GYM most of the days of the week and playing football on the weekends which kept him healthy and got him away from problems at home.

These characteristics that his father has past on only become prevalent later in the plot of the film. Before this the character starts hanging around with a friend he has met through his other close friends and he soon realises that this persons has different pass times than he and his normal group of friends do. This person introduces the main character to smoking cigarettes at first ,which is unhealthy but not too bad but as the weeks go by this escalates to harder drugs and getting up to criminal activities such as theft. He does these things to get money to purchase the harder drugs as he cannot hold down a part time job with the constant absences and going in late he gets fired from most of them.
.

Because of his regular drug use our character developed a working relationship with the dealer and began to sell drugs for him at school discretely as a way of making money to pay for necessities at home and personal items as his dad was still absorbed in alcoholism and spending the majority of money on himself. Despite the characters lifestyle he still managed to get 7 A-C grades at GCSE securing himself a place at his schools sixth form. Unlike the other students his priority wasn't to get the grades he needs for a better life but to keep him self close to his regular customers. By now he had developed enough trust to start selling harder drugs to his customers and was entrusted with introducing them to cocaine. This brought him an increased income, but his "mates" from high school who failed their GCSE's were stuck as runners, delivering drugs to houses that had ordered from the the dealer. They become jealous and begin to harass the character questioning him why he was abandoning them when they were the ones that made his "success" possible. This leads to a fist fight between the main character and his best mate that would also have a strong narrative within the early film to establish him as a character, but the main character ends up winning the fight and the mates split up with a sour taste lingering in their mouth.

As the weeks progress the main character becomes friendly with a girl who is new to the sixth form and doesn't know about his life and so as they begin to talk after sitting next to each other in a class, they begin to fall for each other. As they begin to date the main character opens up about his life and instead of her abandoning him like he expected she stays and helps him to turn his life around. Our main character begins to study for his subjects and gradually starts to move away from the life of a drug dealer eventually cutting ties with the dealer and his associates to go straight. He even begins to try and reconnect with his dad despite him still being a drunk, but years had passed since his mother death and their physical fights had decreased once the protagonist could fight back. they began to talk and slowly rebuild the relationship they had lost.

Around two months pass without the dealer having any contact with the main character and so he sends one of his enforcers to check out the situation by sending him to his house to ensure that he doesn't tell anyone about what he knows. The enforcer finds the house and knocks on the door. The protagonist opens it and immediately recognises the enforcer as one of the dealers people and tells him he is no longer under his employment as he can better himself through lawful means. The enforcer reacts by threatening the protagonist in order to ensure his silence, threatening him and his dad. Although the protagonist had been clean for two months and no longer associated himself with his criminal contacts he still had the mentality that had been drilled into in recent years. To not take threats and respond with violence. He grabs an empty beer bottle his dad had left by the door and glasses the enforcer over the head cutting him deeply. Surprised the enforcer recoils back in pain and the protagonist puts the broken bottle against his throat and tells him if any of his men come back he will do permanent damage to them. Clutching his head the enforcer runs off to inform the dealer of the confrontation and the protagonists words.

After hearing about the confrontation at the protagonists house the dealer decides that the protagonists knows too much about his operation and needs to be silenced. He orders a hit on the protagonist and tells his old friend to do it to make it more personal for the protagonist glassing his enforcer.

The friend knew where the protagonist lived and the route he took to and from school. He gets two of his other mates to help him ambush the protagonist on his way to sixth form and decides that the side street by the river is the best place to do so. They make there way to the spot the next day and he orders his two mates to sit on a wall and chill for a a bit whilst he took position in a hiding spot. When the protagonist arrived he would spring his ambush.

Unaware the protagonist walks down the passage holding his folders when he spots the two the two teenagers sitting talking by the wall and recognises them as the enforcers runners. He decides to walk past them to show them he isn't afraid of the dealer or his threats when both of them stand up and block his path. Before the protagonist can react his old fiend jumps out from hiding holding a knife and hearing him come up behind him the protagonist turns around to see his attacker as he plunges the knife into his stomach. The two lock eyes and pause for seconds that feel like hours before the attacker twists the knife and pulls it out and the group run off in multiple directions. The protagonist falls against the wall and holds onto his wound. His breathing raspy and his body cold he looks down at his wound and sees nothing but bright red. Looking up at the sky the thinks of the past few months and how he was changing his life around for the better and the girl who made it possible. He smiles as he thinks of her and looks once more at his wound. Despite what has happened, he wouldn't have changed  his decision to go straight he thought as he looked up once more. They were the best two months he had had in years and he was happy that he had tried his hardest to fix his his life. He smiles an even wider smile. Then he's gone.

Magazine Analysis

Unable to find a magazine with a film that relates to the genre we have chosen, so I have decided just to analyse the layout that film magazines have.

BBFC Rating for our film

Films that are going to be theatrically released are normally examined by two people using the published guidelines, and most of time will be approved by a senior examiner. The examiners must look at issues like: discrimination, drugs, horror, sex, sexual violence and violence when making decisions.

We have decided to rate our film 18 due to the strong violence and references to drugs that would not be suitable for a young audience to witness or hear. If we decided to censor certain scenes and dialogue from the film then we feel as though it would lose its initial momentum and message. There is also a chance that it could seem less realistic to viewers ,which would give it a watered down effect. However you could also say that since the viewers have not seen the rest of the film or scene we have shot it would not make a difference to them.

I feel as though a better way around this would be to create a greenband trailer, including all the violence and foul language, and to create a television trailer which can be viewed by the rest of the public giving mass  media coverage influencing other to seek out the greenband trailer. 

Poster Comparisons

Green Street Hooligans

The Brick wall used as the background of the poster conotes that the film takes place in an urban environment , as this is the most common place for football stadiums to be and where hooliganism takes place and if they didn't decode this from the title it is reinstated here.

The use of a group of people in the poster represents the sense of gang mentaility, which is a popular convention of British Film Dramas, and the importance of having other people to look out for you in the urban environment the film takes place in.

Legend

The use of two of the main character standing side by side in the poster denotes that the two have a strong family and friend relationship, that they are there to protect each other, which follows the convention of the importance of family in British Film Dramas and the part the family plays in getting into crime. The fact that in Legend and Green Street the narrative is shared between charcters shows that the majority of films in this genre involve side by side stories of individual and so to make our trailer stand out it would make sense to have a narrative that focuses on one character.

The use of a blood red border to the font and the outline of the city connotes that there is a lot of death and viloence throughout the film, again following the conventions.

My Narrative Idea - Street Life

My idea focuses on the social life of an adolescent boy in sub-urban Manchester and the challenges he faces when it comes to peer pressure, drugs, alcohol and violence.

The main character is a college student and so has a lot of free time available outside of school, which is when he hangs around with lots of his friends. By day the group seem to be an ordinary bunch of well rounded teenagers, slowly turning into adults. They have part time jobs that pay quite well for their age, they play lots of different sports, go to the gym frequently in the week and make sure all there work is done on time to a good standard. However. when the weekend comes around this calm and collective side to them changes and with it comes the drugs, alcohol and eventually ,for our main character, addiction.

It all starts at home with marital issues between both of his parents, his dad would have affairs with other women without his mother noticing for a time until she found another phone in his trouser pocket that was the original one he had. After looking through his phone for a while she comes across some text from past flings he has had and this is the straw that breaks the camels back, as they had been arguing quite a lot lately. Once she moved out it was just our main character and his poor role model of a father and although their relationship was good and they were close, the father bad habits became the sons.

These characteristics that his father has past on only become prevalent later in the plot of the film. Before this the character starts hanging around with a friend he has met through his other close friends and he soon realises that this persons has different pass times than he and his normal group of friends do. This person introduces the main character to smoking cigarettes at first ,which is unhealthy but not too bad but as the weeks go by this escalates to harder drugs and getting up to criminal activities such as theft. He does these things to get money to purchase the harder drugs as he cannot hold down a part time job with the constant absences and going in late he gets fired from most of them.

Problems arise when he gets into debt with a drug dealer and frequently misses his college classes. The main character promises to pay the dealer back repeatedly and avoids contact with him for weeks as he sees this as his lowest point and decides he doesn't want this life any more and wants to kick this addiction. The problem with this is that the dealer needs the money to pay his suppliers and knows people that go to the main characters college who he gets to look out for him and inform him of what will happen if he doesn't pay the next time he sees him.

After a month or so of no contact with the dealer and almost kicking his addiction, the main character is walking home one night from a local GYM when he notices he is being followed by a large man, who he thinks he witnessed leaving the GYM just as he arrived. The pace of the man following increases with his own, nerves strike him hard as he recalls what the dealer told him a month ago and a chase begins. The main character gets closer and closer to home, jumping walls and taking alternate routes to help him get away from the antagonist but he just cant seem to get away. He approaches a train line and notices a train coming about to pass and sees it as an opportunity to lose his follower and just as the train comes to pass he makes it to the other side of the track, narrowly avoiding the train, however his follower is not as lucky and is hit by the train.         

Moodboard for Narrative

Focus Group Review

As mentioned in my intial thoughts on our focus group I have analysed all the candidates thoughts and ideas of which I will sum up in this post.

Overall, I feel as though our focus group was very successful as it has given us a lot of ideas to implement into our trailer and has informed us of what our target audience would like to see in terms of narrative and sound especially. Although, it could have gone better if we had asked the quieter members of the focus group some direct questions to get them involved and give them positive feedback.

Feedback we recieved on what narrative our film should follow split the focus group up. Some thought as though a group narrative could lead to more opportunities and keep the film fresh learning new things about character over a period of time instead of quickly learning the manerisms of one character. However, at the same time it was understood that sometimes this can be confusing and hard to keep track of the characters and their significance the more you introduce. Also, the more characters you have the harder it is to be equally amotionally connected to each of them.

I have learned that trailers that are not in chronological order are a lot more engaging than those that are and are much more preffered as they don't give important plot points away as easily and when you go to watch the film you dont know what will happen after a scene you watched in the trailer. This was decided after we watched the trailer for Legend and because the benefits outweight the drwabacks we have decided that this is how we would like to structure our trailer.

Moreover, I found that the females in our target audience would like to see female characters with a lot more substance and instead of reacting to actions of the male characters they should act on their own thoughts and account. They don't want a female characters strongest contribution to the narrative to be their good looks, as seen in the Bronson trailer, and they would much prefer a similar female character to that in the Legend trailer.

I asked whether our target audience would like a narrative that presented a unique type of life style or one that is more relatable and the majority of candidates said they would like to watch a film that was more exiting than their daily life. Although, I agree with the members of the group who said this I feel as though we would not be able to do this idea justice due to the low budget we are restricted to. A film trailer like Green Street Hooligans would be much more manageable for us and suits our budget fine.

Lastly, we discovered that the genre of music did not neccesarily need to match the genre of film or the time period of which the film is set in. As long as the music fits with the narrative and tries to convey similar emotions then its fine to you music from any genre or time. The way sound is edited into the trailer is also important as it can help draw the attention of its audience at key points. For example, the Legend trailer includes lots of action shots and so the music needs to be energetic and throughout matches actions happening on screen especially when text comes up.

In conclusion, I think that the focus group went very well and that the ideas we recived ,as mentioned ,will be extremely useful when it comes to creating out trailer.

I feel as though we could gather a bit more quantititve data by creating a questionnaire and will definitely be considering producing one.

Focus Group Videos

Focus Group Footage Editing

After holding our focus group, James Scott and I stayed behind after school to upload the footage we had recorded on the Ipad to the Apple Mac in order to cut out any mistakes or waiting around for trailers to play to make it more fluid and decrease to file size so we could upload the video to youtube and present it on our blogs. As the video file was so large we spent most of the time just importing it to Final Cut Pro on the Mac, which meant we had to edit the footage today but it worked out well as it meant all of us were there for the editing process and could listen to the information the focus group provided us with. James Scott and I started the editing off by watching through and cutting out any of the errors we made when presenting the focus group. For example, a slip of the tongue when trying to ask a question.

After we had done that Sam Warren took over and edited out all the points where we were getting the trailer to play by adding transitional flashes, as it was just footage of the focus group watching a screen and their reactions didn't matter as we asked for their opinions after the trailer had finished playing. Lastly Sam added a finsih scene and title which I had to edit as the font was of the wrong proportions and hard to read.

Focus Group Initial thoughts

Sam Warren, James Scott and I held a focus group today using candidates from our target audience to get some thoughts and ideas on why people enjoy watching British Film Dramas and how they could be improved. The feedback we recieved will be analysed and presented at a later date in a blog post as I need some time to go over the footage.

Sam Warren created a PowerPoint presentation with questions on British Film Dramas that we wanted to ask the members of our focus group, with some input from James Scott and I. We gave input on the way certain questions would be asked, how we would present the group with past trailers and what areas we would cover in the questions such as Sound and Editing. We also showed the group three past British Film Drama trailers for the films: Bronson, This is England, Legend. We decided that it would be best to get feedback instantly after watching one trailer before moving onto the next in order to keep it fresh in the candidates minds and not confuse their thoughts on one trailer with that of another. Briefly, I will say that using these past trailers was extremely beneficial at helping to generate conversation and give the members with limited knowledge of British Film Dramas and idea of what they were about e.g. the narrative.

Once we had finished watching each of the trailers we ended the session with three imoportant questions that we needed answering from our target audience. The questions we asked were as follows:

• Would you prefer a group or single narrative structure ?
• What suggestions do you have of a name for our film ?
• What genre of music do you feel is fitting for the British Film Drama ?

Obviously we expanded on each of these questions if they were answered briefly without solid justifications. For example, before asking for suggestions for a name for our film we gave our ideas and ask for their opinions on them. Sam Warren came up with the idea of calling it "Young Breed" I then suggested "Street Life" and James Scott suggested "A Brick Maze".

On the whole I think that the focus group went quite well and was professionally orchestrated by our group to gather as much information from our target audience as possible.

Focus Group Presentation

Letter for Parents

Consent form for Year 13 Focus Group

Conventions of a Film Poster

Posters are another popular way of creating awareness and advertising a product. What makes them very useful for advertising films is that they can be used to promote the film in lots of different locations. Common places for poster to be placed are: outside cinemas, bus stops, billboards, train stations and on buses.

A poster should be eye grabbing and primarily illustration, any text on it should be short and sweet. This textual information may be a quote from the film, the title, BBFC rating, release date and the cast. It should make the viewer want to go an watch the film and uses the ratio of 50:50 text to picture to provide them with enough knowledge of whether or not the film is for them.

As you can see by the two British film drama posters to the left, they do not always use shots from the film and instead use the concept art they have drawn up from the narrative as to make use of their artist and not give anything away before the trailer comes out. An icon is very important to have on a poster because they need them to help understand the genre and this will effect whether they like it or ignore it.

The Suffragette poster shows the main character/icon in the centre foreground behind text which makes her look like a criminal getting a mugshot for breaking the law, giving away hints to the viewer about the narrative.

Starred Up's poster presents the main character stood in the centre of a prison block with no one else around suggesting that despite the number of cells with inmates in them he is in fact alone. This makes the viewer subconsciously question why.

If the film is a large recognisable brand with lots of sequels, the poster does not always need a title of the film which leaves more room for illustration and the release date, which is what people will focus on.

Purpose & History of a Trailer

History

The first movie trailer was released in 1913 for a film called "The Pleasure Seekers" and was created by the Lowes Cinemas company. This was a short promotional video that played before the film. This was so well received by the audience that it was adopted in all other theatres they owned. The company most well known for making these trailers was the National Screen Service

These early trailers consisted of  important scenes from a film with a bit of text.

Purpose

The purpose of a film trailer is to create hype for the film, making people want to see the  rest of the film by getting them interested in small fragments of the narrative. A successful trailer will catch and hold the audiences attention for the limited amount of time it has before another film starts or between a programme on the television.

What has become very popular now after being introduced in the 1960's is the stylised trailers, that includes a montage of different scenes, that are not in any narrative order. This was due to the change of who was in charge of the trailer, which moved away from the Marketing department and to the directors who became more involved.

A trailer must also be memorable and it can do this in many different ways. A popular way this is done is through music and the music does not need to be popular for it to be effective, just as long as it is distinctive and stands out it can be from any genre and any time period. This sometimes very useful as it means you do not need to pay large amounts of money in royalties. This is a very important aspect of any film trailer as it helps set the tone and gets an instant emotional reaction from the viewer.

Ideas for Focus Group

To get more of an idea of our target audiences likes and dislikes on the British Film Drama we have decided to hold a focus group of candidates from the ages 18 - 25.

The reason we decided on this age range is because the content involved in these types of films can be very explicit and inappropriate for anyone under the age of 18, and we were doubtful that any parents would give consent for their child to watch the trailers we plan to show to the focus group as examples. Since the year 13's are all at the bottom of the age range boundary we have decided to use candidates from our media class in the focus group and I have thought about designing a questionnaire to give to people in the middle to high area of our age range and will decide after we have held our focus group.

Audience Profile

Relevant Audience Theories

Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy Poster Analysis

Green Street Hooligans Trailer analysis

Instantly, Green Street Hooligans puts a different spin on the British Film Drama which does not follow the typical conventions and instead has the main charcter as an American University drop out who originally went to Harvard, an extremely prestigious college in the USA. The trailer opens with a long, static, follow shot of a plane taking off from an airport suggesting that a character has traveled a great distance, which is then reinforced by the next medium shot of the main character "Matt Buckner" walking through a terminal with luggage. The trailer uses a non diegetic, monlogue given by Elijah Wood ,which tells us he is the main character and explains what he is doing so far away from  
the USA. Although this is not used throuhgout the film or trailer it is a good way of introducing an important character without having to add more shots and scenes lengthening the time of the trailer.




Although the production companies are not metioned in this trailer they do show Universals name as it is a much larger well known company that people associate good films with. Oddlot Entertainment on the other hand is not as well known. They also only show the Universal Studios logo for 3 seconds in order to keep the trailer as breef as possible.

The dialogue between the two British characters shows the prejudice of lower, working class footbal supporters toward foreign people when the man in the coat says " I can't take a Yank to football". The slang used and the way they talk presents them as being less educated becuase of the area they are from and you see a lot of this stereotyping in British Film Dramas. However, the trailer goes against this convention slightly by showing one of the men with a large stack of cash ,which suggests he is a successful business man and quite intelligent.

Although, the next shot shows the trailer sliding back into the genre conventions as its a high angle, long shot of the main character and his friend walking down the street also show the lines of terraced houses with really cramped parking for cars. This housing area is typical of a British Film Drama as the houses are small and low cost, another typical setting for these films is on councils estates. One reason people live in these houses is that they cannot generate enough income to move to a new larger area and the majority of people that live in these areas may be or have been involved in crime. Ironically there is a pub at the end of the street in the bottome right corner of the shot ,which is where most of the violence and lack of money comes from that gets them trapped in these areas. The lighting used  is natural and low key giving the area a gloomy and depressing feeling which would explain why the people distract themselves from the scenery by doing other things. The lighting also represents the typical British weather at that time of year being quite damp and dark early.

Additionally, this next mid shot shows how close and bonded together these football supporters are walking shoulder to shoulder down a street with Matt in the foreground next to hsi family friend, followed by other friends in the background. This is fitting because at this point some dialogue from another scene is played where Matt friends calls him "practically family" which is synchronous with their behaviuor in the shot.

Again this tralier shows how the film is following the British Film Drama convention of viloence for violence sake and this can be backed up by what one of the charcters says to Matt about taking his anger about other things out on the other football suporters. As the fighting starts some non diegetic music starts to play that has a very agressive guitar playing along with the punches he throws. Sound effects are also used to fade the voice of his friend out as he tells him to think of someone he hates representing them as irrational and unjustifiably violent.

The Trailer ends by showing the awards it has won from acclaimed festivals that will tell people that the film must be high quality if a body of experienced film addicts have voted on it. This is also true for the short, snappy and memorable reviews that have been given on the film giving more of an insight into what the film is like ,which a reward can't do as effectively. The trailer ends with the films title in a style of font and colour that is aesthetically identical to the environment in which the film takes place, a light grey, warn tarmac looking colour. This leaves the audience with the narrative idea in their head. Lastly, this trailer uses a well known alternative rock groups music which will build hype for the fans of the group to watch the film and listen to new music and get people talking about the film and sharing the trailer.