Make comparisons with real media texts you have studied.
At a technical level, how well did you observe the conventions of continuity, and the language of film and editing?
For our media project this year our film idea seemed to fit the generic conventions of a crime/thriller movie. At a technical level we stuck to the editing and filming conventions. We were very cautious in terms of not breaking any rules for example the
"180 degree line" rule where the camera can not cross the 180 degree mark as this would confuse the audiences perception of the orientation on the characters on the screen. Towards the end of our film where Jason runs through the car park up to the bin where he collects the money that has been left for him we had a bit of trouble as we thought that by filming from a low angle up the banking, this would look more appealing however would be breaking the 180 degree line rule. We filmed this shot a few times and in the end we were able to shoot from an appropriate angle which meant we weren't breaking any filming rules. We filmed from the side of the car park as opposed to filming from behind Jason.
For our media project this year our film idea seemed to fit the generic conventions of a crime/thriller movie. At a technical level we stuck to the editing and filming conventions. We were very cautious in terms of not breaking any rules for example the"180 degree line" rule where the camera can not cross the 180 degree mark as this would confuse the audiences perception of the orientation on the characters on the screen. Towards the end of our film where Jason runs through the car park up to the bin where he collects the money that has been left for him we had a bit of trouble as we thought that by filming from a low angle up the banking, this would look more appealing however would be breaking the 180 degree line rule. We filmed this shot a few times and in the end we were able to shoot from an appropriate angle which meant we weren't breaking any filming rules. We filmed from the side of the car park as opposed to filming from behind Jason.
We also obeyed the "Match-on-action" filming rule in order to shoot scenes using numerous different shots instead of filming using one shot. For example coming through doors meant using match-on-action. For example when Joel is leaving the house, we filmed from inside the house of him pushing door on the door handle and opening the door and then we moved the camera position to outside of the door and filmed him with his hand on the door handle pulling the door to close it.
Another shot that we decided to use during filming was a "Point-of-view" shot. From inside the room where the main character in our room was trapped we filmed a shot from the point of view of the security camera up in the corner of the room which was filming Jason. In order to do this we lifted the tripod up onto the desk and someone filmed the shot from up there. We then filmed a shot of the security camera up in the corner of the room in order to show the audience Jason was being watched on camera by the person behind the ransom scandal.
Another example of a POV shot that we filmed was when Joel looks into the rucksack in which he put the money to bail out Jason. The camera shows the money from the POV of Joel looking down into the bag.
In terms of the content, how does your film reflect or challenge the conventions of the genre you are working in? Does it fulfil the nature of film genre or will it subvert expectations deliberately?
Originally we started off with the idea of a thriller film however as we progressed onto ideas for filming we added some elements of crime into it. The film is based around a ransom however the elements of crime involved are Joel being mugged which we see being filmed out in the streets. Also threats are made when Joel is on the telephone to the person being the ransom.
- We took ideas from other films which influenced our film and by doing this we stuck to typical conventions of a crime/thriller film. For example we looked at typical storylines and from the film "Ransom" we decided that this would be an appropriate storyline to fit our chosen genre. Also in films such as "Buried" and "A message from Fallujah" the main characters were trapped in confined spaces i.e a room or buried under ground in a box, this meant that by having our main character trapped inside of a small room we would be following the typical conventions.
Conventions such as character appearance also conformed to the sterotypical appearance. The perpitraitor in our film appears in a hooded jacket and has his face covered up. This is typically the case as they are committing some type of crime that they attempt to hide their identity. It was nessecary that we also did this in our film in order for the twist to reveal the true identity of "Dale" the person behind the ransom.
Make comparisons with real media texts you have studied.
The short film that me and my group created was intended to follow conventions of real media products in order to sustain a film genre that was easily recognizable as a crime/thriller, which would involve our intended target audience. The main storyline in which our film is based upon includes a ransom where the main character is trapped and in order to escape needs to provide a substancial amount of money to the perpitraitor. During production i researched typical storylines of the crime/thriller genre and found a few examples, which i then looked further into. One film that i closely analysed was "A message from Fallujah." This film had similarities to ours in terms of the storyline; In the film the main character "Daniel Crane" is kidnapped and held hostage in an abadoned room where he cannot escape which is the basis of our film. Also films such as Ransom and Buried were films that influenced our storyline by relating it to typical crime/thriller storylines. We decided that an abandoned room would be an ideal setting to create an atmosphere that implied danger and created tension.
Abandoned room scene- Message from Fallujah
In our film we conformed to typical crime/thriller conventions of this specific genre by having male characters as our cast. We deliberately chose to do this to follow the generic expectations of a thriller film. In films such as "Taken", "Inception" and "Buried" the main character is played by a male so we decided it would be appropriate to do this also. 
What kinds of audience pleasure are you trying to provide and how confident are you that you achieved this?
The choices which people make are motivated by the desire to satisfy a range of needs. Looking at theories reguarding audience pleasures on uses and grattifications which looks at why people watch things, what do they get out of it? The grattification that the audience gets from our film is adrenaline. People get excited out of seeing things that they dont have in their own life such as excitement and events that give them a rush of adrenaline. Our film is also high on the thrilling dimension due to it being a crime thriller film and there are elements of high tension involved in the film.
Are there any elements of deliberate pastiche or parody, where you play with the genre's codes and history? Are there any intertextual moments where you hint at a reference to another film?
