Planning

After finishing the planning I decided it might be in my best interest to make one blog concisely over viewing the plan I had made

Planning

Concisely

For the planning we decided on focusing on 2 main scenes and then work the rest of the trailer around this the first being the Poker scene, the second being the interrogation scene with the protagonist and the antagonist.

The Poker Scene

The poker scene is perhaps the most important scene for the film as it sets up all the events that follow, so this scene will get the majority of the attention in the trailer. The way this scene will be shot is with a tripod so that we can get as many steady shots in as possible. For this scene we will be transforming the school’s study room into a poker room to the best of our ability. The scene will consist of an aerial shot of everyone entering the room. This will be used as an establishing shot and also to show case how the crime bosses will be dressed smart and in suits and the protagonist will be dressed in a hoodie, this will be used to emphasise how he doesn’t fit in with the others and this will also be a comment on his social status. At some point during the scene there will be a close up of a gun used to highlight that these people are dangerous and what they are doing is illegal. Then the next part of the scene will be a panning shot of the crime bosses and the protagonist playing poker, this shot will be sped up from it’s original speed so that it doesn’t take up too much time and also it will represent the fast paced nature of the poker game they are playing and how it will go from that to a tense moment in the trailer. The next couple shots will be of various points during the poker game, the shots will be pretty standard shots. There will be close ups of the protagonist and the some of the crime bosses in order to build tension. When the protagonist looses the game, there will be a reaction shot which will be mainly of him and barely showing anyone else showing how distant he feels from everyone else and to show a sense of isolation from the protagonist’s point of view and despair. The lighting will be a dark tone representing the fact that they will be playing an illegal game in a shady unknown location. The sound on this part of the scene and throughout the majority of the scene will be the soundtrack playing over everything. The background will be messy and cluttered to represents the uncertainty of the protagonist’s future and a representation of the situation the protagonist is in at the moment. The other characters in the scene will need to be well dressed and the protagonist needs to be scruffy in order to show just how out of place he is.

Interrogation Scene

This scene is also important to the trailer because this will be the first time that the protagonist will be shown in any real life threatening danger. So far he has been cavalier about the situations he has been placed but in this scene he will realise that his life is actually in danger. The setting for the scene will need to be a small room to give the impression of claustrophobia and show that the protagonist is trapped and really has no where to go. The narrow room will also represent the lack of options he has in this situation and how control has been taken away from him. Also there will be a fairly muscular man standing behind the protagonist at all times during this scene whilst he (the protagonist) will be sitting down the entire scene, this will be done to emphasize the difference in size between the two and give the impression that the protagonist is helpless. Then we will cut to a low angle over-the-shoulder shot from the protagonist’s point of view to show the main antagonist standing there with a gun. This scene is very important because due to the angling of the shot it makes the antagonist look much more powerful than the protagonist, who looks weak and powerless in comparison. The gun in this scene will be there to further express the point how the antagonist is in control of the situation and to show how the protagonist’s life is in real danger for the first time.

The final part of this scene will be a high angle shot of the room showing the protagonist, antagonist and the man standing behind the protagonist. This shot will most likely show the entire room as being a small one reemphasizing the claustrophobia element. The claustrophobia will be important because we will be trying to set an element of panic on the protagonist. As for the lighting for this scene, we will trying to have it so that the lighting behind the antagonist is as bright as we can make it, and have him wearing mostly white in order to give him the sort of angel of death feel to him (since he will be holding a gun to the protagonist’s head). Further more the lighting towards the protagonist will be set to get darker in order to represent his future being dim and slowly fading before his eyes, also this is to show how he and his morals got darker and darker as the film progressed.

The opening scene to the trailer will be of the protagonist walking up to the antagonist (at this point in the film he doesn’t know he will be the film’s antagonist). The lighting for this scene will be of a dark room with a beacon of light in the corner on the antagonist, the protagonist will be walking out of the darkness and into the light, this scene will represent hope for the protagonist and how his hope lies with the antagonist. The shot will be a low angle birds eye view of the room then the protagonist walks into the scene then sits down and talks with the antagonist via an over-shoulder-shot. In this shot the protagonist is uncertain of himself and what to do; the antagonist is well lit and knows what to do and what he wants to.

The scene in which the protagonist tells the antagonist he lost, the entire scene the protagonist is sitting down really fidgety and restless to represent his anxiety and panic. The antagonist will be standing up representing that he is in a position of power, the fact he looks bigger is what will be used to represent this. His constant movement will also be a representation of his anxiety also.

For the parts of petty crime, we will use a montage of the protagonist committing the crimes. There will be a voiceover during the montage, the voiceover will match what is going on in the montage, for example the voice over might say “Hell, rob a bank for all I care” the montage will be of the protagonist robbing a bank, or getting ready to rob a bank. This is to tell the audience of what is going on and make sure they follow the trailer. During the montage I intend to make the main character more confident and get better at committing crimes to the point where he can actually confidently rob a bank. This will be done with a bit of screen time and making time pass much faster than it actually is.


Ancillary Taks
This is just the first draft of the planning for my ancillary tasks.




This is my Poster Plan



This is my Magazine Plan

Storyboard

This is just a brief storyboard to sort of put a visual on the scenes I described above.  

The Theory Behind It

Throughout my trailer I’m going to incorporate a literary device “Chekhov’s Gun” which is the implementation of seemingly minor things having more relevance later in the story. For my device I will be using an actual gun, a silver gun that will appear a few times in the trailer subtly and obvious in some places. This gun will be used by two characters in the trailer mainly the protagonist and the antagonist.

In my trailer I will also be using Vladimir Propp’s character theory to explain some of my 2 of my character. I am using Propp’s theory mixed in with Guy Ritchie’s work in crime films. The two main characters in my trailer embody some of Propp’s character theory but have been given a bit of a twist to match the Guy Ritchie style I was going for. The Protagonist is obviously the hero but in this he exhibits hero traits and villain traits. He is trying to do the right thing but he is using the wrong methods, so his two character type’s conflict with each other just as the hero is supposed to conflict with the hero. The Antagonist is the villain but in a more obvious way than the hero but the villain also acts as the dispatcher of the hero in the trailer. In conjunction with Guy Ritchie film the names I would now give to the protagonist and antagonist is the “Anti-Hero” and “Gangster” respectively.