SCRIPT - Idea

I want my script to show the beginning of life, or it could be interpreted at the end. A beautiful scene of nature, either woodlands with sun pouring through the branches in the autumn time or the sunset over the ocean. A women and man will be watching and sitting on the floor as the sun sets and turns into night.

The woman and man will be unnamed and will reach out to the audience and speak about how life is beautiful but also deadly. They want to run away.


Glowing lights (torches) will swarm around her and she will

God
Adam And Eve - 2:16 - 17
Animals
Story of Adam and Eve

Experimental Film - Idea

"What's Wrong?"  -  Script

• People who are distracted by meaningless things from what is really important in society to me
• People who are put into categories in society and how their futures are set in stone
• Pollution, Technology, Beauty Standards, Death
• 
  

Hands painted brightly in certain ways in which they're suffering

1. Pollution - Black (like tar and death)
2. Technology - Blue (electronic)
3. Beauty Standards - Pink (woman standing still with train-tracks outlining a smaller one shot by shot - put a chocolate in mouth and face fill up with pink)
4. Death - No Paint (nothingness of death - all different colours in tank reversed to symbolise the removal of identity and to cleanse the world and society)

Costume of Woman:

When polluted and dead: long white dress with black streaming from her eyes and hands are all black

When objectified: glamorous makeup and clothing with pink on one hand and blue on the other. Train tracks mark a smaller, more 'perfect' body

When obsessed: dressed in typical clothing of a young person 

Intro: All One Shot

Analysis (Why?) - This scene includes foreshadowing into the future and of what happens to the people who have influences by their parents and how it can effect the world in time. The white background represents the purity of children when they are born and the glass case filled with water represents children's future and how they are kept in a boxlike manner. The water represents the children themselves and how their world and future are vast and ever-changing, however they could be manipulated and a deep depression of their future could form. From this, as the droplet of black paint is dropped into the water, the audience is shown the darkness of the world and peers that pollutes their future, hence the older woman crying and black paint covering her hands and eyes.

1. -White background with a glass case filled with water ( pan from the ceiling to the glass case making sure to show equipment used )
2. -Zoom towards the glass case and add a black droplet of paint (slow motion) 
3. -Flash shot the polluted women zooming in on her while the black is spreading
4. -Black out.

Scene 1: Obsessed
Analysis (Why?) - Always looking at the camera

1. -With a black background a teenage girl is shown to be standing still laughing into the camera ( mid-shot from the waist upwards )
2. -An adults face is shown to be laughing painted white with black liner and red lips ( close-up shot )
3. -Shoots back to teenage girl laughing ( mid-shot )
4. -Shoots to the adult with a grim look on their face, showing teeth like an animal ( extreme close-up )
5. -The glass case is shown with no paint and a blue droplet is dropped into the water
6. -Goes to the girl with a blank face, then quickly starts to cry and slowly turn away from the camera ( mid-shot of the girl )
7. -Raised hand up to the sky and swings down ( Close-up shot )
8. -Phone falls to the ground and is picked up by girls hand ( Close-up shot )
9. -Girl with sad eyes and smile raises the phone through the middle to cover her face ( Mid-shot )

Scene 2: Objectified

Analysis (Why?)

1. -Phone pings on a desk in room with a girl in the blurred out background choosing an outfit. She then looks at the phone and walks to pick it up ( Shallow focus, close up shot of the phone ) ( Pictures of models on the walls )
2. -She smiles, looking down at her phone standing in the rays of the sun coming through window  ( Mid-shot of her from the waist upwards )
3. -Curtains are now closed and she looks up in terror ( Close-up shot of phone )
4. -Girl walks from her room down the hall with phone in hand ( Mid-shot of behind the girl, panning from her shoes to her head )
5. 
   

Wong Kar-Wai

Wong Kar-wai (born 17 July 1956) is a Hong Kong Second Wave filmmaker, internationally renowned as an auteur for his visually unique, highly stylised, emotionally resonant work. 

Fun Facts:

Moved to Hong Kong in His Childhood

When Wong was still a child, the Cultural Revolution started up in mainland China. As a result, his parents chose to relocate to Hong Kong with him in tow. Wong’s two older siblings were meant to join them in their new home a little later, but by that time, the borders had closed, meaning that Wong was not able to see either one of his siblings until around a decade later.

Part of the Second Wave

The Hong Kong New Wave started up in the late 1980s, which was a time when film was becoming the chief source of entertainment in China because most Chinese households lacked a TV. There was no style shared by the film-makers counted as part of the movement, but since a lot of them had received western educations, a lot of them were influenced by elements of western film-making such as what were then new technologies. Wong is considered to be part of the Second Wave of these film-makers, which was when their films began receiving international interest.

Made Days of Being Wild

In the 1990s, Wong made the movie called Days of Being Wild, which starred popular actors of the Hong Kong film industry but was more a character piece than what might be called a blockbuster. Said movie was meant to be more of a personal project than something intended to capture commercial success, so it should come as no surprise to learn that it showed some of the common signs of Wong’s signature style. For example, it is set in the 1960s, which has a special place in Wong’s heart. Furthermore, it was more concerned with its mood than with its plot.

Made Ashes of Time

The Hong Kong film industry is famous for its wuxia movies, so it should come as no surprise to learn that it has made numerous versions of famous wuxia classics such as The Legend of the Condor Heroes. At one point, Wong agreed to make a movie based on said novel in an effort to secure further funding for his own projects. The result was the rather unusual Ashes of Time, which was technically a prequel that focused on one of the most hated villains from the source material. Said movie was not successful from a commercial perspective, but it did manage to get a fair amount of attention from the critics.

Approaches Filmmaking In a Rather Unusual Manner

On a final note, Wong is famous for his rather unusual approach to filmmaking. For example, he prefers to start production without a script because he finds filming from a pre-written script to be boring. Instead, the cast members are provided with no more than a rough outline of the plot so that they can develop some of their characters on their own, while Wong fleshes out the rest through a combination of improvisation and time-honed instinct. Furthermore, Wong is famous for disallowing rehearsals because he wants his cast members to seem more natural and spontaneous on the movie screen.

His Films

• The Grandmaster - the film took nearly 10 years to arrive, from initial conception to release in 2013, and the film, unfortunately, suffers from Wong’s trademark confused plotting and ad-hoc scriptwriting -  Wong attempts to untether the martial arts genre from its conventions
• Days of Being Wild - despite being voted the greatest Hong Kong film ever made by the Hong Kong Film Critics Society in a 2010 poll, But the film is also home to some of Wong’s worst excesses – the pointless inclusion of Tony Leung Chiu-wai’s character in the closing credits is perhaps the most obvious example of all of Wong’s profligate filming.
• As Tears Go By - debut was a critical and commercial success that would enable him to go on to make the star-studded Days of Being Wild. The film is, for the most part, unashamedly mainstream. It being a triad movie – a genre revived by John Woo’s 1986 hit A Better Tomorrow – allows for a certain amount of action
• 2046 - Initially, 2046 disappointed upon release. It was neither a clear sequel to In the Mood for Love nor the all-out sci-fi feature pre-release materials indicated it would be (in typical Wong fashion, many of the futuristic elements, including a large set, were discarded and left on the cutting room floor)
• Fallen Angles - A companion piece to Chungking Express, Fallen Angels has always lived in the other’s shadow. Which is a shame because the later is one of Wong Kar-wai’s most ambitious films, ‘as ungeneric a noir as could be imagined’ in the words of film critic Amy Taubin. Certainly, there are surface similarities – overlapping dual storylines of romance.The slow-mo action is turned up to 11, the entire movie is bathed in neon (not till the final shot do we see natural daylight) and there’s barely any dialogue as voiceovers inform nearly everything. The work is Wong’s most deceptive piece of art. It appears all superficiality but the flashy visuals do their own heavy lifting and are subtly expressive of characters’ emotions.

Inception Opening Scene Analysis

Opening Sequence

Water is first shown through panning, following the waves as they crash onto the cliff. After, an eye level close up of Cobb is shown collapsed on the sand, this could suggest to the audience through the symbolism of water that the main character is drowning perhaps in guilt, fear or that he is literally dying. The camera then shoots to children playing, matching the eye level of the character and showing to the audience that they are figments of his imagination as the contrast between his ill manner and their indifferent behaviour. In contrast to the light heartedness of them, it is also shown that he is in a dream like state through a dramatic long shot of an old oriental building, which is almost random, unlike the first perception of the children and shocks the audience to question what is happening and what is going to happen. Already from the seriousness of the first few shots it is obvious to the spectator that there will be many questions that need to be answered.

Orson Welles - Lady from Shanghai 1948

History 

-Born May, 1915 - Died October 1985
- Parents divorces when he was four
- His mother died when he was nine and father turned into an alcoholic
- Was musical and creative, by the time he was nineteen he was a well known broadway star
- Married 'love goddess' Rita Hayworth but was divorced when filming The Lady from Shanghai
- Named pioneer in both radio and film

Quotes from The Lady from Shanghai

- 'I always found it very... sanitary to be broke' - could be talking about hi last life, living with his parents before they became famous through his fathers breakthrough. Could also be talking about the failing relationship of his and Rita's.
- 'That's how I found her, and from that moment on, I did not use my head very much, except to be thinking of her' - could be talking about the marriage of him and Rita while it was good.
- 'I was right. She was the killer.' - could be talking about the death of his mother, and the plummet of his fathers wellbeing and alcoholism.

How is Orson Welles an Auteur?

Orson used and suggested events, during his life time, to map out the 

smoke and mirrors
acceptable charity
expensive faces
moving camera - leading and following - anticiaptes camera movements - crane movements 9( swoop and soar)
3 min 20 sec shot
shadow
distorted angles and lenses got more extreme 

Key Features of Winter's Bone

Feature 1: Budget and Film Type

As an independent film, the film was surprisingly in theatres for over 45 weeks and ultimately earned a $6,531,503 domestically and $9,600,048 internationally for a staggering total of $16,131,551, above it's $2 million budget.

Feature 2: Themes


Poverty/Financial Insecurity - The community is blighted by rural poverty. This is shown through the mise-en-scene, cinematography and passive and active social context within the film.

Lack of Opportunity/Low Educational Outcomes - Creates a sense of separation of mainstream infrastructure in the close-knit community.

Secrets - The whole film has a strong sense of the unknown as Ree searches for her father as a main theme of the story line. This creates a tense atmosphere.

Family Loyalty/Kin - This theme is based around patriarchal power but dependant upon song, resilient women.

Addiction - This is shown to have devastating consequences on families and individuals within the film. One main addiction that many of the characters have is Methamphetamine, which in conclusion leads to Ree realising that this may have been one of the causes of her fathers death.

Violence/Domestic Abuse -

Mental Illness - Ree takes care of her mentally ill mother which in return suggests how she is weighed down by the responsibility of being both the mother, father and sister figure to her younger siblings  and to take care of their property.

Evaluation

Although I don’t believe our film was a huge success I do think it had elements about it which were good, for example the contrast between light and dark we did represent the contrast between life and death, and I believe this worked as we often romanticise life and we did that by making it appear more vibrant. Another good thing we did was how we used point of view shots to emphasise how these were memories, this worked as it allowed to the audience to see through the eyes of the main character and thus understand this was her story.
Despite this we did have problems, such as how we ran out of time to record clips for our film, so it wasn’t finished; if we were to improve this next time we would arrange our time better, so we could meet up outside of college to film more memory clips and get a better range of locations in our clips to make it appear as if It’s happening over a wider range of time. Another problem was how most of our clips were zoomed in meaning our film didn’t look how we wanted it to, to improve this next time we would spend more time learning about the editing software we used so we could find a way to prevent this