Evaluation of Thursday’s Runner

Charlie Bennett

16.2.10

Jodie Burrows

Martyn Eley

Introducing my Crime Film

My Name: Charles R H Bennett.

Name a Film: Thursday’s Runner

Certificate: 15

Genre: Crime Film

Sub-Genre: Gangster

Members of the Group: Charles R H Bennett

William Panter

Alex Cooper

Martyn Eley

Additional Actor: Christian Jenner

In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media

products?

• Our Film is similar to real life crime films in the sense of that it has a simple story, a frantic opening scene with an element of violence. It also has a reference to drugs.

• Our prop use was minimal as we only used both a briefcase and a bag of mixed herbs acting as Marijuana. We filmed outdoors all the time and so we had natural light and we decided to use everyday costumes to add more realism.

• Thursday’s runner will be considered to mainly be a Gangster film. Two different sets of people fighting over drugs and using violence is a stereotypical convention of a gangster film and that is the what we have based our film on.

• We were inspired to make a gangster film after viewing the opening scene of Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels. We liked the idea of the freeze frames and applied this into our film to add a similar effect.

• Our music is a mixture of slow and fast. The fast music typifies gangster films during the chase scene but the slow, creepy music is something that would normally be found is a psychological

thriller. • Our lighting also goes against the stereotypical gangster film. We have filmed in total daylight as

opposed to darkness, which is where most of the violent scenes would have been filmed.

How does your Media Product represent particular Social group?

• We have three characters in the film and all of them are young males which typifies the stereotype of gangsters. We decided to use the three males because they were mainly seen in the real life films that we had researched.

• The group is portrayed in a negative way because we see violence and drugs as the main focus in the opening scenes. We portrayed them this way because we decided that it would make a fast action-packed opening scene.

• We used stereotypes in the way that young men are seen dealing with the drugs and the violence. We thought this was more realistic, of everyday media representations oh these particular groups.

• The audience are meant to sympathise with the man on the run. This is because he is so poor that he has resulted in crime that eventually doesn’t pay.

• We have dressed the main character in low quality clothing that mirrors someone who doesn’t have a lot of money. An old tattered brief case is also used to show this.

What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?

•Our research found a company called Coffee Films. They have produced several crime films before and being an independent film publisher, they have a history of publishing amateur and low budget films and promoting them to audiences. As our film fits in to the amateur and low budget category they would be ideal.

• Coffee Films would be more likely to distribute our film in local circles. Local Art-house cinemas are the more likely venue instead of big multi complex cinemas in the cities. This is because our film is a lower budget than mainstream developers.

•YouTube and Facebook would also be a good way to promote the film. They would distribute the film to everyone online and people can watch it for free.

Who would be the audience for your media product?

• Our film is a certificate 15 so all of our viewers will be this age and over. From our research males would be the majority of viewers with females the minority. This is because stereotypically it is Males who would be more interested in this gangster film. We chose it to be certificate 15 because there is some violence and showing of drugs, which fits into regulation laws highlighted by the BBFC.

How did you attract/address your audience?

• The audience would enjoy the chasing scene as it has a lot of excitement in it. The voice over explain what is happening so that the audience understand what they are seeing. This would make the audience enjoy it more as they understand the different characters and who is good and who is not.

• As you can see in the chart our questionnaire results show that chases are the most popular element of a crime film. We used this to our advantage and chose to start with a chase so to draw in the reader and this encourages them to watch the rest of the film. This appeals to younger people because the criminals are young men, which typifies the stereotypical criminal, and the fast upbeat loud music.What elemnts do you enjoy most in a crime film?

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What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?

• The Internet was very helpful because it allowed us to research different aspects for example film certificates. We also used it to view opening scenes of other films and this gave us many ideas about what we could do.

• I learnt the basic skills of using a digital camera and the Final Cut Software. Although I found it difficult to begin with I was successful in using the programme. I thought that Final Cut was very effective because you can do so many different things on it but it sometimes froze and was at times very temperamental. I found the same with garage band which was, if anything, a little too detailed so it took along time to create something we like.d

• If I were to do this again I think that I would either use a different piece of software that I am more confident on, such as Sony Vegas, or I would get more experience using the software beforehand.

• I struggled with uploading my work to e-blogger. I found that uploading images was difficult and time consuming while the system regularly caused me problems and crashed. I had to load up certain things several times for it to register.

Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product?

• The Preliminary task taught me about different camera angles and techniques. I learnt about the 180 degree rule, shot-reverse-shot and match on action. I was able to learn the basics of continuity editing, which helped in my gangster film.

• In our film we used many different camera angles. We used the match on action during the end of our opening scenes so that the viewer can see everything. For example we used the shot, reverse shot when we filmed the chasing scene, this enabled the audience to understand the narrative.

Conclusion

• For our research we looked at the history of Crime Films and analysed some. This gave us better ideas about the type of film we wanted to create and how we should go about it. We looked at all the different genres and how they are similar and how they are different. This helped us to get the right components within our film.

• In our planning we started to build up a story and we worked around it. We made a cast list and made notes of all the props we were going to use and a location report. Planning was good because it allowed us to think of every little detail and make sure it related to the film.

• We filmed for about 2-3 hours. We stuck to our plan during filming and this was good because that meant that we didn’t spend a lot of time discussing what we were doing and we just got on and did it.

• Editing was interesting because it allowed us to see the film properly and decide what bits were god and which weren't. We spent a lot of time discussing this and eventually made a mutual decision that we were all happy with.

• I most enjoyed the filming of the film itself. This was because I enjoyed some of the acting and putting into practice some of the new camera techniques I had learnt.