Case Study: Body of Lies - Mise-en-scene.

Body Of Lies was released in 2008 and was directed by Ridley Scott. It features famous actors such as Leonardo DiCaprio and Russell Crowe. Throughout its time in the cinemas it made a total of $39,380,442, which is less than what it cost to make (which was an estimated $70,000,000).

The film starts with a quote from W.H Auden then fades out and tells you the location (Manchester, England). The black then slowly fades onto a foreign man and half his face is hidden in the shadow whereas the other half is lit up by sunlight. He is facing piratically facing towards the camera and addressing other people in the room, he is gesturing his fingers at them which makes him appear more important. The camera angle makes you feel as if you are one of the people he is talking to.
The camera pans out and shows more of the room, then switches to the camera moving down the corridor of what looks like a small, clustered flat. It shows a room with a lot of light coming in from the window, because its so bright it makes everything else appeared darker and with more shadows.
There is a man sitting at a table in there with lots of strange pots and pans surrounding him and smoke coming out of one of them. He looks hard at work (and very stressed) like he is building something (a bomb).

You then move into another room where a different man is standing watching television which has the first man talking on it. Another man is then brought into the scene, he is asleep in a dark room which light shining on him which makes his body and muscles appear big, this makes him look very powerful. He also has a book on his stomach and he is holding it with his hand; this can also mean he is clever as he can read. The second man appears with smoke around his face.

The next scene cuts to a street view of Manchester, just outside the building. Police and Swat Teams are everywhere and smoke is also coming from somewhere. A milk truck clatters down the road and the police let it through. All the swat team are now running into their positions and breaking into the flat. Its very busy and there is a lot of movement and things going on as they rush around. There is one part that is filmed from behind a fence which makes you feel imprisoned or as if something is trying to be kept in and you aren't meant to be there.
The milkman appears at the door of the flat and everyone is eagerly watching him as he puts the milk down outside. He is a distraction for the swat team as they break the lock on the door and sneak inside.

The people upstairs in the flat realize something is wrong and alert each other and wake up the sleeping man.
The room that the swat team is in is very dark and slightly smokey,all you can really see of them are their silhouettes (you cant see their faces as they are in masks). The others upstairs talk to each other in their own language and there are no subtitles on screen to tell you what they are saying and the camera switches between them. You never really see any of their faces because they are concealed by the shadows. The man at the table says something then blows up the building with the bomb. It quickly cuts to a shot of one member of the swat team and flashes yellow because of the explosion, then goes to a long shot of the exploding building and the road, you can still see the milk truck.
People everywhere in the street are panicking and screaming and its all a scene of confusion, bits of the building are falling down among them. It shows the explosion from another shot and more bits of building flying everywhere.
The scene then ends here.

Plot

In my group of Alana, Daisy and myself we have discussed the full plot of our thriller, drawn a storyboard, annotated it in a presentation and then today looked at music that would fit the aspects of the film well. We were looking for dark and brooding music and found several good pieces. We also played around on garage band looking to create something fitting.
Then we talked about what the main characters would wear, why they should wear them and if they were practical.

Next week we shall continue this and also look at locations which would be good to film in.

Scene Shots

I went to the woods near my house where I thought of filming the thriller and these show a long desolate track leading up to a dense wood in the distance which makes it look big and daunting.

 

I think they look quite effective because there are no buildings or people in the shot which adds to the lonliness and the fact there is no one around to help if you were in danger.

Case Study: Kick Ass

Kick Ass was directed by Matthew Vaughn who also co-produced it with Brad Pitt. It was released in the UK on 26 March 2010 and 16 April in North America.Filming took place in several places but mainly in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, and various locations in the UK, including Elstree Studios.
The film made a final gross of $48,071,303 in the U.Sand $47,960,570 outside of the U.S, so was a massive hit worldwide! It has also been said that they have the green-light to go ahead and make a sequel of it.

The film was set as an 15 when released at the cinemas and on DVD, so that is the age it is targeted at. I think people into their 30's may also like it, but I can't see many parents wanting to que up to see it, as it is quite disturbing and upsetting in parts of it so they may not want to see it or for their children to either. I think that it should in fact be set as an 18 because it uses obscure language throughout and also features a sex scene in it. Looking at the whole film I think it's more aimed at males, most the characters are male and it is quite violent. However, I think it is a great film, one of the best I have seen, so it can still apply to females.
It seems a bit of a cult classic at first, it was an acquired taste but then people starting recommending it to others and it all took off and millions of people have seen it world wide and love it!
Many people thought it was too harsh and out-there though so it put people off and many even complained about the disturbing scenes featured in it.
On IMDB it has a high rating of 8.1/10 and has had over 90,000 votes.
One user comment has said "It's Superbad meets Kill Bill." which I think is quite a good description of the film and most of the 500+ reviews all give it nearly 10/10 stars!

However some people are not as impressed, one person says "I cannot believe the undeserved high rating of this film, by way of balance I must therefore award it a 1.
The storyline starts out promising enough as a lighthearted comedy but it quickly runs out of steam and it becomes apparent it actually has nothing new to say."
So as you can see, it's not to everyones taste.

New technology has increased the intensity of this film by using computer animation to give it a more cartoon feel in places as the film was based on a comic, lots of CGI shots, Red Mist had a very cool and gadgetry car and Kick Ass also promotes many huge companies, such as Apple (an iPhone was used), myspace.com (Kick Ass and co had a website with myspace) and youtube was also featured in the film.Throughout the film it features many different camera shots, a lot of them are long shots because there are a lot of establishing shots and action shots of explosions etc, so a long shot is the best for this so you can see the explosion in all its glory. Hit Girl also has a POV experience in the film, she is wearing night vision goggles and you see from her perspective as she pans around the room looking for villans (this looks and feels slightly like you are in a computer game).

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

So far I have learnt how to use the video cameras properly and how to attach them to a tripod and navagate the camera around on the tripod to get all the best angles I need. Tripods are very important when it comes to filming because it keeps it nice and steady instead of having a wobbly shot (unless you need it that way), so it is always best to use them or a flat, sturdy surface.
I also learnt how to use the iMacs and edit things using iMovie which was a lot easier than I thought it would be. Everything is clear and simple which really helps, as it will build you up to using more professional versions of it.

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