Narrative theories

Vladimir propp stated that Whatever the difference between fairytales and stories they all Have the same internal structure.He stated that there are 8 character and 31 different functions. Star wars as an example fit perfectly into propps theory however recent films like pulp fiction do not. The main characters are: The villain The hero The donor The heroes helper The princess Her father The dispatcher The false hero Tzvetan Todorov another person gave another theory was about equilibrium which said that all stories are about the fight to return to normality. Its normally that an event happens and the rest of the story revolves around how to make everything normal again (equilibrium). Our Film connected to Propps theory: As our story being a thriller seems to fit almost perfectly into propps theory. There is a hero in our movie who is an ex FBI agent who is on the run, There is the villain who is the head of the FBI, the donor is his brother who gives him aid and vital information. The false hero is one who takes his place and exposes the actual hero as a bad guy. The princess in this case is the heros girlfriend who is captured and used as 'bait' to expose and get the hero under their control. The girls father in this case is part of the conspiracy and the girl does not want to have anything to do with him.

Story arc

Our movie is based on a a james bond type thriller. The story line revolves around an ex spy in the FBI who finds out about some horrific government plot that is going on and he has been betrayed by all his allies!He has a confronatation with one of his closest freinds who is also part of the conspiracy and warns him about what is in store for him. His whole family including his elder brother who he seeks help from are murdered. With everything that he had completely gone his only oprion is revenge!! He sets out and one by one eliminates all the agents in the FBI and last of all there is a fight scene between him against his friend and his ex boss!

Key elements of the film

As our movie opening is going to be a thriller it has to have certain scenes to prove and show that it is what we say it is. Therefore we have decided to film our opening scene in a low key light setting therefore giving it a sort of scare and there is going to be a short james bond chase scene thereby kicking off the movie with an action filled start.We are going to have some props such as guns and smart suits and sunglasses making it look cool!!Our audience we are aiming at is between the age of 15-30 and they are mainly the mainstream(explained in detail in point 14).The film opening is going to be showing two events going on simultaneously thereby filling in little more information than is required.Even though we dont necessarily have to give the whole story we would like to make it a little different than other openings in the past and try and make it interesting from the start.!!We are going to have between 5-8 people in the chase scene and we will use different actors in the simultaneous office room scene.It is going to be fast paced from the beginning and hopefully we can maintain it throughout the two minutes.Will have shots throughout the school and I am hoping to get a shot of the sunrise or sunset for an establishing shot.

The Film Company

The institution that maybe interested in producing and distributing our films is hammer film productions which is a british filming company in the UK. They mainly make horror films however they also make sci-fi and thriller films. I feel that the reason they will invest in ou film is because our film is a james bond type movie and it is one of a kind as it has a very young cast from gordonstoun!!!!They will be very keen
on having something new for a change and since it is in the shadows of james bond type movie it may be a success. However this is just a thought and a plan and has to yet be presented to them so that they can see it.The other film company that we looked at and that maybe interested in out thriller movie is Coffee films british independent film production company. I fell they might produce our movie as it is a thriller and that is one of the genres they are interested in and since it is similar to a james bond movie they ight consider that as a plus point.

Pearl and Dean

The Pearl and Dean is primarily a british cinema advertising company. They basically sell advertisements to the british cinemas prior to a movie. I am briefly going to talk about the way they categorize their audience. So they have three categories of audience which are further divided into Age, Gender and Class: 15+ : These are for young upmarket teenager. The majority of this market is between the age group of 15-24. There are more ABC1's therefore there is a high market a they are the so called higher class, and there are slightly more female audiences than men. Family:These are mainly housewives and young children. There is an equal number of audience members throughout the age groups of 7-14, 15-34 and 34+. There is a much higher majority of ABC1', compared to C2DE. and there are about 56 % female audiences compared to the 44%of male audience. The Art House is the final category is fr slightly older people and consists of a lot of ABC1. About 63% of 34+ aged people are in this category. They are almost only ABC1 and there are an equal number of male and female members.

Audience research

I think that the type of film we are making attracts the sort of audience that likes action, and people who are very good at something, like a very good and crazy detective or assassin. Our audience likes big turns in the stories, but not too big. Like if the main character has a special thing about him that the audience like they would not want him to change, an example woulld be if the main character can get all the ladies and he is a real player, the audience will not like it if he gets married in my opinion. But other types of turning points that have to do with the missions or campanies they are in is very popular among our audience in my opinion.

Opening sequence Bourne Identity

This picture shows a rusty tap and in the clip there is a diegetic noise when the tap is turned on, it tells the audience that this is being performed in a basement kind of atmosphere and makes the audience suspicious of this being a criminal act. 

 in this picture you see a mans dirty fingers operating a mans bulletwounds, you see the blood and what was inside the man, this underlines the fact that there is some sort of criminality going on. There is also a very calm and mysterius non-diegetic music, this makes the audience curious.

 It is very obvious that this is done in an amateur way since you can see that the man is waering a fleece, and the room is dirty. you can also see a small round window in the background which shows that they are on a fishing boat.

 in this picture you see that the man is wearing a wetsuit, this tells you that the fishingboat probably picked him up from the water. As well as a bullethole.

  The injured man wakes up, in this shot there is a closeup of the injured mans face as he is strangling the other man, his facial expression shows confusion, pain and anger. He is clearly very surprised of where he woke up and has no clue what is going on.

This is a key shot because the man who was suspected of being a badguy and a criminal because of his little lab in the basement of the boat and because he was operating on the man with a dirty scalpel and dirty hands is helping him and telling him that he found him in the water which is a big turning point.

 This shot shows what he under the injured mans skin, it looks like a laser and underlines that the man on the operation table is clearly part of some serious and mysterious stuff.

 This shot shows that the operation room is abseloutely not an operation room, but a room in the bottom of a boat with a toolbox to operate on the man, it underlines how amateurly the procedure is done.

Opening sequence analysis The Mechanic

The mechanic opening sequence

The clip starts by showing a Columbian man arriving in Columbia with a private jet. You can see right away that it is a very wealthy man because of the jet and the bodyguards waiting for him at the airport with fancy suits, sunglasses and weapons. They are standing there with fancy cars to underline the wealth of this man.

 

They step into their fancy cars and drive away as there is some calm southern American music that sounds a little mysterious but at the same time tells you a lot about the man, in this part they make it very obvious that the man is involved in a lot of crime because of the music as well as they drive into a village and step out of their car and attack helpless members of the society because his car was in their way. As their cars approached the village the lighting was very peaceful, the music was also very calm. And you can see that the people were very happy until the richer ones arrived.

 

As the rich man approaches his villa there is a great of all of the cars in his escort driving through a narrow gate with big walls on the sides and the big villa in the background to show how rich and powerful he is.

 

He steps out of the car with all the bodyguards around, this proves the high level of security he has it is easy to understand that he feels threatened. The boss also stands out from the bodyguards by wearing a different coloured suit.

 

He steps into his villa and goes straight to the swimming pool, the swimming pool is very dark, there is no chance of seeing what is in the water, this is to make the audience curious and paranoid. There is obviously something going on because of the mysterious music, guards and the dark swimmingpool.

 

When he is in the swimming pool he is being filmed from under the dark water, this could mean that he is being filmed from another person’s sight, which is under water.  While he is swimming you can hear diegetic sounds like the sound of him taking a deep breath over water while he is swimming or the sound of his arms mowing under water, this makes the audience feel the reality of the situation. The darkness of the water makes it scary.

 

During the killing and when the killer is escaping the music played is quite fast which stresses the audience. The killer is under water wearing a black wetsuit which makes him look very professional. Also the killing is very quick and clean and he gets away easily and quickly, a way of showing the killers skills.

 

The killer took the arms of the dead person and made it look like he was swimming so the guards would not notice he was dead. A way to show how professional the killer is.