We have just finished editing our sequence and over-all I am pleased with what we, as a group, have created. Although there are some things I would do differently I am happy with what we have done.
At first, we had the idea of filming our footage in the style of a teen-comedy like ‘American Pie’ because we thought it would be original and different, but this idea didn’t happen due to the fact that we had trouble thinking of a plot and somewhere to shoot it which would fit with the genre.
In the end we decided to concentrate on the genre of ‘social realism’. We researched films such as ‘This is England’ (Meadows, 2006) and ‘Dead Mans Shoes’ (Meadows, 2003) to get inspiration for camera shots and the interaction between the characters. Although, once we had filmed and we started to edit and change our footage, we thought the genre of social comedy fitted better due to the use of back humour out actors used, although not purposefully, in our footage. We felt that black humour is fitting to our genre of social comedy.
As a group, we then researched ‘A Room For Romeo Brass’ and ‘Bend It Like Beckham’ because these films use shots, atmosphere and interaction in the same way that we wanted to.
The storyline for our story is about two brothers, Frank (the older brother, played by Ben Watson) and Bobby (the younger brother, played by Will Bannister). Frank has got involved with knife crime and is getting himself into dodgy situations, he is also trying to keep these secrets away from his younger brother to protect him. Our sequence begins with an establishing shot of Bobby walking home, we shot this footage at Adembrookes and at a Council Estate in Trumpington. We took the inspiration for this beginning from ‘Dead Mans Shoes’ which starts off with Anthony an his brother walking through the countryside. As a group, we thought this looked good and decided to film Will walking through the concrete scenery until he got to his front door. Once in his house, Frank starts to get fidgety and scared about his younger brother finding the knife. Our clip ends in Bobby finding the knife and a confrontation starting.
In my group, I decided to be the editor. I found this role quite hard but I am pleased with what I produced. I was responsible for editing the clip to make it flow better and to make it look like a social realism film. I decided to edit our clip so that the atmosphere between the two brothers when the argument was happening was really intense. I made the shots of the characters faces change very quickly to show the urgency of the argument.
As a group we also decided to not include any non-diagetic sound to convey how the characters were feeling. Also to build up the tention between the two brothers. However, earlier on in the sequence we decided to include sounds of the city to make it more realistic. We added sound effects of helicopters, sirens and cars.
Overall as a group I think we worked well together, however there were some disagreements about the name for the film, at first we wanted to call it 'Barrel Boy' because we were going to use a gun as a weapon, but we had trouble finding a gun. Insted we decided to call it 'Merkin' Skankin' and Shankin' because it sounded appropriate and added to the comedy element of the film. There was some dispute about the name of the film but we decided to use it anyway.

We have just finished editing our sequence and over-all I am pleased with what we, as a group, have created. Although there are some things I would do differently I am happy with what we have done.
At first, we had the idea of of filming footage in the style of a teen-comedy like 'American Pie' (1999, Weitz) because we thought it would be original and different, but this idea didn't go due to the fact that we had trouble thinking of a plot and somewhere to shoot it which would fit the genre.
In the end we decided to concentrate on the genre of 'social realism'. we researched films such as 'This is England' (Meadows 2006)

9 screen grabs

We have just finished editing our two minute sequence from a film, even though it is still a bit rough around the edges I am generally pleased with how our project went. Throughout our filming process there were a couple of hiccups, most commonly to do with fitting in a time we were all able to film, but apart from this everything ran quite smoothly.

At the begin of the project the first idea to crop up in our initial brain storming was to do a American style teen comedy, much like the American pie franchise or one of the new Hollywood ‘Bromance’ themed movies like ‘ pineapple express’ (David Gordon Green, 2008) and ‘I love you man’(John Hamburg, 2009). However this idea fizzled out due to location difficulties and accents etc. we then changed our idea to more of a social realist style film much like the work of directors Shane Meadows and Mike Leigh, on the other hand we still wanted some humour within our film so we ended up creating a clip from a social relist comedy, much like Meadows ‘A Room for Romeo Brass’ (1999) or Leigh’s ‘Nuts in may’ (1976) from the T.V show ‘A play for today’.

The story line in our two minute clip is about two brothers arguing over the possession of a knife which one of the boys has obtained. We added social realism to the film by using a story of murder and gang violence, which gave it a dark element, however the costumes and way the actors talk is funny and brings a lighter side to the whole clip, catching that classic British dark humour which is portrayed within many British films. My appointed job throughout the filming process was cinematographer and I was responsible for choosing the angles and also the panning of the shots. This role was important at the beginning of the sequence as we had to show one of the characters played by Will Banister walking home through an estate. I chose several shots which panned down from the sky to make the sequence more interesting to the viewer, and one of these shots was used in the final cut. Later on in the clip much of it is dialogue meaning less original shots where used, but just close ups of people’s expressions and them talking. The final shot in our sequence shows the knife fall on to the floor of the bedroom and we decided to use a crash zoom effect on this image to create more shock factor and to spark emotion within the viewer.

In our sequence we did not use any non-diagetic sound as we felt collectively as a group that this would distract the viewer from the raw emotion which was in place throughout our sequence and the relationship which is built up between the two brothers in the two minutes of footage. However using the software final cut we added some sound effects of helicopters, traffic and sirens in to the background of the sequences outside to make it feel more realistic and natural.

Generally as a group we worked well with each other and didn’t have many disputes about where to take our film or what to do next. The only minor disagreement between the group was on the name of our film. Originally it was to be called barrel boy, which takes reference to the film ‘Bullet Boy’ (Saul Dibb 2004), however due to a lack on props on the day of filming the original idea of younger brother Bobby walking in on elder brother Frank admiring a gun, had to be scraped and a knife used in the guns place. This meant a name change and I came up with the idea that our film should be called ‘Merkin, Skankin and Shankin’ as this uses street slang which is present in our film idea but also is a rather humorous name and plays in to the comedy element of our film. However other members of the group did not like this name and there was a debate whether to keep it or not. In the end though, we did decide to run with this title.

Another role in which I had in the group was that of Actor. I was chosen to act purely on the basis that the two roles within our clip were written for males, and being only two males in the group I had to step in and act. Personally I felt my performance within the sequence is a little rusty and in several shots I was smirking, which clearly took away from emotions we were trying to portray in our clip.

Despite this my general feeling about our two minute clip is that overall it was a success, obviously with more time we could have sharpened up the editing and sounds, and even shot a bit more dialogue footage to expand the scene. But I am pleased with our finished film and felt we worked extremely well as a group and as a collective of ideas and opinions.

Evaluation

Film Sequence Evaluation

After finishing making our two-minute sequence from a film I am quite pleased with our results however there are some things that I wish had gone a bit more smoothly in the production stage. Most of these however were just organisation within the group and all being able to film at the same time which proved to be a bit of a problem.
When we first started out our initial idea was to do a sort of American Pie type film. It was mainly Ben's idea but once we looked into it we realised that it could actually work quite well. We decided to do a Social Realist Comedy however as we thought it would be more interesting and a bit different from everyone else. We looked into a number of films but the main ones were "A Room For Romeo Brass" (Shane Meadows 1999) and "This Is England" (Shane Meadows 2006). We liked Shane Meadows style as he played on very simple aspects but made them interesting and clever. He also used a lot of humorous situations, which had a dark side to them.



















Our two-minute clip involved two teenage boys arguing over one of them having a knife. At first we wanted our sequence to be quite dark and mysterious to go with our Social Realism genre but after filming a first few scenes we realised that it was actually quite a funny situation. A boy trying to hide something from his younger brother is amusing in its self but it being a knife makes it that much more amusing. So we changed our genre to Social Realism Comedy instead of just Social Realism. We did this by having over dramatic clips and very cheesy acting from the two boys but at the same time quite serious subjects were discussed to keep that Social Realism aspect.














The role I had in this project was the director and the editor. I wanted to direct because I had never done it before so it was a nice challenge I set myself. I also wanted to edit because I find that part very interesting when it all comes together and a final sequence is produced. Being director I got to choose how each clip followed the next. At the start of our clip there is a lot of Bobby (Played by Will Banister) walking around different parts of Cambridge. I wanted this to happen because I think it makes a good re- establishing shot and set the scene as well as introduces the first character. I think the audience can learn a lot from the first few scenes as well as a bit about the character Bobby. The scene is set in different parts of Cambridge but we were trying to set the scene of rough parts of Bristol. We did this mainly by filming some flats near Addenbrookes hospital, as they look quite dirty from all the pollution in the city. We also added sound effects of cars and police sirens over the top of Will walking. This helped to build up some idea of where the two boys were living. We decided we didn't want to add any non-diagetic music to our sequence, as it wouldn't fit properly with the storyline. We also thought it might ruin the mysterious effect that Will was giving off in the first few scenes. The first time we see Frank (Played by Ben Watson) is just a close up of his hands holding a knife. We chose to put this shot in as it doesn't give very much away and when it was originally a long shot the whole suspense was lost so we filmed just a close up instead. You can't see Ben's face and there is no sound at all. The audience is oblivious as to who this second character is which helps with the dark mysterious side to our sequence.

When Will walks into the flat we wanted some realisation from Ben that his kid brother was home. We decided to have Ben hear the front door slam shut which is when he jumps up swearing to himself. I wanted this to happen because it gives off the comedy effect as Ben struggles to hide the knife but the audience is also on edge wondering if the younger brother will find it or not which is the more serious side to our sequence. This helped to create suspense for the audience as they wonder why he is acting shifty. We also wanted to make the audience clear of the relationship between Frank and Bobby so we wrote in the script "Hey bro...you all right?" as the first line said to signify who they were in relation to each other. The scene then played on as the younger brother Bobby rambled on to tell his cooler older brother about his day. We decided to end the sequence when Bobby found the knife as this created a dramatic realisation and added emphasis to this ending moment.









As a group I think we worked quite well together. No one really disagreed with each other about anything and we all played our roles without any problems. When it came to the editing stage I think we all worked together to get the best possible outcome we could as we all found the editing part quite hard. Fortunately I already had some basic skills in Final Cut Express and Garage Band that helped me edit and finalise our two-minute sequence.
To conclude I am really happy with our final outcome. I think a few things could of gone better like our organisation as a group but other than that I think we have produced a good two minute sequence that underlines the values of a Social Realisation Comedy and could ultimately lead onto a full film.

Social realist

We researched into some youtube video's that are similar to our film clip.


(A room for romeo brass)



(A room for romeo brass)