Our group began thinking about this media project during the summer, before coming back to school. Though there were many discussions, the ideas were very bare and in the early stages, but we all agreed that an early start would put us on the road to success.
One of our very first ideas involved a disabled man with a dilemma. We were all keen on the idea of a disabled person as a main character, and thought it had a lot of potential and could create a lot of enigmas. The basic idea revolved around a disabled man who befriends a doctor or psychiatrist after an accident, but after a period of time, asks his new friend to help kill him because of his depression since his accident. Group member David Huxford, a Philosophy and Ethics student, brought up the idea of euthanasia and we all agreed that it was an interesting topic that would raise questions among the viewing public. This basic idea also had other incarnations, such as the disabled man befriending a racist or anti-Semitic doctor, with the doctor only realising later in the film that his new friend is usually someone he hates.
We thought this idea was strong, but each group member started bringing up potential problems. For example, the portrayal of disabled people on film can be a taboo subject among some people, and we agreed that we wouldn’t want to cause controversy. We also established that if the disabled person was portrayed wrong, it might provoke laughs among audiences, completely the opposite of the image we wanted. After another discussion, we decided that this idea would be too problematic and decided to go down another route.
Though we dropped the idea of a disabled person as our main character, we as a group decided that we wanted our main character to have particular quirks and be quite complex. Many Sixth Form videos have characters that are uninteresting, bland and are not exciting at all. We agreed that videos like this look rushed, and wanted our main character to be interesting and sophisticatedly planned.
If our first main idea was perhaps part of the drama genre, our next one fitted into the thriller genre nicely. Two of our group members live near a large crop field, which we fe
lt would be a very interesting location. Group member James Moss suggested the idea of a ‘cycle of life’ that the crop field could represent, which we all thought was a clever reference. Taking influence from the film ‘The Box’ (Dir. Richard Kelly, 2009), our basic idea contained either one or two people following particular tasks on a mysterious list that had been sent to them. When one person completed the tasks, they were led to a man who offered them their greatest desire. The character would choose a large sum of money, and the man would give them this, but leave them confined in a blank room with no contact to the outside world.
Our entire group agreed that this idea was exciting and would allow for many interesting locations and camera shots. We also knew that this idea needed to be developed more, to fill the full five minute time slot and make the film interesting to watch. The ending was a particular favourite of the group as we thought most people would not see it coming, most likely making them watch the short film again. We also had some interesting iconography prepared for this idea, such as a ragged suicide note and a formal meeting in the middle of a deserted crop field. This idea stayed as the main one for our group for a couple of weeks as we tried to develop it further and add to the storyline. But problems started occurring, and members started to disagree and lose interest in the idea as a whole. We also found that filming would most likely take a long time thanks to the many locations involved, and that this would cause problems with the editing. After a long consultation, many aspects of this idea were dropped and we were almost right back at the start again.
Our final idea, involving a man with a complex background growing exasperated at his psychiatrist, though a completely new idea, has taken influences from some of our earlier ideas. For example, the psychiatrist has come from our very first idea, and we have kept our promise of keeping our main character complex and quirky.
Because of our many earlier ideas, we feel that the one we have now has taken a long way to get to, making it well thought out and more compound than other groups, and has the potential to be distributed far and go a long way.
One of our very first ideas involved a disabled man with a dilemma. We were all keen on the idea of a disabled person as a main character, and thought it had a lot of potential and could create a lot of enigmas. The basic idea revolved around a disabled man who befriends a doctor or psychiatrist after an accident, but after a period of time, asks his new friend to help kill him because of his depression since his accident. Group member David Huxford, a Philosophy and Ethics student, brought up the idea of euthanasia and we all agreed that it was an interesting topic that would raise questions among the viewing public. This basic idea also had other incarnations, such as the disabled man befriending a racist or anti-Semitic doctor, with the doctor only realising later in the film that his new friend is usually someone he hates.
We thought this idea was strong, but each group member started bringing up potential problems. For example, the portrayal of disabled people on film can be a taboo subject among some people, and we agreed that we wouldn’t want to cause controversy. We also established that if the disabled person was portrayed wrong, it might provoke laughs among audiences, completely the opposite of the image we wanted. After another discussion, we decided that this idea would be too problematic and decided to go down another route.
Though we dropped the idea of a disabled person as our main character, we as a group decided that we wanted our main character to have particular quirks and be quite complex. Many Sixth Form videos have characters that are uninteresting, bland and are not exciting at all. We agreed that videos like this look rushed, and wanted our main character to be interesting and sophisticatedly planned.If our first main idea was perhaps part of the drama genre, our next one fitted into the thriller genre nicely. Two of our group members live near a large crop field, which we fe
lt would be a very interesting location. Group member James Moss suggested the idea of a ‘cycle of life’ that the crop field could represent, which we all thought was a clever reference. Taking influence from the film ‘The Box’ (Dir. Richard Kelly, 2009), our basic idea contained either one or two people following particular tasks on a mysterious list that had been sent to them. When one person completed the tasks, they were led to a man who offered them their greatest desire. The character would choose a large sum of money, and the man would give them this, but leave them confined in a blank room with no contact to the outside world.Our entire group agreed that this idea was exciting and would allow for many interesting locations and camera shots. We also knew that this idea needed to be developed more, to fill the full five minute time slot and make the film interesting to watch. The ending was a particular favourite of the group as we thought most people would not see it coming, most likely making them watch the short film again. We also had some interesting iconography prepared for this idea, such as a ragged suicide note and a formal meeting in the middle of a deserted crop field. This idea stayed as the main one for our group for a couple of weeks as we tried to develop it further and add to the storyline. But problems started occurring, and members started to disagree and lose interest in the idea as a whole. We also found that filming would most likely take a long time thanks to the many locations involved, and that this would cause problems with the editing. After a long consultation, many aspects of this idea were dropped and we were almost right back at the start again.
Our final idea, involving a man with a complex background growing exasperated at his psychiatrist, though a completely new idea, has taken influences from some of our earlier ideas. For example, the psychiatrist has come from our very first idea, and we have kept our promise of keeping our main character complex and quirky.
Because of our many earlier ideas, we feel that the one we have now has taken a long way to get to, making it well thought out and more compound than other groups, and has the potential to be distributed far and go a long way.
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