Setting and Location Ideas: Psychiatrist Office

With the shooting schedule date imminent, the group began to frantically seek out a psychiatrist office. The notion was to locate a room that reflected the grey and jaded mise-en-scene from the countryside shooting, whilst maintaining some sense of a clinical, uncomfortable atmosphere.

Keeping that in mind, we all set out searching yet to no avail. It seemed that no matter where we looked it because almost unattainable to locate a room that would enhance all the ideas and notions we were trying to arise during our short thriller.

It was only when flittering through family pictures when I stumbled across photos of our recently refurbished living room. As one could formulate from the pictures below, the proverbial film fan could argue that such a setting would destroy the clinical notion set above. However, the group have reassessed this idea, and determined that perhaps the family setting could work just as effectively.

This could reinforce the suggestion that these are just normal people, with completely juxtaposed views upon how they live their lives. It would also anchor the violent, more climatic scenes towards the films conclusion, as it would ground the film and make the scenes unfolding before the audience seem more authentic.

Some of the problems we may encounter however derive back down to the fact that the room is a living room- not a psychiatrist office. However, like all good directors of their art, we can hopefully mould this around the plotline. For example, protagonist Christian is a volatile yet intellectually stimulated being, who has almost lost faith in the world and the people around him. So when he is forcefully subjected to see a phoney psychiatrist, trying to conform to a world gone wrong by preaching from the confines of his own phoney living room, this would infuriate the protagonist, ultimately leading to the psychiatrist’s demise.

Obviously, we could manipulate the space we have, to reflect the psychological/thriller genre. Such examples would include removing the rugs, sofa and family pictures. We could even pull the blinds and dim the lights to formulate an almost surreal, dreamlike sequence. One group member even suggested lighting the fire, which co-links with such films as “Shutter Island” in the warden office. As the room is quite drawn out as well, I can picture that reinforced long shots of the two over the table would anchor the scene quite fittingly.

Like with all initial ideas, I can understand that on the very day of shooting this room may not meet the required standards that our group are longing for. For example the lighting may be wrong, the required camera angles may be inaccessible, the mise-en-scene may conflict with opposing scenes etc. However, hopefully this suggestion will speed up the shooting process and enhance our marks in the long run, balancing on the factor of luck and how the footage looks on camera.

Hopefully if we do chose to pursue this room for this particular sequence, we can draw together a comparative blog-post of the room prior and post shooting dates, to inform the examiner of how we moulded a simple living room into a make-shift psychiatrist office.

The "Scenes From a Memory" Influence

The concept album "Metropolis Pt.II: Scenes From a Memory" by progressive metal band Dream Theater is an album which has influenced some of the ideas for our short film.

The album centres around the story of a man called Nicholas, who has recurring dreams of another life. He goes to see a psychiatrist, and the album opens with words softly spoken by the psychiatrist:



"Close your eyes and begin to relax. Take a deep breath, and let
it out slowly. Concentrate on your breathing. With each breath
you become more relaxed. Imagine a brilliant white light above
you, focusing on this light as it flows through your body. Allow
yourself to drift off as you fall deeper and deeper into a more
relaxed state of mind. Now as I count backward from ten to one,
you will feel more peaceful, and calm. Ten. Nine. Eight. Seven.
Six. You will enter a safe place where nothing can harm you.
Five. Four. Three. Two. If at any time you need to come back, all
you must do is open your eyes. One."


The album takes the listener on a journey through which Nicholas discovers that the dreams he has been having are of a girl called Victoria who lived 70 years earlier. The regression therapy focuses his dreams so that they are much more vivid, and he is able to meet Victoria. She reveals to him that there is a reason that she is haunting his dreams, and tells him that she wants him to know her story and has been searching for a way to reveal the truth about her death.

Eventually, Nicholas learns that the reason he is being haunted is that he was Victoria in a previous life, and therefore they share a soul. After discovering this, finding out what happened to him in a previous life becomes an obsession, and he feels that he cannot rest until he uncovers the truth. It takes over his life.

As the album unfolds the listener learns that Victoria is in love with Julian Baynes, but that she is drawn into an affair with his brother Edward because of Julian’s lifestyle of gambling and drinking. Newspapers report that Victoria was shot by Julian, who then killed himself, leaving a suicide note. However, Nicholas believes that this is not the truth.

At the end of the song “Fatal Tragedy”, the psychologist says "Now it is time to see how you died. Remember that death is not the end, but only a transition." This is a reference to the fact that Victoria was reincarnated as Nicholas:



This is significant as we learn that not only was Victoria reborn as Nicholas, but that he carries the same personality traits as Victoria, and also that deeds will follow his soul through eternity. This foreshadows the fact that eventually the story will come full circle and that the same thing will happen to Nicholas.

Eventually, Victoria ends her relationship with Edward, leading Edward to kill his brother and Victoria. He then writes a suicide note and puts it in Julian’s pocket, getting away with the murder.

Satisfied that he has uncovered the mystery and that he can go back to his own life, Nicholas goes home and relaxes. However, he is startled when the psychiatrist turns up. He says “open your eyes Nicholas” and then it is implied that he kills him, completing the circle once again. Presumably, the cycle will continue with whoever Nicholas is reincarnated as.

Part 1:

Part 2 (Watch from 3:18)


It can be interpreted from this that the purpose of Victoria haunting Nicholas is to warn him of the vicious circle, however it does not end it as Nicholas is murdered in the end.

It is the cyclical aspect of the story which interests me most, as it deals with the concept that our fate is already decided though we don’t know it. The psychiatrist is also an interesting character because as far as we know he has no motivation for killing Nicholas other than to complete the cycle. The line “open your eyes” is also repeated from earlier on in the album when Edward kills Victoria.

There are many aspects of this story which we will use as inspiration for our film, particularly the words of the psychiatrist as they have an eerie calmness to them which adds to the sinister nature of the story.

1st day Of Filming

After the awful attempt to begin filming, we as agroup got our act together and decided that onFriday 19th November; we would spend the day filming for our short film. However, because we all had the same lesson first period, we all waiteduntil ten o’ clock to being shooting. So after confirming it was OK to go out shooting for the day, then signing out, we got into Dave Waters car and set off for our first day shooting.


As we began driving to location, we decided what our primary and secondary objectives were to be for the day. Our primary objectives were to film shots of the country side for our opening title sequence. Our secondary objectives were to film parts of the film in which we could edit into the film. The main area of shooting would be in the Billericay country side roads (facing the fields) to represent the every slowly regressing psyche of the main character. The effectiveness of the shots use whilst we were in motion creates the effect of a journey within the mind of the main character.

The most difficult part to shoot was the running in the mad scene. Due to the presence of the fog, it created a really nice effect of me disappearing into the distance. However, due to the wet morning conditions, the soil in which i had to run on was shift and difficult to run on. But after checking the footage out, it turned out to be worth the collateral damage, even though mud got everywhere.

The strengths of our first day made the footage look more towards the genre of which we wanted to create. The fact that we chose to film whilst the atmosphere was foggy gave an ominous feel to the video, as well create an amazing illusion when the main character runs into the distance. As well as this, the amount of footage we caught exceeded the amount which we may actually need for the scene we plan to create. Because of this, we have a large variety of choice when it comes to what can go in and out of the title sequence.

The weaknesses of this day, however, did make the day a little less productive as it could have been. For example, we did spend a lot of time driving around looking for locations because we hadn’t pre-planned the set location we planned to use. Also, half way through the day, we began to lack motivation for the task at hand, so we went to Dave Waters’ house in Billericay and began to distract ourselves by filming pointless footage and watching it back on the camera whilst. This not only wasted what little time we had that day to film, but it also crippled us in the sense that we could have used the time more productively (such as organise what we would do on another day of filming).


Overall, our first day of filming turned out differently than i personally had expected it to be. The shots we got were genuinely better than I had expected, but I feel a lot more could have been done to improve our future plans for this project. However, the next day shall further improve the project and get the grade we deserve as a group.

Film Name

We decided to think of a name for our film. After brainstorming many ideas we eventually settled on the name "Existence of Christian". The reason for this is that we thought having a short title with one word was clichéd. Therefore, we decided on a title which is still catchy but slightly longer. It is also very vague and creates enigmas and a sense of mystery for the viewer, instantly enticing them to watch the film.

The title suggests that because our character merely 'exists' rather than 'lives', he sees his own life as fairly insignificant. This could be part of the reason for his mental instability. The decision to include the main character's name in the title came from the idea that calling the character 'Christian' immediately conjures up images of a good-natured, forgiving, religious person. However, the fact that our character is in fact none of these things (perhaps he was once) makes the title slightly ironic and almost misleading. It is not our intention to deceive the audience, however we believe that by not conforming to expectations, it will enhance the viewing experience as the film will take the viewer by surprise.

Character Development & Influence

As the group was practically all set to shoot, we began to deliberate over one of the most vital aspects of our five minute Thriller- the protagonist. We are essentially aware that within the confines of a short film, it is unlikely the audience will form bonds and thereby connect with this persona, so as a direct result, we plan on illustrating a figure with no back-catalogue, which in itself should formulate enigmas, as well as an air of mystery.

After some careful thought, we settled on the name Christian. Portrayed by our groups very own David Huxford, we have selected this name for a handful of reasons- Fundamentally due to the fact it is a conventional English name, which should raise deceiving pre-conceived notions of normality in our audience’s minds. Secondly, our audience should subconsciously link the name to religion, so when they closely analyse his contradictory mode of action, this should formulate some sense of irony- a trait we wanted to encapsulate within our short thriller.

The short as a whole revolves around the themes of trust, grief and the human mind. The name therefore could metaphorically anchor who the lead protagonist yearns to be, despite the fact that his life has moulded into something somewhat demented/ deluded etc.

In terms of his disposition, he is regarded as fairly erratic, and at times volatile. Despite this however, he is an intellectually stimulated human being, someone, who perhaps feels suffocated and crushed by this intense knowledge. This may sound somewhat vague; however, he yearns for that oblivious naivety that the vast majority of people do not seem to appreciate on a day-to-day basis.

The fact that the vast majority of shots selected within the 5 minute sequence will consist of long-shots of the protagonist, we could also argue that his tall/somewhat spindly Non-Verbal-Communication to convey signs of malnutrition. This could be one of the first pre-conceived notions the audience will formulate to suggest that he will inevitably commit suicide, despite the fact that he is the culprit. This should be fairly effective in the sense that Thriller’s are renowned for their enigmas; therefore questions will be raised as to how such a person could commit such a crime.

To anchor Christian’s mediocre, yet seemingly important life, it is vital to consider his place of residence, as it has to reflect his persona in a fitting way. For example, as his psyche is somewhat frenetic, nonetheless demanding, I could imagine his house would be littered with mess, but all the same day-to- day items that would be demanded on the proverbial week. Like his name, I can imagine the street would be extremely reflective, somewhere based in the suburbs, where nothing out of the ordinary would occur. Thereby, the climactic scene of death would be exemplified and magnified simply due to the normality of the house, the normality of the room, yet juxtaposed with a warped mind.

In terms of the Psychiatrist, we required a figure that could perhaps fit within the perceived stereotype of a psychiatrist. Therefore we pursued fellow student Dr. George Austin- your typical male psychiatrist, with the conventional, visual allure to suggest he leads a financially steady life alongside the nuclear family, with little or no troubles. This conformist nature is the exact stereotype that protagonist Christian would internally despise, which is the controlling idea behind our short. This typical stereotype should reflect his dialogue/psyche as well, to the extent where it sounds as if he is treating Christian more like a number opposed to a person, which should eventually lead to his peril.

The influence for this comes from 1960s TV show The Prisoner, in which the main character is only referred to as "Number 6". This spawned the famous quote "I am not a number, I am a free man!" and could be seen as a protest of individualism against a world where to be seen as different is bad. An underlying theme of our character will show elements of this, as part of the reason he is seeing a psychiatrist could be because he feels outcast.

Another film which has influenced us is 2001: A Space Oddyssey. Although not a 'character' in the traditional sense, HAL 9000 is a rather scary vision of how computers may one day be the downfall of mankind. The reason it is influential to our film is that, much like HAL, our psychiatrist seems to be there to help his patient and would never harm him. However, it turns out that he has a sinister dark side. In the case of HAL, this means sacrificing the crew for the good of the mission. In the case of the psychiatrist, it is not clear what his motive is, however the idea is much the same; and made even creepier by the juxtoposition of his psychotic motive against his calm, boring voice.

Script-First Draft

Psychiatrist: So let’s progress. Within this world, within the confines of your own existence, explain your troubles. What bothers you?

Patient: Hmm… I dunno’. Every morning, I get up, and I think what am I doing here? What am I feeling? What am I giving?

Psychiatrist: You see (name), it doesn’t matter what path you’ve gone down, or where you plan to go. You just need to find some hope in this world.

Patient: Hopes just a word, and you can’t just find it at work, or with the family, or in some dream. And sometimes you just think, damn, have I really got to live like that?

Psychiatrist: Well now, that’s why I’m here, together we can beat this.

Patient: Are we done?
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Patient: Now listen, I may be wrong, but this hope you speak of. It lies in the air we breathe, the sounds we hear, and the water we lay in…

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Script Inspiration- "Last Thoughts on Woody Guthrie"

The inspiration and influences for the script above derive from a recital, performed on the 12th April 1963 by American Singer-Songwriter Bob Dylan.

The reason I have moulded the script around this renowned piece of poetry is due to the context of poem. Dylan uses this five page stream of consciousness to singlehandedly convey all paths we can pursue in life, from a youthful mad delirium, to old age, and unavoidable death.

Through this collective piece of writing however, the piece manages to entice the reader to realise how we function in this world. We all have no recollection or reason as to why we are here, and our lives, and inevitable death is subjective to the people around you. For instance, Woody Guthrie, died in a hospital, yet Dylan summarises the poem with- “And though it's only my opinion, I may be right or wrong, you'll find them both in the Grand Canyon, at sundown”.

Therefore this poem reflectively conveys all walks of life, whether that is misery, or happiness. This is the sole reasoning behind using this piece as influence, as both the patient and psychiatrist are two people of conflicting personas, who hold fixed ideologies upon life, a theme consistently regurgitated throughout Last Thoughts on Woody Guthrie.

Location Ideas

Setting and location is an important part of any film, and choosing the correct place to film can make or break the whole project. Our group has had many long discussions about where we feel the most productive location to film is. After we had our finished basic idea and had begun storyboarding, we had to decide how the particular location we would choose would affect the mood and tone of the film itself. To start with, we contemplated what the location should look like, before searching for somewhere that we already knew. For example, for the opening scene with the dead body in the bathtub, the group decided on what look we thought the bathroom should have, rather than choosing to settle on a bathroom in the home of one of the group members.

For the opening scene, we agreed that the bathroom and the bath itself had to be clinical. The body is calm, as if the prospect of death had lingered in the air for some time. To film this artistic death in an uninteresting, stereotypical family bathroom would have completely taken the impact away from this scene. Whoever the body is, this death has not been rushed and we wanted to give the bathroom the look of someone that is tidy and organised, and that his demise is just one of the things to tick off from his list of things to do on that day. A white bath with white tiles on the walls would be the perfect location for this scene. If there are any images on the walls, they may make the scene look amateur and lazy, depending on what the images are. This scene is probably the most important in our film and is our main controlling idea, so our group has decided to search thoroughly for the bathroom closest to the original ideas in our mind. In a perfect world, the bathroom would look similar to the one used in the film ‘Garden State’ (Dir. Zach Braff, 2004). At the beginning of the film, the character of Andrew ‘Large’ Largeman is heavily sedated and his whole house is very plain and clean. The walls are white, the bathroom is large and the bath itself is swallowed by the rest of the room. This use of setting was very cleverly chosen and gives the opening to the film the feeling of loneliness, but with a hint of OCD about cleanliness. The scene also has the look of purgatory, a big bland of nothing. If our scene looked similar to this, it would give the audience the feeling that the character already feels like he is on his way to death, and is just speeding up the inevitable.

Another important scene in our film is the discussion between the psychiatrist and the patient. This scene would require a psychiatrist’s office, but because we have no budget we must improvise. In our storyboard, the room is predominantly brown, with many books on shelves and a large desk. The two characters would be situated in the centre of the room in different chairs. The psychiatrist’s chair is small and comfy, making him look big and almost like a higher power. The patient’s chair is vastly different, huge and overbearing around him, making him look feeble and unimportant. This scene was well thought out throughout our group, but we realised that this location with the correct iconography would be almost impossible to find and use. Therefore, we decided that the specific chairs idea could be dropped if needed. We will continue to search for a similar-looking room. Any room that looks like it has been used daily for many years with many books or shelves could easily be seen as a psychiatrist’s office. A similar location to the one we are aiming for is in the film ‘There Will Be Blood’ (Dir. Paul Thomas Anderson, 2007). In a scene towards the end of the movie, Daniel Plainview is now very successful and living in a large house and his adopted son comes to visit him. Daniel is sitting behind a huge desk, and the room itself is also domineering and has a very arrogant feel to it. Shelves filled with books stagger the sides of the room and the walls are barely visible. A room similar to this is what we are aiming for. Of course, a room of that magnitude is most likely not going to be found by us to use, but if we could take specific elements from it our scene would come to life and be similar to the original ideas that we planned.

The title sequence is also an important scene to talk about in terms of location. The point of the title scene (apart from show our names) is to show the slowly diminishing mind of the main character. To portray this, the title sequence begins with a dolly shot of the beautiful countryside. After this shot, the images became more unattractive to the audience. The images and the main character’s mind are alike. The idea presented to us as a group was to film field and industrial based buildings as we were approaching location. The main mode of transport to get to these locations was by car (driven by Dave Waters). This then would get in the way of our shooting schedule, and it would be an extremely effective shot to use for the title sequence. One of our inspirations for this came from the Pink Floyd album ‘Animals’. The picture of just a factory and the smoke was the reason we decided to have the psyche decline in the title sequence by using images from the industrial world. The beginning of the title sequence where the beauty of nature is captured to imply sanity within the psyche of the main character is very important to capture correctly. Because of this, the location needed to be beautiful, open and easy to get to. We eventually decided to film the country side whilst within the car, to gain a really different dolly shot of the countryside. The idea for the countryside came from last year’s opening to a thriller ‘Allegiance’. The very first thing you see is the grass in a field, until the shot pans up and you see an unknown character being hanged from a tree. Instead of just the two seconds of just beauty, then shock, we plan to prolong the beauty and the depressing images to give the audience a chance to get into the mood of the film.

Overall, the locations we have chosen for our film have been chosen very specifically to allow the audience to feel the emotion we plan to emit from the scenes within our films. If the locations aren’t what we plan them to be like, our film won’t have the same emotion and it won’t be as effective. Based on this, location is very important to our project, and following the guide which we have set for our group would be very wise indeed.

Hypothesis for Questionnaire

For our questionnaire the group decided that it needed to be specific and bold if it was going to be any real use to us. We decided to build up a hypothesis of precisely what people we would ask. People outside of media studies don’t tend to watch short films, as they are hard to access and don’t have a large demographic to aim at. Because of this we decided to ask people outside of media studies so that we could gain an insight into what casual film watchers would look for or would interest them if short films were more easily available. By finding this out, it would also allow us to market our film better to casual film viewers outside of media and film production with posters and magazine reviews that have to be completed in the ancillary tasks.




From the answers we got it is clear to see that the majority of people would not watch a short film out of choice. If they did watch one, they would prefer to watch it in a cinema before the feature film. The most likely reason for this is that it wouldn’t require any extra effort from the viewer as they are already at the cinema, and also the film would likely be the same genre as the feature film. Most would also be willing to watch a short film on YouTube rather than TV, for example.

Of the thriller sub genres, it would seem that people would rather watch a psychological thriller than a horror. Perhaps this is due to the fact that the Horror genre has been worn-out to the extent where these thriller hybrids are becoming somewhat cliché and thereby dull. Therefore, one could argue that the more contemporary thriller enthusiast likes how the human mind works, incorporated within a narrative full of enigmas and twists.

However, from our questionnaire, we also formulated data which suggested that the conventional thriller fan prefers realist narratives opposed to surrealism. This would suggest that although perhaps the simplicity of the horror/thriller may be a dying breed, audiences still enjoy a simple narrative that can keep them engaged, yet perhaps with a twist that will not disrupt the flow of the narrative.

Overall, when looking back upon the early hypothesis devised by Taylor Gladwin, the questionnaire closely reflects his notions above (with some slight variations).However, from this piece of data collection, we can now modify our marketing strategies, and perhaps showcase our short before a feature film of the same genre. The audience would therefore feel inclined to watch our short as it would bear little or no effort to watch. We can also back-track to our storyboard, and slightly tweak the narrative to meet our demographic requirements.

Focus Group

Just like AS level, a focus group was conducted to gain a better understanding of what should be expected within our short film. But, unlike last year, the questions would be very different due to the fact that short films are not as popular as feature length films. Because of this, we needed to make sure that questions we asked didn't confuse the members of the focus group or create dis-illusion about what is expected of our short film. Though the group wasn't as big as expected, two of the three members were media students, and one student didn't study media. We felt that this would benifit the production better as someone with no real experience of short films would show more of what the majority of audiences want, not just what is told to the media students.

The questions were chosen as a group to keep conversation going within the group. Awkward silences would not only not benifit our research what so ever, but also the members of the focus group would feel less comfortable answering the questions. We had a first attempt at a focus group, and the questions were too specific, and the members of the focus group feel victim to the awkward silences. An example of these questions would be:

What is your favourite short film? and How many short films have you seen?

These questions don't promote a real answer as the majority of any group would say they haven't seen many short films (and won't remember what they were), and won't attempt to look for a short film for cheap 5 minute entertainment. To prevent this, we made the questions more broad to keep the group interested and provide better reseach material for our short film. This is why the questions had to be about films in general, and then we slowly moved into the category of short films, still not trying to make an awkward moment arise.

These were the questions we eventually came up with:

1) What is your favourite film (in general) and why?
2) What do you think makes a good film?
3) What characters do you best associate with within a film?
4) Where would you preferably watch a short film?
5) What would you like to see in our short film that would make you want to see it?

Those were the questions and this is how the focus group went:

Planning Diary

Week 1

As the group fundamentally comprises of two As Media groups, we shall initiate the coursework by analytically comparing our prior media blogs, so we can accumulate notions upon where we went wrong, and where we thrived, to ultimately build a blog embracing both positive ideologies.

Once this has been polished off, we will begin to devise ideas and notions upon our five minute production. Here, we will post initial, preliminary perceptions upon our film, which should thereby reflect an intended audience. Building up our blog step by step, we can use our findings above as a catalyst to formulate ideas upon our intended audience institution- an in-depth post concerning how and when we can exhibit our short production. Finally, we have to eventually consider accumulating research for themes we plan to exemplify, as well as codes and conventions for the near future.

Week 2

While week 1 served more time towards preliminary research, with posts not always relating to our short production, week 2 will more intimately reflect our progress and ideas upon our short. For example, posts will be conjured up concerning our strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, threats, mood/ story boards and risk assessments. Moreover, we may develop our common understanding of the short though the odd textual analysis.

Another key feature to blogging we plan to complete soon will concern a protagonist analysis post, methodically explaining our characters name, origins, disposition, role within the film, and how his worldly present reflects the genre of the film.

To wrap up the week, we may very well devise an intended audience profile, for both the model male and female. However, the board has stressed the importance of this post, so we may just reserve our energies for a later date so the post can hit its optimum level.

Week 3

Similar to week 2, the group will essentially focus their energies towards developing their overall idea for the short film of our choice. Once the intended audience profile is complete, we shall pursue our influences within the realms of film and display how these films have reflected our ideas, as well as our primary ideas upon sound, iconography and costume design. Piecing the work together ever so slowly but surely, we will then exploit the use of group member Dave Waters’ car and hopefully go in search of some appropriate settings and locations.

By now, the group will be basically ready to shoot our short production. The duration of shooting will fundamentally depend on weather forecasting in the near future, and whether we score lucky with our setting and location ‘hunt’. However, if all runs smoothly, we could potentially shoot all the mandatory footage by the end of the week, or half-way through week 4.

Week 4

The agenda upon week 4 ultimately depends on the fate of our shooting the week prior, however, if the course of action runs as prepared, the group can essentially focus of post-production work, involving evaluations of shooting, sound, mise-en-scene, editing, audience feedback, institutional analysis etc.

Week 5

Complete remaining post-production work, and pursue evaluation questions until completion.

TBC

Problems On Our First Day Of Filming

Friday 12th of November was supposed to have been the 1st day of filming for the group, but complications that arrived at the last minute have prevented this, thus, postponing filming. There we as a group decided to get filming as of this date and the problems mounted up one after another. These were the problem that we faced.

The first problem we faced was that one member of the group (David Huxford – myself) had an appointment for A&E scheduled on the day, so the group would most likely have to film without me. However, due to an early arrival at the A&E and the swiftness in which I had my foot checked, I managed to get back before 11 o’ clock; the time in which we all planned we would leave.

Even though all members of the group were planned to go filming now, another problem had risen from nowhere. Due to poor communication between each other, we all didn’t have a clear picture of what we were going to do once we had set off filming. But because of this, the group member that was going to drive us to locations wasn’t in at the time planned. Because he didn’t have a lesson until last, he didn’t feel sure that all of us were going to be at school and ready to go, so he weas still at home, presumably sleeping.

Fortunately, we will all be in together on Friday 12th November to re-schedule the day of our first day of filming, most probably to sometime next week. But this just shows that as a group, we haven’t learnt from our mistakes of last year. And being as we don’t have as much time as we had last year, we cannot postpone filming to a ridiculously late date, so we shall wait and see how this pans out.

Potential BBFC Rating for our Short Film

Though most short films are not shown in cinemas, our group have agreed that we should decide on a BBFC classification rating for our product. Hopefully in the near future short films will be shown before features in cinemas, allowing young, budding directors and screenplay writers to make themselves known. Should this or something similar develop, short films will have to be rated within a particular age range.

After finishing our storyboard and having a clear image in our minds of how our film will look and feel, we decided to discuss the rating. Though our film will most likely not contain swearing, as it usually sounds tacky and forced in low-budget films, we agreed that the tone of the film would push it above a rating of 12. Dealing with death and themes of identity and masculinity, the film will be too advanced for younger viewers, and our target audience ranges from late teens to mid-adults. Therefore we agreed as a group to rate our film a 15. We decided that a rating of 18 would be too high, as there is no strong bloody violence or hard drug use – typical features in 18 rated films.

By rating our film a 15, it would obviously allow a larger age range of people to see it and hopefully get better distribution.

Initial Ideas For Title Sequence

After careful deliberation within our group, we decided that a well-filmed title sequence would be an exquisite extract to add to our film. Many of our group’s members favourites films have excellent opening credit sequences, and we all believe that having a good title sequence adds to the films mood and gives the audience an idea of what to expect later on. We also proposed the idea of having a title sequence completely opposite to our film’s mood, to throw audiences off, so that when certain events happened in the film they would become more shocked and surprised. This idea was well thought out at first, but fell through and we decided to create a simpler title sequence, but with interesting and provocative images behind the credits.

We took influence from the opening sequence of ‘This Is England’ (Dir. Shane Meadows, 2006). Though not in the same genre as our film, the opening credit sequence intrigued us a lot. The images are all of England itself, starting off with happy images, but slowly drifting to ones of misery and despair. We thought that this technique was very effective, and thought that we could use a similar method for our opening sequence, to show our protagonists psyche and his view upon the outside world. Rather than using images of England, we thought we could get images of particular places. For example, for the opening shots which will be ‘happier’, we could get shots of trees in autumn and children playing in the park. As the shots get darker and more distressing, we would use shots of dismantled houses and shoddy wastelands. We agreed that this sequence would set the tone for our short film and give audiences an idea of what to expect from the next five minutes of footage.

Another title sequence that our group took influence from is from the film ‘Alien’ (Dir. Ridley Scott, 1979). The opening sequence was very minimalist non-diegetic sound, and the word ‘alien’ slowly comes together on the screen. As the letters piece together, the suspense gets cranked up and as the word is finally complete, the viewer is shown the spaceship on which the later destruction will happen. This opening sequence was very influential on our group, and we especially liked the use of minimalist sound. We agree that a particular song or a lot of non-diegetic sound over the images in the credits would not set the mood as we would like, and we would most likely not get the desired reaction from the audience to the images being shown. Because of this, we have agreed that the least amount of non-diegetic sound would be the best way to open the film and set the mood.

Dr. Strangelove

Although classed as an old gem in cinema history, Dr. Strangelove was one of the first of its kind to employ a title sequence at the beginning of a film. What I have learnt from this preliminary research is that it must reflect the genre at hand, a trait Dr. Strangelove captures perfectly, as a B-52 bomber “mounts” a KC-135 Tanker in mid-flight.
The remaining reasons I have pursued this film as inspiration for our title sequence concerns it overwhelming simplicity, yet maintaining dynamic impact all the same. So although we may not necessarily incorporate planes within our opening sequence, soaring through the air, we plan on capturing this simplicity in a way that anchors and reflects our psychological thriller genre. In terms of sound, the contrapuntal, American alteristic non- diegetic sound serves as an effective anchorage for the upcoming film, as this could satire the stupidity of war, and the fact it is ever going and omnipresent.




Watchmen

Watchman, on the other hand, presents a new, jaded world. This is fundamentally captured through the cinematic frameworks, that being mise-en-scene, editing, cinematography and sound. The title sequence suggests how life has fallen through new tangents, which has thereby altered society’s minds and perception upon the world. As a result, this universally affects the psyche, something that co-links with our films genre. The sequence fundamentally presents the beauty and malevolence in life all wrapped into- the torn disposition of our protagonist.

This theme entwines with the over-dubbed non-diegetic sound of Bob Dylan’s The Times Are-A Changing, a song which lyrically mirrors how people are progressing too fast for the world, which will inevitably lead to its downfall. This similarly anchors our protagonist’s psyche, someone who cannot keep up with the world’s progress, and therefore slips between the cracks of life.

In this sense, the opening sequence should serve as some form of metaphor for the lead protagonist; so therefore, it should mirror the genre, our patient and the world within our film.

The only chink in the armour here concerns the complexity of Watchmen’s opening title sequence, rife with special effects and CIG. It appears however that dynamic impact can also be presented through simplicity, as seen in Dr. Strangelove. Therefore, we will have to entwine features from both film’s title sequences.

Initial Ideas on Cinematography

Whilst simultaneously crafting our story-board, we split the group and began to formulate ideas for specific shots that could reflect our short five minute Psychological/Thriller.

Being that the genre relates to the psyche, or processes of the mind; we have appreciated the fundamental needs of (extreme) close-ups, to anchor claustrophobia and paranoia encapsulated within the protagonist. Secondly, we will need to consider the leading figures temperament when confronted by interaction.

Due to the fact he is essentially a solitary being, we will have to stay away from two-shots, instead maybe reverting to shot-reverse-shot in sparse moments of dialogue. This friendless notion that we have pinned upon the protagonist could also be anchored through wide shots of the countryside, with the figure lonely traipsing through fields, a shot inspired by “The Quintessential Guide To Dispose a Body”.

As time is of the essence, it would seem irrelevant and lengthy to discuss every shot throughout our five minute production. Therefore I plan to discuss our finest ideas concerning iconography, our first being the establishing shot of a bathroom plug-socket. We have pondered as to following the socket wire up to a perished corpse limp inside a bath. Initially the execution of such shot may be regarded as somewhat taxing, as we will have to locate a tracking dolly, and perform an extremely smooth shot. Straight away from this very unsettling image the audience shall hopefully be able to identify the genre, as the gingerly prowling cinematography should almost mirror a stalking notion, perhaps somebody who is so dehumanised, they have taken on animalistic like qualities.

Though spoken of before through initial research, we have also discussed the suggestion of a dolly shot tilted down upon the countryside. Coupled together with some thought provoking non-diegetic sound, this shot could symbolically propose that life is at times one big congealed, rushed mess. However, the beauty encapsulated in the shot could subconsciously portray that despite this notion above; the beauty in this world is what makes life worth living- the two conflicting dispositions that tear our protagonists mind, encouraging him to react as he does.

The next shot, influenced and inspired by “Garden State” ”, we plan on using an over-the-shoulder shot, reflecting off a mirror to identify our protagonist for the first time (commonly referred to as a Master Shot). This shot, introduced by a possible tilt up from the sink water could once again anchor the paranoia encapsulated within the protagonist’s psyche, as his suspicious, fearful state encourages his mind to believe the world is out to get him. This should thereby throw the target audience off course, as they believe this homicidal lunatic is actually the victim.

In terms of props and iconography, we almost want to capture these material items in a similar way to the countryside dolly shot. Initially this may seem vague; however, being that the protagonists yearns and almost dreams for a better life, he consumes his life around materialistic comforts, opposed to continually bettering himself as a person. Therefore, all shots of his clothes, clocks, radio and television perhaps will be executed in a close up, as he in not extracting the bigger picture out of life, which could be offered perhaps through a long/mid shot.

Themes to be Exemplified in our Short Film

Since our short film has had a long pre-production process involving some very deep discussions, our group has deliberated which particular themes will be represented in our film. I have highlighted three main themes that we as a group think will define our film and be assessed throughout the narrative.

One theme that we think is very important is masculinity. This is a big part of everyday life for most males – the struggle to be seen as strong to other people. In our film, the patient is desperate to be seen as ‘normal’ to others. He despises that he has to be in therapy and feels weak because he can’t deal with his life on his own and has to employ the services of a psychiatrist. Because of this he feels the need to dress smart, to look successful to others. He has no close friends, and desperately craves the attention from others so that he can feel human again, and particularly feel like a man. These feelings have not been helped by media encouragement. The media, including in real life, promotes traditional masculinity in our culture. Men are encouraged to celebrate stereotypical ‘male’ activities such as violence, fast cars and alcohol. This is shown in the film ‘Fight Club’ (Dir. David Fincher, 1999) where the characters of the narrator and Tyler Durden create a ‘club’ where men fight each other bare knuckle until someone gives up. Tyler believes this shows masculinity, exemplified in his quote “how much can you know about yourself if you’ve never been in a fight?” This shows the stereotypical nature of man, and how they seek power by any means necessary. If our film was a full feature length and the patient’s back story was explained, the audience would probably see him struggling to live up to the stereotypical man, and not understanding why every man in a magazine or in adverts look so similar – handsome, tall and well-preserved. Because the patient is not even remotely like this, he feels inadequate and his inner demons are highlighted even more.

Another important theme that will be explored in our film is the definition of identity. This is a consistent theme in thriller films, especially psychological ones. Characters usually struggle to define who they are and try to discover their true self. This is shown in the film ‘Shutter Island’ (Dir. Martin Scorsese, 2010). The protagonist in the film has to thinks he has discovered a diabolical web of lies and seeks to find the truth, but ends up finding out more about himself than he ever wanted. The protagonist (the patient) in our film has a similar problem. Though he knows who he is, it is not the person he truly wants to be. He feels that everything he does is done without his mind agreeing first, as if his body just acts and he has no time to stop and think before. This disconnection between body and mind gives the patient the feeling that he is not in control of his own life and has no sense of where he is going. To know how he wants his future to plan out, he has to lose this numbness to himself that he feels every day. Again, if our film was feature length it would most likely explore why the patient went to therapy in the first place, and would show him embracing therapy at first, believing that it would cure him. Our group have agreed that our film will address this theme as it will create intriguing enigmas among viewers and give it a dark undertone that we feel will suck the audience into the dilemmas that the patient is facing.

The final important theme that our film will address if the theme of existence and purpose. This is another theme that is quite common among thriller films in general, as characters struggle to find what the meaning of their particular life is and strive to find their reason for existence. In our film, the patient is looking for his purpose. Similar to the theme of identity discussed above, he feels that his life is pointless and that he is just a pawn in an evil game. We as a group have not decided whether the patient believes in God or an afterlife of any kind, but if he did he would most likely feel that he was put on this earth to be laughed at from above. It may seem a bit extravagant, but the patient feels that he should be ordinary, and ordinary people don’t lead the kind of life that he is leading. Every day that he lives, he comes second best and sees people that are far more successful and superior in every way than him. Our group feel that this theme will grab the viewer’s attention, as it is something that all people have felt at some point in their lives. Everyone wants to know why they are here and/or what purpose they have on this earth. We feel that by referencing this psychological state of the patient, audiences will feel more connected to him, though he is an outcast.

Overall, we as a group think that these themes are all interesting and will give our film broader dynamics to be explored. Our film will now hopefully feel and look much more sophisticated than most other low-budget short films and will set us apart from the rest, allowing us to hopefully be noticed and get our film distributed further than expected.

Final Storyboarded Idea

Even though our final idea did take considerably longer to complete than the other groups, we as a group finally managed to complete the storyboard explaining our idea. The story is as follows:

Brief Description of Action

Shot 1) Film opens with shot of plug socket. As non-digetic radio talking goes on, the camera pans across the room, following the plug. The plug eventually leads into the bathroom.

Shot 2) The non-digetic soundtrack makes the scene contrapuntal. We see a dead body face down in a bath full of water. The radio ends and the shot turns to black.

Shot 3) Extreme close-up of a body of water. Eventually, a drop of blood falls into the water to turn the water red. The camera slowly tracks up.

Shot 4) As the audience thinks death, it turns out to be a man who has cut himself shaving. A split mirror points out the split personality of the character. He stares at his reflection for many seconds.

Brief description of Action

Shot 5) Low angle shot of psychiatrist. Dialogue will be put into the scene. Psychiatrist makes himself far superior to the patient.

Shot 6) High angle shot of the patient. We feel sorry for the patient at this point, making himself rather inferior to the psychiatrist. The room’s colour will reflect the mood of the patient.

Shot 7) Shot of the country side, the dolly shot will go across the field and capture natures beauty, contrapuntal to the story line ( Possible title sequence to go here)

Shot 8) The patient is getting changed into his smart attire. There’s rapid editing at this point between shot 8 and shot 9.

Brief Description of Action

Shot 9)A clock on the counter is going anti-clockwise. Rapid editing between last shot at this point.

Shot 10) Main character beings to go crazy after the rapid editing. The mental psyche of main character begins to break here.

Shot 11) Wide shot of the main character sitting down, looking at his hands. The shot isolates the character as well as better continues the physical sign of his psyche failing.

Shot 12) Point of view shot towards the radio on the desk top. This is ment to be symbolic of the 1st shot and the radio used then.

Brief description of Action

Shot 13) Darkened out room and lamp motivate the psychiatrist to work. The psychiatrist is writing his notes. The darkness amplifies the idea of secrecy within his work.

Shot 14) Close up of the documents show that he is reviewing the main character.

Shot 15) Almost parallel to the psychiatrist, the main character, too, is writing. But instead of documents, he’s writing a note. Again, isolation is the key theme with this part.

Shot 16) Upon close up, we see what he has written. This is to imply that somehow the patient and the psychiatrist are connected.

Brief Description


17) The main character is told by his psychiatrist to close his eyes and breath as a different means of 'help'


18) However, something appears to be wrong. The main character faints as the psychiatrist puts on his coat.


19) To hide the body, the psychiatrist is seen taking the body up a flight of stairs to the bathroom.


20) As the psychiatrist leaves the crime scene in the bathroom, we see a note on the bathroom door saying 'Life is precious, but not to me.'

Brief description


21) After the suicide is revealed to be a murder, and the murderer walks away, the climax to the film is revealed.


22) End Credits.

Initial Ideas For Costume

As referred to in previous posts, from very early on in our thought process our group decided that the main characters in our film needed to be interesting with particular quirks, rather than bland and repetitive – something seen in most Sixth Form produced short films. As ideas propped up and our main idea began to take shape, so did the look and feel of our two main characters – the patient and the psychiatrist. Though still currently nameless, all of us have quite a clear image of what these people will look like and how they will act. This post will focus on the potential costume and look of the two characters, and how we intend to use particular items to manipulate a designated audience reaction.

Our protagonist, who will be referred as ‘the patient’, has gone through many incarnations throughout pre-production, starting off as a basic man with typical problems that therapy would usually help with. He has developed into a complex person with some interesting hidden agendas. After the patient grew into the character we wanted him to be, our group had a long discussion about how he should look and why. After a couple of generic ideas, we thought of some clothing that would work very well with a particular scene that had already been storyboarded. The scene involves the patient slowly getting dressed, as the clock in the room is ticking backwards, and gaining momentum while getting louder and louder. The patient will get very stressed before finally lashing out. Our group had decided early that the patient has inner problems but desperately craves to be ‘normal’ on the outside. Because of this, we decided that he would want to dress smart most of the time, as if by doing that he would seem important to the outside world. But the patient can’t quite get as smart as he would like, as he has a distinct scruffy look about him, and his ‘smartness ‘will never be as elegant as he wants. So in the scene mentioned above, the patient will be getting dressed into particular smart items, such as stylish trouser and a shirt and tie. But as the clock ticks backwards and the pulsating sound invades his mind deeper and deeper, he will become agitated and rip his shirt or tie, perhaps signalling that he has had enough and just wants to get out of his diseased conscience and explore his fragile inner world.

Our group agreed that this idea for costume was very interesting and would raise a lot of enigmas among audiences, so we decided that the patient would be wearing smart clothes in every scene he is in. A selection of shirts and ties will give the impression that the patient tries to work hard on his appearance and has various outfits, as if that he feels that’s what most ‘successful’ people do, and desperately wants to be like them. This can be compared to one of my favourite films ‘American Psycho’ (Dir. Mary Harron, 2000), where the protagonist Patrick Bateman always has to look his best and be seen in the most expensive restaurants to show his power and how successful he is. Patrick can never stand to be second best, and when fellow co-worker Paul Allen shows off his impressive new business card, something with as little meaning as that to the rest of the world is the kind of thing that puts Patrick in dismay, and he happily kills Paul with an axe shortly after. Our character has similar feelings, though not quite as extravagant. He feels inadequate that he has to be in therapy, as all he wants is to be seen as normal with no distinct problems. By being in therapy this is ruining his idea of an ordinary life, and he feels the psychiatrist is standing in the way of his happiness.

Overall, our group feels that the character of the patient is a very interesting one that audiences will be intrigued by and will maybe see a small part of themselves in him.

Our other main character in our film is the psychiatrist. Our group has not developed this character nearly as much as the patient, as the psychiatrist will not have that much screen time, but will still play a major role in our film. The main scene that he will command will be when he is talking to the patient in his office during a therapy session. This will likely be the scene with the most dialogue, and we feel this scene needs to show the psychiatrists hold over the patient.

The psychiatrists costume will look basic, but we hope that by choosing the correct colours and general look, he will have a dark undertone about him. Most psychiatrists wear normal clothes, usually smart-casual. As a group we thought that either a pair of jeans or semi-smart trousers would be adequate, along with a casual shirt underneath a dark jumper. The psychiatrist wants to make his patients feel calm around him, so doesn’t dress over the top. The jumper could be the colour of brown, as that usually symbolizes friendliness and trust, which the psychiatrist wants to establish with his patients. The trousers will also be dark, most likely black.

This costume may seem generic to some, but we as a group feel that by dressing like this, the psychiatrist also wants to be ‘normal’, or what he believes being normal is. After doing his job for quite some time, he feels like he has connected too much to his patients over the years and is now just as damaged as they are. He wants to act as regular as possible, since he doesn’t have many friends and perhaps by dressing in a ‘friendly’ way, his patients might befriend him and he will be able to have a typical relationship that stereotypical ‘normal’ people have. Our group feels that by having this similar connection hidden inside both main characters, the final outcome will have almost an ironic feel to it, as the other person is what each of them have been looking for, they just didn’t know it because they were both too afraid to share such deep emotions with others.