Trailer Plot - 28th September

First Film plot thoughts

I currently have a small but improvable film plot. This film plot will probably be tweaked and improved before completing my final trailer. I have chosen to comprehend a similar film plot to the SAW trilogy, however maybe with less of a twist. I need to develop my ideas a lot more before I can perfectly decide what happens sequential in my trailer plot.

We did a small exercise in class which was cleverly designed so everyone in the class could talk to each other individually; this was to explain about their film plot and their latest ideas. Through this exercise I was able to include some different things to my plot which I wouldn’t have thought about before.

I have currently decided to have a main character that lives a normal life. He is a typical boy aged 17; he has just dropped out of high school and is living life in the fast lane. He has recently done some bad things; these bad things include abusing alcohol, drugs and simply taking life for granted. Due to this he has been kidnapped and taken to a mysterious place by dangerous anonymous people. He struggles to fight for his life; he soon learns you need to take every day in life with respect and not to take life for granted as he has been. However there is a small twist along the storyline, he may know the kidnappers a bit more than he thinks.

Main Character – John Randall (kidnapped boy) – The main character in my trailer is a normal boy of 17 years of age, he is amongst the most popular highest people in his age group. He has just discovered alcohol and different types of drugs. However, he has started to become involved with a slight addiction towards these drugs and certain people are slowly losing their patience with him. Eventually he gets kidnapped where he struggles heavily for his life; he soon learns that life is a very important thing which should never be taken for granted.

Second Main Character – Harry Smith (John’s best friend) – Harry Smith is also a normal boy who is 17 years of age, he is totally equal to John and they have a very close friendship bond. Harry is slowly watching his best friend’s personality deteriorate slowly; Harry doesn’t like this due to many different reasons and decides to sadly act upon Johns bad indecisions. Harry eventually decides that enough is enough, John is abusing his life to the point where Harry and the rest of the friendship group have developed a hate for John after he starts to turn against them. They have decided that karma has to be dealt with, what goes around comes around is a line which starts to appeal to Harry and the rest of the friendship group.

Third Character – Tim Wright (friendship group) – Tim is also involved in their close friendship group, Tim is a very cautious person who doesn’t have much confidence. Along with Harry, Tim is also watching John slowly go off the rails and is becoming upset at the same time along with Harry. Due to Tim’s lack of confidence and his shallow personality he doesn’t have much say to anything therefore Harry and Tim slowly work together to come to a very important decision regarding Johns treacherous behavior.

Fourth Character – Mysterious Torturer (Harry Smith) – Harry Smith will play two very important roles in the film plot, as well as being Harry Smith he will eventually interrogate John without John even knowing. This will eventually be revealed as the very fascinating twist in the film plot which will make people gasp. Harry Smith will mysteriously be challenging John to fight for his life without John even knowing his previous best friend is teaching him a very valuable lesson that life should not be taken for granted.

Other Actors – These will be the main actors, however I may use a few other people who will fill in gaps regarding my film. By this I mean different people who can sit with John, Harry and Tim but not necessarily play any role in my plot. These other actors will most likely not talk but be there to generally fill in to make the scenes look genuine.

Narrative

The narrative of a storyline is often created involving a wide range of different fictional or non-fictional involvements. These aspects often include prose, pictures, song, motion pictures, speech, video games, poetry theatre or dance.

The narrative of a film can be rearranged using different ‘narrative devices’, this mainly occurs when a film travels through the past, present or future tense. This is very popular in the majority of films; these are often related to as flash forwards, notions and flashbacks. These can be used in many different ways to represent the past, present and future tense.

In SAW movies flashbacks of the present tense are very affective. These flashbacks are often revealed in a shift narrative which explores the present tense of a situation.

Another narrative device is known as shifting a certain narrative point of view. In this case the plot is often very chaotic, an audience will usually figure plot and story information with pieces of information between individuals and groups.

I feel that if I was to involve this narrative into my film with use of flashbacks and sound will be the perfect combination to make my trailer stand out in a unique way.

I will now talk about a few narrative devices which I feel can bring a lot of excitement and thought into a trailer from an audience’s perspective.

Dreams, Nightmares – Including dreams in a narrative are the perfect method to make an audience feel involved and draw their mind. This is evident that an audience will instantly wonder whether a scene is happening in the past, present or future tense.

Voiceovers – Voiceovers are a strong narrative device which is often used to explore into an individual or a situation to give an audience a deeper insight into a situation. A good example of a voiceover revealing emotion would be to explore an individual characters problems, this instantly connects an audience to feel as if they should be helping them.

Repetition – I feel repetition is a very strong narrative device which if used with sound can be displayed very effectively. A good example of repetition being affective would be a brutal scene where perhaps an individual was being tortured, together with use of sound this could build up perfect tension to an audience.

Film Director - James Cameron

James Cameron

James Cameron is one of the better known film directors in the film industry. Cameron is a Canadian film director, producer, screenwriter, editor, and inventor, he was born on August 16, 1954 and he is currently 66 years of age. Cameron was born on Kapuskasing, Ontario, Canada. Cameron grew up in the town of Chippawa, Ontario in Canada. Cameron studied at a school in Niagara Falls named Stamford Collegiate School.

James Cameron has directed, edited, and produced a huge number of mainstream movies. I would personally say Avatar is his biggest accomplishment to date, however his collection of movies are all too unique to compare.

Cameron is a very inventive film director, this is evident from Avatar. He could be seen as someone who sets the height of the bar for new inventions. In Avatar James Cameron was the first person to use stereoscopically technology.

Film Director - Tony Scott

Tony Scott

Tony Scott is an English male film director, he was born on June 21, 1944 and he is currently 66 years of age. Tony Scott is an English film director; he was brought up in North shields, United Kingdom. Tony studied at Grangefield School in his early days; he later proceeded to West Hartlepool College of Art and Sunderland Art School for his fine arts degree. This insisted Tony to become a painter due to the success of his elderly brother.

Eventually Tony became interested in film making and directing where he made his first debut by appearing in Boy and Bicycle. However he wasn’t directing this film, he was an actor. After a short time this diverted Tony’s attention towards directing and film creating.

Tony Scott has directed some very well known famous films, with these big film names such as Top gun, Beverly Hills cop 2 and Man on Fire. These are very well established films which are known hugely worldwide.

The majority of Tony’s films involve a lot of action; however he has a special way of keeping his audience engaged throughout. This is evident from Man on Fire, the film is very well balanced in terms of action, and there is always something big happening quite often in terms of action scenes. His main way of keeping us engaged throughout the film was having a tense kidnapping scene; the only way we can find out what truly happens is to watch the film through to the end. This is a very good method to keep audiences alerted to the film due to the fact we want to know what happens.

Film Director - Darren Bousman

Darren Lynn Bousman

Darren Lynn Bousman is a male film director, he was born on January 11, 1979 and he is currently 31 years of age. Bousman is an American film director; he was brought up at Overland park, Kansas. He originally graduated at a film school named Full sail university. He originally attended a high school named Shawnee mission north high school before advancing to university. He eventually got engaged to Laura Bosserman during October 4, 2008.

I would personally say Darren is popularly known for his recent infamous SAW trilogy. The horror/thriller film series is fairly unique compares to other films of the same category.

Bousman has a very reliant way his films keep us engaged throughout, from the start to finish. Darren’s method in his films to keep us engaged, attached and wanting more is common amongst the SAW trilogy fans. This is due to the fact each movie, during and after often leaves a lot of unanswered questions in our minds. I think the way he keeps us attached in his films is definitely something for me to look at, I will definitely try to incorporate this factor into my trailer.

Moodboard

Mood Board

I have created a mood board to give some overall thoughts to narrow my choices into which type of film I could include in my film trailer. I have simply included the following factors into my mood board; this is to rule out which genre of film would positively suit my interest of trailer. I have taken a look into the following:

- What has influenced my choice of film
- An overall exploration of film directors
- Which films I am interested in
- Why I am interested in these film genres
- What style of films I enjoy

Different ways of editing

Editing can be used in many different ways to give different effects whether it is time and present or in the past present tense.

If you are aiming to show some footage is in the past tense you can introduce different effects.

one example of a past effect is using black and white unsaturated colours, this is one of the main effects used in very old films to give a old history effect.

... black n white video

another effect for representing the past tense is using a high blur maybe combined with slow motion to your video for a dreamy kind of effect.

... blur slow motion video

These effects are very good for different situations such as flash backs or old memories in a movie clip.

In different type of movies different colour settings are often used, this is to connote the general mood and atmosphere of a certain scene or movie genre.

Here is an example of a gloomy horror movie , horror movies or dark scary scenes often have a higher contrast of blue involved combined with maybe a lower contrast and brightness. This is to add a dark and gloomy effect.

... horror scene effects

On the other hand in maybe a comedy film you would match the colours with the mood, a comedy has a high level of humour therefore bright and happy colours would be perfect to match a comedy movie. I would simply add a higher amount of saturation if i was editing a clip involving comedy.

... high saturation comedy clip

When editing a trailor you need to try and involve all the action into a short amout of video time, this involved including a lot of different video angles depending which type of video trailor you are creating.

Fast paced editing is often used to tense situations, this would mostly be involved in a fast paced chase or something similar. This would involved a lot of variations of POV, close up and over shoulder angles, this is to keep our view limited to make us feel in the victims boots.

...small example of a chase...

Music is also a very big part of editing, the way you sync a clip can determine the total mood of a clip. I will make two small videos to display emotion and how music can make the viewer think.

... emotion clip make peopel think.

I will now make another clip where music syncing can create a more tense and quick atmosphere to keep the viewer on their toes.