Evaluation-Question 3

What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?

To get our film distributed we will need to send the film to the studio after it has been purchased its rights and so the studio we make a licensing agreement with the company. If wanting it to get to the cinema the next stop will be that the film is sold to theatres. Certain cinemas chains that I feel may release our film are Showcase cinemas and Vue as they buy quality and different films in which 'Granted' is.

One particular film distribution that I feel may distribute our film is Revolver Entertainment.
The distribution is UK based and has distributed some crime drama films just like 'Kidulthood'(2006) and 'The Harder They Come'(1972). They are a multi award winning, marketing lead and work by producing some of the greatest Home Entertainment. They continue to build up the industry with a unique, innovative approach to managing releases by advertising their film on social networking sites like Twitter and Facebook which will be great for advertising our film because we will also advertise it on social networking sites that attract millions. It was founded in 1997, and has operations in London and Los Angeles.

Another type of a film distribution that I feel may want to distribute our film is Verve Pictures which has distributed fellow British crime drama 'Bullet Boy'(2004).'They are an independent UK specialist film distributor, with particular emphasis on both British and independent films’. They may want to distribute our film because our film is unique in the way that it challenges our genre. I chose them because they have already got experience in distributing a crime drama film so doing ours wouldn't be a problem.

Away from film distributions that have distributed crime dramas, Dogwoof is probably the most likely one that may distribute our film. This is because they are best at producing Indie films and they believe that filmmakers need a better deal. They will also be suitable for our film because we want it to become a success in which I know Dogwoof is because they release their films nationwide, on over 80 cinemas, backing the release with major campaigns showing determination. They manage to share their releases by sites like Twitter, Facebook and Youtube which are very popular with our target audience.

If we wanted to advertise our film differently another method that could be used to advertise our film would be through the internet on social networking websites in particular Myspace which is the most popular networking site in the USA available in 15 languages and attracts more than 200 million visitors.
The reason I chose Myspace is because according to statistics they attract the most teenagers who have completed secondary school in which is my films target audience, so advertising it there will grab their attention.

If we wanted to distribute it Youtube will be best as it attracts millions of people and is the world’s most watched video website. This is a lot cheaper and can appeal to audience through the word of mouth which is good so that we will be attracting much more people than we expected. If we use the Youtube it will be more likely that people will be willing to watch it and cheap to publish. This will then raise the number of view and a national film distributor will see the views and know that the film is attracting many people.

Evaluation-Question 2

How does your opening sequence represent particular social groups?

Our opening sequence of 'Granted' focuses on certain social groups which are two different social groups. One are young thug looking teenagers living in an poor area in London and the other is a young and intelligent man. We chose to do it this way so that our film does not only focus on one narrative but two sides in one which will make it more enjoyable.

In our opening sequence the main characters are not present but the characters that are shown, are represented just like the area as dirty, poor & dangerous.The costumes that the characters were wearing were hooides and trainers suggesting that these people are teenagers who probably are poor and bad. These are stereotypical views on teenages living in London, representing them as deprived teenagers. Another way our opening sequence represents the social group is by body language and facial expressions. This is because they are shown standing restless and screwfacing. This shows that they are not happy people and something has gone wrong in their past because they will not be up in the morning doin nothing important, representing them as lazy and careless. The fact that the props of the characters in the opening sequence are alcohol bottles and cigarettes represent them as brave and careless teenagers because they don't care about thier health which should be good at their age and they should not be drinking nor smoking due to it's illegal at their age meaning they don't care what trouble they can face.

'Scarface' (1983) is an example of a crime drama film that doesn't show its characters which the audience don't expect.The three characters that are present in our opening sequence are all the same age and of different races which suggests that everyone living in that area are the same regardless of race and nationality. One crime drama film that uses a range of different people is 'Kidulthood'(2006)who uses different races for characters and both genders.

We used a low angle, close med shot of the teenage gang in our opening sequence pretending as if they well selling drugs which will show the audience the social group they represent which is lower class teenagers. We chosen to use those shots because the low angle will show their strenght and power while the close med shot will show their face to see their facial expression dealing drugs and costume to see what stereotypical class their in and if thier in gangs. The parallel sound used was a slow gangster beat which will tell the audience that they are gangsters and that they feel slow in a sad way just like the pace of the beat because of the environment that they are living in. This is very similar to 'Boys in the hood' apart from they use real songs. In the frame of the shots the props that one character is holding is a cigarette with a lighter & the other an alcohol bottle which both are stereotypical crime drama props. This will make the audience aware that their life is wasted at a young age and they possibly don't care.

Before our cast was chosen we wanted them to be all boys because it will suit with the convention, but later had to change it because there were not enough boys and had to use a girl. As much as we thought it would ruin our film putting a girl it didn't because changed her image and repesented her in a gangster form.
Me and my group directed our cast to stay true to their representation of our characters by the use of their body language and costume. This meant that they were to be standing like gangsters, moving around like gangsters, screwfacing and wearing hoodies.

As our main characters were not in our opening sequence, apart from the non digetic music it was down to the setting/location to represent our main characters. We located our film during a busy morning in a dirty alleyway near litter & graffiti. It's not very nice and is a convention of where you will expect to find gangsters hanging about.

The main characters in our film are:
Character 1
Name: Nicholas Smith
Nickname: Big Jon
Age: 22
Date of birth: 22.01.1987
Gender: Male
Current Address: 42 Boxley Street, West Silvertown, E15 4nf
1 younger brother
Health Status: Healthy
Lives With: Gang Members
Personality: Never gives up, Risk Taker
Zodiac Sign: Aries
Chinese Zodiac Sign: Rat
Ethnic Background: Black British
Single

Character 2
Name: Trey Smith
Nickname: Tee Dog
Age: 20
Date of birth: 10.08.1989
Place of birth: Barking Hospital, London
Gender: Male
Current Address: 1 Barge house road, North Woolwich E16 3nx
1 Older Brother
Health Status: Healthy
Personality: Tough
Zodiac Sign: Leo
Chinese Zodiac sign: Monkey
Lives on his own
Single
Ethnic Background: Black British

From these pictures you can see how they they are represented by their costume, props, colour design and body language. Nicholas is represented as a gangster due to he is wearing a hoodie and a bandana which represents gang culture as well as the gun. Trey is represented a average man due to his normal ocstume and his smile representsd him as a kind man.

We didn't show him in our opening sequence but if we did he would have been represented as a good young man, minding his business probably of to work with a smile on his face just like picture.

Overall I believe that the opening sequence of 'Granted' represents particular social groups effectively by the characters body language, costume, props and location and so appeals to our target audience.

Media Evaluation: Question 1

Q1
In what ways does your media product USE, DEVELOP or CHALLENGE forms and conventions of real media products?

Our film uses the conventions of crime dramas (gangster) films through our characters, narrative, sound, Mise en scene and opening sequence.

The opening sequence of ‘Granted’ follows the same form of most openings by
.Including title
.Including soundtrack
.Including characters
and showing themes

First of all in our opening sequence we used an establishing pan shot to show our location which follows the crime drama scene in which it isn’t nice but dirty and ghetto.


Another way in which we followed our conventions is that we showed medium shots of characters portrayed as gangsters in which crime dramas (gangster to be précised) use a lot, for example ‘Boyz ‘n’ da hood’ represent their characters looking like gangsters that they are.
Although our opening sequence follows the conventions of the forms of opening sequences, it has its own style. Throughout our opening sequence there are several hints as to the themes of our film which are similar to many themes of other crime drama films.
Some include:
Murder
Poverty
Drug dealing
Gang Culture
Surprises

The characters in the opening sequence of ‘Granted’ follow the codes & conventions in crime drama films because they are represented as gangsters committing crime living in inner city London. This is very familiar in crime dramas because gangsters are involved in crime which makes it realistic and inner city’s because they tend to have high levels of crime for example 'GoodFellas' uses gangsters involved in crime in inner city New York.

Our narrative as well follows forms and conventions of real media products. We followed the crime drama conventions in the way that crime takes part. This includes murder and drug dealing in which is involved in our narrative. One of our main characters gets shot by another main character which is seen as a convention for crime dramas especially if one is a protagonist and the others an antagonist like in Kidulthood when Sam kills Trevor. A different example of crime dramas (gangster) films that are similar to our narrative are GoodFellas in the way that the area you live and grow up in can change your lifestyle. This is because in our narrative, Nicholas who is one main character is separated from his brother at a young age, then moves to an area supposingly the establishing shot we used at the beginning and becomes influenced by it and later becomes a gangster, just like in GoodFellas Henry wants to be like the gangster and soon does because of the area that he lives and sees everyday.

In our film we used digetic sounds such as gunshots & a hip hop soundtrack(Parallel sound) beat and planned to use non digetic sounds such as cars and train noises going past, which follow the conventions of our genre because our genre uses these sounds to tell the story and brings the film to life. For example if I wasn’t opening my eyes but listening to the film I will be able to know what the genre of the film is about, because of gunshots and the fast aggressive hip hop soundtrack beat. The sound that we used also develop forms & conventions of our genre because after the soundtrack(non digetic) the next sound used is gun shots (countrab boundtal) which could suggest that the beat of the soundtrack is the action and after that is the gunshots meaning murder or someone gets shot.

When it comes to the Mise en scene my group used it to the extent that we followed the correct conventions of crime dramas. In our opening sequence for setting we showed the London underground, alleyways & council estates. We used them because they are all crime drama (gangster) conventions and they represent life in the ghetto. We used a pan shot of graffiti to represent the people living in the areas and the area itself which follows the conventions of gangster films because graffiti is stereotypically associated with gangs especially teenagers in which we use in the opening of the film. The costume the characters in our film dress in are track suits, hoodies & trainers excluding Trey who is the C.I.D and dresses casual (polo shirt, trousers & shoes) which follow crime drama conventions because the characters in crime dramas normally dress as stereotypical thug looking guys such as in ‘Boyz ‘n’ da hood’ & ‘Kidulthood’, in which the gangsters of our film do.

Props used in our film our guns, cigarettes, alcohol bottles & drugs. These props are common in almost every crime drama gangster films to show what the gangsters use in everyday life. We wanted to use it so that our film will look like our genre and so our target audience wouldn't feel disappointed. Another part we did in camera was the rule of third from low angle in which the three characters were standing from left, centre & right. This was to show how powerful the characters were & and how the area belongs to them, to which is a typical code and convention of gang crime films because the directors wants the audience to know exactly who these people are.

As well as using & following crime drama conventions we also challenged it. During the opening we had statistics & facts about London gang related crime which some crime dramas do not use and so challenged it so that our film could stand out from other crime drama films and so our target audience will realise that it is something they don't see often and therefore enjoy it. We also used a zoom in shot of a council estate which challenged the conventions of our genre because many of the crime drama films don’t show the homes but rather the location.

We also challenge the conventions of typical crime drama openings because we don’t include our main characters in which almost every crime drama (gangster) film does like 'Menace to society'. The audience will see the setting of the film and will get ready to know what characters to expect and picture them in their head. We also challenged conventions of typical crime drama (gangster) films in both our main characters and characters in the opening scene. They are not vicious grown men, of a certain ethnic group, like in 'Menace 2 Society' and 'Scarface'. In Granted the characters in the beginning are 3 young teenagers,1 black male, 1 white male & an Asian female, while are main characters are both grown men but only one is vicious while the other is a nice gentleman. We chosen to do it that way because we wanted our film to be different and have a unique selling point. We also thought it would be a good idea because the characters are from both genders and different races so would possibly attract all kinds of people because of the characters diverse.

Our film challenges the conventions of crime drama narrative with regards to characteristics. The main characters are 1 protagonist & 1 antagonist rather than a group of each. This challenges the conventions of a crime drama film because many crime drama films tend to use a gang, family/friends or police force as their main characters like in ‘Four Brothers’ while ours sticks with the two separate brothers’ lives.

We also challenged the conventions of gangster crime dramas especially in the opening scene because we didn’t include dialogue which was very challenging because it’s important for our audience to know what the genre will be about so they stay engaged. Another way in which we challenged our genre is by not including dialogue in our soundtrack. This was also very challenging because dialogue is mainly used so that the audience we listen to what it’s saying and relate it to the film. Especially in gangster crime dramas because when you hear the aggressive gangster rap you will know exactly who the characters will be like, where it will be located & what genre will be based on. British film 'Adulthood' is one film like this.

We also challenged our genre by race & gender. During the 70's and 80's particularly in USA most of the crime drama films used men from Italian/Latin ancestry like 'Scarface' and 'The Godfather'. In recent crime drama (gangster) films the gangsters are usually all male with African ancestry depending on the location such as British film ‘1 Day’ based in the deprived areas in Birmingham. (1 Day poster) (1 Day cast) .
Making our film different by the race and gender of the characters would attract more people because our secondary audience and others we believe that because someone in their race is a character the film will appeal to them. This in particular happened to me when I wanted to see the movie 'Hairspray'.

Fourth song-City breakz 1

The rhythm to this beat will suit our film really well because it's slow with a gangter beat which will suit the location we did & time in the foggy morning in the ghetto place. The song also feels like it's telling a story especially when we see it with the film itself.

Third song-Maybe

This beat features a big sound base like a drum and continues to a instument being played later. I chose this song because it matches the scene that the openng scene will be in.

second song-slow jams 2

This beat is a fast tempoed beat that features a couple of second pause. I chose this song because it represents the area and culture of the gangsters and the seconds pause could be used showing closeups of the gang meaning the audience will paude and think into their lifestyle.

First song-Do damn thing 2

This song has a fast hiphop gangster rhythm to it. I chose this song because it will suit the the opening of my film because it's based in a gangster enviroment.