Letter

This letter was written by someone who was in a car crash. I think we could take some ideas from this, there are some points within it which we wanted to add into our story. 

As the car made contact with my fragile body, all our memories passed by my eyes. I didn?t think about the pain. I thought about the things I would miss: My High School graduation, getting married, having children. And then, I thought about you. Your smile, your soft hair, the sound of your laugh. All of that would be gone, out of my reach, but the memories will never fade. I will never forget you. You will eventually move on, but all I ask from you, is remember me. Remember our good times, and remember our bad times. Remember our fights, and remember our apologies.

My body lands in a heap on the side walk. Blood forms a pool around me. I hear screams from all directions. The car swerves and hits a tree. The driver, injured and clearly intoxicated, stumbles out of the car to my side. ?I?m so sor-? He slurs before I lose consciousness.

After what feels like century , I come to my senses. Brief images are played like a movie. People are yelling as ambulances arrive on scene. I formed a lump in the back of my throat, when I saw that you weren?t there. The pain of the accident sank in, and I quietly cried out in pain. My Mother rested my head on her lap as she silently wept.

A car tore down the road and stopped by one of the ambulances. Out you stepped of car and my slowing heart skipped a beat. Before you could get to my body, a paramedic stopped you and said something I could not hear. You ran past him to my side and knelt down. Tears streamed down your face. 
?I love you,? You choked. I could feel myself being lifted up onto the stretcher.
You took hold of my hand, and kissed me on my bloody lips. I looked you straight in the eyes and said, ?I love you too?, but it only came out as a whisper. Doctors all around me rushed, but it was as if they were in slow motion.
I realized that my final seconds were passing. I gripped your hand and said,

?Don?t forget me?, as my heart beat it?s last time.

Super 8

We have decided that in our film opening we would like to incorporate the style of super 8. We think that this will add more individuality to our clip and will make it more unique to other clips being made. Because of this we need to research into different methods of this style being used. Some useful examples we have found:

<iframe width="560" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/cE6wxDqdOV0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>


<iframe width="560" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/4ICwknDOI6s" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>


The use of super 8 in both of these clips has helped us understand the effects it have. It shows how easily it is to portray a sense of memory in a film. The old style shows it as an event that happened distant in the past. With the addition of dissolving titles on top of this will also add to the sense of memory in the opening clip.

Images:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qd87_jjK1-8

Blog

Check this blog out as well Maria - this contains letters from different people to anyone that they loved that has passed away. I think this would be a useful place to get some idea's for our monologue.

Letters to the dead - Blog

Script Ideas

For the narration in our clip we want to have the voiceover speaking of emotions. For this we want the wording to have an impact on the motions of the watching audience. Possible quotes we are going to use:

• "The tragedy of life is not that it ends so soon, but that we wait so long to begin it." 
• "Some people come into our lives and leave footprints on our hearts and we are never ever the same."
• "Don't cry because it's over. Smile because it happened."
• "Death must be great, because no one has come back from it."
• "A farewell is necessary before you can meet again".

Script Draft:

Charlie: Someone once said, "The tragedy of life is not that it ends so soon, but that we wait so long to begin it.". However, i like to think life is just the beginning, death must be so great, because no one has came back to tell me differently.. 

*music begins in the background* 

36 days, 5 hours, and almost 27 minutes. 

Since that moment. That one moment. One split moment. Changed it all. 

*noise of car crashing* 

..Remember that time we went to the park, that park with the biggest maple tree we'd ever seen. 
Where it started off as a beautiful sunny day, then out of no where the rain came pouring down. I thought you'd be mad, but your laugh was so loud and you just couldn't hold it in.*echoes laugh* Almost to the point you were laughing with tears in your eyes. That was the moment, the moment I knew I couldn't live my life without you. Who would have thought such a simple moment would change the rest of my life...
Words are all I have. A pen. Some paper. And the words I write down. Thats all I have. No romantic gesture, no grand apology, no excuse or reason to make all this disappear. Not even a goodbye. But 47 years to sit in these 4 walls and think about it. Just think and relive that one moment that defined everything..
*doors slam*
So here it is.. my letter.. explaining it from my point of view.. my story being told.. the night i lied to the police, to confess to a crime someone else did. Someone who i made a vow to love and protect no matter what. Was it really the right thing to do? or did i make a mistake, a mistake decided in a moment, a mistake that cant be undone, a mistake perhaps so insignificant as it wont bring back the life of an innocent child.  
*sound of ambulance*
child who will never experience graduation, marriage or having a kid of their own. all because of a moment. a moment that defined what their life will always be remembered by. 
What is someone suppose to do when the person they protect doesn't protect them, the person who moves on in a matter of weeks, and betrays the love use once had together.. nothing but manipulation. 
*sounds of handcuffs* 

all my love, charlie

Home Videos

I began to look at home videos on google. I know i have several of my own at home, so I will look through those tonight. I first typed home videos into google. This didn't turn out the sort of results I was looking for, rather just video sights like vimeo, youtube and metacafe. I therefore decided to look for home videos on these sights and soon I began to find quite a lot. I found them by typing phrases such as 'our son doing/learning/being...'.

I then thought that before I started to look at home video clips I should recognise the important stages of life that would be recorded - especially in the sort of film we are planning doing it is only the important areas of life which would be important for the viewer and help maintain there interest. Below is a list of what I think are the more important areas of growing up we need to recognise in children -

• Birth - child being born - maybe not suitable to include the video of a birth but maybe clips of a newborn baby?
• First words - a child first speaking - this might be hard however as we are not intending to include sound from the video clips. Might be more wise to get pictures to represent this event.
• First steps - an easy clip to find.
• First Christmas - a baby on their first christmas - this shouldn't be too hard to capture in a video.
• First Day of School - might be hard to get a video clip of this, more likely to find pictures - i know i have pictures of my first day. 

* A point to note - maybe include videos and pictures of the boy and his girlfriend he speaks of - it might be easier as we are both girls and it will be easier to find home footage and make it more personal for us.

• Learning to ride a bike - I think this would be nice to include as it would make it quite emotive as it includes the more minor details.
• First Communion - This area would be easier captured with pictures.
• First Date - This would be an area we would possibly have to record ourselves.
• First Day of Secondary School - we will have to record this ourselves, or make use of our own pictures.
• Passing Driving Test - we will have to record this ourselves.
• Passing Exams - we will have to record this ourselves.
• 18th Birthday - we will have to record this ourselves.

So as you can see from the above list - by no means exhaustive - there are a lot of areas we could focus on with our opening scenes for the film. I'm going to get 2 examples of each of the above if I can - not those where I said we will have to record this ourselves. 

Super 8 effect

We want to give our videos that antique look, so as Mr Tierney suggested we have looked into this effect that is the super 8 effect. On final cut pro they have their own version of this effect. I tested this out on a test clip from our preliminary, I do like the effect it creates-
There are also other techniques which we could use that could emphasise this antique feel. I particularly like this because it is used in My Sister's Keeper's opening -


I think this is effective as it gives an idea of memories - which I believe is a good way to go with our monologue because it keeps a personal feel to the overall movie.
Super 8 originated in 1965, also known as Super 8 mm film, by Eastman Kodak as an improvement on the previous type of film. It has been largely replaced now as a filming format but is often used to imitate the look of old home movies or create a stylish look - we are trying to create this look of old home movies, therefore i think this technique could be very useful to us.



The above video shows an example of super 8 in use. I think this clip is really well done and I like the focus of detail on small things such as the small droplets of water. I would like to imitate some of the effects carried out in this clip in some of what we do.

General Idea + To do List

Our general idea is as follow - A boy is narrating . He should have a deep voice. Starts off black. We find out that he died recently in a car crash and that this story shows how the people he loved have moved on, eventually ending with his girlfriend finding a new love. When we find out that he died and a bit about his past, a series of moving images along with the titles are on screen ( similar to the layout of the opening scenes in Dear John and My Sisters Keeper.) The moving images, will include a video from when the speaker is quite young, up to his death. We only get blurred scenes of his death scene, and after we see pictures of family, friends - mourning. Monologue being spoke by a boy will be as if he is speaking to the audience - really speaking to girlfriend. Light colours/older images - edited images to be used to show that this in the past. During the beginning when black, have the sound of writing possibly? Only sounds to be used are diegetic - those which tie in with the memory being recounted.

In monologue use quotes which have meaning - look up quotes and be selective about the ones which affect me and maria personally - our target audience is going to be mainly teenage girls/women - as they would be more interested in this genre so by choosing things which affect us we will attract our audience better.
Look into home photography and videography - internet and personal. When recording also remember images must not look posed - get examples of such home imagery.
Keep language highly emotive.
Keep images and language personal - therefore more likely to engage audience on a personal and emotional level.

To Do List

• Type up main plot onto blog
• Begin research for monologue of main boy character.
• Start to research home videos - what makes them so natural - camera/mise-en-scene
• Look at personal home imagery/videography. Anything you could use.
• Think of structure - STORYBOARDING
• Think of writing monologue
• Look at titles - which types of fonts and titles could work. 
• Think of actors/actresses - who to use according to behaviour, suitability - voice
• Locations
• Angles/editing/mise-en-scene - storyboarding camera use
• Draft a shooting schedule.

Opening Narrative

We want to use a narrative at the beginning of our film. This is a common feature of most romantic dramas which can be seen by our individual research. A Narrative is defined as 'a story or account of events, experiences, or the like, whether true or fictitious'. With this definition it is obvious therefore that when we have this narrative it needs to be something which is heartfelt, or genuine, in order to make it believable and therefore make the story of the film believable. It is therefore important that we include a lot of personal sentiments within it.

Previous

Above is a previous example of a romantic drama made in media studies. I really like this example and feel we could take something away from it. I like the different camera angles used and how each of them don't necessarily fit together, but i think this would be good for the opening of a film because it means we don't give a lot away. This example received an A and this is the blog for the makers of this film emmajeremya2.tumblr.com. Although this is an a2 example i still feel there are many things within this film which we will be able to use. The one thing i notice about this film is the lack of titles, so we therefore should look at another film were titles are used. I personally like the above example. I feel it captures the teenage romantic genre and the titles that have been used are very creative and make the most of everything available to them. I would like to follow with titles similar to this film. I think to make opening titles successful we need to not focus as much on actors but more on the titles and mediums which we use. Also, we need to try not to reveal our story but to simply give the audience a feel of what our story is about.

Opening Methods

From looking at different methods of opening filming methods I have found about different techniques and the impact they have on the viewers. Different styles can be used, for example, for sound narration or music can be used. The way in which the titles are presented can also vary, they can be used as simple words or they can be used to add to the story of the film. This has helped me to expand my knowledge on methods and will give me a better selection of possible techniques to use when it comes to making my opening.

Romantic Drama

From the research into my chosen films I have recognized that their are several things which romantic dramas all seem to have in common, especially in their openings. Below find a prezi of the different things i found in common, and then another below that of the things i think are good and which we could bring into our film: