Digital Filmmaking - Week 7



19/08/2019

I am again at a lost and back to square one with my project after Rob Sarkies convinced me to go back there and work with a simple story for a short film. I have the simple story of someone searching for something missing or someone avoid someone else, but I was stumped on how to develop the story or to bring drama into the story. I couldn't see how it could go in different types of directions.

 I'm now considering doing a promotional video for this project. The question is who will be my client?
Promotional videos research

 NHNZ Media. (2015, October 6). NHNZ moving images [Video file]. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HyjFcSChjWE
Client: Natural History New Zealand.
Product/service: They film high quality stock footage, especially to do with natural environments.
Message: They are professionals and capture moments of life from different types of wildlife and environments.
Filmmaking techniques: Uplifting music, variety of different camera angles, mix of stationary and drone camera movement. Big logo on the right corner and 16:9 aspect ratio.

 Thoughts: I believe the video is successful in promoting their service and I quite like it because I'm immediately amazed at the ultra quality of their content and what they are capable of.

21/08/2019

I finally managed to email Patrick the idea and about booking a time with him to talk about it further. He suggested 9am tomorrow in The Clinic, but that wouldn't work for me because of my VFX class from 9am until 1pm and personal appointments later in the afternoon.

 Patrick then suggested meeting up in the student lounge at 1.30pm tomorrow, which actually suited me better.

Beesley, M., & Laing, J. (2015 - 2020). Westside [Television series]. New Zealand: Three


I have recently managed to watch the new season of the TV3 drama-comedy series, Westside. It's a prequel to the hit TV3 drama-comedy, Outrageous Fortune. I really enjoyed this series because a lot of things happen, a bit good and flawed character development, the characters are starting to look like themselves in Outrageous Fortune, funny and good references to foreshadow the events in Outrageous Fortune (that I believe oslty fans of the show would understands). 

I like how they have maintained Ted West's leftist views and love for the Labour Party, and they do well at blending the story around modern New Zealand history during the time period. With this season being set in 1987, it covers Rogernomics, the Edgecumbe earthquake, the stock market boom and crash, and the Rugby World Cup. In the past, the story has done well at referencing or having an episode around an historical event. 

1st season (1974-1979) - Exemption stickers, 1974 Commonwealth Games, the Dawn Raids, the 1975 general election, the drug trade, and the Erebus plane crash.

2nd season - 1981 Springbok Tour, 1981 general election.

3rd season (1982) - 1967 currency change, Vietnam war, Strongman mining disaster (flashbacks).

4th season (1983) - Wage freezes.


In the final episode, I felt sad for Sparky because his family has disappeared and Wolf has banished him from Auckland. Wolf's character development in this episode was quite flawed because he leaves his parent's house with his wife and kids because of how his mother is a cold and heartless hypocrite, but then does the exact type of thing (in this case, to Sparky) she would do.

Inoue, H., Ishihara, Y., Kanesaku, H., Maruyama, M., Maseba, Y., Nakagaki, H., Togo, Y., & Kon, S. (1997). Perfect Blue [Motion picture]. Japan: Rex Entertainment.



Themes - Paranoia, fame, obsession, mental illness, loss of innocence, internet trolling, definition of reality

It takes its time with building up its psychological tone

I really sympathized with Mima when she thought her fishes had died.

Dated plot points like the protagonist being a technophobe when it comes to the Internet. The internet being new and hard to use makes it look somewhat trendy.

Mental illnesses that affect both the protagonist and antagonist. In this case, the antagonist's mind set is reminiscent to Mark David Chapman (the guy who shot John Lennon)

22/08/2019

I consulted with Jacqui Bree. To do with catering, she suggested to get quite a bit based on the number of cast and crew and for lunch or dinner to get stuff a lot of buns, coleslaw and meat. For casting, she suggested to look at the auditions from the third year group project and consult with Patrick and Rachel about it.

 I talked with Patrick and suggested concerning that if I'm not confident with my new idea, then just don't do it. We talked potential issues with my screenplay like health and safety with the run over scene and that the camera could not be on the road for filming (there are ways around it) and the idea of trying to halve the script to suit the three days of shooting the film. Removing the counselor scenes would be a start.

 I did bring up the auditions from the third year group project this year Patrick, but he suggested to email Rachel.
Perfect Blue - continued

Mima's alter ego as a pop idol is annoying as hell

The sound design can at times be unsettling

Mima's alter ego is presented like the alter ego of Edward Norton's character in Fight Club, but much more psychological and unnerving.

My thoughts at the end of this film was - what the hell did I just watch?!
It also left me with questions like - was Rumi the stalker?

It took me until the final scene to realise that Rumi was the one putting stuff up about Mima onto the internet because like Mima, IU couldn't tell whether the scene was part of reality or was delusional. This in effect is a great use of subjectivity in this film.


The film is definitely unpredictable, mind-bending, and surreal on the lines of films by Christopher Nolan and David Lynch.


23/08/2019

I went through the script managed to shorten the script down to 12 pages. I added some dialogue in a scene for the new ending to make sense and I also made sure the counselling scenes were removed. I also managed to lay out the presentation for this paper.

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