The Craven

Ciley Myrus from BDC on Vimeo.


For my short film preliminary project I worked in a group of 3 with Sam and Shaakira. On the first day we were filming Shaakira wasn't in so we had to do as best as we could with only 2 people. We hadn't planned previous to the day we started filming, which we should have done because then our work would have been more organised and we would have been properly prepared on the day. We also had to use someone else to do the filming for us, which didn't work out too well as they didn't shoot a lot of camera angles and a lot of the shots were shaky. Our idea itself was alright but nothing really to do with what we had to do.
   When we looked back at our footage we didn't really have a lot so when Shaakira came back the next day we filmed some more. The editing went really well and no problems occurred at all during the time. We all worked well together and there were no arguments or disagreements at all. When we created the opening titles, we wanted to do more with them to make it more exciting but we had a limited amount of time so we had to leave them as they were
   From doing the preliminary task I have learnt a lot. I have learnt that I should plan what I am doing in advance to avoid complications like this time and I should also be prepared for unforeseen situations like having a missing member of the group. I should have also thought about what we actually needed to do as part of the task instead of focusing too much on the storyline.

We were once a fairytale-Spike Jonze

• It seems like the main purpose of this film is to promote Kanye West as the whole film is about him and features his music
• The mise en scene is a nightclub, the lighting is dark so it is hard to get a feel for the surroundings
• The camera is also blurred because Kanye is supposed to be drunk so the audience can see what he is seeing, as the film goes on the camera becomes more blurred to show Kanye getting more drunk

Spike Jonze-short films

Spike Jonze-feature films

Spike Jonze

• Spike Jonze was born Adam Spiegel on October 22nd 1969
• His work includes music videos, television, film and television commercials
• In 2006 he was nominated by the Directors Guild of America for "Outstanding Achievement in Commercials in 2005." He was nominated for work that included Hello Tomorrow for Adidas, Lamp for IKEA, and Pardon Our Dust for Gap. 
• He was a producer and co-creator of TV show Jackass and Jackass: The Movie
• Spike was also a co-founder and editor of Dirt magazine alongside Mark Lewman and Andy Jenkins
•  He was an editor for Grand Royal Magazine and senior photographer for Transworld Skateboarding
• In the past, Jonze shot street skateboarding videos, including Blind skateboard company's Video Days in 1991, and Lakai Footwear's Fully Flared in 2007. He also co-directed the Girl Skateboards film Yeah Right! and the Chocolate Skateboards video Hot Chocolate
• Spike has many alter egos, including Richard Koufey who is the leader of the Torrance Community Dance Group, an urban troupe that performs in public spaces. The Koufey alter ego started when Spike filmed himself dancing to Fatboy Slim's "Rockafeller Skank" as it played in a public area, Spike showed the video to Slim, who loved it, Jonze then assembled a group of dancers to perform to Slim's "Praise You" outside a Westwood, California cinema and taped the performance
• He also has a speaking part along with Dave Eggers in the Beck song "The Horrible Fanfare/Landslide/Exoskeleton" 
• Since 2007, he has been the creative director at VBS.tv, an online television network supplied by Vice and funded by MTV
• Jonze directed Where the Wild Things Are, which opened in the USA on October 16, 2009. It is  the product of a decade long collaboration with author Maurice Sendak
• In July 2009, Jonze acquired the rights to make a film adaptation of the Shane Jones novel, Light Boxes. It is expected that Jonze will act as producer on this project with Ray Tintori
• In July 2010, he directed a stop-motion trailer for an upcoming concert for the Canadian band Arcade Fire

One Day by Michel Gondry

Michel Gondry

• Michel Gondry was born on May 8th 1963 in Versailles, France
• He is known for his inventive visual style and manipulative mise-en-scene
• His filmmaking career began when he created a music video for French band Oui Oui
• His video making style caught the attention of singer Bjork who asked him to direct the video for her song human behaviour
• He then went on to direct 7 more of her videos
• Other artists who have collaborated with Gondry more than once are Daft Punk, Radiohead, Beck, The White Stripes, The Chemical Brothers, The Vines and Stereogram
• He has also created numerous TV adverts including Gap and Smirnoff vodka where he used the technique ''bullet time'' which was later adapted in the matrix
• Michel made his feature film debut in 2001 with ''Human nature'' which received mixed reviews
• His second film ''Eternal sunshine of the spotless mind'' became one of the most critically acclaimed films of the year
• Michel directed the musical documentary Dave Chappelle's block party which followed comedian Dave Chappelle as he attempted to hold a large, free concert in Brooklyn
• His TV advert for Levi's jeans holds the record for most awards won by a TV commercial in the Guinness world records 2004

Shane Meadows

• Shane Meadows is a self taught British filmmaker from the Midlands
• He was born in Uttoxeter, Staffordshire on 26th December 1972
• He dropped out of school before reaching his O levels and intended to be a criminal mastermind
• He was caught buying a stolen set of John Lowe darts and admitted to stealing an egg custard tart from Sainsbury's, it was clear the criminal underworld wasn't for him
• When his criminal charges were read out in court, laughter could be heard from the gallery and judges bench after it was revealed he had stolen a breast pump from Boots, this was when he decided to embark on a career in filmmaking
• In 1994 Shane volunteered his services to the Nottingham based Intermedia Film and Video Ltd, he was allowed to borrow camcorders and editing equipment in exchange for working there for free
• He asked his friends and family to get involved in his films at first
• After he had made a couple of short films, his friends watched them and were impressed, they decided they wanted to get involved in the future
• After making a short film every month, Shane and his friends were frustrated there were no festivals or venues to screen their films
• They set up their own event called 'six of the best' which was held every couple of months in an old local cinema
• The event grew in popularity and eventually became an international video festival called 'flip side'
• The first of Shane's films to grab attention was ''Where's the money, Ronnie?"
• He then made a documentary for Channel 4's 'battered Britain' season called 'King of the Gypsies'
• Shane then made a film called 'smalltime' which was an example of Shane's philosophy for aspiring filmmakers, stick to what you know and you won't go far wrong
• Shane then made his first feature film Twentyfour seven which led to This is England
• As Shane looks to future feature length projects, he still likes to create short films as much as he can

The Stairwell-Shane Meadows

• The opening scene is of a light switch, it has been shot at a slanted angle to show that the film is not high budget, Hollywood film but is a gritty, low budget film
• The lighting in the film is mostly dark to make it more edgy and gives the audience the impression something sinister is going to happen
• The first character we see is a male with dark clothing on and his hood up, their is bright lights shining from behind him so we can't see his face because of the shadow from the light, this makes the character seem mysterious and the audience would automatically assume he has done something wrong
• It also looks like he is running away from something/someone 
• The lighting is very bright on the female character and because the camera is also very close to her face, the audience gets a good look at her
• The way the camera keeps changing focus from one character to the other really quickly it makes the audience fell like something big is going to happen between the two
• The music throughout is very repetitive and fits in with the urban location of the film, it stops when it reaches the 'climax' of the film
• The film ends with the two characters running into eachother as they were travelling opposite ways up/down the stairwell, its an anti climax because the audience were expecting some sort of conflict between the two characters

• The film has a circular narrative, what we saw at the beginning of the film is exactly what we see at the end, its like a continuous loop
• The whole film is very dream like, it may have inspired films today such as 'Inception' where you don't know whether the main protagonist is dreaming or not, the whole film is so surreal its hard to differentiate what is reality and what is in the characters mind
• There are many significant objects featured throughout the film; a flower, phone and knife. 
• The music in the film builds up tension throughout, every time something more dramatic starts to happen, the music starts to build up
• I think that the flower symbolizes the womans life and the hooded "grim reaper" character keeps trying to take it away from her and she's fighting to get it back, we see that the hooded character has a reflective mirror face so when the woman looks at it, all she sees is herself, so it's like she's is battling with herself whether to take her own life or not, this links to the end of the film where she does decide to commit suicide

Avant Garde

''Ahead of the crowd''

"Cutting edge"

"Experimental"

• Maya Deren-avant garde director in the 1940's/50's
• Anti mainstream stance within films
• Promoted the idea of artistic licence and creative freedom

 

La Sortie de L'usine

History of short films

• Short film has revolutionised the film industry, with each new advancement in film there has been a short film that sparked it off
• 'La sortie de l'usine' (1895) was the first short film to be made, it was short due to technical restrictions
• In 1910 when films got longer the term 'short subjects' was coined
• 'short subjects' became popular among audiences because people could go to the cinema and see 3-4 films rather than just 1
• 1930's Hollywood block booking big Hollywood studios forces a small production company to sell their shorts, which they turn into feature films
• The US Supreme Court declared block booking illegal but the damage to short film had already been done
• Classical narrative-90 mins or more feature film
• More profitable for film exhibitors-2 hours turnover of film
• Invention of TV-mass medium short films were aired until the 1960's
• 1980's; short film reinvented however they were much darker and grittier.No longer about commercial success but about content and conveying a message

Mud Boy

• Opening scene is the back garden of a house.
• There is a trampoline in the garden so you know there are children living there
• You can also hear arguing in the background between two adults so you already think that the house isn't a happy place to be.
• The adults are arguing over there missing child Jamie, there is a little girl in the room, Mina, while her parents are arguing, she doesn't look bothered about it so this is normal for her
• The arguing gets louder and the dad turns on Mina and starts shouting at her for playing a computer game and slams it down on the table
• We learn from this that the dad is a bully as he is shouting at the mum and daughter for no reason
• Mina runs outside, the argument is getting louder and more violent. she knows to escape, the garden is quiet so she can't hear whats going on
• Mina isn't really bothered with all the arguing, she is used to it and has learnt how to deal with it
• Mina starts playing with toys, making the man toy shout at the woman toy and ends up killing her because the woman had threatened to go to the police about his abuse
• Children like to copy what they see their parents doing. This shows what Mina's life is like and what happens at home
• Mina starts digging a hole in the ground and discovers her brothers dead body, she imagines that he is talking to her and that they are having a conversation together.
• Mina uses her imagination to escape the horrible reality she is living 
• Her brother is the only person she can talk to in her family so she pretends he is still alive and can hear him talking
• There is music playing in the background, it is very quiet and sounds sad and soft
• The weather is also dark, dull and grey-reflecting on what is going on in the house
• Mina says to her brother that their mum has been looking for him, she doesn't mention their dad. This shows that the dad doesn't care about him or want want to know where he is
• Mina cleans the dirt off her brother and when he coughs she goes to get him a drink, she cares for her brother and acts like a parent towards him
• When Mina goes back into the house there is a broken glass on the floor, she doesn't take any notice of it, just carries on what she's doing
• She goes to get a toothbrush and is constantly looking over her shoulder to make sure no ones there, she sees a door handle turning and hurries downstairs. She is scared of her dad, even though she is doing nothing wrong,she doesn't want to be caught by him
• Mina says to her brother that Eddie thinks he is rubbish, this tells us the man in the house is actually her step dad, not her dad
• Mina says that Eddie smells of beer all the time which tells us he is an alcoholic
• Mina is more brave than Jamie, he is scared to go in th house because Eddie's there but Mina holds his hand and tells him its alright and they go together
• When Mina goes inside to wash her hands we see Jamie standing over her shoulder, the camera turns to watch Mina washing her hands, when it turns back there is a police officer standing there
• this shows us that Mina is back in the real world and has left her fantasy world because her brother is now gone
• We see Eddie being arrested, Mina and her mum are both watching, they look at each other and smile because they know the abuse has ended
• When Mina and the police officer go into the garden to find Jamie, they both look down at the spot where he is. Mina sees an empty hole in the ground and the police officer sees Jamie's body. Mina believes her brother is still alive

About a girl

• Title came up like a text message, you can hear the buttons being pressed-the films about a teenage girl
• First see a young girl dancing to Britney Spears, tells us she's into pop music
• She is shown as a silhouette, she has a hidden identity-she's alone, dark, isolated
• From what we can see from the girls family and the area she lives in she is poor and she is from a working class background
• She is confident yet naive
• It's filmed like she is having a conversation with the camera person, like a documentary
• She comes from a single parent family and she lives on a council estate
• She doesn't have a very good relationship with her dad, her mum hates her dad
• Her dad is unemployed
• she is 13 years old and believes she is an adult, she doesn't like being treated like a child
• she doesn't believe what people say, she doesn't believe her dad
• she enjoys singing, it is her escape from reality
• she thinks she knows everything, she is cheeky and has an attitude
• Her mum spends a lot of money on cigarettes, theres not a lot of spare money around
• she wanted to buy a piano but her mum couldn't afford one
• She wants to escape her current lifestyle and become a singer, we see that her mum wants to escape it too because we see her buying a scratch card
• She prefers her dad to her mum, her dad's not a very good dad and he doesn't really want to know but she still wants to live with him
• She doesn't notice how bad her dad is, she idolizes him
• Pathetic fallacy-the weather is grey and dull. This is a reflection on her life
• We also learn that her mum doesn't care very much, she threw a dog in the canal
• The girl is a product of her environment, she managed to get pregnant and no one noticed
• When she throws her baby in the canal its a reflection of what her mum did to the puppy
• The plastic bag she throws into the river with the baby in is a representation of her-she is disposable. The bag ends up getting trapped which means there is no escape from her actions
• The way that there is no music in the film makes the film seem more realistic and more like a documentary than a film

One Two Many from BDC on Vimeo.


There are 3 characters, not too many like typical short films. During the fight scene the camera was at a low angle and it was in the perspective of the person being attacked to make the audience feel like they are in that persons position. The music in this scene was very high energy which makes it more dramatic and aggressive. The storyline was good because it wasn't too complicated and it didn't need the audience to read too much into it. It was also quite realistic as it could happen to someone.

Horny

Catherine Des Forges-'' Spare economic narratives, interesting storytelling, well structured work which draws in the audience quickly.''


Gareth Evans-'' Short films are long films that end earlier. A good idea, succinctly, less is more.''

Comparison of feature films and short films

Short films