MEDIA as Analysis of Preliminary Video

The Male Gaze Analysis

The first gaze that I see in the video that I have cut is when Justin does a “narcissistic” look crossed with an “invitation” gaze. This means that Justin looks indifferent, self-sufficient, arrogant, slightly insolent, haughty, aloof, confident, reserved; slightly or fully closed eyes. The emphasis is mainly on the eyes, his mouth is shut, his head is to one side, looking back to the camera. His gaze is suggestive of mischief or mystery, the hint of contact potential rather than sexual promise, the cover equivalent of advertising’s soft sell.

The second gaze that I see is from Justin again, but this time, he is using a “seductive” gaze. He is staring straight at Ciara, biting his lip and staring with his eyes half open at hers. He looks confident, arrogant, slightly insolent, seductive, dreamy, heavy-lidded and sexual.

The third gaze that I see is that of Ciara looking back at Justin during his second gaze. Ciara is doing a cross between the “sexual” gaze and the “super-smiler”. Ciara has her teeth showing but does not have a cheesy grin. She is quite heavy-lidded with her head thrust forward, she looks arrogant, confident, self sufficient and mildly seductive.

The fourth gaze is Ciara being quite “soft/introverted”, yet “seductive” and “sexual”. She has her mouth open, eyes half closed but looking upwards as if through her eyebrows. She looks confident, arrogant, seductive, sexual, almost showing herself off by pouting a little. Her behaviour suggests availability.

My fifth and final gaze that I see is the one of Justin, which is the last shot in my video. Justin is looking downwards, but towards the camera, whilst Ciara is kissing him. Justin looks slightly subdued but satisfied, he looks confident and arrogant as he is not facing her and he looks quite cool/level. His eyes are half open and he looks heavy-lidded, he is not smiling, but has quite a straight face. Justin appears to be quite uninterested in Ciara’s behaviour at this point.

Flowchart On The Production Of Films

MEDIA as Flowchart on Production Process

The Male Gaze

1. Chocolate Box: half or full-smile, lips together or slightly parted, teeth barely visible, full or three-quarter face to camera. Projected mood: blandly pleasing, warm bath warmth, where uniformity of features in their smooth perfection is devoid of uniqueness or of individuality.
2. Invitational: emphasis on the eyes, mouth shut or with only a hint of a smile, head to one side or looking back to camera. Projected mood: suggestive of mischief or mystery, the hint of contact potential rather than sexual promise, the cover equivalent of advertising’s soft sell.
3. Super-smiler: full face, wide open toothy smile, head thrust forward or chin thrown back, hair often wind-blown. Projected mood: aggressive, ‘look-at-me’ demanding, the hard sell, ‘big come-on’ approach.
4. Romantic or Sexual: a fourth and more general classification devised to include male and female ‘two-somes’; or the dreamy, heavy-lidded, unsmiling big-heads, or the overtly sensual or sexual. Projected moods: possible ‘available’ and definitely ‘available’.

In a study of advertisements in women’s magazines, Trevor Millum offers these categories of female expressions:

1. Soft/introverted: eyes often shut or half-closed, the mouth slightly open/pouting, rarely smiling; an inward-looking trance-like reverie, removed from earthly things.
2. Cool/level: indifferent, self-sufficient, arrogant, slightly insolent, haughty, aloof, confident, reserved; wide eyes, full lips straight or slightly parted, and obtrusive hair, often blonde. The eyes usually look the reader in the eye, as perhaps the woman regards herself in the mirror.
3. Seductive: similar to the cool/level look in many respects - the eyes are less wide, perhaps shaded, the expression is less reserved but still self-sufficient and confident; milder versions may include a slight smile.
4. Narcissistic: similarities to the cool/level and soft/introverted looks, rather closer to the latter: a satisfied smile, closed or half-closed eyes, self-enclosed, oblivious, content - ‘activity directed inward’.
5. Carefree: nymphlike, active, healthy, gay, vibrant, outdoor girl; long unrestrained outward-flowing hair, more outward-going than the above, often smiling or grinning.
6. Kittenlike: coy, naïve (perhaps in a deliberate, studied way), a friendlier and more girlish version of the cool/level look, sometimes almost twee.
7. Maternal: motherly, matronly, mature, wise, experienced and kind, carrying a sort of authority; shorter hair, slight smile and gentle eyes - mouth may sometimes be stern, but eyes twinkle.
8. Practical: concentrating, engaged on the business in hand, mouth closed, eyes object-directed, sometimes a slight frown; hair often short or tied back.
9. Comic: deliberately ridiculous, exaggerated, acting the fool, pulling faces for the benefit of a real or imaginary audience, sometimes close to a sort of archness.
10. Catalogue: a neutral look as of a dummy, artificial, waxlike; features may be in any position, but most likely to be with eyes open wide and a smile, but the look remains vacant and empty; personality has been removed. (Millum 1975, 97-8)

What Causes Institutions To Thrive As A Film Business

MEDIA as Discuss the Issues and Patterns Which Enables Your Institution to Thrive as a Film Business

I saw this and loved its originality

TV Drama-Generic Conventions

You will find that TV dramas all have the following ingredients:

Characters – even particular kinds of characters: eg, at its most simple, ‘good’ and ‘bad’ characters.

Stories – they all tell stories, whether those stories involve adventure, crime or romance and they often, but not always, end happily.

The stories are told against familiar backdrops: – eg, homes, police stations and offices (for crime dramas), hospitals (for medical dramas) – most of which are created in studios. However, most dramas also use outside locations to create particular effects.

Camerawork – particular kinds of shots are used: eg, sequences involving establishing shots followed by mid-shots of characters, shot/reverse shots to show character interaction and, in particular,close-ups to show the characters’ emotions.

Stories use dialogue to tell the stories. Occasionally, monologues are built in (as voiceovers, a character telling a story).

Music is used to punctuate the action, create effects (suspense, tension) and underline emotional moments.

Particular subgenres tend to have items which make them immediately identifiable – police cars, blue lights, operating theatres and scalpels, triage/reception areas in hospitals. Icons of the genre, they symbolise the (sub)genre.

How Cuts & Budgets Affect Production Practises

A couple of lessons back, we were asked to create and pitch our own film idea and then plan budgeting for it. My budgeting looked a little like this:



Director - Richard LaGravenese, £2million overallEditor – Andrew Mondshein, £10,000 a week (10 weeks)

Location – Ruislip College, £100,000

Cinematographer – Barry Ackroyd, £50,000 overall

Cast – Open Auditions, £1,000,000 overall - Venue: Main hall at Ruislip College (Place of Filming)

Script Writer – Will Fetters, £50,000 overall

Plus the below the line costs, amounting to a maximum of £1.7million

We were then asked to look at our budgets again, and then pretend that one of our financers had oulled out of the deal and our budgets dropped by a third. We we asked to respond to this and show our new figures. Without below the line costs, our budget was £33,333 pounds under budget. So we could afford to keep ours the same. However, we did come up with some slightly different plans, just to be safe. We said we'd lower the directors cost by £500,000 and if Richard LaGravenese was not happy with that deal, then we'd look at some B-list directors who could produce this film at the same quality, but costing a lot less money. This would make us £533,333 under our budget and give us plenty of money to spend on below the line costs.

Film Financing

When i first got introduced to film financing, i thought it was an easy thing, i just thought they used the left over money they had from previous films to make new ones and carry on that way. But you really don't. There are so many ways to get film financing and it all starts off with your film pitch. Your film pitch must include what, where when, who and why about your film. What is it about? Where will it be filmed? When will it be filmed? Who will watch it/be in it? Why will people go to watch it/would people invest in it?

Once you have made your pitch, there are several placs you can go for funding, such as:

• Government grants
• Tax Schemes &Tax Shelters - Tax shelters are deductions in tax if you include a British cast, for instance and use a British setting, and use mainly British employees in your film. This deduction makes it a lot cheaper to produce your film
• Debt Finance such as: Pre-sales, Television Pre-sales, Negative Pick-up deals,Gap/Supergap financing
• Equity Finance such as: Private, Hedge-fund or Product Placement

All of these methods are suitable, but you would have to look at where you are planning to create the film and with which actors before you begin to look at finance, so you can see where is cheapest.

When finding finance, it is advised to get as many financers as possible, so that if one financer pulls out, you still have others to rely on. Whereas if you have only one financer and they pull out, it's pretty much game over.

Conventions Of My Prelim

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Filming & Editing - Opening The Door

Warp Films - Fact Sheet

Rushmore - Is Max A Typical Teenager?

In class, we were asked to watch the montage scene of Rushmore. We were asked the question " Is Max a typical teenager?"

First of all, we watched it all the way through without stopping the video and i picked up that somebody said he is the worse student at Rushmore.

My answer to the question is no, i do not think that Max Fischer is an average teenager because he tries all of the out of school activities and the stereotype of teenagers is that they are lazy - Max is far from lazy. Also, another stereotype of teenagers is that they are scruffy, Max is almost always dressed formally and he is very smart. He has founded some of the groups and is in charge of a lot of the others, which, again goes against the lazy teenager stereotype.

When we went into analysing the scene of Max, i noticed first of all that there were bees on the front of the book that he opens to start the montage scene. This may suggest that he "flies" from activity to activity. He may be "Busy as a bee" or "The bees knees".

Max is the founder of the Yankee Review Publisher. In the video, Max is leading the others in the group and Max is placed in the middle of the group. Max is dressed very formally in his suit and boe tie, whilst the others are just wearing unbuttoned shirts. All of the other characters are wearing baseball boots, whereas Max is wearing proper shoes.

Max is the French Club President. Max is shown wearing a red hat, all the rest of the group are wearing blue which shows his importance within the group. He is also the only person wearing a flag. Also, Max, again is in his full suit, and everybody else is less formal than him. Max is sat at the front centre of the shot.

Max is the Model United Nations - Russia. Max is again placed in the centre of the shot, wearing his full suit. He is a very important country of the United Nations. Also, i thought about the American crudge with Russia, Americans do not like Russians, so this may be a signifier of the whole film. If you look carefully at Max's body language, he is very interested and he seems to love his role, whereas the others are slouched and it looks as though they do not want to be there.

Max is the Stamp & Coin Club Vice-President. This is not very typical of teenagers and so goes against another stereotype. We don't see any other people in the shot. There is a large collection of stamps. Max may be a geek?

Max is the captain of the Debate Team. Everyone in the shot is showed to be wearing bow-ties and Max is still in his uniform - he is an outsider. Max obviously likes his uniform which is very odd for a teenager. Max may be poor or not very well-off. Also, Max is at the side of this shot, so he may be of little importance.

Max is the Lacrosse team manager. Max is still wearing full uniform, despite the fact he is sat on the bench. Max is not a typical jock shape and is nothing like the rest of the jocks. He isn't playing and he isn't properly part of the action. Max is sat there arranging equipment and the rest of the team have just dropped their equipment on the floor and they are ignoring him. This reflects what they think of him.

Max is the Calligraphy Club President. Max is showed as the only person on the shot, so it looks like there would be very little members if any others besides him.

He is the Astronomy Society Founder. Max is showed to be facing the camera whilst the others are taking part in actually looking at the stars, Max does not appear to be doing anything, this may be due to his lack of knowledge about stars.

He is the Fencing Team Captain. In this shot he is showed participating but still wearing his trousers with the rest of his fencing suit. He doesn't have the proper equipment, which, again, shows that he may have a low income or be poorer than the rest of the students. He stands out.

Max is the Track & Field J.V. Decathlon. On the shot he is showed to be on his own and when the camera zooms out, you presume that there will be lots of people behind him, but he is the only person running, so it does not show his ability. He may not be very good.

He is the 2nd Chorale Choirmaster. Max is still in his uniform in this shot and Max is only the 2nd choirmaster, not the first, so he may not be very good at it.

He is the Bombardment Society Founder. Everyone around him is casually dressed, whereas Max is still in his uniform. He is a very clear leader and takes his role very seriously. He is showed in the middle of the shot, so obviously of high importance.

Max is in the Kung Fu Club at yellow belt level. On the shot, looking at the belts, Max is the worst out of the lot and the people who make up the rest of the club are younger than him.

Max is the Trap & Skeet Club Founder. This is another unsualy actvity for an average teenager. Max is again in his uniform and he is with his friend. They may be the only people in the club.

He is the President of Rushmore Beekeepers. Max is still in his uniform and there are only two people on shot, so at a guess, that will be the only two people in the whole club.

Max is the Founder Of Yankee Racers. Max is sat out of the action in this shot and Max's kart doesn't appear to be as good as the others. Max again seems to be an outsider and is again in his uniform and there are not many other people racing, this may be because he is the founder?

Max has named a club "Max Fischer Players" and he is the Director. It is quite vaine to call a club after yourself, Max is in the middle of the group, which represents his importance and everyone is wearing black clothes, which may reflect what the club is like: dull and boring.

He is in the Piper Cub Club and he has logged 4.5 hours, which is not very long at all. So he may not be very good. Max is in his uniform again.

In a lot of the shots showed, Max is either not taking part or is not very good at what he does. This, i think may be a signifier for the whole play. Max is obviously not an average teenager due to his involvement in a lot of outside clubs and he is obviously a very enthusiastic participater. However, the shots show him almost always in his uniform, i think this is done purposefully and this may be a money issue, or just purely to show that he is not an average teenager.

Max is represented as quite geeky but is in no way, shape or form an average teenager.

Film Making

In class we watched a short, ten minute film which told us the basic ins and outs of what has to be taken into consideration when making a film.
First of all, film making is a gamble. You never know if you're going to make the money back or whether you are simply going to lose it. This is the main risk when making a film, will the audience like it? And who will go so see it?
A film next to always starts off with a producer. Their role is to get the money for the film; find a director; find a script writer for their idea; find health and safety officers and they are basically in the middle of all the action. They are the entrepreneur. Once they have chosen their director, the producer must look after their director as they are now in charge of what your film will look like.
In the film, the people said that there were four main parts in creating a film and they are: developing the idea; raising money for the idea; making the idea and producing/selling your idea to the market.
When you find a script writer, their main stimulus for a whole film is an idea or a question. Once they have written their idea, they then redraft their script twelve to fifteen times NORMALLY. That means that sometimes there are more. The script writer, must try and relate the script to the audience so that they feel the issues covered in the film can affect them. The more emotions a film makes the watcher feel, generally, the better the film, so making the script relate to the reader can be quite a vital part. The script must tantalise the director otherwise the director might turn down their script. One of the script writers say that you must have a distinctive beginning, middle and end. They say that a basic format is one that can rarely go wrong. So, how do you know if you have a good/hollywood blockbuster script? Well, apparently, it is a combination of instincts and the market place that you aim your film at.
Once the script it made, they then create screen play. At this point, they then get the director back on board and then they look at the budget together and then look into a cast. This is called "The Package". The cast are vital to the film as it makes the difference as to whether somebody will come and see your film or whether they won't.
The script developer works with the screen writer to look at what is important to them. If it is not good enough, for instance, the team, the film might not get funding and then you're back to square one.
Most film makers get their funding from worldwide or co-production deals. Usually, film makers like to have between 3 and 10 financers because their money is more guaranteed and it is far safer. Of course it is easier to get one funder, but it is a lot higher risk. Obviously, the more your directors, writers and actors cost depends on who you go to for financing.
Then comes the planning for the film. What will be filmed? Where will it be filmed? When will it be filmed? etc. A lot of people in the film industry go for the hardest scene first and then build the rest of the film around it.
For the filming you need a cinematographer. The cinematographer is the directors right hand man - they can turn the script into something amazing.
Budgeting is another key area of the film. To make a film, you must make a finance plan to see where your money will go and when, otherwise you may go over budget, and a lot of the time, you cannot afford to do that. You need a business plan, which is basically an analysis of the script. The business plan shows all of the above the line and below the line costs.
Then, the director must decide where they see the film being played. Clear plans are fundamental as without them, your film cannot work. You must decide whether a $20 million film will have a $20 million audience, if not, you can't afford to make it. As one of the people said, a film must be "definable without being formulaic".
A key area of films which people underestimate the value of in almost every film is the marketing of the film. It is very costly and without advertising, people won't know their film is on. So, marketing decisions are things such as: does it fit into a good sellable genre? Do you have marketable stars? Is your director/producer well-known?
Making a film is not as important as marketing film, because that is where the money comes from.

The Seven Key Areas Of Presentation

Media as the seven key areas of representation

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Lester Burnham (Kevin Spacey)

Lester Burnham is the main character in the award winning film "American Beauty". As a class, we were told to make notes on his body language, voice, clothes, mise en scene and general representation. At the beginning of the film, Lester is talking about how he has less than a year to live. However, he does not know that yet, the voice over is as though he is speaking from a dead person's perspective. During the introduction to himself where he reveals where he lives, what he does etc. he speaks with a monotonous and unenthusiastic voice which later links to his body language. During this time in which we get to know him, he shows a defeatist view on his life, it is as though he has nothing left to live for. It appears that he has everything a person could possibly want to achieve in their lives; he has a large house, a wife, a child, he's smartly dressed, a nice car, large shower, his daughter has a computer in her room etc. He basically shows that he's succeeded already and has no ambition any longer. He even admits when he's masturbating in the shower, that's the best part of his day.


When we are introduced to his wife, it shows her with gardening gloves on which match her gardening accessories, she is looking after her roses and maintaining her garden, obviously a very materialistic woman. His wife and his daughter both think that he's a loser and they show this via their sarcasm, especially when he is late for work and he drops his papers - she gives him a deathly stare and shows her hate towards him, which is mutual from both Lester and his wife. When he gets in the car, he sits in the back, with his wife and daughter in the fornt, which is quite unusual in traditional families. When he is in the back, he does not join in any conversations, he just sits there and falls asleep with his body slumped. Throughout the beginning of the film it shows that nothing goes right for him and that he is a liability. Despite all of this, Lester's voice picks up and become more confident when he says that things are about to change.


During this opening of the film, i picked up that there was a repeat in the colours Red, White and Blue. Which shows to be quite patrotic, as the American flag is made up of those colours.


The final thing i picked up on is that Lester is trapped. He is always on the inside looking out and never vice versa. I think that this may act as a signifier for the rest of the film. As he is trying to change this order in order to make his life better.

Creating A Film

In class, we were given a task to come up with a pitch for film idea. The better the film, the better the teachers funding for your film would be. However, there were two target market groups you could aim your film at: Infants or African-American men. We went for African-American men. At first we had to discuss what we thought the interests of African-American men might be and then this gave us a stimulus as to what our film could be about. After a few minutes of "err"ing, we thought it'd be a good idea to create a British version of the American film "Freedom Writers" as that would intrigue a similar kind of audience as to what we were aiming our audience at. We had to come up with all of the above the line and below the line costs and find out how much exactly everything costs.

The basic summary of the film is as follows: There is an awful lot of violence caused by gangs in a college to a point where the college is shut down. There are five different groups, some split by race, others split by class. There is one teacher in the school who see's an opportunity to complete a project by taking one member from each of the gangs and making them work together. The project goes well, things are clearing up and gangs are starting to be civil with one another. The college, after a year of hard work form this teacher is finally due to reopen. But the night before the college reopens a single member from one of the gangs shows their true colours and sets hell loose with what he really thinks of making peace.
For this idea, we got £5 million. Which, we soon came to realise is not a lot of money. However, we were given our budget by a tax schemes company so we have no extra taxations which could have lowered our profit before by 17.5% or more.
We thought a good start would be to use the college that "The Inbetweeners" use - Ruislip College. We thought this would be an ideal place to film and to audition people as it would make them familiar with the set they would be working with in the near future. Obviously, the budget is low, so we would have to use new, upcoming actors and actresses.
When we were deciding on directors, editors and script writers etc. we thought it'd be appropriate (and cheap) to use the same director as "Freedom Writers" (Richard LaGravenese) due to his know how of these sort of films and the same editor (Andrew Mondshein) and script writer (Will Fetters) of "Remember Me".


So, overall, our budget spending looks like this:
Director - Richard LaGravenese, £2million overall

Editor – Andrew Mondshein, £10,000 a week (10 weeks)

Location – Ruislip College, £100,000

Cinematographer – Barry Ackroyd, £50,000 overall

Cast – Open Auditions, £1,000,000 overall - Venue: Main hall at Ruislip College (Place of Filming)

Script Writer – Will Fetters, £50,000 overall

Plus the below the line costs, amounting to a maximum of £1.7million