The Scripts

Working Title: 

Jay Burgoyne

Length: 5 minutes Format: DSLR Digital film.

Hook line:

Short Synopsis.

Following the story of 3 individuals talking about a significant past relationship, and the break up that followed, as the dialogue moves on the audience are given clues and it becomes apparent that these 4 characters are speaking possibly about the same person this is shown through similarities in their stories. Its a bit of a different take on a portrait drama, as you learn about the subject only through others and never see her.

Mid Length synopsis:

Follows the story of 3 different individuals after a break up from their partners, they narrate key parts of the relationship that worked and that didn't work, the journey is coming through the other side of a break up as pretty much everyone can relate to this journey as it is a pretty universal subject matter. The film will use many different locations in order to visually build a picture of the relationship and in a sense journey through the past of the characters life, or memory, I will do this by having the main characters acting as if they are journalists doing a report on the relationship with focus on good composition and using a sort of documentary style drama. I will be giving all the characters individual personalities to contrast from each other, for example one being quite dumb but good hearted, one being a bit of a joker etc to gain a wider variation of viewing for the audience. The twist in the story is that through the dialogue it becomes apparent that they are all talking about the same person. The themes I would like to explore are firstly people having different opinions on the same thing, for example there may have been things that one character liked about the girl and things that another character hated. Secondly I wanted to explore something that nearly everyone can relate to which is relationships, but not in the conventional loved up way that they are normally portrayed.

Analysis:

I have taken inspiration for my idea from 'High Fidelity, In the film John Cusack visits flashbacks of his exes, in order and narrates things to the character in a flash back that went wrong with the relationship, the result is a comic opening to the film that is light hearted on what can be quite a difficult subject matter for people, I think this is a good technique to keep the film lighthearted and the film is very well scripted and will be a good starting point for research for my screenplay. I also took inspiration from 'About a girl' a film in which the camera follows a young female through a housing estate, while she narrates to the camera her life, and as she talks about her life, the camera transports her to the scene that she talks about then carries on from there, I want to use this technique or story telling as I think it will work effectively for the aesthetic I want to achieve, and will allow me to achieve a faster pace for my drama as it cuts out much of the having to explain using camera work how you got from a to b but rather the dialogue combined with a quick edit does this effectively. I want the tone of the piece to be quite stylised, good use of colour, possibly even having a colour scheme for each character. I want to experiment with techniques for switching from each character in the edit, for example when the audience are starting to realise that they are talking about the same character I could use one character sitting on a bench talking about how they had sat here and talked about etc, then cut to a POV shot from the bench and then have another characters voice coming in saying something different but in the same location and then have the camera switch back the the previous position on the bench but with a different character talking this time. This will help people to draw parallels in the dialogue and work out the intention of the film. Other techniques I want to use are walking and talking to the camera, I like it but I think it could be played with a little bit more, like a sort of waynes world style where they sneak under the table to talk to the camera, but less 80's. I also have another similar edit technique to the bench one in mind, but with a chat over coffee, where the camera flicks to POV and you see the coffee cup coming towards the camera and then black, then you see another coffee cup at a different table going back down, and it transitions again to the next character. Another transition I would like to use is taken from 'Slacker', where two characters pass each other on the street, and the camera switches character and follows the other person, I think this would work well in my film as it means the two characters would have walked past each other without knowing who the other one was, or in actual fact that they had both gone out with the same girl. By the end of the film the audience will feel like the know the character that they are talking about but wont of actually met her.

Key points :

• emphasis on transitions between characters, keeps the film interesting
• emphasis on dialogue and linking together certain similarities with the character they are talking about
• emphasis on composition, want to devise a colour scheme for each character where possible, to fit with their personalities.

Idea Two

Alice Wybrant

Crew: Chris Aitkenhead, Alice Wybrant, Jay Burgoyne, Reece Saunderson & Shelton Sitima.
Working title: The Letter

Length: 05.00

Short synopsis:

On the surface this short film is about a young boy delivering a very important letter. The story unfolds with his voice narrating his thoughts and actions. The key characters are the young boy and the young girl who is in the last 30 seconds of the film. The young boy's character is somewhat serious and 'deep' thinking but in a 'too old for your age' kind of way. This then makes his character slightly comedic to an audience. There is a journey present in this film, both physically and mentally. The action of delivering the letter is a journey the boy has to take but in the narration we hear how he feels about what's inside the letter (although the audience don't find out until the very end). We hear how much courage it took him to write the letter let alone deliver it. As the young boy acts 'old' for his age and is generally deluded by his own intelligence the themes of age crop up a lot. These can be seen in the mise en scene of the film. The boys costume, hair etc. It's also in his actions. For example turning his nose up at things people do his age.

This film is about a young boy delivering a very important letter. The young boy is 'old for his age' and feels he is somewhat 'trapped' in a younger persons body. If he were to write a profile for himself on a dating website he would probably sound like a dog. “Enjoys long walks in the park and sitting by the fire”. The content of the letter itself does not get revealed until the last 30 seconds or so of the film. He builds up the prestige and importance of the letter throughout the film saying how it's one of the most important letters he's ever written in his life so far. In the last few seconds of the film we see a young girl opening a letter. Revealing a really badly made valentines day card and a shot of her very unimpressed face. The set up of this is hinted at near the start of the film when he states what date it is (12^th february).

Analysis of approach:

This film will most likely be shot on DSLR. What will it look and sound like? The sound design for this film will be key as it's mainly told through voice over narration. The sound will be both diegetic and non diegetic and this is what will link the image to the voiceover. It's style is slightly quirky, mirroring the boys personality. Camera angles will be slightly obscure to show how he perceives the world/people. Other techniques that will be used are lens flares. (Due to the main inspiration) The main inspiration to this film is another film called 'Submarine' directed by Richard Ayoade. The character 'Oliver Tate' in that film is a lot like the young boy's character in this. The mood of the film is a mixture of mystery (due to the secrecy of the letter) but also ironic/sarcastic humour.