What Certificate?

Here are the possible certificates that i could aim to get for my OTS, i have also noted what the film should include or not include to be given these specific certificates and what each one means:

Suitable for all

The films that are marked with this should be suitable for children aged four years and older. These film should be postive and shouldnt show any violence, threat and horror.

Parental Guidance

General viewing but some scenes may be unsuitable for young children. The term 'parental guidance' is used because parents are advised to consider whether the film is unsuitable for thier child.

Suitable for 12 years and over

The content of the films marked with this sign have inappropriate content for children younger than 12 years of age. Parents might find the content not suitable for their child.The ‘12’ category exists only for video works. No one younger than 12 may rent or buy a ‘12’ rated video work.

This category only exists for cinema films. A child may watch a film in the cinema that is under this certificate if they are accompanied by an adult. This adult would judge whether the content is suitable for that particular child.

                                                    

Only suitable for 15 years and over

Film that have this certification arent suitable for an under 15 to watch in the cinema. Under 15's also cant buy or rent these films.

Only suitable for adults

No-one younger than 18 can see this film in cinema and they also cant buy or rent these films out. The content is too harsh and inappropriate for children.

R18

These films marked with this logo are only shown in licensed cinemas, or supplied in licensed adult shops and to adult no younger than 18 years of age.

                                      

I got this information from the offical website of the 'British Board of Film Classification' (this logo is on the certificates) here is the link which i will also apply to my long list of helpful hyperlinks:
http://www.bbfc.co.uk/

I have been thinking a lot about what certificate i suspect my film noir OTS will be, and i think it would probably be a PG or 12. There will be no swearing, or gory violence (when the trigger is pulled the screen goes black) - quite innoccent. But what could make it a 12 would be the suspence, loud creepy music and the idea that my victim will be followed.

Note: I also need to do a questionaire finding out if my audience is interested in my plot!!!!

CHANGES!

After having a talk with a teacher about my idea of how i am going to have one actress playing all of my characters, i came to the conclusion that it isnt going to be easy to create and it might also be hard for my audience to follow. So i have decided to have one female actress playing only 2 woman characters and a male (probably my dad) playing the man. I will only have 2 femme fatales. I have decided to have one person to play both of my characters because i would like it to show that rich women want just one thing and i think it could give the impression of two sides of one woman. It will show the power women have over men. I have devised a plan have both of the women being completely oppposite in every way (exept black clothing as it is classic film noir), here are the characteristics of each woman:

Woman 1 - Brunette, red lipstick and nails, black dress, dark eyeliner, seductive, devious, confidant, snobbish
Woman 2 - Blonde, pink or natural lipstick and nails, black dress, natural make-up, sweet, nervous, uncomfortable

EITHER ONE COULD BE THE KILLER!

Each number links back to my post-it note storyboard as i have labelled them woman 1 and woman 2.

I have decided to change the idea of having an actress to play the male character because it would be more realistic and easier to film. It will help with the scene where the killer is following the victim after he has been in the telephone box.

Task 1: How many ways did i access the media yesterday?

Well, looking at my list, i would probably say A LOT. From the first second i woke up to the last blink i had before i went to bed, i was in some way doing something media-based. Instead of filming me drawing the mindmap and uploading it onto here, i have just had to draw the mind map on a prezi - i know, BORING. No excuses, i need to find out how to upload videos because my blog is pretty bare of them. But using the helpful arrows and frames that prezi.com has to offer, i will make sure it is 10 times better than it would have looked if i had of drawn it. Eventhough we were only meant to write about how we come across these different types of media, i also wrote about what type of media is used to create these medias. Wow a lot of media words used.Take a scroll down and have a good look! Bonne Lecture!

Speak!

I am not planning to have very much speech in my OTS, as im trying to make it as mysterious and eery as possible. Im trying not to give anything away to quickly. I want questions to be left unanswered - so the speech that is present is very'open'. By this i mean that what the man is saying could be about anything. It is up to the audience to guess what they think is going on. The only dialogue will come from the man (who is future victim) while he is on the phone in the phone box and also while he is being followed by the killer. I have planned what the dialogue will be:

"I've got it"
"I've got the money"
"You'll see it soon"
"10 minutes"

The audience will probably assume this conversation with an unknown person is about the money the man won in the poker game. In the OTS the audience will not find out who the person on the other end of the phone is but they will know that the man is the one that dialled the phone. They also will know that the man was cheating during the poker game with an extra playing card hidden in his cuff. This is dirty money which has been unfairly won. He rang somebody else to inform them that he has won the money. From this short conversation, it can looks as if the man has a dirty deal going on. It makes us wonder what the man gets in return for giving this money away to this unknown mysterious person on the other end of the phone.

The audience knows that the man is a cheat and probably not a very nice person. They may also think that the two women that he was playing against in the poker game werent very nice either - due to their snooty, mysterious and unexpected ways. Maybe the audience will like that the man has been killed? Nobody likes a cheat.

Good'ole Vogue Magazine.

As i was flicking through my religiously-bought Vogue magazine, i came across these photos. As the lady-like trend is the hot-spot right now, 1950's-inspired designers are splatted all over the pages. Prada and Louis Vuitton have mainly sported this trend in these two seasons, adding frills, lace and bows to the most well-made and wanted dresses on the catwalk right now. The glasses these models are wearing are obviously inspired by the 1950's which are embedded with real gems but fake lenses. Obviously these glasses wont be sold in Specsavers any time soon and are not for everyone, bu having some black ones in my OTS will make that lucky character stand-out from the crowd and could help that character look completely different from the other femme fatales. I need to get my hands on a pair!

There is also another important thing that i saw on these frocks which i need to keep in mind when dressing my actress: The dress are either on the knee or below it - for my OTS i will stick to this rule, but to make my actress look sexy and sophisticated i will definitely have to create curves. These outfits that the designers have put together are very 1950's but it resembles the sweet and conservative 1950's, and not the sexy, mysterious and seductive 1950's film noir women i want to portray. I do have to say though, if i had these outfits in black - absolutely perfect!

These photos above are photos that i also found in vogue and a few other glossy magazines. They are mainly from film reviews. They do show the wealth of the women, and the independence they have. Their poses and expressions help this. I especially like the black netting going over one models face with her wearing dark eyeliner and red lips - very sophisticated and classic.

Feedback.

In our last lesson, we had to sit in front of the class and present our ideas using our concept maps. I did skip a lot of the VERY detailed points as i didn't want to bore anyone and to make them feel patronised. However after i did my presentation, i was a bit annoyed as i completely forgot to tell everyone about my really interesting and different ideas that i had! I was secretly uber-proud that i did it on my own in front of everybody with no script and no definitive idea about what i was going to say. I did get some VERY helpful feedback though which i have mentioned in my previous 2 posts. People did mention how i was going to film my scenes with just one actress and what the reason for me to do that. Before this presentation i thought my OTS was going to be very typical and a conventional film noir OTS, but me having one actress and having 3 femme fatales made me realise it isn't going to be as conventional as i thought. I was very grateful for that advise. I was also asked the question - did women actually play poker with men in the 1950's? I felt a bit stupid for me not knowing this weeks into planning it, but with the help from 'Yahoo answers' i found out that.....no they wouldn't have if the man didn't like it. The men had control over the women, and wouldn't have let them play against them, it was a mans game. But in my OTS, the male character is cheating, so he wouldn't have minded playing with the 3 'vunerable and foolish' women if it means getting money from them. The women wouldn't have minded playing with the male character because they knew he had money, they wanted his attention and those particular women wanted to be independent and to be able to make money for themselves without being controlled.


Also, here is a few websites i discovered while trying to find out if women played poker back then. Please keep in mind that the internet isn't always telling the truth and i haven't used these sites to plan my OTS but having them one here would give me something to look back on if i need reassurance:

http://www.ehow.com/how_2318271_make-film-noir.html
http://www.ehow.com/how_2156744_write-noir-mystery.html

Problem solved.

Here are the answered i promised i would post, i have given them a lot of thought and hopefully they work out fine in the end! I have found out that my so-called idea of my OTS to be traditional and stereotypical of a film noir isn't actually going to be a strong part of my OTS as i thought. Having one person to play all of my characters and having 3 femme fatales isn't very conventional. So here we go...

1. The reason for me to have one character playing all of my characters is to give the impression that all wealthy people think the same things and have the same personality. I don't really believe this but creating a stereotype of what a rich person is like, i think it would be interesting and good to experiment on.
2. In the last lesson we had, we were explained to about the 20 second rule. You can have 20 seconds of a certain song and its okay, you can also have that song playing out of a radio (if only my radio was 1950's!) as if the character is listening to that song from the radio. For my OTS, i think I'm going to use the 20-second rule but other music that i use i will have to possible mix it myself, by putting two tracks onto each other - therefore creating a new desired sound.
3. Ah, this problem. I do have other people who i can dress up as a character while my actress is also in the shot. So i will have to use another person but try not to show their faces or anything that might give their identity away - hence creating the mysterious and subtly unidentifiable impression of a character.
4. I have given this bit a lot of thought, i decided that at night and in winter, people wouldn't be silly enough to walk round the streets? Maybe some people would, but i also thought that i wanted to use a lot of close-up shots and of feet walking to keep the killer unidentifiable. I have realised that the time when we are all meant to be filming is in winter and there is a high chance of ice and snow to be on the ground. This could work in my favour for helping create the cold and harsh atmosphere but it could work against me as my actress could be quite cold and walking on the ice might not be the most glamorous situation she has been in! I'm not really going to get shots of just the street, i will only shoot where the victim is walking. I discovered that there is actually a telephone box in the street where i am filming! YAY, soo helpful! Behind this telephone box are railings and a big curving tree which would look very atmospheric in the dark. I probably wont get a shot of the character in the telephone box, i will probably just have a still shot of the telephone box with the audience just hearing the phone call.
5. Well, the title is in french because i do think it adds to the mystery and sophistication i am trying to portray, and if this was a real film that was being made and it would be sold on the shelves, i think it will look different from any other DVD. It could be linked to the fact that if the title is unknown to the audience, the killer is also unknown to the audience. 'L'amour est le tueur' means 'love is the killer'. Somebody did bring up a good point in feedback asking if i would give any indication of love in my OTS. I have decided to purposely make each connection with the female characters and my male character very equal. My male character will have no more of an attraction to one femme fatale to another - this is to make the possibility of the audience guessing who the killer is slim.

Hopefully these are the last of my problems, but my idea of having one person playing all of my characters will have to be tried and tested and if it doesn't work, it can always be changed. I need to see if it works before i quit, it can either go one way or the other! Bonne chance à moi!