Basic Film Ideas: Planning ?????????????

3 part narrative of my whole film?

A happy setting is created, the murder/kidnapping of a child occurs, a member of family close to the brother realises that the police aren’t doing enough to solve the case and hence forth takes it into his own hands.

The main events I will mention in my film trailer?

The kidnapping/ murder and how it was supposedly planned, the happiness prior to the murder. And sequences of how people tried to track the murder down.

Who are the main characters and how are they involved?

The main characters will be the victim, the family of the victim, the murderer- however I have decided that I want this to be an enigma throughout the trailer and I will establish this through a blurred effect. These will not be the only characters, however they will feature the most.

Which actors will play the central characters? What types of personalities do they seem to have?

A young/childish character who will play the victim, he will come across as happy and outgoing which will add to his level of innocence.

The murderer will be seen as mysterious, will a spontaneous yet intelligent personality

What is the current working title for your film?

“Looking for Luke Maloney”

I want my eventual title to be an accurate representation of what the film is about- for example films like: The imposter, Man on Wire, Catfish all describe the storyline of the film

What may be the central conflict or obstacle for your characters to overcome?

The murderer, how did he do it, why did he do it, why did he do it, when and where did it take place.

How will you finish the trailer so that viewers do not know the ending

Finish with an enigma, leave the audience wondering the outcome- so potentially finish on an intertitle which creates mystery something along the lines of “The story finally meets its end” or “Will justice be found”

What is your tagline?

“Creeping into the depths of mystery”

Which buzzwords will you include to help describe the tone and mood of you film?

Delightfully Gripping

A thrill ride ….

Which review quotes will you include? Who are the reviewers?

From well-established magazine articles

Empire review

Nominations from Bafta awards: Best Independent film

Newspaper

Poster Planning

I have looked at both teaser and theatrical posters and whilst both have their respective advantages. At this moment in time I feel more inclined to make a teaser poster because, if done effectively, I will be able to establish my genre and conform to the demands of my target audience in the same way that a theatrical poster would.

Suicide Squad (2016) Teaser Poster Analysis

The teaser poster for suicide squad has been set out in a cartoon fashion and whilst being basic, the appearance of the characters on the poster are distinctive and allow us to imagine a similar and realistic picture in our minds. Especially with the Joker- despite there being no conformation of it of him being one of the characters on this poster, we are made to assume this given the green hair (a textbook characteristic of his appearance) as well as his red mouth.

Otherwise we are left trying to conjure any relations for the other characters on the poster, but taking into consideration that the Joker is a formidable villain and that he shares a similar appearance to the other characters- once again we are made to believe that these characters are all villains

Another evident feature of the poster is the colour red- it is seen on  6 out of the 10 characters- this further encourages the idea of evil amongst these characters as the colour red is reinforcing evil.


The title is bold / intimidating and it even carries a sense worry, given that the letters of the word "suicide" are unbalanced. This effect is emulated with the word "squad" as the "Q" is instead made to be a scar face, perhaps another hidden character within the film. But more likely (given the cartoon layout) it may be a representation of death, which is possible, seeing as during the marvel comics a character who dies is often shown having crossed out eyes or "X" in order to show the death.

The secondary title, is smaller than the main film title but it carries a message of importance, this being the films release date. This piece of information it specifically  underlined in black to reiterate its importance which also deliberately draws the attention of the audience as the colour contrasts against the pale colour of the background.

I really like the "simple yet effective" approach used within this poster, as it identifies its target audience through characters and font. This style of poster is something I may attempt to recreate as I am convinced having seen a few teaser posters so far that it is the right type of poster for my film.

Man on Wire (2008) Theatrical Poster Analysis

With regards to camera angles and shot composition, our view of the poster is a point of view shot- looking down upon the isolating drop. The rope looks thin and fragile in this shot despite being fairly close to the camera itself. The black appearance of this character – something associated with death or pain, could also be used to contrast the titles- with one of the most important ones being “ A film by James Marsh” with the last two words being in bold to emphasise his role in the film. This pattern is continued with the information underneath also being black, but its size is considerably smaller therefore showing the insignificance of this information to the reader. 

The information underneath the main title states “ Dancing on the rooftops of the world” it appears to be in the same font as the main title, which sheds a sense of hope and belief that there isn’t going to be any problems. And if anything the title itself creates an enigma for the audience as they want to see if the outcome of the film is positive (as the white titles represent) or negative – portrayed through the blood red titles. The poster itself is well lit given the white clouds, however at second glance these become daunting to look at due to the darkened appearance of the top right hand side of the poster.

 However we are also aware that the main title is not only a blood red, but also the boldness and font of the title hints at the bluntness and potential consequence of the narrative. Given that red is commonly associated with death/pain and suffering. Therefore there is reason to believe that (along with the story line) the film is not mainstream and could appeal to a more reformed target audience. In spite of this the poster sets out to show its achievements, which is shown through a contrast between the gloomy white clouds and the official white titles. Which would of course occupy a large majority of the poster as this may be one of the USP's for this film (Ultimate selling point)

We can tell that this is a theatrical film poster because it contains a wide array of information regarding the film whereas a teaser poster would contain very little information as it is just trying to intrigue prior to the films release.

However I have decided that I will not try to emulate this style of poster as, for me, the poster comes across as boring despite the setting. Instead I would look to include brighter colours to make my poster seem more interesting and generally nicer to look at. Rather than using dark ,and dull colours. I also made the decision to limit my analysis of this poster simply because I found it boring and uninspiring to look at. 

Sound Analysis

The trailer opens with a soft piano tune playing over the top, this acts as non-diegetic sound, but allows the trailer to progress at a steady and constant pace, however as the sound fades away we hear a voice over- something that resembles a blurred out voice. A sound we often hear from pilots, this creates a sense of safety as Pilots are figures of authority.


Then we hear a sound bridge of the same voice being carried over into a scene of panic, this is represented through the diegetic sound of screams, which we can assume have been amplified to create more fear. This is accompanied by faced paced editing as well as low key lighting to create a sense of instability for the audience. The diegetic sound at this point is quickly rising in amplification.

The effect of this is to quickly enhance the audience's engagement. This overlaps with the diegetic sound of yelling "Sully" "Sully" "Sully", and then the sound cuts completely, then after 2 seconds of silence and a close up of a male characters face- we are told that the character we are facing is Sully, but the silence is also significant as it shows perhaps a sense of wrong doing / misjudgement.

We then resume with the non-diegetic sound of the piano , however this time the sound is deeper in tone. Which suggests that something big is going to happen. At this point the piano increases is frequency, as to signify the change of camera position/ location. For example it coincides with the jump cut- therefore speeding up the pace of the opening. The remainder of the trailer is then a mixture of cross cutting from the plane, and what appears to be an office location.

Then we reach the climax of the trailer, this is evident as this shot is a longer take, but also because the dialogue of a news reporter is loud-implicating that the following shot will be significant. What then follows is a sequence of short takes along with non-diegetic sound that increases until we see the main title of the film.  The deepest piano tone is then heard, which then fades away slowly as the title appears on the screen.







I would like to emulate the effect of high tempo music gradually increasing in some form of prosody, until my trailer reaches its main climax or in this case title.

Initial Trailer Ideas

Generic Conventions

By creating poster based on the genre conventions of a thriller I have improved my understanding of this particular genre as prior to researching I did not have a great understanding of stereotypes and conventions of what makes a contemporary thriller.