Our Cast (Kierann)

Male protagonist - Gary - Chris Phillips

In the end we chose Chris to act in our film opening. this was mainly due to the fact that our actual actor couldn't turn up for the reshoot so we had to use our backup actor which was Chris. this wasn't a burden though as we chose Chris as our backup actor as he was our second choice.

Female protagonist - Ellie - Jade smith

In the end we chose Jade as our lead female as our other lead actress couldn't turn up two the second filming session however, we feel that Jade in the end was the right choice as she perfectly portrayed Ellie as our group perceived her.

Male antagonist - Boss 1 - Adam Bluck 

we chose him in the end as we believe his voice perfectly matched with Boss 1. His voice ticked all the box's in which we were looking for. we preferred him other all of the other actors as he had what everyone else lacked which was maturity.

Female antagonist - Boss 2 - Paige

We chose her as Boss 2 because we broght the energy into the scene, something all of the other actresses who auditioned for the role lacked.

Casting the Film Opening (Kierann)

Our film opening includes two characters who can be physically scene, then another two characters who are only verbally heard. what we require from the two characters who are physically seen is that they have to be from Caucasian ethnicity. this is because our film is mainstream and is located in the UK and the ethnicity of the UK is Caucasian. We require one male actor who looks hansom and he has to look as if he is in his 20's. We do not require a specific colour of hair but we want the hair style to be in fashion. We require for the other character a Female actress who looks pretty. She has at least look as if she is in her 20's as well. from both actors we require them to have some skill within acting so when we do auditions we will have to look out for it. For the other two vocal actors we require a male and a female. the male actor has to speak with a stern, but serious voice even when the conversation becomes casual. For this character we do not require a specific age however we do want them to have a hint of maturity in there voice. The female actress has to speak like a stereotypical girl, she has to speak with a hyper and enthusiastic tone in her voice. for this character we require someone who is young adult.

The way in which we will be auditioning the actors is that we will give the actors a script in which they will be having conversation with another character. we will be doing this as it will test if they will fit the necessary needs for the character.

Script (Kierann)

Boss 1:               Agent 82.

Hugo Lewis:     Hey Boss how's the wife.

Boss 1:               Good thanks she's doing fine, How's Ellie

Hugo Lewis:     Great, we're having a romantic dinner for two...It's our                                                                            anniversary.
Boss 1:               How fantastic, but now to the serious business...........we have new target for you.

Hugo Lewis:     Just give me a name, I want dessert.

Boss 1:              Your target is Ellie....your wife!

Boss 2:               Agent Glitterballs, hows it going honey (2 seconds)

Ellie Lewis:       It's going amazing, thanks for asking babe. (3 seconds)

Boss 2:               Sooooo feel me in with the deets. (2 seconds)

Ellie Lewis:       so yeah that's what he did. (3 seconds)

Boss 2:               OMG that's too cute (2 seconds)

Ellie Lewis:       I'm so lucky (giggles) (2 seconds)

Boss 2:               Oh yeah before i forget, I have a new target for you.........It's Hugo, your husband.
                           (6 seconds)

Ellie Lewis: I can’t believe that it’s our two years anniversary babe.

Hugo Lewis:     Well it’s been two amazing years.

           
                          (both characters giggle) 

Ellie Lewis:      So how was work today.

Hugo Lewis:     Ah you know how it is, the boss is working me to death

Ellie Lewis:     (giggles) Well at least your here now and not on another trip.
                         (Phone rings) oh I'm sorry hun, its work i'll be back in a sec.

Hugo Lewis:    Don't worry it's okay.
                          (phone rings)

Mise consideration (Chris)

Mise

Female:

·         Red dress

·         black heels

·         black bag

For the female we are going for the smart, pretty look. We want the colour of her outfit to be red because red has the connotations of danger -  which fits her role as a spy.

Male: 

·         Black suit

·         White shirt

·         Red tie

·         Black shoes

For the male we want him to be wearing a smart, sharp black suit with a red tie. We again want the red tie because it suits his role as a secret agent. We want the black part of his suit because it again has connotations of death and danger, a reoccurring theme throughout the film.

Props:

·         Candles – we need candles in the scenes because we want to create a romantic setting to the film.

·         Wine glasses

·         Table cloths

·         Red cloth for backdrop

·         Empty wine bottle

·         Red juice

·         Ice bucket

·         Ice

·         Red lipstick

·         Pictures of each other

·         Wedding rings

·         Fake dinner

·         Phones

Lighting:

For the lighting on our genre it is important that it is subtle and looks smooth. It also needs to be dim as well (to fit the restaurant romantic look). We would want to have low key lighting on the background to help bring the audience’s attention to the main characters. Then we would want high key lighting on the main characters to again bring the attention to them and what is happening in the scene. 

Location Scouting (Group)

Ivory Pegg - Chelmsford

Pros

• In Chelmsford so it is easy access for all of the group members
• Red interior which goes with our colour scheme (Red and Black)
• Their location could make you think the film is in London as there is no give-a-ways towards it not actually being in London

Cons

• Never been so have no idea of the pricing or the quality, nor do we know how friendly the staff are

The Lion Inn - Boreham

Pros

• Exterior has red lettering and red roof, which goes with our chosen theme (also formerly known as 'The Red Lion', a little Easter Egg)

Cons

• Expensive
• May not be easily accessible for everyone
• Their location is hard to make you think the film is in London as there is give-a-ways towards it not actually being in London
• Fussy towards who they let in so may not be able to get access

The Grange - Boreham Interchange

Pros

• Friendly staff so there's a higher possibility of being allowed to film in this location
• Food is well priced (and is rather nice too)

Cons

• Looks more like a pub than a restaurant
• Lots going on on the walls which may distract the viewer from the film
• May not be easy to access for everyone
• Often busy, requires booking in advance
• Their location is hard to make you think the film is in London as there is give-a-ways towards it not actually being in London

A Canteen - Chelmsford

 Pros

• In Chelmsford so is easy to access for all the group members
• My (Adam Scholz) uncles work there so getting permission to film in this location seems likely
• Not extremely busy due to its somewhat close proximity to more popular fast food chains (McDonalds and Taco Bell)
• Wide doors so easy to get in and out
• Well spaced out so easy to get cameras and equipment around without ruining everyone's evening
• Simplistic aesthetic that wont distract the viewer
• Their location could make you think the film is in London as there is no give-a-ways towards it not actually being in London

Cons

• Food is expensive
• Has more of a cafe feel than a restaurant feel. But this can easily be changed

Trattoria - Chelmsford

Pros

• In Chelmsford so is easy to access for all group members
• Their location could make you think the film is in London as there is no give-a-ways towards it not actually being in London

Cons

• Is a Jamie Oliver restaurant so prices could be high
• Rustic aesthetic on the inside, which could look run-down
• Due to being a high-brow restaurant, getting permission may not be easy

Our Story Board (Chris)

 This is the storyboard that we followed when it came to filming - due to the final location that we had to film at we had to adapt some of the shots as we could not achieve them. This meant that we had to think on our feet to pick shots that again would suit the storyboard and would look good - which meant we took multiple different angles of the same scene and picked the best one in post-production.

Our film Title (Kierann)

Our film Title 

Our film title is 'Killer Romance'. we chose this title by researching the top films in each genre and find out how they title their films. we found that for action films they usually have something dark, violent included in the title. this is where we decided to include the word 'killer' in the film title. For RomComs we found that they always have something romantic or something relating to love in it, but with a comedic twist to it for example the irony of the binary opposite or two things in which you would never be said toogether in an everyday life. This is where we decided to include the word romance in the title. which lead to the name 'Killer Romance' the comedic influence in the title is that 'killer' and 'romance' are completely different things and are in no shape or form relative.

For example here are the top three action films on IMDB. 'The Equalizer' the word 'equalizer' brings out a violent mood to the title.  'The Equalizer' could suggest a number of things. the first thing that comes to mind when i saw the title was that it could be about a man who murders people, maybe he could be a hitman. We can also see a hint of violence in the 'Mad Max Fury Road' title. The violence in this title is the 'Mad' and the 'Fury' both emotions that are commonly associated with violence.

The title 'Knocked up' relates to its genre romance as it references to sex and pregnancy. The other genre is shown by the slang used in the title 'Knocked up'. It is viewed as rude and informal, these are common conventions for a comedy film.

Our Film Title Running Order (Chris)

When it came to the final order in which our titles would be played we decided that we would use the research that we undertook to come up with a good list of titles in the correct order. We eventually combined the two film titles - Forrest Gump and Mr and Mrs Smith. our final running order now looks like this:

Our Title Order:

Production Company Logo: Red Tie Pictures

Red Tie Pictures Presents...

In Association With Karanashe Toe Sock Productions...

A Kierann Hills Film...

Title: Killer Romance

Main actor: John Proctor as... Hugo Lewis

Main actor: Jade Smith as... Ellie Lewis

Producer... Bill Gates

Sound... Steve Jobs

Music By... Bensound.com

Edited By... Dave Johnson

Co-Edited By... Peter Jackson

Casted By... Doug Morris

The reason that we decided to have so many titles in our piece was because we are a mainstream film company. This means that it is essential for us to make it look like we had a big budget crew with us. Just like most mainstream films - like Forrest Gump and Mr and Mrs Smith it was important that we had a lot of titles. We think that now having a lot of titles makes our piece look a little more mainstream.

Our Chosen Institutional Logos (Adam)

This is our chosen institutional logo for our production company. Because our chosen company was a Mainstream company, we needed a moving logo since all mainstream companies use a logo like this. Universal pictures has the universal logo orbiting the world, MGM has the lion and Paramount has the stars forming a circle in front of the mountain.

This is our second institutional logo. In a majority of films, there is often a second company that has had something to do with the making of the film. This could be to do with distribution or perhaps a subsidiary of the main company (e.g. Working Title is a subsidiary of Universal Pictures). 

Our Institutional Logo Designs (Adam)

Here are the logos that I (Adam Scholz) have designed for our film company, Red Tie Pictures. My designs are labelled 1 to 5 to make them easier to walk through as i discuss the pros and cons of each design

The first design has the words 'Red' and 'Tie' either side of a red tie, with the word 'Pictures' split in half either side. Its handy that we chose 'Pictures' over our original idea of being 'Red Tie Productions' since 'Productions' has an odd number of letters, making this design (and the second design for that matter) harder to make. I have chosen not to develop this idea further because the choice of lettering style doesn't work because of the T's being in the places they are, meaning the shapes the letters are in look wrong.

The second design is the words 'Red Tie Pictures' in the shape of a tie, with two back triangles at the top imitating a collar. The words 'Red' and 'Tie' are part of the knot in the tie and the word 'Pictures' makes up the rest of the tie, with the letters arranged 2 wide and 4 down. I believe that this design, with some adjustments, could be a candidate for the final logo.

The third and fifth designs are similar variants of each other. The part that remains the same is the main body of the tie, which is in the shape of the word 'Pictures'. The difference between the two is the placement of 'Red Tie'. Design 3 has it in the loop at the top, and Design 5 has it above the tie, leaving the loop open (the text wasn't supposed to be black, it was just a way to hide up a mistake I made when outlining the drawings in pen). In my opinion, design 5 is better than design 3 since the letters seem rather squashed into the loop in design 3. I will remake this design, but to improve it, i will make the letters saying 'Red Tie' bigger, and perhaps on one line rather than on two (maybe overlapping part of the loop?) to make it easier to read.

The fourth design is a front on red tie and black collar, with 'Red Tie Productions' written in the left edge of the tie. This is a design that I have chosen not to take forward because the text is just too small that the audience wouldn't be able to see it. Maybe on a cinema screen, but on anything smaller its going to be too hard to read

RESIT-Celebrity Casting (Kierann Hills)

Celebrity Casting 

Male Protagonist
Seth Rogan

Our main character would be Seth Rogan. This is because he has a great reputation for being a great comedian with many films under his name. Instantly the audience will know that our film is a comedy as soon as they see his face. Just because he only acts in.

Female Antagonist

Amy Poehler

Our female protagonist will be played by the female comedian Amy Poehler. I would consider her to be a female version of Seth Rogan. Someone who is known for being in many comedy films and that being the only genre she works in. the same effect will happen when the audience see her. They will instantly know that this film is a comedy.

The reason why I have chosen two famous actors from each gender is so that we can attract both genres to our film. To balance it out so that we do not just focus on one genre but two, equally. This will hopefully attract a wider audience than many other films with the same genre.

Characters In Our Film (Group)

Hugo
Hugo is the male main character in this film. On the surface he seems like your average day-to-day businessman. He claims that he works for Martin and sons, a well known Car dealership, in their financial department in London, but this business is in fact a secret spy agency. he is a confident sort, who has a charm for the ladies.

Ellie
Ellie is the female main character in this film. Similar to Hugo, she seems like the sort of person that would blend into the background of life, when in fact she too works for a Hitman-for-hire business, called PZ. PZ is an all-female hitman business whose whereabouts is unknown. 

Hugo & Ellie
Hugo & Ellie have been married for 3 years and the film begins on their 3rd Anniversary. 


Hugo's Boss
In the film, not much is know about Hugo's boss. We never see him as a character, we only hear his voice


Ellie's Boss
In the film, not much is know about Ellie's boss. We never see her as a character, we only hear her voice

Our Target Audience (Adam & Kierann)

Our main target audience would be couples aged 16-20’s. This is because 51.5% of people aged 16 and over in England and Wales are in a relationship. There are many RomCom films out there in the media industry, but there aren’t many romcom action films out there. We believe by joining these three genres we could attract a wider audience. Romcoms are already very popular with females and couples, however sometimes males do not find this genre interesting at all. This means that they might not like this genre at all and might not watch it alone without their partner. By combining the genre to the film it’ll convince males to watch the film and will appear to them. In all this will open out our target audience by the masses.

There was brief consideration of having a homosexual couple in our film, since recently homosexuality has become something that is much more acceptable to portray, but due to there still being lots of controversy around the area, we believe we could lose a large chunk of our potential audience, which from a film companies point of view, is not a risk we would be willing to take. If we felt as if a homosexual element was a necessity and would 'add' to the film, then we would've incorporate it, but we weren't going to add it in for the sake of adding it in.

Attracting Our Target Audience (Kierann)

Attracting Our Target Audience


There are several things we need to consider when it comes to our audience. To attract young couples, which is our target audience,the protagonists will be a young couple. This will make it more relatable for our target audience as, despite their job in this film being something that isn't a 'normal' occupation, its something that could be relatable. 

To attract our female viewers we will efficiently use camera angles. For example, the close up and mid shot of the couple holding hands. From our research we have found that women consider themselves emotional beings and thus while watching romantic films they especially love and get engaged when something romantic happens between the two leads, this is the 'Uses and Gratifications' theory where people go to watch films to feel emotions. That is why we have included the intimate touch of the hand within our film opening. We will dress our female character with fashionable new clothes as his will encourage our audience to the film.

To attract our male viewers we hope to included the male protagonist, Hugo, accidentally draws blood while shaving. this we hope will creates suspense and uneasiness with in our audience and  the blood itself symbolises danger. these are all common generic conventions in which are used in action films. All in all this is what males look for in a film. We will dress our male character with fashionable clothes instead of out of fashion clothes. we believe by doing this it'll incise our audience to the film.

25 Word Film summary

Married couple, don’t know each other’s true jobs, secretly both spies, conflicting agency, ordered to kill each other, both fake deaths, move away to Argentina.


By Christopher Phillips

Our Film Certificate (Chris)

For our film we have chosen to go with a 15. The reason for this is because all of our idea's that we want to have in our film fits the age bracket that is on the BBFC website. During our film viewers will be subjected to strong language, sexual references, violence and threatening behaviour, all the things that are under a 15. This is good because we can aim to make our film a little more grown-up and have humour that adults will enjoy and understand as well as the younger generations (16 to mid/late 20's and women of most ages).

Christopher Phillips

Audience Figure Research (Chris)

When we have a look at films that go with our sort of genre we can find out what our film could make and what should be spent on a film like ours. When we have a look at the film 'Passengers 2016' we get the following figures:
'Passengers 2016' cost $110,000,000 (estimated) to make.
After getting an idea of how much it cost to make we can now get a good idea of how much they made during the weeks it was out. 
at the end of the film once it had been all added up, 'Passengers 2016' made $270,657,489 on the 27th of January 2017. meaning that they made around $160 million in the box office. 

when we have another film in this genre we can see that we get the same sort of figures. When we have look at the film  Mr & Mrs Smith (2005) we can see that they get the same sort of figure's:

The budget for the film was $120,000,000 (estimated).
After the whole time that it was in the film we can see that it made around $186,336,103 (USA) which is around the same amount that passengers made and was shown on 3424 screens. This gives us a good idea of what our film could potentially make if it was released in the cinema.
When we have a look at how much money it made in the UK we can see that it made around £3,943,422 and was shown on 450 screens. 

Audience Mood-board (Adam)

This is a mood-board of the types of people we would expect to be a part of our typical audience. Our target audience is made up of couples of all ages (primarily teenage couples, but any age of couples would be part of our target audience). Because of the romance element, we would expect young to middle aged woman to be part of our target audience.

This will help us when making our film because we would know

The Whole Film (kierann)

The Whole Film

1. The couple are in a restaurant together for a day out, the women gets a call and says she needs to take the call urgently as it is from her work. Moments later the male gets a call which is from his work as well. Both of them get orders to assassinate each other and are both devastated.
2.  After the meal they head home, both can barely look each other in the face and an awkward mood sets the scene. when they reach their home it cuts to the next morning. 
3. They both get ready for work as they usually do, however this time they are both sceptical of each other. they both confront each other to say their goodbyes before they go to work but it just ends in a awkward silence. 
4. When they get to work then both argue to their boss and explain that they are married. As they are in separate places it will be shown by multiple cuts to each scene. In the end the Boss's both explain the importance of the situation and in the end they persuade to  go through with their mission.
5. Hugo heads home and when he opening the door, a TV falls from up above from the balcony. His wife explains that she slipped while she was moving things around. when realising that killing Hugo will be harder than expected she goes and changes into something that may subdue Hugo.
6. The couple are both in the kitchen preparing their dinner, man pretends to slip with a knife with a knife in his hand, directly behind his wife, but his wife moves out of the way to grab some more potatoes (more comical stuff like this continues to happen throughout the rest of the week).
7. Later one night, the male watching TV while his wife is in the kitchen, her phones goes off and says ‘what’s the update on assassinating your husband’ at that point the wife is in the middle of the room, staring at her husband and an epic fight commences.
8. As the battle goes on both husband and wife realise that they can’t kill each other so they fake their deaths and flee to Argentina to start a new life.

l     

By planning where the rest of the film will be going, it will enable us to easy plan out our introduction. We will know where will have to finish off and it would give us an understanding of the narrative aswell.

Our Film Mood board (Kierann)

By doing this it has made us as a group think about the key aspects of our film and how we need to try and introduce these ideas in the film opening.

Audience Questionnaire Answers Analysed (kierann)

Audience Questionnaire Answers Analysed

In total we gave out our questionnaire to 10 people. we gave our questionnaire out to a range of people from the ages 16+ and included both genders. we have done this so we get a wide range of answers and not just answers which are relevant to one possible target audience 

What would you think the plot would be about in a RomCom Action?

For this question 8/10 people said that they would expect the plot to be about a couple. The most popular out of the 8 theories were that it would be about a couple in distress or the male fighting for the females love. when creating the narrative to our film this will help as this shows us what our audience would like to see in a Rom-Com action.

Would you prefer a male or a female protagonist?

The results of this question were very close. For a male protagonist: 5. For a Female protagonist: 4. For male and female protagonist: 1. As the results were so close we have decided that we will have both a female and male protagonist as this will attract a wider audience.

What type of protagonist do you expect to see in a RomCom Action film?

The most popular results we found were: Hot, Funny, stupid, interesting, shy, Brave, romantic. with this information we will now decide between our group what traits our protagonists will have. from this we now know what stereo-typically people want to see in a RomCom-Action

Do you believe that action would work well with a RomCom, if not why?

For this question we got 10/10 on the answer yes. this is good news as it mean our idea for a RomCom-Action was a success. This means that our film could be a success as we are giving the audience what they want.

What ages do you think a RomCom Action film?

From the results of this question, we clearing know who we should target are film to. Young adults 16-20's had gotten 8 votes out of ten and even the other two votes included young adults as well as including another answer.

Who do you think would watch a RomCom Action film?

This question was very similar to the last however we wanted to define who would rather come to watch the film so that we could make the film more relevant for the target audience. Out of the three answers we gave them the results are very close. 4/10 for couples, 3/10 for males, 3/10 for females. As the results were very close we have decided as a group that we will target our film towards couples as it is relevant for both genders.

What would you like to see in a RomCom Action?

From this question we can clearly see that from the people we asked, they would like to see a comical side of romance incorporated with violence. several people also mentioned that they would like to see a lot of death, romance.

By Analysing the audience questionnaire it has shown us what kind of target audience we are focusing on and what our plot should be about. When creating our characters this will give us instructions on what they are like. This will make our target audience enjoy the characters and see what they want.

Here are 3 of the ten questionnaires which are filled out.

Our Chosen genre (Kierann)

Our Chosen genre

we chose to have a hybrid genre of RomCom Action. with all three being as strong as each other instead of being a sub genre. the reason why we chose this genre is because we looked into the top 10 genres on IMDB and we found that Romance, Comedy and action were all on the top 10 genre list. We believed that if we combined all of these genres together in one film, will be able to attract a larger open audience. It would combine two large audiences. Young couples from the ages of 16 to mid/late 30's and women of most ages. 

By doing this post it'll help us when we are making our film opening. This is because it will make us think how we will show the genres in the film opening and as we are a hybrid genre we will need to find a way to incorporate all of the genres we are including.

The Type Of Institution We Will Be (Adam)

We have chosen to be a Mainstream company instead of an independent one because our group as a whole have watched a lot more mainstream films over independent films, so we would know what to include when making the film. Also, in terms of creating the film, independent films have much more technical story lines and are created to make the audience think as well they give the audience an overall powerful message and avoid mainstream genres, some even being difficult to pinpoint a genre onto, such as American Honey (2016). This would mean that research into similar genres we were planning on doing would be hard to do, as well as the story needing to be aimed at a niche audience. As well as this, creating the story itself would more likely end up with us creating something which has never been done before, which is one of the things you shouldn't do in a Student Film, especially one being created on the time-frame we have been given.Due to these factors, we have chosen to be a mainstream film company. 

"Don't try to reinvent the wheel, but also don't play it safe" - Adam Scholz's Blog-post 'What makes a good student film?'

What we know about film openings as a group (Kierann and chris)

What we know about film openings as a group

•          To introduce the important roles such as the main Actors, Director, Writer and Producers.
•         It sets the scene and shows the viewers the social, historical, cultural and location of the film.      
•         It gives a glimpse of what the film has to offer.
•     Must contain a sequence of titles in the right order, 
•     name of studio that is distributing the film, Name of production company, Name of director, Names of principal actors, Film title, Name of Caster.
•     Must give a brief Narrative without revealing to much
•     Includes Non-diegetic  music relevant to the film to set the scene. The music should relate to the genre.
•      Film openings usually are about 2 minutes long.
•     The genres of the film should be shown in the film opening
•     The protagonist should be shown in the film opening, however in some films like horror they like to reveal the antagonist first, e.g. scream or inglorious bastards.
•       Must contain the title sequence which should be presented in the right order.
•     Exposes the theme and main plot of the film.

By doing this it will help us when creating our film opening. the reason why is that we know what to include when making the film opening. By following these guidelines our film opening will be a success.

Film Opening Re-creation Shot List and Timeline (Kierann & Chris)

 For this we created a timeline and we also combined the shot list in with it as well. This was done to minimise the amount of paper we needed to take when we are going to shoot the film and it also means that its all in one place. When it comes to creating our real piece it means that we know what we will have to create and when we should have out titles on it too. we did this so it would give us guide lines to what to film. this is because we wanted our film opening to be as close as our inspiration 'Drive' as possible. This would also help us out later on in our films development as we wrote down how long each scene was shown in the film opening. this meant that we would later on while editing help us out on the timing of each scene.

Our remake film opening (Kierann)

Our remake film opening

    

By making this title sequence it has helped made me consider my own title sequence as it has taught me when and where to put the titles. with doing this activity we wouldn't know anything about a films titles.