Approaches to Analysing Films Continued

Feminism

In considering the way that films are put together, many feminist film critics have pointed to the "male gaze" that predominates in classical Hollywood filmmaking. Budd Boetticher summarises the view thus: "What counts is what the heroine provokes, or rather what she represents. She is the one, or rather the love or fear she inspires in the hero, or else the concern he feels for her, who makes him act the way he does. In herself the woman has not the slightest importance." Laura Mulvey's influential essay "Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema" (written in 1973 and published in 1975) expands on this conception of the passive role of women in cinema to argue that film provides visual pleasure through scopophilia, and identification with the on-screen male actor. She asserts: "In their traditional exhibitionist role women are simultaneously looked at and displayed, with their appearance coded for strong visual and erotic impact so that they can be said to connote to-be-looked-at-ness," and as a result contends that in film a woman is the "bearer of meaning, not maker of meaning." Mulvey argues that Lacan's psychoanalytic theory is the key to understanding how film creates such a space for female sexual objectification and exploitation through the combination of the patriarchal order of society, and 'looking' in itself as a pleasurable act of voyeurism, as "the cinema satisfies a primordial wish for pleasurable looking.". Films depicted from the feminist viewpoint often readdress the distribution of power and wealth in this patriarchal society by placing the female character in the position of authority.

Approaches To Analysing Films

Structuralism

Structuralist film theory is a branch of film theory that is rooted in Structuralism, itself based on structural linguistics. Structuralist film theory emphasises how films convey meaning through the use of codes and conventions not dissimilar to the way languages are used to construct meaning in communication. The work of Vladamir Propp (characters) and Tzvetan Todorov (narrative) is most often used when disucssing structuralism. 

 

Pictured above is one of the main props that our group will use in our film trailer; the demonic book that helps to release the evil entity in the film, at the point where the state of equilibrium breaks. The film's main tag line "Demons Never Die" can be seen scrawled across the left had page above. The words appear to be written in blood, which immediately suggests the sinister nature of this book. The demonic symbol that also plays a key role in the film can be seen seemingly hand written twice on the page. The repetition of the symbol symbolises the importance it has in the film. The fact that is hand written shows it was possibly written in after the book was made, possibly in a state of demonic possession, showing the effects on the mind and well being the book has on anybody it comes into contact with.

On the next pages a small section gives the background to the Cornovii, the tribe behind the demonic possession in the film. The depth the book goes into suggests that the tribe were big and powerful, and had a big influence on the time they lived in. The mysterious symbol can be seen once again which heightens the influence it has in the film whilst also creating a sense of mystery surrounding its origin. The devil can be seen accompanying the symbol and the text which allows the audience to make links between the tribe, and the devil, and the negative image clusters (fire, hell etc) and connotations that surround him

 

The British Board of Film Classification (BBFC) is a non-governmental organisation, founded by the film industry in 1912 and is responsible for the national classification and censorship of films within the United Kingdom. The BBFC highlights two main goals for their work: to protect children and vulnerable adults from potentially harmful content and to allow parents to make "Informed viewing decisions" (source: http://www.bbfc.co.uk/what-classification/guidelines).

 

The BBFC update their guidelines roughly every four or five years. The most updated version of these guidelines provide these age ratings that the BBFC classify every film with before its release, with the following break down of each rating:

 

 

• U - Universal, suitable for all audiences 
• PG - Parental Guidance, generally suitable for viewing but some scenes maybe unsuitable for smaller children
• 12 - Suitable for children ages 12 and over (Home)
• 12 A - Suitable for children ages 12 and over with an accompanying adult (Cinema)

(12A is normally reserved as a guideline for cinemas and retailers for children to be accompanied by an adult when purchasing or viewing a film with this rating. 12 is normally left on the box of the DVD/Blu-ray release as home supervision cannot be monitored)

 

• 15 - Suitable for children over the ages of 15
• 18 - Suitable for adults only
• R18 - Suitable only for viewing by adults on licensed premises

Here is our animatic for the film trailer we shall begin to create in January. Whilst we endeavoured to ensue it was fully completed, an umber of minor shots are missing from our storyboard as the busy schedules of the other actors we required did not always coordinate with our filming shoots. However we have inserted a soundtrack that is similar to the one we intend to create in the final production and have began to incorporate some of the major an more complicated ideas we have for the finished product such as teasing the more intricate back story (the history of the symbols and Celtic tribe for example) with the inter-titles at the beginning of the trailer/animatic. We have also experimented with many of the ideas we had for cuts and camera angles, for example, to begin to utilise industry methods such as the "code of enigma" to give the product a professional and authentic look.

Today in our lesson we, the group, had a lengthy discussion to summarise this terms efforts, set goals and personal deadlines for the group, as well as bring new ideas to the table for us to think about over the Christmas holidays. As a group we've always felt that the code of enigma will largely stem from the back story of the tribe involved in the "cursed" symbols, so therefore one of our ongoing tasks has been to develop this story on from newspaper reports and primary research we gathered in the early stages of development. I suggested we incorporated shots of men in black hoods inbetween the inter-titles at the beginning of the trailer, to immediately get the audience asking questions of the identity and intentions of the mysterious hooded men. I felt their appearance would be similar to that of other horror greats seen in such films as "Scream", so perhaps the fear of this recognisable threat would enhance the tension experienced at the beginning of the trailer.

Above is the completed storyboard my group and I created for our trailer. We now intend to use this as a template to produce an animatic, which will ultimately then help us make our final film trailer. On a personal note I was inspired by Alfred Hitchcock's extensive storyboarding on his classics such as "Psycho", as I found the extensive details and notes made along side the sketches ultimately help make a more professional and complex product.