Creative Project - Screenplay (Zach)

Disgredarded

Internal Location – Black Screen

A Voice over of the female lead is used as she is describing how she is alone.

Dialogue:

"People say that the internet is your friend. Even for people who don't know how to make friends in reality. I think that we'd agree this is bullshit. Take me for example."

 

(FADE IN)

 

Internal Location – Female leads bedroom (Friday Morning 8.05AM)

Cut from black to a shot of the female leads bedroom floor. Books on how to make friends and an opened bottle of Jack Daniels Whiskey are all scattered underneath her bed. Tracking shot.

Medium shot with a bird’s eye view of the female lead as she wakes up. Her glasses are hanging off her face and one of her books lay across her chest. Quiet non-diegetic sound/music playing in the background as part of the films soundtrack.

Medium shot of the female lead as she sits up while in her bed. Two ‘geeky’ posters are visible on her wall behind her of Pythagoras and Einstein. Medium shot while she adjusts her glasses. Quiet non-diegetic sound from previous shot continues into this shot.

Long Side shot of the female lead sat up in bed. Another ‘geeky’ poster, this time Darwin is visible behind her. The female lead then swings her legs around to get out of bed. Quiet non-diegetic sound from previous shot continues into this shot.

As the female lead gets out of bed there is a close up of her foot as it knocks over a bottle of Jack Daniels near her bed which has obviously recently been consumed by her. Quiet non-diegetic sound from previous shot continues into this shot. There is also the sound of the Jack Daniels bottle clicking against hardback books.

 

Internal Location – Kitchen of the female leads house (Friday Morning 8.34AM)

Close-up of the female leads breakfast, which is a plate of pancakes. Her hands are visible as she picks one of them up to eat. Sound of the kettle boiling also in the background as she is eating. Quiet non-diegetic sound from previous shot continues into this shot.

Medium shot of the female lead sat at her kitchen table while eating her pancakes. Quiet non-diegetic sound and kettle boiling from previous shot continues into this shot. The female lead is wearing what is stereotypically known as ‘geeky’ clothes as she is about to leave the house for a day at college.

Close-up of a bird’s eye view of the female leads breakfast plate which is now empty. Quiet non-diegetic sound from previous shot continues into this shot. She grabs the plate to clear her breakfast up.

 

Internal Location –Hallway of the female leads house (Friday Morning 8.45AM)

Long shot of the female lead used as she is in her hallway walking towards her front door to leave the house. Quiet non-diegetic sound from previous shot continues into this shot.

Close up shot of female leads face. She takes a deep breath with her eyes closed and exhales with her eyes open. Quiet non-diegetic sound from previous shot continues into this shot. Her breath is also heard over music.

Close up shot of female leads hand as her hand is on a door handle leaving the house. The door slightly and slowly opens before cutting to the next shot. Quiet non-diegetic sound from previous shot continues into this shot.

 

Internal Location –College Canteen/Dining Hall (Friday Morning 11.54AM)

Point of view tracking shot from the view of the female lead while she walks through her college dinner hall/canteen. People already sat in there will pull chairs near them in as she walks by them. Quiet non-diegetic sound from previous shot continues into this shot. Noise of the crowds of people in the canteen is also heard. Female lead spots an empty table and a tracking shot is used again as she approaches it.

Medium shot of female lead sat alone in canteen. Other students sat out of focus in the background. Slow motion action is used as other students walk past her. Quiet non-diegetic sound from previous shot continues into this shot. The crowd of students in the canteen is also heard.

Medium shot in slow motion of a random boy who is pointing and laughing in the direction of the female lead. Quiet non-diegetic sound from previous shot continues into this shot. The crowd of students in the canteen is also heard as well as the boys laughter.

Dialogue:

"Look who's got no mates."

Female lead sees this happen and a camera tilt is used as she looks down at a point of view shot from the boy to her lunch on the table. Slow motion is used for this tilt. Quiet non-diegetic sound from previous shot continues into this shot. The crowd of students in the canteen is also heard. Overlaying this sound we can hear the female leads heavy breathing which continues into the next shot as the shot fades to black.

(FADE TO BLACK)

Internal Location – Black Screen (Friday Morning 11.56AM)

Heavy breathing continues from last shot. After six seconds all noises stop immediately.

 

Internal Location –Hallway of the female leads house (Friday Afternoon 4.30PM)

High angle long shot of the female leads front door as it opens, this shows that she is inferior and not in a high position. Female lead walks in clearly upset and makes not much noise. The door opening creates a creaking which can be heard as well as the female lead sniffling to show she has been crying.

Close up shot from the ground level as female lead throws her bag down to the ground. Female lead continues walking out of the shot leaving her bag.

 

Internal Location – Staircase of the female leads house (Friday Afternoon 4.31PM)

Low angle close up shot of the female leads legs running up the stairs, still with shoes on.

 

Internal Location – Female leads bedroom (Friday Afternoon 4.31PM)

Long side shot of female leads bedroom. She climbs into bed and lays down quickly, eager to be comfortable.

Medium shot of the female lead crying into her pillow, still with her glasses on which are crooked because of position on the bed. Crying heard as well as quiet non-diegetic music.

Close up shot of the view from under the female leads bed like the second shot, showing her books and a Jack Daniels bottle. Her hand comes down and grabs the Jack Daniels bottle which knocks against the books underneath her bed.

Close up side shot of the female leads head as she drinks from her Jack Daniels bottle. Slow zoom to her mouth.

Extreme close up from zoom, only the bottle and half of her face is visible in the shot. Non-diegetic music getting gradually louder.

Close-up pan to the left as the female leads grabs hold of her laptop and puts it on her bed. Non-diegetic music played. Zoom out from pan to a medium side shot of the female lead sat on her bed. Non-diegetic music continues. She opens laptop slowly.

 

Internal Location – Female leads bedroom (Friday Night 11.09PM)

Close up shot of the female leads face as she is drinking and smoking while crying to show how upset she is. Non-diegetic music continues.

Scrolling screenshot of female leads online blog "Lonely Hearts Blog", showing her past video posts that are on her blog. New non-diegetic music.

Handheld video recording from the view of the cam recorder of the female lead as she makes a video post for her blog. She is still smoking and drinking while crying like in an earlier shot. Non-diegetic music and she describes how she feels.

"College was awful today.. I hate it all. It's almost like no matter how hard I try I don't fit in anywhere, I just wish someone would accept me... It's been that bad that the highlight of my day is coming home to drown everything away through drinking and smoking and this fucking internet never helps me".

 

Internal Location – Black Screen

Non-diegetic sound, music fades out.

 

Internal Location – Female leads bedroom (Saturday Morning 7.00AM)

Handheld camera still in use at a medium shot as the female lead had forgot to turn it off, however this time she is not in the shot and only an empty alcohol bottle and her posters are visible in the shot. No sound is used.

Close-up shot of female lead passed out on the floors pan across her floor to show bottles, her ashtray and her head. Quiet non-diegetic music used. A red flower is seen in the female leads windowsill as the camera pans to the window and zooms out through the window. Quiet non-diegetic music continued.

 

(ZOOM OUT)

 

External Location – Local Park (Saturday Morning 9.32AM)

Long shot of the female lead walking through a local park in the early morning. Quiet non-diegetic music used.

Medium shot of the female lead sat on a bench, people in the background walking through the park whilst she sits. Quiet non-diegetic music continued. Shot will be sped up as people walk in front of her and the camera. A boy sits on the same bench, notices the female lead and walks away. Shot continues to be sped up.

 

Medium shot is used to show more strangers walk past the female lead until a different boy sits on the same bench. Close up of the boys face as he smiles and moves closer to the female lead. This is done in normal time speed with non-diegetic music.

A medium two shot is used to show that both characters have a connection. Non diegetic music continues through this.

Cut to close up of the male character as he starts to talk to her, saying that he recognises her from her online blog. Diegetic speaking and non-diegetic music continues.

"Hey you're that girl aren't you? I've seen you before... From the lonely hearts blog. Just so you know, I don't want you to feel alone"

Close up of girl as she smiles for the first time during the film as she lowers her head due to being embarrassed but also very happy. Non-diegetic music continues.

Medium two shot of both characters talking and smiling. Diegetic speech and non-diegetic music continues.

"Maybe we could go get a coffee or something sometime?"

"Yes I'd like that a lot"

 

(FADE OUT)

 

Final Word Count – 1,716

Creative Project - Reflective Analysis (Zach)

How successful have you been while making the type of film you have created?

For my A2 Film Studies Creative Project coursework I was asked to create a short film. I worked with my friend Emma Jackson in a pair to create the best film that we could produce together. The role/job list was divided equally at the beginning of the year between us both to ensure that we both knew what we were doing. However due to some problems we had the roles were changed around to suit the individual. The roles that I was responsible for are as follows; Genre Research, Synopsis, Screenplay, Animatic, Music Choices, Sound and Audience Feedback. The roles that I and Emma shared are; Target Audience Response, Shooting Schedule, Camera Set Ups and the final product.

When I started my genre research I thought it would be wise to first research the different themes within the drama genre. This helped us to define the themes that would be included in our short film. The themes of the drama genre are; Drama often relies on the characters emotions, Development of realistic characters, Real life issues are often used and that Drama aims to tell stories of human struggles so that the audience can relate to it and understand it. This let us know that our story definitely fit the drama genre due to our short film revolving around the nameless female protagonist as she struggles with real life issues and by the end of the film develops and conquers her fear of isolation and loneliness. I also found well known examples of drama films such as The Godfather and The Shawshank Redemption which aided me understand further what we needed to do to create a successful short film of the drama genre. Additional things I researched in reference to the drama genre were the sounds used in the genre and the plot elements. With sound, in the drama genre sounds are often exaggerated for additional effect on the spectator and to support the development of a character. I believe that this research was very successful because it allowed us to create a short film that included conventions of the drama genre in the correct way. Obeying the codes and conventions of Drama was an objective of ours; otherwise our film wouldn’t make any sense. Therefore we had to ensure that the research was done effectively to achieve our aims.  

The next thing for me to do was the target audience research. This was important as if we did not carry it out then our short film would have been substantially more difficult to produce as we would know who will be watching our film and therefore how to please them while watching the film. When I started I pointed out that the three main key themes to take into account when undertaking target audience research is the age, gender and interests of the spectator. For example, we had to ensure that our spectators were interested in drama films because if they wasn’t they would be likely to not be entertained by the short film which is of course one of the main purposes of a film, to entertain your spectators. After my research I pointed out that since our film would contain alcohol and smoking it would have to have an age restriction, however we didn’t want to limit our audience so we decided on the age of 15 up to the age of 25 as our film would touch on issues that people within that age range are more likely to have to deal with. However even with this in mind we thought that it would be in our best interest to show the film to people not in this boundary also so during our audience feedback we should get a varied set of answers. I many ways I feel that the target audience research could have been improved. This is mainly due at the time when we carried out the research, we were both still not 100% on whom our short film would appeal to. Therefore I think that if we targeted a more precise audience from the beginning it would allow to have been more successful in the long run.

Next on my list was the films synopsis. The synopsis was very important and had to be done twice as the original was too long. Since we knew at this point what our film was about and what would happen in it we decided to write it down and create a synopsis so that there was no confusion later. In the synopsis I used 142 words to sum up our imagined short film. This outlined the brief details of our film. I believe that we fulfilled and followed through with our aims in this sense because the synopsis never changed and it still fits perfectly with the final product that we have created. Consequently I think that the synopsis was very successful as it only needed re-doing once when the word count was too long, although since then nothing else had changed and it fulfils its purpose of a brief summary of the short film. If however the synopsis did not provide an accurate summary of the film it would be unsuccessful.

Therefore the next obvious thing for us to create was a screenplay. However to create a screenplay I needed to meet up with Emma and discuss what we wanted in the screenplay and storyboard which was her responsibility. The two things go hand in hand in a sense because the storyboard is basically a visual form of the screenplay. Therefore once we had discussed the details we went our separate ways and created each of them. When we had both completed this task we met again and compared the storyboard and screenplay, only a small couple of adjustments were needed to be made so that they were identical shot by shot. Therefore this shows meeting the aims of our film planning due to the accuracy of our screenplay/storyboard and only a few minor adjustments needing to be made. This suggests that our planning was successful as we would only be unsuccessful if our storyboard/screenplays were completely different which they weren’t which suggests the planning of such things that Emma and I did was successful.

During this time Emma had created a storyboard which was on her role list and as a result an animatic needed to be created. To create the animatic I found an iPhone app that allowed me to take photos of each of our drawn storyboard shots and make them into a video animatic with added music. This was one of the simpler things I had to do and wasn’t that complicated in comparison to other things that needed doing. In terms of creating the animatic, the production was very successful and productive. This is because I found a simple way to carry out the task of the animatic which I originally thought would be a difficult/long task. Since I had no idea where to start to create an animatic I would say I was successful in finding a resource to create one easily which I know many other people didn’t think of doing.

Now that the majority of planning for the short film had been done we needed to organise a shooting schedule so that we knew when our filming would take place and be completed. Myself and Emma got together in one of out Film Studies lessons to ensure this was done. We looked at a calendar to see what were the best possible dates we could use for our filming were not only me and Emma were available but our cast also. Therefore this was an important thing to get right so everyone was in the same place at the same time. The only one problem we had was on my part. I forgot about a day Emma had put forward for filming which clashed with a day that I was unable to do due to work commitments. This ‘bump in the road’ let the pair of us know that more effective planning would be needed. Although since that incident we have not had a problem. Overall when it comes to the shooting schedule there is no doubt that we could have improved it to be more successful. The immediate thing to do that comes to mind it to give ourselves reminders for certain dates so that neither of us forgot or double-booked a date, this would have led to less hassle and a smoother process in my opinion.

The music choices for our film were something which I needed to do as the micro-feature sound was my responsibility so I needed to pick out music that would be most effective and fit successfully with the film. I spent a great deal of time listening through my own music collection and research possible music that I could use for my film. I eventually decided upon using three songs; Asking Alexandria – To The Stage, Of Mice & Men –The Calm and We Came As Romans – A War Inside. I selected To The Stage with the purpose to go with the scene in which out female lead starts drinking and having flashbacks of people bullying her. The main idea of this was because up until this point in the film the female lead been bullied and everything in the film was rather quiet and as this scene is one of the most important where she has enough and does something drastic. Therefore a drastic and different choice of music is needed to show the disrupted narrative of the protagonist. However in our audience feedback many people said they didn’t like this point in the film. This was brought to my attention through my audience feedback which alerted me that people didn’t understand the jump from soft quiet music to loud rock/metal. Although this is something I anticipated and did on purpose to shock/confuse my spectators in the spirit of Quentin Tarantino who I studied for my Small Scale Research Project. Therefore I think it is fair to say that I was both successful and unsuccessful in this respect. At the same time however there were some people who completely understood the use of this song and enjoyed it. The song stands out to me as well because lyrically it fits with the scene very well. ‘’Just like the cigarettes hurt, just like the whiskey burns. I guess I’m never gunna learn’’, are the lyrics whilst out protagonist is drinking and begins smoking. This reflects her pessimistic attitude during this point in the film and how she thinks she will never escape this loneliness that she has put herself in. I believe that this would have been more effective if spectators knew the song and lyrics, as they would see how and why it fit in place. Furthermore I think that I could have selected my target audience more effectively to ensure a greater success.

This leads onto the sound which was my role to find appropriate candidates for recording separate parts of sound for the film. The main element to this was the voice recording for the male voiceover of the chapters within our film. For this I needed someone who I was friends with to make the whole thing much easier due to a long script of chapters. Naturally one the first voices to spring to my mind were Callum Ahmed who was a deep voice with a tone that we were looking for. So after discussing the idea with Callum, we arranged a date to meet up and record the sound. We used a silent music room at college as a space that we could record the sounds without any background noises being an issue. In this respect I think I was successful in recording sound as all the sounds we have used in our film have been up to standard. In the scene when our protagonist comes home from college and runs up the stairs, on the video recording the audio wasn’t very clear. So I decided to watch the clip numerous times and recorded myself running upstairs and I managed to quiet successful match the video up with my audio. When we asked what spectators disliked about the short film on our audience response not a single person made a negative comment on any of the dubbed-sounds that I recorded. This tells me that nobody had any problems with it or could tell that the sound was over-dubbed and not the original, which suggests that I was successful in achieving my aims of recording the best possible sounds for our film.

When it came to when we filmed parts of our films, we needed to set the camera up to the best of our ability. Camera set ups were done by both me and Emma who would take turns for different shots making sure that the frame and everything was set right to ensure the best results would come from out recording. I believe we were very successful because there was never a scene which we had to go back to re-record due to poor camera set ups, therefore this indicates that we did our jobs properly. On our feedback sheets multiple people commented on the camera work as one of their favourite aspects of the film. Bearing in mind the amount of people who said things like this it suggested to us that we were successful with our camera set ups and frame work, otherwise our shots would have not been up to the standard that they were and people would have commented on it during our audience feedback.

Since Emma did the majority of the editing for the film once we had the final product it was my responsibility to create an appropriate survey to give to spectators to fill in while watching our film as part of our audience feedback. I researched by looking at a lot of different examples of questions from past students audience feedback, however the same few questions were coming up which suggested to me that there wasn’t a great deal more that I could ask people other than what people had already chosen. Once we had finalised out own questions we invited people to attend screenings of our films, we also handed out questionnaires to everyone who agreed to help us out while they were watching our film. Then it was just a case of analysing our results and use them in out reflective analyses. To make sure that I got a varied set of opinions from my audience feedback I made sure that I asked a variety of different people to give feedback from my film. For example, I asked people from the ages of 13 – 39 the results of which went hand in hand with the age of the individual and how much film knowledge they already had. I also made sure to ask not only people who study Film Studies but additionally people who don’t. My idea was that this way I would get feedback from general spectators at the same time who watch films for entertainment rather than critics who will pick at the film and read into it which some people were. However we still needed feedback from all these different people so that we could be critically analysed and learn were we went wrong and to see what others thought about our film.

Overall I think that it is fair to say we were successful in creating our short film for the most part. I think it is fair to say that out short film conforms to the conventions of the drama genre, which is something that people commented on in our audience feedback. Also our film uses these conventions very well I feel to express what genre it is and to show the spectator the themes of drama which we incorporated into our film. An example of a film to compare with our main theme of loneliness is Bridget Jones. Both films are personal stories of the female protagonists who are working through issues, in this case loneliness. However I think our film is much darker than Bridget Jones and takes into consideration more realistic issues that some people go through. The Diary entries/chapters make this seem more realistic and more of a personal story of the female protagonist.  Further evidence for this is the idea of trying to fit in and being unsuccessful in love. This is because our protagonist attempts to fit in more by reading about how to make friends, she even owns a blog named ‘Lonely Hearts’ to assist her in making friends however the problem still stands that no matter how much she tries she still doesn’t fit in. This is backed up when she begins drinking at home and starts to have flashbacks. In these memories we see from her point of view people bullying her and calling her names. This was used in order to show the audience what has happened to her previous to this which has led her to drinking and smoking. The flashbacks are things that she is trying to forget but can’t. Therefore I believe we were successful in creating a film of the Drama genre as it fits with other films that are in the genre such as Bridget Jones which suggests that we have conformed correctly to the codes and conventions.

 

Final Word Count – 2,903

 

Creative Project - Short Film Final Draft

Roles

Group: Emma Jackson & Zach Glasby

Narrative research - Emma (Done)
Genre research - Zach (Done)
Story Type and Character research - Emma (Done)
Target audience research - Zach & Emma (Done)
Synopsis -Zach (Done)
Locations - Emma (Done)
Costumes of Characters - Emma (Done)
Props - Emma (Done)
Casting considerations - Emma (Done)
Drawn storyboard - Emma (Done)
Screenplay - Zach (Done)
Animatic - Zach (Done)
Shooting Schedule - Emma & Zach (Done)
Music Choices - Zach (Done)
Colour Correcting - Emma (Done)
Camera set ups - Emma & Zach (Done)
Cinematography - Emma (Done)
Sound - Zach (Done)
Mise en scene - Emma (Done)
Editing - Emma (Done)
Final Product - Emma & Zach (Done)
Audience Feedback - Zach (Done) 

SSRP Presentation Script

SSRP Presentation Script: Quentin Tarantino, Auteur or not?

Slide 1:

Hello everyone, in my presentation today I will be talking about auteur and director Mr.Quentin Tarantino. Throughout my presentation I will be discussing the use of themes within his films, his cameo roles within his films, his frequently used actors and his individual auteur style and influences. The question I asked myself was ''Is Quentin Tarantino an auteur and what sets him apart from other directors and auteurs.

The films I have chosen to use are Django Unchained (focus film), Pulp Fiction (supporting film), Reservoir Dogs (supporting film) and Kill Bill (supporting film). I have chosen these films specifically because they are throughout Taratino’s career as a director and I feel like give me a better judgment on him as an auteur.

Slide 2:

The film I am going to begin with is my focus film Django Unchained. The key themes I have found in this film were racism, blood & violence, profanity and relationships.

Django is Tarantino's latest film from 2012 which became very successful around the world. It was heavily criticised for it's used of the word "nigger", some critics even claimed that Tarantino was using it in a racist manner. However in one of my sources, Tarantino claims that he did it to give a true representation of South America during the slavery period and that the original cut of Django was much worse in every aspect and had to be watered down for it to be suitable for viewing. In the video interview he says "I could handle it but we wasn't sure if the general viewing public could so we had to change a lot of it". Despite all of this Tarantino doesn't let anything change his directing style which I believe makes him a very powerful auteur in his own right.

Slide 3:

In Pulp Fiction we see the same themes as Django but with some new ones this time such as sex & nudity and drug abuse.

Slide 4:

Reservoir Dogs was the first Tarantino film that I ever saw and in all honesty it really shocked me. This is mostly because previous to this I had never before seen a film like this which I really enjoyed. I had never heard so many uses of the word ''fuck'' in a film before either. For these reasons I thought it would make a good choice to use as my third film.

Slide 5:

And my final film I studied and researched for my SSRP is Kill Bill: Volume 1. Out of the four films I have explored for my SSRP, this was the last one that I had watched. I really enjoyed how Tarantino mixed the film up, for example half way through when it turns to anime I thought was very odd as I had never seen it before but still very unique of Tarantino. The fight scenes I feel are very graphic being one of Tarantino’s most iconic styles.

Slide 6:

I will now be discussing the theme of blood & Violence. As you can see from the picture on the right hand side there are two comparisons of Kill Bill from 2003 and Django from 2012. From these images we can see how Tarantino has used very similar almost identical shots in the two films. From the blood splatters on white snow and white cotton flowers to the low angle shot looking up at the dominant figure from the perspective of the submissive character. This I believe shows that in some ways he has not changed as a director which could be a positive thing to show that he has his own individual auteur style. 

Slide 7:

When looking at crime in Pulp Fiction, I think the most obvious thing is all the drug taking within the film. For example, the scene were we clearly see John Travolta’s character injecting himself. This scene has been known to put many people on edge. Nowadays it wouldn’t have as much of an impact on the audience than it would have in comparison to 1994 when it was released.

Crime in Reservoir Dogs is very clear. In one of the first scenes all of the men are organising a bank robbery while smoking and telling jokes to make light of the situation. However we don’t actually see the robbery take place which defies the crime genre convention. Here we can see Tarantino’s auteur skill and style at work.

In Kill Bill the most prominent crime scene in the film for me is when Uma Thurman’s character is in a Coma and the doctor charges people to rape her.  Not only is rape a taboo subject in many society’s which shows Tarantino’s fearless attitude but also show something that has only been joked about in previous films of his such as Reservoir Dogs.  

However when it comes to Django, I don’t believe that there is much crime in comparison to his other films. This could perhaps be due to his use of other themes in Django. But also looking at the time period Django, black people were treated severely different which would be considered a crime in modern society. Many critics have criticised Tarantino for this claiming that he is racist.

Slide 8:

First I will be looking at profanity in the film Django. The word "Nigger" is used constantly throughout the film when characters within it are referring to black people. As the video I will soon show you this is not done in a racist fashion. It is done to shed some light on the situation in South America during this time where black people were not equal and slavery was in action. There are also many uses of the word "fuck", "shit", "bitch", "bastard" and "hell". God’s name is often combined with "damn" in the film which could show the view towards religion at the time.

So here is the video that I have to show, it is an interview with Tarantino himself.

Slide 9:

Profanity is used an extreme amount in Pulp a Fiction. The word "fuck" alone is heard in many variations over 270+ times I found from an article which I selected as one of my sources. Interestingly enough the film at the time of its release broke the world record for the most uses of the word "fuck". This could show that perhaps Tarantino was using it as a statement to show people that he would not let anything change him or his directing style and that he was in the business to stay. I feel like this gives him status and defines his style.

I have another video to show you now. It is a clip from Pulp Fiction were we see Samuel L Jackson calm but then lose his mind when he starts shouting and swearing at some college kids, he then starts shooting them. This really highlights the themes of not only profanity but also blood and violence which I have already talked about. This is the very infamous 'Say what' scene.

Slide 10:

In the opening scene of Reservoir Dogs, strong sexual dialogue is used frequently and graphically including a gross joke about prison rape. When looking directly at the amount of times a word is said I found that ‘’fuck’’ is used 272, 5 utterings of the word "nigger" which is said more in a racist way than Django if we compare the two. I know this because Django is set during the slavery period whereas Reservoir Dogs is not set in such a time. There is also several uses of 'dick', 'shit', and lots of abuses of God's name.

Slide 11:

In terms of Profanity Kill Bill probably has the least in it. Although there are many uses of "fuck" and so on, I believe Tarantino has done much worse in other films. However the word "cunt" is used a few times within the film which is a much harsher swear word. Therefore I think that using it showed Tarantino to be fearless in a way.

There isn't much else to talk about in reference to profanity in Kill Bill so I don't have a video or anything to show you. But next I will be moving onto the topic of frequently used actors.

Slide 12:

Tarantino tends to be very particular about the actors that he includes within his film. Such as Uma Thurman, Samuel L Jackson and Steve Buscemi being the most prominent actors. This tells me that he has a clear view of what a film of his will be like before he even makes them. What I mean by this is that when Tarantino has the idea for a film he must imagine specific people in specific roles which is a way of showing how he is a talented director/auteur.

Slide 13:

When looking at Tarantino’s individual style his cameo appearances within films are a great way of showing how he has his own individual style. For example here is a list of his cameos, his most popular in my opinion being Mr.Brown from Reservoir Dogs due to it being one of his most well-known films. He also appeared in Django, Pulp Fiction and Death Proof. In doing this I believe it is a way of drawing out one of his main influences which I believe to be Alfred Hitchcock. This is because Hitchcock was a director too and a very successful one at that who had cameo roles within his films. However this was not to the same extent as Tarantino because he didn't have speaking roles.

Slide 14:

Before I tell you anything else in reference to Tarantino's auteur style I want to show you a video interview from him which I used as one of my source as he explains his use of genre conventions within Pulp Fiction.

Not only does this apply to Pulp Fiction, it also applies to Reservoir Dogs in the way that we do not see the bank robbery take place which in a film of the crime genre you would expect to see, especially since it is the focus of the film.

Slide 15:

To bring my presentation to a conclusion I believe that Tarantino is indeed an auteur and a very talented one at that. He uses many different themes in his films and goes against the genre conventions in his films. Pulp Fiction is a prime example of this where he tips the conventions on its head.

Word Count – 1,712

SSRP: Catalogue of Items

A2 Film Studies - Small-Scale Research Project Sources Catalogue

Films: (4 Items)

Item 1: Tarantino, Quentin, 2012. Django Unchained, Columbia Pictures. (Focus Film)

Django Unchained is the film that I have decided to use as the focus film of my SSRP. This is because I feel like it includes the most to talk about when discussing Tarantino’s directing style and auteur features. Firstly near the end of the film Tarantino has a cameo role as one of the mining employees.

Item 2: Tarantino, Quentin, 1994. Pulp Fiction, Miramax Films. (Supporting Film)

Pulp Fiction is a Tarantino classic and a film that is known by many. In my opinion Pulp Fiction is a film that is very good at showing Taratino’s themes such as blood, violence, profanity and sex and nudity.

Item 3: Tarantino, Quentin, 1992. Reservoir Dogs, Dog Eat Dog Productions Inc. (Supporting Film)

Reservoir Dogs is a Tarantino film that I have chosen as a supporting film primarily because of the clear themes in the films. The film clearly shows Tarantino's use of the themes Crime, Profanity and Blood & Violence.

Tarantino also plays a bigger cameo role as Mr.Brown. In this role he is seen in the film from the very first scene.

Item 4: Tarantino, Quentin, 2003. Kill Bill, Miramax Films. (Supporting Film)

Kill Bill was the fourth film that Tarantino had made and is in my opinion an excellent way of showing Tarantino’s directing style and themes in his films. For example, anyone who has seen Kill Bill will know about the amount of blood within the film. Therefore it is a good film choice for showing Tarnation’s use of blood within films. This will most likely be the strongest film out of my choices for showing this theme.

Books: (3 Items)

Item 5: "Tarantino", Smith Jim, Virgin Film Books 2005

I have found a book on the director Quentin Tarantino that I think I will be using for one of my items in my catalogue. This book is called 'Tarantino' and was written by Jim Smith and was published by Virgin Film Books in 2005.I am considering using this because the book discusses several Tarantino films that I will be talking about in my SSRP and I believe that it would be a useful source when researching. For example, the books talks about Pulp Fiction and Reservoir Dogs which at two of my selected films.

Item 6: "Quentin Tarantino - The Man And His Movies" (Jami Bernard, Harper Collins Publishers) - 1995.

Using for information on Pulp Fiction and Reservoir Dogs. In reference to Pulp Fiction, Tarantino says that he loves going through scripts aloud which he did with Uma Thurman when he first met her. Therefore this source could be used as an example of how Tarantino is a good director through his planning of films and his auteur style. Later in the book Uma says "you know, Quentin always says that all of his characters come from somebody he knows, or somebody he's met or something that he's seen. And he's always been led by that in casting and designing it. And my character was one of the few that came purely from his imagination. He didn't have a preconceived notion; he just knew he'd know her when he saw her". This quote is excellent for when I look at frequently used actors and Taratino’s individual auteur style.

Item 7: Reservoir Dogs - Quentin Taratino

Features an interview with Tarantino in which he discusses how he uses genre conventions. Tarantino talks about how after a year and a half after writing Natural Born Killers he was no further in then in the beginning. "It was out of this frustration that I wrote Reservoir Dogs. I was going to go really guerrilla style with it, like the way Nick Gomez did Laws of Gravity. I'd lost faith in anyone giving me money - and then that's when I got the money". In this quote Tarantino tells us about how when he started writing from his heart and what he himself wanted he started to become successful. This in itself shows that when Tarantino started this what he called 'guerrilla style' of writing must have been successful which could be an aspect of his individual auteur style.

Magazines: (1 Item)

Item 8: Sight and Sound Magazine Issue - October 2003: Quentin Tarantino, Kill Bill Interview.

I thought that this interview in Sight and Sound would be a useful source to use I'm my SSRP because it is directly from Tarantino himself and therefore he is likely to explain his reasoning for doing certain things within the film Kill Bill. Specifically I'm reference to the theme of violence. This is because Tarantino says "there's never a moment when I'm telling you this is happening in the real world, when you're not aware you're watching a movie. Nobody is getting killed, this isn't real blood and if you don't like it you mustn't like the colour red because you know it's not real. It couldn't more obviously be a movie". This quote from Tarantino is almost used to justify his use of blood and violence however it is not an excuse and I totally see where he is coming from. This also shows how Tarantino is a no-nonsense director who does what he wants to do in creating his films. Again pushing the idea of his own auteur style.

Web-Based Sources: (3 Items)

Item 9: Independent Article on Django Unchained (By Jonathan Romney)

http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/films/reviews/jonathan-romney-on-django-unchained-its-good-then-its-bad-well-it-is-tarantino-8458657.html

I have chosen this article as a source for my SSRP as I believe that it would be a useful and reliable source with some valid opinions. This is because it is taken from the Independent which is a well-known and trusted organisation.

Item 10: Internet Movie Data Base (IMDB)

IMDB is a well-known and trusted website for films and tv shows. I thought it would be wise to look up the pages for the films I am investigating to see what I can discover and how they can help me. For example, Taratino’s films include a large amount of profanity and therefore when talking about this as a theme it is difficult to narrow down and use specifics. However on each film page on IMDB there is a section that reads 'Parents guide'. This points out each theme within the film and how they have been used. For example in the film Pulp Fiction, how many times has the word "Fuck" been used. Instead of watching the film and making a tally chart I can just find out the exact number. Therefore I am going to use this as one of my source as I believe it would be extremely useful for discussing themes.

Pulp Fiction Article:

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0110912/?ref_=nm_knf_t1

Reservoir Dogs Article:

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0105236/?ref_=nm_knf_t2

Kill Bill: Volume 1 Article:

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0266697/?ref_=nm_knf_t3

Django Unchained Article:

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1853728/?ref_=nv_sr_1

Video Interviews: (4 Items)

Item 11:

This source is alike the Sight and Sound source in a way because it is again from Tarantino himself. However I think that this source will be more reliable as it is a video and therefore we will see a more representive response from Tarantino. This is because in the Sight and Sound article Taratino’s words could have been twisted by the interviewer. 

Item 12: Pulp Fiction ‘’Say What’’ scene (YouTube)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m7L6piElF3c

I will be using a scene from Pulp Fiction in my presentation when discussing themes. The scene during the beginning of Pulp Fiction what I am using shows John Travolta and Samuel L Jackson visiting the students apartment and start shouting swearing and shooting them. This scene can also help me when I talk about Tarantino's frequently used actors; this is because Samuel L Jackson stars in Tarantino films such as Pulp Fiction and Django Unchained.

Item 13: Quentin Tarantino video interview - Django Unchained (YouTube)

http://youtu.be/fCPTDQkKe3I

After watching this video on YouTube, straight away I knew that it would be a great thing to use as a source in my SSRP. This is because in the interview, Tarantino himself comments on his use of Violence and profanity within the film Django and explains why he has used them. Therefore I think this source will be extremely useful when it comes to me explaining why Tarantino has done certain things to show his use of themes.

Item 14: Quentin Tarantino video interview - Pulp Fiction (YouTube)

http://youtu.be/qlC1nVUFuck

This YouTube video is excellent in my opinion that is for explaining Taratino’s auteur style and how it has changed over time. This is because Tarantino himself discusses the story of Pulp Fiction and explains what his inspiration for it was. Therefore I think that this video would be great for showing what Taratino’s thinking was for how he made Pulp Fiction.

De-Selected Items: (2 Items)

Item 15: Scott, Tony, (written by Tarantino) 1993. True Romance, Warner Bros. (Supporting Film)

My original idea was to use this film as one of my selected items as it was written by Quentin Tarantino, however I have realised that the film is not directed in the same was as Tarantino film because he did not have a part in the directing aspect of the film. Although it is clear that the film is still written in the style of a Tarantino film, however because the main thing my SSRP is investigating is Tarantino's directing style so I think it would be best to make this film a deselected items as I believe that there are better Tarantino directed films that I could use in my SSRP.

Item 16: Empire Magazine Online, Django Unchained Review (Web-based Source)

At first I thought that it would be a wise idea to find a review of Django online. I wanted to use a source from film magazine ‘Empire’; however it soon came to my attention that it would be difficult to find a copy of Empire that had an article on Django. Also the fact remains that Empire magazine doesn't really use professional language when reviewing films. What I mean by this is that the reviews tend to be more about the films plot and how entertaining it is rather than actually analysing the film. Therefore I have decided not to use this source for my SSRP.

Word Count – 1,488

SSRP Presentation Reflection

I gave my SSRP presentation on Friday afternoon and felt like it went successfully. I do feel however that it could have improved in certain aspects and after talking with John about it I am going to spend my time improving the actual presentation and my presentation script. I am also rethinking some of my sources on my catalogue, replacing some that are not as useful with some that will give me a better and further understanding and insight into Tarantinos autuer style.

Overall I'm happy with my presentation which I was extremely nervous about and think it could have gotten a lot of worse, although it is obvious that there are improvements that can be made to boost my grade.