Research into Film Noir: Neo Noir

I decided to use Emaze to present my information on the aspects of different Neo Noirs as I was confident when using this software before.

Research into Film Noir

The Film Noir genre was first introduced in the 1940s after World War Two. During this period many of the men had been at war so they were exposed to violence and darkness. The name 'Film Noir' is French for dark film but is in French as it appears more 'attractive'. As it was post-war everyone was feeling more aggressive and women had bigger roles in the country because they had to provide for the country and men at war; many people disliked it and the films were propaganda to teach the public to return to the way things were before the war.

Here are some examples of Film Noir titles. Conventionally, it will be in black and white withe the text being big, bold and white for contrast.

 The conventional contents of a Film Noir includes violence, mystery, darkness and black and white; this is because it was a very dark era and people did not want 'jolly' films.

Expected characters are:

Femme Fatal looking 'seductive' in Double Indemnity

• The everyman (anti-hero)
• The femme fatal

Other characters that are sometimes included are:

• The villain
• Henchmen
• The girl next door

below are the characters in these three films colour coded):

The Killers                                                     Double Indemnity                                                    Black Dahlia

• The everyman (anti-hero):     'Swede'              Walter Neff                                              Dwight 'Bucky' Bleichert
• The Femme Fatal:                   Kitty                   Phyllis Dietrichson                                 Madeleine Linscott
• The Villain:                               Big Jim              N/A (nemesis of Walter is B. Keyes)     N/A
• Henchmen:                               Max and Al        N/A                                                           N/A
• Girl Next Door:                         N/A                    Lola Dietrichson                                       Katherine 'Kay' Lake

Generic conventions of Film Noir from mlevesley

Media Roles in The Film Industry

I experimented with the software VoiceThread to complete this work on different media roles in the Film Industry.

Reflective comment:
I was unsure on how this software worked but the tutorials helped, also I struggled to find short, relevant videos for each of my slide so some slides do not include a video to keep the viewer interested and entertained.

My Top Ten Films

I have created a presentation on my top ten films. I decided to use Emaze for the first time to experiment how it works.
Reflective comment:
 I managed to include videos from YouTube in many of my slides to make it more interactive for the audience. It was very simple to use and I picked up how to use it quite quickly.

Media and Me Prezi Presentation

This is a presentation about how I experience media in my life. I used prezi for the first time to create this presentation.

Reflective Comment:
I found it difficult to use to begin with as I did not know what all the tools did. With help from others, I was able to create the presentation and gain valuable experience.

The Babadook - Sweded Film Finished

This is our finished sweded film that we produced over the summer.

What is a Sweded Film and where did they come from?

The idea of a Sweded Film is to recreate famous films using limited resources and technology. This idea was first inspired in 2008 by the comedy film ‘Be Kind Rewind’. Generally these films are much shorter in length than their originals and are filmed on virtually no budget.

As mentioned before, the actual term ‘Sweded’ was founded from the 2008 comedy film ‘Be Kind Rewind’. The plot of this film involves two characters attempting to replace a store’s video collection by recreating films using a camcorder and claiming they are special editions from Sweden. This is where the name ‘Sweded’ came from.

Before the actual film came out, a YouTube channel was created to help promote the film. The channel contained a film that the actors had Sweded and a video called ‘How To Swede’. Obviously the production of low budget films had existed for years before this film arrived but the term originated from the 2008 film ‘Be Kind Rewind’.

Sweded Films became more popular following the film in 2008 and thousands of people now create a variety of videos recreating films and trailers. When making and recording a Sweded Film, people spend little to no money. Props and outfits are made by hand and location is very simple. Our Sweded trailer is a prime example of recording with no budget.

The Babadook Sweded Film Location, Camera and Editing

As Jack had all of the props needed available at his house and he had areas perfect to film from such as a table outside, we decided that we should film at his house.

We decided to use Jack’s iPhone 6 to film on as it has a great camera quality and he will always be there as it is being filmed in his house. Every single one of us had a turn filming parts of the swede and it was whoever was not needed in the scene being filmed.

To edit the swede we used a free app on the App Store called iMovie, this meant we could easily rearrange the clips in order, remove audio from some clips and add voice-overs all on one iPhone.

Here is an example of the layout of iMovie. At the bottom there is a camera button to add videos, a microphone to record sound and a settings button to edit a clip. In this scene we muted the video, added a voice-over then recorded Matthew playing the piano to add some audio similar to the official film.

Here is a photo of Jack recording Matthew whilst he plays the piano for the background sound.

The Babadook - Sweded Trailer: Script

Joshua Coe- Mum

Jack Grimshaw- Samuel (Child), Head Teacher, Old Lady (Hooded)

Niamh Gallagher- The Babadook, Assistant Head Teacher

Matthew Levesley- Robbie, Old Lady (talking to mum), Doctor, babadook voiceover

(Mum and Samuel in bed)

Mum: Where’d you get this?

Sam: On the shelf

Mum: Whether it’s in a word or in a look, you can’t get rid of The Babadook. A rumbling sound then 3 sharp knocks-

Samuel: Bababa dook dook dook

Mum: That’s when you’ll he’s around, you’ll see him if you look

(Mum and Sam search house)

Mum- Nothing bad’s gonna happen, Sam

Sam- Did you think that about my dad before he died?

(Old woman outside)

Old woman- He sees things as they are, that one

Samuel (Voiceover): I promise to protect you if you promise to protect me

(Mum in school with two teachers)

Mum: Oh my God, did he hurt anyone?

Headteacher: The boy has significant behavioural issues

(Mum and Sam in car)

Mum (voiceover): This monster thing has got to stop, alright? It’s just a book, it can’t hurt you.

(Mum sitting with Robbie)

Robbie: Are you alright?

Mum: Yeah, yeah, I’m fine

Robbie: You don’t have to be fine, you know

Mum: Just a bit stressed at the moment

(Mum and doctor in doctors office)

Doctor: All children see monsters

Mum: Not like this!

(Mum in police station talking to officer)

Mum: I’d like to report someone stalking me and my child

(Door swings open)

Sam (Voiceover): You can’t get rid of the babadook!

Babadook (voiceover): You can bring me the boy (x3)

Sam (voiceover) : Don’t let him in! (x5)

(Mum in car with Sam)

Mum: WHAT DO YOU WANT?

(Mum coming towards Sam)

Mum: You are trespassing in my house!

(Mum forces Sam into bath)

Mum: I’m sick Sam, I need help

(Mum screams)

TITLE SCREEN

(Mum under bedsheets)

Mum: It isn’t real, it isn’t real, it isn’t real

Babadook (voiceover): Baba...dook...doook...dooook

Planning Our Swede. Props and Ideas.

In the trailer of The Babadook, there are only a few props needed, mostly the props were items of clothing to make us look more like the characters we portrayed. To make Josh look more like the mother he needed to look more like a woman, to do this we used a wig the Jack has.

In the start of our sweded film we needed a book that could be used as the babadook, inside the book we included drawings on plain paper that were drawn by Niamh.

Dressing gowns and hoodies were worn over the top of our original clothes in some scenes when we were filming the scenes with the boy, Sam, and the mother. Matthew and Jack both had to wear a smart white shirt and tie when portraying the characters of the headteacher and the doctor.

In one scene there is wood being sawn and hammered, this was simple as in Jack’s shed he had planks of wood, a saw and a hammer. Also, there was a crossbow used; luckily Jack’s brother had a toy crossbow which we borrowed for the scene.

Multiple scenes were filmed inside a car so, with no keys in the engine, we borrowed Jack’s car to film a few scenes with the mother and son.

 Wig worn by the mother (Josh).

Crossbow used by Sam (Jack).

Mother and Sam (Josh and Jack) in full costume in the car.

Planning Our Film Ideas

We decided that the quickest way to choose a film trailer to swede was to write a 'Pros and Cons' list for each film we thought we could do, we then compared them. As a group, we decided that The Babadook was the best film to swede.