Doritos / ECA

A quick blog on two projects I have been the Sound Recordist for recently. Both very different.

"A Different Kind of Love" was shot by students from the ECA. I noted the hugely different approach we have at the Academy to the way they film from ECA. Their focus was continually on the image. The sound was clearly a necessary evil, and the performances were neither developed or concentrated on. Everything was about the composition of the shot. A strong-willed DoP, a weaker Director and the absence of a 1st AD meant that we ended up with an average of about ten takes for even the simplest of shots. I very quickly grew to despise the phrase "One more for the camera". After all, what is the point of getting a repeat of a shot in which you change nothing. If there is a problem in the first shot, it will very probably still be there in the second identical shot. Nevertheless I got through it. I got some basic knowledge of how to operate a Marantz solid state recorder (very much a crash course in that I had to figure out the buttons by trial and error - cue lots of distortion). I was unable to find a way for the Marantz to accept a line signal coming from the mixer on an XLR cable, so I had to set the mixer output to Mic level, which is less good for signal-to-noise ratio but which at least allowed me to get some signal recorded!

"Doritos: Share" was a 30 second advert done last weekend. Due to a lack of actors (out of the five required we ended up with two) I had to act, as did the runner and the director. So I can add "hand out the window, boom back in the sunroof" to my list of awkward sound recording positions, especially when trying to act with the right half of me. Being Sound Rec and an actor is far from an ideal situation. For the wide shots, I had to prop the boom pole up, wedged between C-Stands, and hope for no sudden gusts of wind... Beyond that, I'm not sure I learned anything of note about sound during this shoot. We had to use 6 AA batteries for the SQN as the MP1 battery had been omitted from the kit request: these required replacing half way through the shoot.

Online Content

Although I appreciate these blogs are finished academically, I have found it useful to use them occasionally to think a topic through inside my own head. Although I try to make all my thought perfectly legible and logical, this musing is primarily for myself, in order to get my head round the concepts of 360 commissioning and online content.

The first thing to note is that “online” content need not be particularly different from any other type of content. The internet is a medium like any other, and is versatile enough to handle almost any kind of content we wish to upload to it. (It surely cannot be many years before there is a tactile element added to the internet, where we are able to “touch” and “feel” objects with a sensory glove. When that is combined with virtual reality goggles, we will truly be into the cyber age. Virtual environments will become the norm, starting with gimmicks and pornography, before filtering though into general entertainment, and social networking and eventually working its way into virtual committee meetings, business meetings, retail, education, and government.).

So what sort of “online” content can be provided to accompany a TV show or feature film?

Firstly, there is no real difference between online and broadcast. So we would have the episodes available to watch or download, either at a cost or for free. A realistic business plan would probably look to have either the watch/download costing a certain amount of money, or the payment of a certain amount of money to subscribe to the service.

Secondly, we could have information in a text and picture format considering key aspects of the series: the characters, the locations and the wider environment.

Third, we can have extra audio-visual content: stories surrounding and giving new insight on the main TV story. These can range from a variation on the “deleted scene” to something a little more deliberate.

Fourth, we can have games relating to the show: everything from quizzes to retro platform-style games.

Fifth and finally, we can provide merchandise for sale.

Ultimately however, this will all prove nothing more than a mild diversion and window dressing for the audience. The most popular sites on the web are those which the audience contribute to. So we have Youtube, Flickr and Facebook, as well as sites such as fanfiction.com where the public try their hand at creative writing. We also have the escapist phenomenon known as Second Life, where people create an avatar to represent them, design it as they wish and let it inhabit a certain envorinment and interact with the other avatars.

So how can we incorporate audience content into our website without ever surrendering control of the story, the characters and the core content of the show?

Some elements work better than others. The best selling point of Facebook is the monopoly it has on the internet. This is the kind of site which only works if it is the only one. All competition, like MySpace, Bebo, Twitter, Friends Reunited and Google’s new network called “Buzz”, must be eliminated, preferably by the public simply abandoning these smaller networks. We all want to feel we are a part of a single global community and Facebook has a huge percentage of the global population as members, so setting up an alternative to Facebook is foolish. But we can work within the parameters set there: at the very least by establishing a Facebook group centred around our show and run in a semi-independent fashion by someone who appears to be a member of the public, and a huge fan, but is in actual fact, likely paid by the producers to keep the group active with continually changing content, updates, mailings and discussions.

Second Life is an intriguing one to emulate. Working best in a fantasy or sci-fi show, we can permit folk to create their own avatar which inhabits the world of the show. So to use my caveman premise, we can let the audience create their own caveman and explore the cave environment and interact with the other avatars they meet there. This is a massive thing to run and to keep interest up, so a games company would have to be drafted in to provide the interactive environment and provide continually new challenges for the gamer to overcome.

As long as it was strictly clear that we took no responsibility for the content uploaded, we could have a fan-fiction page available as part of the site, where users could upload their own stories about the characters and the environment. This has been very popular for many shows and films, especially Harry Potter (in the years when I used to peruse the site). Now Twilight has probably taken over as the top spot. But I have never seen this as a part of a film or show website. (Generally I have found the official websites to be very sparse in material and the fan-sites, to be bursting at the seams.)

The same could be applied to you tube and Flickr. Working within the confines of these sites, but embedded on pages in our own site, we could invite the public to upload their own material. We would moderate for relevance and appropriateness, but would have a huge disclaimer up about our lack of responsibility for the content.

We could of course have a message board with several threads for fans to gossip about the show: rumours of upcoming episodes, debate of motivations and characters in previous episodes. Again this would be moderated, but only for appropriate-ness. We would be committed to allowing all content derogatory to the show and all spoilers, as long as everyone was clear we had no responsibility over what was said.

So by the time we have implemented all of this, we have a very informative and interactive website, but the question of extra audio-visual material remains. What form should this take?

This either falls into the category of information, in which case it is simply a film, or it presents something interactive, which is a game. A game can incorporate film and remain a game. A film cannot incorporate gaming elements without becoming a game. The best games allow the user complete control, and a game which only allows a user very limited control is very frustrating. It feels like a very rubbish game and a very rubbish film at the same time.

I’m scratching my brains trying to come up with something that is an interactive film, but is not a game, and the best I can do is a short film with a message board underneath to debate the issue that arose, or to provide a three minute film and ask for the public to film their own sequels. The best will win a prize. This, crucially, can have no bearing on the characters, plot or environment of the main series. The closest it can come is if a character has left the series, and we know he or she is never going to return, they can be thrown to the dogs (I.e. the public) and the public can decide their fate.

Anyway, I could blether on for ages, but there we have it. Some thoughts on online content.

Titus - An Analysis

Introduction
The film I have chosen to consider is Titus, directed by Julie Taymor. Made in 1999, it is an adaptation of Shakespeare’s Titus Andronicus: his most bloodthirsty play.

Dante Ferretti’s Production Design was awarded a Silver Ribbon by the Italian National Syndicate of Film Journalists. In particular, the Costume Design by Milera Canonero was nominated for an Oscar.1 In her production notes, Taymor states “I wanted to blend and collide time, to create a singular period that juxtaposed elements of ancient barbaric ritual with familiar, contemporary attitude and style.”2 It is this deliberate mixture of assorted anachronisms which gives the city of Titus its unique environment.

Looking at elements within a five minute sequence, I am examining the visual references to fascism, and seeing how these meld seamlessly into the texture of the world Taymor and Feretti have created.

A Vision of Various Periods
Interviewed for www.talentdevelop.com, Canonero talks about the chronological setting for the film. "It's a reinvented vision of various periods. There are references to the 30s, the 40s, the 50s, but not historically or academically used… The film is a period in itself. Of course, I've been inspired by Roman and Etruscan historical references, but Julie wanted to create a world of its own, not one that ever existed."3

Here we have an example of the modern and ancient blend. The microphone is a Shure 55 model, popular in 1950’s America4, recalling the Presidential campaigns of Truman, Eisenhower and JFK. But it bears the sigil SPQR: Senatus Populusque Romanus. This was the logo of the Ancient Roman Empire, used along with the eagle as a document header, as a military standard and as a stamp on monuments of Imperial glory. It was revived again by Mussolini as a visual boost for his fascist regime which he termed the New Roman Empire.5 Underneath the SPQR logo, we have, in smaller letters, the word NEWS, with a clear allusion to the style of television news bulletins still prevalent today.

The costume worn by Marcus, the senator, is equally a blend of styles. He wears a single breasted suit, brilliantly white and very modern in its minimalist cut. However, over this is neatly thrown a white sash with a red band, clearly reminiscent of the bleached white toga candida worn only by the Senators of Ancient Rome, with its distinctive stripe of garnet running diagonally down from the shoulder.6

Saturninus

Saturninus’ faction has a clear parallel with fascism. The Mercedes in which Saturninus rides is identical to the transport favoured by Hitler when he was joining in marches. The parallels between the first picture above and the picture below are remarkable.

But Saturninus has added a bullet proof cage around himself and from this we can gain an insight into his character. Obviously hated enough to have survived a previous assassination attempt, Saturninus is cowardly and paranoid, hiding inside a glass box to protect himself from the people he seeks to rule. Looking for contemporary references, the clearest parallel seems to be with the Pope, who is famous for journeying in similarly modified transport7. Given that Titus is set in Rome, it is possible that Taymor is making a subtle dig at the Vatican paranoia.

The stance adopted by Saturninus when addressing the crowd is clearly modelled on Hitler addressing Germany at the Nuremberg Rallies.8 Saturninus himself wears a leather trench coat, black with huge lapels in a dynamic red colour. The trench coat was made popular after being issued to officers in World War One. Later, as Hollywood took it over, it projected the image of an intelligent hard-man. Especially in leather, the floor length trench coat gives an impression of elegant dominance.9 Saturninus’ sleek red and black coat has certainly not seen hard times and his use of it appears to be a deliberate statement of the image he would like to project.

Some of Saturninus’ followers are following his fashion - in the long shots we see a cohort of about ten men wearing black trench coats with the distinctive red lapels. We are reminded of a political uniform. Wearing a uniform while on a political march has been outlawed in the UK since 1936, because of its association with fascism.10

On the hood of the car, and on the front of each of the motorbikes, we have an ornamental wolf head. This motif of the wolf occurs again and again throughout the film, and is a reference to the twin founders of Rome, Romulus and Remus. Legend has it they were raised by wolves.

The Set
Choosing a location for filming is as much a part of art direction as providing costumes and props and this scene is set against the backdrop of the EUR, once Mussolini’s government centre.11 Taymor describes it in her production notes: “[It] is referred to as the "square coliseum" because of its myriad arches. Built by Mussolini to recreate the glory of the ancient Roman Empire, this surreal -- almost futuristic architecture -- was a setting which perfectly embodied the concept for the film.”12

Banners and flags are a simple way to transform a location into a set. Here, black banners are hurled from the top storey in mourning for the passing of Caesar. Saturninus’ followers wave dynamic red and yellow flags, while Bassianus’ cohort have more gentle pale blue and white flags. Incidentally, these are the colours of the two rival football teams in modern day Rome: A.S. Roma and S.S. Lazio respectively.13

Conclusion
Combining many different styles and time periods may come across as a bit of a hotch potch, but it is clear that the periods and places referenced are not at random. Each has a parallel with the key elements of the film. Ancient Rome provides the original setting; Fascist Italy and Germany chimes with the attitudes and behavior of Emperor Saturnine and the contemporary references remind us that human nature has not changed and we are still capable of such brutality as any of our ancestors ever were.

References

1 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0120866/awards (16-01-10)

2 http://www.foxsearchlight.com/titus/film.html (16-01-10)

3 http://talentdevelop.com/interviews/Page1047.html (16-01-10)

4 http://www.oaktreeent.com/microphones.htm (23-01-10)

5 http://www.spqrtravel.com/spqr_meaning.htm (16-01-10)

6 http://www.classicsunveiled.com/romel/html/clothmen.html (16-01-10)

7 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Popemobile (23-01-10)

8 http://www.bild.bundesarchiv.de/archives/barchpic/search/_1265285115/ (30-01-10)

9 “Men’s Fashion in the Twentieth Century” Maria Costantino BT Batsford Ltd 1997 p71

10 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_Order_Act_1936 (16-01-10)

11 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Esposizione_Universale_Roma (16-01-10)

12 http://www.foxsearchlight.com/titus/film.html (16-01-10)

13 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Derby_della_Capitale (16-01-10)

Hitchcock and Truffaut

I have just finished a book of conversations between Hitchcock and Frances Truffaut, mentioned by Andy in one of the classes. I found it really interesting to read.

Truffaut is obviously a huge admirer of Hitchcock's work, and as they look at all the films Hitchcock made up to "Torn Curtain", his enthusiasm certainly seems to melt Hitchcock's sometimes gruff exterior. The book is framed as a dialogue, with the words transcribed directly from conversations had between the two film-makers. This lends itself to some entertaining moments where Truffaut irritates Hitchcock, or Hitchcock insults Truffaut or some other aside which (for some reason) amuses me.

I found Hitchcock's view of the New Wave interesting. He denounces neo-realism (or "the Italians") as being unable to tell a story, uninterested in structure and poor at climactic moments and especially the endings of films. He is more ambiguous about the New Wave, possibly with Truffaut (one of their main proponents) being in the room with him. He says he does not understand their dismissal of story structure: his own films are carefully constructed to maximise the impact on the audience. The drifting, apparently aimless style of the New Wave seems to be at odds with Hitchcock's precision. He also has little time for Realism at all: if you want to portray real life, he says, make documentaries. Hitchcock prefers dreamlike settings, nightmarish archetypes and voyeuristic fantasies.

He also made some other interesting points.

It is not necessary for the film to make logical sense. As long as it seems to roughly make sense on a first viewing, all that matters is that the audience are swept up in the emotion and tension of each scene.

The stronger the villain, the stronger the film. A stupid villain produces a stupid film; a weak villain a weak film and a predictable villain provides a predictable film.

An audience prefer to have a star as a protagonist because they already feel they know him (or her) without the character having to be comprehensively set up. Where Hitchcock used Cary Grant and James Stewart, the same would apply today to most big names. Even if it's Johnny Depp playing a role different from any he's ever done before, we still are more likely to warm to him than if it was somebody we had never seen before.

The job of the director is to tell things visually. Don't use dialogue if the images can say it for you. Use dialogue as a mask for what is really going on in a scene. Very rarely have the character say what they mean, especially at moments of emotional stress.

There was a lot more, but time and space constrain me. Well worth a read though!

Week Beginning 1/2

Monday was a time for us all to give presentations on our analysis of various scenes. I've very much enjoyed doing this assignment, and delving into the art direction of Titus has been both eye-opening and inspirational.

Tuesday was a meeting amongst the class to look at extra-curricular projects which we might be looking at. Almost everyone had ideas, and most of these I thought were good ideas. I'm hoping that when the shortlist for the end-of-year scripts are announced later today, it will give us all (and especially those of us who don't have to continue in development) added impetus to work on these projects.

After this we had a meeting on our documentaries, where we were chided for our lack of progress. However, we did, finally, decide on who was in which group and we have started taking a couple of steps int he right direction.

Wednesday was, for me, a full day filming with the BBC. Sounds exalted, but in reality, it was either a case of watching someone else - and not a very experienced someone else at that - or else manning a camera on mastershot, which didn't require much (if any) fiddling!

Thursday was deadline day for both Ray's essay and Richard's script. It was also an afternoon with John Yorke, looking at online content. I think I have an obvious aversion to online content, as intuitively I think of grainy, pixellated images the size of a postage stamp. This of course is not the case, but when combined with the lack of any feasible business model is not inspiring. This (I suppose) is a key issue with the Internet in its totality. Why would you pay for something, when you can get it for free? We get our news for free on BBC News website and others. We get our music for free on Spotify and others. We get our video clips for free on youtube, our TV free on iPlayer, our books free on GoogleBooks, our information free on wikipedia, our phonecalls free on Skype. It just goes on. And meanwhile, we end up devaluing all these services and taking them for granted. Why would we pay for these things, when we can get them for free?

Friday was a class on Directing, very useful. We looked at the casting process from briefs to auditions. One of the key things is the use of improv in auditions, the importance of giving the actor the script first and ensuring they have read it, and the benefits of having more than one actor in at a time.

At the weekend I was at a Christian Arts conference, called Interface, meeting up with artists from all disciplines: sculpture to fashion, songwriting to mechanical design. We looked at questions like "What is Art?" "Why is it important?" "Does it need to be justified?" and "How can we use our Art to bring glory to God?". One of the speakers was Norman Stone, director of "Man Dancin'" and various other TV and film dramas. He was particularly interesting to hear, and I also met up with two other film makers from the East Coast. Given that film is far more collaborative than most art forms, it is particularly exciting for me to meet new film-makers, and I'm always looking for more people I can work with.

Week Beginning 25/1

The Week began with a look at British social realism. I've just read a quote from Francois Truffaut who says "There is something about England that's anti-cinematic... To put it bluntly, isn't there a certain incompatibility between the terms 'cinema' and 'Britain'?... Considering the high intellectual level in England, and in the light of her great writers and poets, isn't it rather curious that in the seventy years since cinema came into being, the only two British film-makers whose works have stood the test of time are Charlie Chaplin and Alfred Hitchcock?"

Certainly I feel he's being a little French about the whole thing, but he maybe has a point. Since then, you could arguably add Richard Attenborough, Ridley Scott and David Lean but the key thing about all these directors is that they made their name during their career in America. It seems as though trying to make movies outside America, and certainly trying to produce a film in the UK seems to lend itself to failure. Perhaps downbeat, and there are excpetions of course, but to me it seems that if you want to be a prolific film-maker, you have to live and work in the US. Ken Loach would be the counter-example, but in my opinion, his films don't stand in the same league as those made by the other directors above.

Tuesday was a tutorial with Adam looking at developing my TV series idea a bit further. I am happy with the way it is going, and am looking forward to taking it further, and writing part of the first episode.

In the afternoon we were given out the briefs for documentaries which we are going to be engaged in. I think the idea of doing a documentary freaks me out a bit as they are so much harder to do well than drama. Its a different kind of film-making, and frankly I don't think its what I'm going to prove to be very good at. The documentaries I prefer are those educational ones which are unashamedly trying to teach you something scientific, historical or philosophical. These rely on talking heads, with illustrations, dramatic reconstructions, anecdotal relief and usually a bit of foreign travel to spice it up. Telling a story by visual language sound to me like it will end up either being sledge-hammer style metaphor or ridiculously subtle, pretentious twaddle.

Wednesday was a class with Zam, exploring some of the locations we had discovered around Glasgow. We looked at the practicalities of filming in various places and how a different look could be got simply by filming round the corner.

Thursday was a tutorial with Richard - for which I was 10 minutes late. I got some very detailed notes and hope to make another redraft tomorrow. Very pleased with the way my script has turned out so far, though if it ever is commissioned, the producers will try to shoot me.

Friday was a screening of The Seventh Seal. I have seen this movie before and I think blogged on it, so I won't make a separate posting for it again. Suffice to say it remains one of the most insightful, thought-provoking films I have seen. There is a lot of dialogue, which Richard wouldn't like, but which I think you need when you are dealing with such philosophical ideas. The metaphors come piled one on top of another, and it would be fascinating to analyse a scene from it. All done with beautiful photography and moments of great humour, this is one of my favourite films.

The afternoon was a class with Abigail, where we all got a row for not taking our assignment seriously enough. Personally I thought the script we were working from was the most boring script I've read since the last one she gave us out. I feel it would be vastly more enjoyable and engaging for us if we were doing production breakdowns of some of the scripts we had written last year. Rather, we have been handed out a script which has been written out very poorly. It is little wonder we are less than enthused for our task when it is clear that whoever transcribed the script from which we are working was equally un-enthused. They didn't even take the time to proof read it or attempt to format it.

Week Beginning 18/1

Monday was a class on the French New Wave. It seems to me I have less of an understanding of exactly what this is than I do of, say, Italian Neo-Realism or British Social Realism. I have decided to add a couple of Jean Luc Godard's films to my list, as the only New Wave film I have seen is the 400 blows, and bearing in mind how influential it has been it is difficult to actually isolate these characteristics which were new in this New Wave.

Tuesday was a look at documentary again, with this time a practical exercise: taking the story of a teacher's suicide and trying to find the story that resonates with us all. I found that it was something none of us considered at the first pass, and that much time was spent considering the details of the event itself before we realised that the key story here was about dis-satisfaction with life and a search for something more. Or, as the Bible might say "What profit is it to a man if he gains the whole world and loses his own soul?"

Wednesday was a day off, so spent on our essays and on pre-production for "Communication Breakdown": Dionysios upcoming film.

Thursday was supposedly a day of technical, but it was cancelled due to editshare being down. We spent the day working on essays.

Friday was a viewing of This is England, followed by a massive assignment given out by Abigail...