Institutional Research

For my institutional research I have chosen to do universal studious. Because they have made some good films in the past and seem very inspirational to work from or for. Also Universal is world wide so making a film could be published or made anywhere in the world.

Universal is one of the six major movie studios in the world. They were made in 1912 and were founded in New York (April 30, 1912) by a man called Carl Laemmle. On may 2004 universal studios the controlling stake in the company was sold by Vivendi to General Electric, parent of NBC. The resulting media super-conglomerate was renamed NBC Universal, while Universal Studios Inc. remained the name of the production subsidiary. They have been making movies since they began and still are till this day.

     They make money by having made all these films, they have studios were you can go visit and have theme park in America based on some of the films they have made.

Our film is based around comedy’s such as Shaun of the dead, Jonny English. Humor with the twist of dark, scary zombie moments like resident evil and 28 days later. Lots of movie's based around two of these genres are in the universal studios list of films. I think the opening movie will look professional in the best way that it can. Clean cuts, good makeup, and clothing. I believe our film would be good for them, because it has two genre based in it and a huge range of age views watch these type of films-because it would be British based.  

     while being made, the company might seem intrigued with a British film and pay for it and publish it over the globe. Due to their review on it and if we could meet their standards.  

     The money we would need wouldn’t be a lot. Due to that fact we would be shooting in out location In Britain. We would have British cast, makeup, est. the budget would be cheep because we could all work together. We would need around £500,000 or less, due to the actors we get, and their standards. We could get fresh ones out and see if they do a good job on the film.

     The type of music that the audience of a media consumer of this film will depend on which side of the genre they prefer more. If they are on the comedy side, it will be things like Rizzle Kicks, Maroon 5 or Christina Perri. However if they are on the side of horror/ zombie, they may prefer darker music such as Enter Shikari or Metallica.
The type of TV programmes that I think my audience will watch may vary from things like comedy (Stand up) to darker ones like Black Books. Comedy is the main point as not many TV shows follow dark themes however Day of the Triffids is an example of an army of things taking over.

      Finally the type of websites will mainly be social networking sites such as and twitter as they are the in thing at the moment and most people use them.

what I have learnt from this task is:
* Its best to do research on a movie comany before you start production
* You need to think about the imporants things, such as money and all the other piece's that fit around that
* Location if also a key factor to make sure you have the setting already there and wont hassle producers and comanys in the process

Regulation Research

the BBFC is the British board of film classification. they are the team that go and watch films and games and come up the age rating for the type of media.

they have different age groups to go with different types of media. they have:

U ~ This certificate means that all ages groups can watch this movie. The movie would be set around a positive story and have positive characters to suit the tale and the young audience ( aged 4 and above)

PG ~ This means you must be with an adult to watch the film (parental guidance) A PG film should not disturb the younger children or scared them, but it is better use for children aged 8 and over. Its up to the parents if they think it would be advisable for they children to see. 

12/12A ~ With a 12/12A, it  both means the same thing, but you cannot be under the age of 12 to see the movie unless you are with an adult, its the same with the pg. If you are 12 aged or over its alright for you to go see the film by yourself. the 12 aged rating would scared or disturbed children if they are accompanied by an adult but are much under the ages rating of the film.

15 ~  This is for fifteens only and cannot be seen by any one younger than that age, even if accompanied by an adult.

18 ~ only a viewer aged 18 or over can watch this movie. its too Much for anyone younger, if you were to try and by an 18 rated film, game or magazine you must be 18 or over. Other wise you will have it taken away from you and told to leave the area.

they also review whats in the film in categories so they know what rating to give the media. they go by these categories.

• Sex ( How it is viewed or portrayed within the film, if it just spoken about, it will be given a lower rating to that if it is seen happening on the screen)
• Drugs ( Viewing/ Portrayal if we see someone taking drugs that will be given a higher rating to that if they are just spoken about)
• Language (Continual swearing will higher the rating to 15 or 18 but if there is little or no swearing then the rating will be lower. Also in this category will be innuendos/ sexual mentioning)
• Violence (Violence is taking in high regards to whether a higher rating is given. Films like Texas Chainsaw Massacre or Star ship Troopers with graphic scenes of death and disemboweling had 18 certificate ratings whereas others have received 12 or 15 because not all of it is seen on screens)

from looking at these certificates and the standers to make the age rating. our film would be under a age rating of 15 at the highest. knowing there would be scary moments in there. not alot of gore due to the cost of makeup. there would be no drugs, sex. So all of those would be taken out. I believe our film would be put under the category of horror in most cases.

 

What I have learnt from doing this task is:

* We now the limits we have

* We know how to meet the standards of the certificate

* We can now find out who to please the views and give out a sensible aged certificate

 

Audience Research

For this task we had to do a formal questionnaire to find out who watched more of what genre and what genre they was into. This tasked helped use in finding out, who's into what movie genre.

Please Tick or write the appropriate answer next to were shown

Male or Female?	MALE	5	FEMALE	4
Do you Like watching films?	YES	9	NO	0
If yes, how often do you watch them? ( in times per week)	0-2	6	3-5	3	6-8	0	More	0
List your 3 favourite genre of films in order of preference	1	horror	2	action	3	fantasy
Do you prefer Horror or Comedy genre of films?	Horror	3	Comedy	3	Neither	2	Both	1
Reason Why?	no reason

What I've learnt from this task is that finding out about the target audience your aiming for is going to make the making of the film much easier when trying to please the audience in the right ways. we have fond a huge group of people that mix with different genres and it helped us.

Target Audience

We needed to research and come up with the audience who would mosty watch these types of films. we bullet pointed everything we came up with and found out that these two genres are very popular in all catagrories:

• Dark humour for things that is gory or horrific ~ Light hearted, liker’s of previous work by actors

• Horror age usually 15 and above depending on how graphic the horror scenes are. Comedy is usually a family age from 5 to 105 as it is family aged.

• Both male and female but it would come to personal choice whether they watch them or not as it is down to personal taste.

• For the younger aged viewers, it may depend on family upbringing and whether they were allowed to watch them as minors.

• The nationality is  based around british, due to the location where we live and what movies are made and showed.

• working classs and lower class would watch these movies and upper class wouldnt due to the humor in those types of films.

what i have learnt from this task is that, its always best to do research to finding out the target audience you are after. before you go ahead and start to plan you story and who will be staring in it etc...

Texual Analysis Of Resident Evil

We had to review the first opening minutes of a movie based around of our choosen genre, mine was zombie horrors and for that, I used Resident Evil.

Textual analysis

 Resident Evil

The following is a textual analysis on a zombie/horror genre – Resident Evil.

In the first two minutes of resident evil, we are introduced to the setting of the laboratory. A virus breaks out in ‘the hive’ and the computer system realises things are bad. The computer goes into suicide mode and kills everyone in the ‘hive.’

In the opening scene of resident evil we are place to a black screen, showing us nothing at first. Then we can slowly see a prick of light. The camera moved forwards and we find ourselves looking at a man in a laboratory in a virus contamination suit. This makes us feel eerie, as we leave the darkness and head into a cold looking lab room. We see a glass container holding a blue colour liquid that we don’t know much about at this time. But we see it gets placed into a heavy sliver box and locked away tightly. This makes us feel curious about what’s in the box and what it could possibly be. Then we get a close up of the man n the suit although we cant see a lot of him because the glass is reflecting the light and so we feel almost as if this character has something to hid.  The male is then out of the suit and we get a close up of him throwing one of the glass containers holding the blue liquid., as it smashed on the floor, the man leaves in a hurry. We get a glimpse on him, but we still can’t make up his face. It’s still being hidden.  The doors he leaves locks automatically and it seems as if the door is locking aggressively to get a since of the man being in a hurry and maybe the status he is being given.

    A close up of the smashed liquid on the floor is being panned upwards to se a vapour lifting into the air and going into the air vents. The screen then goes back.

The music/sound used seems very hard and cold. We hear the resident evil theme beginning to play as we enter the world of resident evil. The sounds are clear and simple yet they mean a lot and have a dark and cold feeling to them. We mostly hear glass clanking and being lifted up. We hear doors whooshing open and then slamming shut and locking by themselves. Giving the viewers a sense of being in the lab there with him. when the container spills on the floor, the glass smashing sound is echoed and amplified to tell us that what just happened isn’t good and so we had to hear it and pay attention to it. Also when this happens the music stops. Meaning that that small moment in the opening of the film is what the movie is going to be based on and the events that will occur.

What I’ve learnt from the opening of the film is

• you don’t need to show any zombies to make it scary in the opening
• you don’t need a lot to happen to get your point across
• doing or saying little can actually be a lot in movie language

What I’ve learnt that doesn’t help in the opening of this film

• is getting a real sense of were you are or what’s going on
• don’t know the back story to the movie and there is no dialogue

Task II: Story Synopsis

We had to come up with a story that would fit well with the genre had had choosen to do. In the end we came up with a story like this:

Production Credits will role. As the final few are rolling, We cut to an establishing shot of the moors on an eerie evening. We hear a wolf howl and then we cut to a runner going along a path. They are whistling as we cut to inside the bushes nearby as a “Creature” is watching this runner. We hear grunting noises and use parallel editing going back and forth until the “creature” attacks. We then cut to Will, the main character practicing at home the next day. Someone shouts to him its time to get ready. Music begins to role (song “Evil Walks” - ACDC) as He is seen getting ready putting on jacket, glasses etc. Throws a dart at the bulls eye on a dartboard and the titles appear.

Heading into town, he is whistling a tune as he walks down the street. We use parallel editing to go between what is thought to be a zombie and Will but when it jumps out turn out to be his best friend. Will and friend go to his friends house and turns the TV on to see on every channel that it’s the news. Will and his mate mock play they are zombies before hearing

A knock on the door. His friend goes to open it and sees it’s a zombie. Jokingly thinking it’s another friend playing the same game he invites him in. While in the lounge, the zombie tries to bite his friend. He gets pushed away, while hearing on the radio how to notice a zombie. Quick shots/ cuts on the parts as they are said they scream and leg it out the house down to the park.

When the two guys walk into the park they already notice police everywhere and people eating people or attacking the police.

     As wills friend think it will be funny to get closer to a zombie to get on all the action, he is almost killed but a police officer saves him right before he is attacked. The police tell them to leave the area but they must leave now before the town goes into lock down and the military arrive.

     Will receives a phone call from one of his other friends saying his girlfriend turned on him and bit him. Will insists that they must go to his friend and help him. The two boys fight before will ends up on his own heading into the town to save his friend. When will looks around it seem as if he has entered another town or city, it was not the same one he grew up in. he located his friends home and goes inside. No one is there, its silent dark and eerie.

What i've lernt from making the synopsis is that the two genre's blend really well. And you can have an equal amount from both or more genre's to make a good plot from the film.

Task One ~ Research Two Genre's Of Our Choice.

 In this research task the group had to find and pick two different types of genre's. Then after picking the movie genre we had to then choose a sub genre to work from. Will and myself had done lots of research and had finally picked Action Comedy and a Zombie Horror. After this part we then had to think about what

could happen in this movie: The cast, the location, the setting, the story and the ending. We had come up after alot of debaiting to come up with a zombie action comedy! being influenced by Shaun of the dead and other zombie comedies in their styles of humor. We had made a slideshow presenting our research of our genres and what could easily happen in them.

what i've lernt is that, you could take any genre and place two together to make an interting story. it could be interesting and work or it could go the complete opposite way.

once this had been finished and we had finally come up with the plot, we then had to go ahead and write up a Synopsis!!!