Production and Post Production 2.3

My original idea which I used on my storyboard, had to be changed completly for all the right reasons. The idea of a man feeling disturbed in the center of the woods was more complicated than I thought. It was very unlikely that I was able to round up a cast, find a location, ask permission, organise costume and actually shoot the film in under a week, my thoughts were it was going to be really time consuming and too complex and the film itself was probably going to extend to ten minutes which was not what I wanted. Also it didn't really have a plot and was going nowhere. My second idea titled "The Stalker" is understandable and makes a lot more sense, what I quite liked was the fact that it was a very basic setup. It has an easy to follow storyline, I didn't need much to create it, it has a limited cast and the location couldn't be anymore simple than my house.
Although, my second idea does contain some elements of the first one. I burrowed the idea of feeling you're being watched and the eerieness of being alone. So in a way, it is disturbing to watch. I also managed to give the illusion of being alone in the woods. My garden is relatively big and a has a few bare trees and it definetly has that woodland effect, so it made a perfect scenery. In the opening scene,I used the hallway in the house to place down unusual messages to create the effect that someone is unexpectedly in my house. This scene was shot in the dark using only a torch and the camera. The second scene at the front door, it was meant to be dark but I had to have the hallway light on as it was impossibly to even see someone's face with the camera, even with just torch light you still can't see the background. But I tried to make it as dark as possible when editing it and the outlines were clearly visible. The next scene outside the front door, once again I had to have the porch light on as it was pitch black outside. The scenes in the garden was shot in the daytime, so I had to give the illusion of it being a lot darker when I was editing. To make every scene look resonably the same, I put it in a black and white setting which at the same time made it look haunted. I didn't want a soundtrack to accompany it as I liked the silence of it and the blank intervals which creates suspense. I had no choice but to star in my own movie which was not originally planned

Task 1.4: The Exhibition Space

Dominique Gonzalez's TH.2058, a form of installation art set in the Turbine Hall of Tate Modern gives the illusion of a doomed city under major threat. She has created this imaginative atmosphere by installing bunk beds to portray people sheltering from an enemy or a disaster with books laid out to complete the scenery, all of which are relevant to the theme having a connection with alien invasion and war. The installation itself is set in the future, in 50 years time originally coming form both fiction and non fiction situations partly based around London under attack either by flooding, bombing or invasion. The Turbine Hall is accompanied by the sound of rain fall which illustrates the fact that the city's population is taking shelter from the never ending rain which leads to the surrounding animals sculptures such as Louise Bourgeois' s giant spider to mutate.

Susan Hiller's work that rakes place in Room 8 on the fifth floor explores the association between female adolescence and their paranormal occurrences that their in control of.A combination of supernatural fantasies and witchcraft. Her creation of Psi Girls in 1999 contains brief extracts from films that portrays young women using their paranormal powers. These extracts include Brain De Palma's The Fury 1978, Matilda 1996 and Firestarter 1984. All the clips are on a loop and each features the women levitating objects or starting fires controlled by her mind, all clips are saturated in washes of vivid colour. The soundtrack alternates between eerie silence and the rhythmic clapping and drumming of a percussive gospel choir that reaches a crescendo before reverting to static noise.

Pawel Kwiek's work (Room 4, Level 5) is a combination of conceptual and contemporary art form. "Video P" begins with a shot of Kwiek at a mixing desk, editing his own image. He focuses in on the video language by whatever contents is on that video, which makes the audience fully aware of every wipe or edit which is very alike of what he did in his previous film "Video A." The artist is in his own fixed position and it isn't always clear whether his movements are following the video's edits or vice versa.

Jonas Mekas' s display (Room 6, Level 5) is a film diary with a personal record of the New York avant-garde in the late 1960s. It draws on thousands of hours of footage shot between 1964 and 1969. It witnesses nearly everything in everyday life such as celebrations, friend, intimate family moments and public spectacles. It is titled "Diaries, Notes and Sketches" also known as Walden. A complex sense of typical events emerges as weddings and births collide with scenes from the circus and the first public performance of The Velvet Underground. Partly a documentary, autobiography and a cinematic poem, the film's animated, colourful rhythm produces a fluid and radiant sense of history.

Part Five

Each of those three films have inspired me in different ways especially in the way that most of the time, uses surreality combined with various images and complex storylines like in Koyaanisqatsi in which no dialogue is used and explains the plot through the score and differently played images, although I find basic plots such as The Girl Chewing Gum, interesting to watch as not much was needed to create it and it is just as good without a soundtrack, few dialogue, a basic location and natural background noises. If I was to create a short film, it would either be surreal with a score and no dialougue or a basic setup without any added sound effect and it would be scripted.

Part Three

Not all the three films have a basic storyline. The Girl Chewing Gum, in this case, doesn’t have a beginning, middle and end, it has however a complex structure. It is set entirely on a London street corner and it is being watched and observed every second. The observer in this situation is the man you can hear in the background narrating. It is a giveaway at what he is doing. The first few moments, we as the audience believe he is doing a running commentary then the next moment, he is directing everyone and everything that “appears to be around him.” However we later discover that he isn’t behind the camera after all. We know that it is all recorded and was rehearsed time and time again so everyone on that set that set that walked past the camera was well aware that they are being film because, of course, they accepted the permission to be filmed.
So for example, he says “the man walking past is going to put his hand in his pocket.” It’s not being psychic it’s just recorded beforehand or the footage could be recorded and the man records himself in a studio. He later explains that he is not there but he is apparently in a field several miles away. He gives the illusion of this simply by switching from one location on the busy street corner to a deserted field, he is however still not seen and this field may not be several miles away in fact it might not be very far at all.

He not only directs and commentates, in between he gives a history about certain aspects of the street corner and at one moment, bizarrely asks for the town clock to move towards him even though it is very unlikely to happen.
Similarly, 1001 Nights doesn’t have a basic storyline either. Five women are placed in a dark room and the lighting is focused on them, they all have their eyes shut and one by one speak only when their eyes are open, alas, the rest don't make any sound or movement when someone is speaking. They talk about their traumatic past involving war and violence, at that moment we beleive that this is a true to life documentary when really these women are acting as victims and are given a monologue. The audience becomes engaged in what they are saying, until the film shows off its element of surreality. The story of one of the women strangely and randomly involves a rhino and then that bond between the audience and the victims is broken.

On the other hand Koyaanisqatsi is completly different in which is does use a basic storyline but only through the music. It starts of slow at beginning, fast throughout the middle then slows down again at the end. The opening begins with images of cave sketchings and a rocket explosion, then moves on to fast forward images relating to the environment and at the end goes back to the rocket, before it blew up.

Part Two

Koyaanisqatsi uses an eerie score combined with fast foward and slow motion music which emphasises the way in which the film takes its balance. The movement of the images all depends on the speed of the music, it also represents this continous routine of the day to day life in the natural and manmade world. For example the cloud formation and the scenes on an escalator sped up whereas the montage of ocean waves and the rocket explosion are in slow motion. This film is an example of craft as it is creative in many ways with the various types of images and locations, the use of colour and speed and the eerie music. The audio used is non- digetic, all is played is a score which is used throughout the entire film, there is virtually no dialogue and sound effects or natural sound.

This is different in comparison to The Girl Chewing Gum in which the audio is digetic; everything is heard from a car driving off to the sound of footsteps. It is set in black and white and is an example of context. Everything in the film was simple with the choice of location. This could be because of the fact that not a lot of money gone into creating the film whereas with Koyaanisqatsi, costed a lot with the excess use of technology to pay off the score, lighting, locations e.t.c.

1001 Night s is quite similar when referring to cost. The film didn't cost much to create as it was set in a dark room with no audio and special effects. However the film received a lot of credit despite the lack of technolgy; it is also an example of context as it had a basic setup. Overall, both films compared to Koyaanisqatsi, are mainly about the dialogue and the plot.

Part One

I have chosen to give a descriptive analysis on the following films: Koyaanisqatsi (Godfrey Reggio), The Girl Chewing Gum (John Smith) and 1001 Nights (Jannane Al Ani.) In this paragraph, I am going to compare the differences and similarities that the three have.

Koyaanisqatsi was directed in 1982 by Godfrey Reggio, the title itself comes from the Hopi language translated as life out of balance which sums up the entire plot of the film. The film shows us what is happening in the world around us emphasised by Reggio’s use of fast forward and slow motion images in order to make comparisons between different types of physical motion. The film depicts humanity, the concept of natural and manmade environments and how they go through a slow ordeal of falling out of place, it is also a recall of day to day life.

In comparison, 1001 Nights directed by (Janaane Al Ani in 1998) is also based around humanity. The film is focused on five individuals (all women) as they talk through their traumatic experiences about war and violence that happens in the outside world however some are surreal, they are either dreamt of or imagined, not all of them are true accounts but they do have a link to true to life events.

The Girl Chewing Gum a low budget 70s film directed by John Smith similarly gives a view on everyday life. Set on an East End street, the film is part-commented, part-directed of what’s happening at every moment on that street corner or what is about to happen, it is based on reality and control outdoors in full detail.

All three films each give a depiction on day to day life although Koyaanisqatsi and 1001 Nights give the low down about the outside world whilst The Girl Chewing Gum just shows what happens every moment in one area .