Representation !

Hi blog ! Hope everyone is doing well. Today I'm going to discuss representation in our film opening. While a lot of this won't really be portrayed in the 2 minutes we present, my group and I still thought it was important that we thought these things out to create a better opening.

The family in our film, the Costales, are Hispanic-Italian. While the film industry works to represent this group more every day, they are still a minority and vastly underrepresented. Because we are working with the subject of money laundering and framing, we wanted to represent this group because they are typically presented in film in that type of manner. However, in our film, they are innocent. Aria's father is Venezuelan and her mother is Italian. They both speak Spanish and keep both their Hispanic and Italian heritage present in the family. The family is wealthy and successful, but we wanted to make Aria's mother a powerful businesswoman, not just a rich lady who earns all her money from her husband. We wanted her to have a real Cher moment.

We are also representing Hindu culture through the goddess in our film, Kali. Known as the Divine Mother, she is a mother figure to our main character Aria. She is also recognized as the destroyer of all evil things, and a divine protector, so her character in our film works to save Aria from the dangers her family will face.

New Characters!!

Hey everybody ! So with out new film, we needed to come up with new characters so that we could make sure to have them established as well as possible to the audience within the first two minutes during our opening. Here they are:

Aria Costales:

• Main character
• Only child
• Shy, reserved, keeps to herself
• Will do anything to save her family

Kali:

• Goddess
• Purpose in the story is to help Aria
• Those devoted to her see her as a mother figure
• Guides Aria like a mother ^

Lorenzo Costales:

• Aria's dad
• Businessman
• Travels a lot for work
• Though he is absent a lot, he cares a lot for his family

Giulia Costales:

• Aria's mom
• Businesswoman
• Cares for her family but is always working

Changes!

Hello to my all fans. Happy quarantining! So we have some big changes coming to our story!! An entirely new plot!! How exciting and mentally exhausting to keep up with!!

So, here's some of the concepts involved in our new movie opening:

• A goddess who only appears whenever our main female character gets sleep paralysis
• A girl who's family is in deep danger

The goddess represents a mother figure in our film. She is going to help our main character and guide her throughout the story, mainly through the conflict her family will be facing. We want the goddess to only appear to our main character during sleep paralysis episodes. This new concept is much easier as it can all be filmed at home. We still need to figure out who will be playing who, as none of my group members can leave their houses (PRACTICE SOCIAL DISTANCING PLEASE!!) But for now this is a lot of new information, so we have to develop our characters, a clear view of what we will include in the story, script, etc. It'll be okay though, I'm actually really excited about this! 

PROGRESS!!!!!

Hi everyone!! I hope everyone is practicing social distancing and having a blast in isolation!! Personally I might be going a little insane but it's okay. So my group and I have decided that we want to stay in the same action-ish genre and try to keep the main character as our age. I also know what demographic our film opening will be catered towards. Originally, our film  target audience was young female adults aged 15-21. The new film will have similar characteristics:


- Action genre
- Main characters are 18-21 years old in the narrative world
- Real ages of actors were 16-17 years old
- Two main characters are female

We want to keep similar themes of money laundering or something along the lines of that, so hopefully we can figure out a strong concept to make it work with all the obstacles we are facing. But I'm staying optimistic!! 

Corona, I hate you.

Hey Blog! So i'm kind of losing my mind again but it's okay. I had to change my project for the second time but now we're good! Due to this whole pandemic, my group was unable to meet up to shoot together or go to our local Dunkin, so it was evident that we needed a new idea. Because of social distancing, I can't go to see anyone. Right now we're super stressed out because it's hard to figure out something where we can all put our footage together to make a seamless film. I don't think we can stick with having the whole complicated money laundering thing, especially since we can't have the same actors. This sucks a lot and I'm miserable. I know I sound like a big baby but I swear I will figure this out. This is going to be a beautiful opening. Just wait.

Some cool action movie openings !

Hey blog! It's Friday! My schedule has opened up a lot since practically everything but school has been getting cancelled due to the Corona virus. I'm scared that if things get worse my group won't be able to meet to film. But we're staying positive!
I did some extra research on action movie openings because while the fantasy ones I researched also can be action movies, I wanted to fine tune it more and get a better understanding.

The Dark Knight (2008)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yqvbv-SB4bg

This scene, while it starts with action immediately rather than towards the end like in our film, does a great job at enticing the audience and grabbing their attention. It lets the viewers know that this is going to be a fast paced, violent movie. The main purpose of this scene was to introduce the antagonist, the Joker, and allude to conflict with him. 

Dukirk (2017)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c7DHbaY54YQ

This scene introduces you to the main character, Tommy. While it is not a dialogue-heavy film, you still follow him throughout the movie, so this scene is really important in setting that up. It also gives context; soldiers surrounded in World War 2. Like The Dark Knight, this opening keeps you interested and keeps you wanting more. 

Characters

Hi guys! So we developed our main characters for our film and it was a weird process. I never really had considered all the thought that goes into something as simple as picking our characters' names.  Especially because it has to match your characters' personality. Turns out, there are actually a lot of names to choose from. Who would've thought?

Our film will have three main characters:

• Cris(Female)
• main protagonist
• best friends with Aria
• 18 years old
• 90s aesthetic
• ambivert
• curly hair
• artistic
• Aria
• best friend
• outgoing
• girly
• quirky
• adventurous
• Cris(male)
• antagonist
• head of a drug ring
• stole laundered money 
• way older

The opening will be centered on female Cris and Aria until our protagonist gets mistaken for the other Cris. We wanted to make the girls very different from each other to kind of highlight the contrast between them, especially with Cris. We wanted her to seem innocent, so the audience knows she was in a sense 'framed,' while still keeping her an accurate 18 year old. 

Money Laundering at your local Dunkin :-)

Hi blog!! So my group has a general idea of what we want our film opening to be about. We have our main concept, but until we finalize the script and try out different things while filming, we don't have a lot set in stone. Our story is going to revolve around a teenage girl named Cris and her friend Aria. They'll be hanging out and see an ad for Dunkin Donuts. The ad will explain that it is free donut day! Since that is a super cool deal that I wish were on right now because this project has given me the most intense craving for donuts, the girls go to their local Dunkin. What they don't know is that this specific store location is a spot for money laundering. Aria and Cris are casually in the Dunkin when Cris gets mistaken for another Cris, a male drug dealer who stole laundered money from the site. We still have to work out the details, but the scene will end with Cris being taken to the back by the workers to work out this all this shady stuff.
We don't want to give too much away about who's behind everything in our opening, as its only the first couple minutes of our film. But these scenes will be enough to make our audience very confused and wondering why a teenage girl is being dragged against her will into the back of a Dunkin. I think our idea is pretty original so I'm excited to see how it works out.

I did more genre research??

Helloooo blog I hope you're all doing well! Since I switched over from working alone to my group, I also had to switch genres. Previously, I was focused on the fantasy genre, but our film will be an action piece. So I had to compile some research on this genre in order to familiarize myself with the conventions and all that good stuff.

Action

Genre Conventions

This genre is characterized by a couple distinctive traits. To begin with, action films have a clear protagonist and antagonist. While our hero may vary from a human with supernatural powers to a scrawny teen, the hero is typically the center of the film and is working towards beating the villain. This villain, however, doesn't have to be a person. There are four subgenres under action that deal with the struggle the hero must face:

1. Action-Adventure: Person vs. Nature
2. Action-Duel: Person vs. Person
3. Action-Epic: Person vs. Large organization
4. Action-Clock: Person vs. Time

Additionally, action films tend to have a ton of, you guessed it, action. They are normally fast-paced and keep the audience at their feet. The action involved can be huge explosions, a simple fist fight, a character fighting against a cruel jungle, and so much more. These films cost more because they are heavily location-based, due to the fact that urban areas are typically a hub for action and require a lot of special FX, props, technology, etc. 

The target audience for action films are males aged 16-25, but they can appeal to anyone depending on the specific piece. Some are more violent than others, and some are just purely adventure films. 

I made a huge mistake and i'm dying!!!

Hi blog, its been a while! The past couple weeks have personally been so overwhelming and stressful that I have entirely pushed this project to the side. 

This was a setback and definitely is not like something I'd do. With a project like this, time management is essential in creating a film opening, blog and CCR that I feel proud of. I'm totally drowning in makeup work for all my classes but starting from now on, I'm going to get it together and focus on creating the best project I can. I'm setting a schedule up for myself to create postings to catch up on what I've missed. Will I go insane trying to balance all this work and my mental health? Probably! But I'm going to turn in a super cool project so its worth it!  Please wish me luck so I don't implode.