We have chosen to use a non linear narrative, introducing the film with the ending, from a different perspective to which will ultimately end in, following the beginning and middle of the film. Opening with the introduction of characters, before one is shot to the floor, not seeing where the shot came from, at this point the reason for the films actions aren’t clear, but the climax is high. The film progresses to the beginning of the film, introducing the characters interacting with each other, planning the robbery with the main antagonist assigning job roles. Jumping to the middle scene, the camera tracks/pans the character/s running with a duffel bag filled with stolen cash, as they escape from the robbery. Sirens can be heard in the background, as the scene blacks out. The end of the film showing a second perspective arises showing the characters walking into hideout, dropping their duffle bag taking out some of the money, chucking at the other character giving him his cut of the money. The character refuses, questioning the amount he has been paid, arguing, he is shot by the main character (this explains the first perspective ending scene).  Leaving the room he questions himself and his recent actions.

We plan to shoot our 4 scenes in 3 different locations, with 2 of the scenes being the same setting. We plan to film in the following locations: a public house , which will feature the characters planning their robbery, down a public street where the protagonist will be tracked running from the police bearing the money with the final scene taking place the same time as the first, this will be shot in an abandoned bunker where they previously planned to meet after the robbery.

Before brainstorming our ideas we watched different crime films, so that we could fully understand how a crime film is sequenced and shot at various angles, we also looked at the mise-en-scene for possible locations, props and costumes. One particular film that we looked at was reservoir dogs, having seen it and being very familiar with certain aspects such as the mise en scene and character performance, we felt this knowledge could help us progress and inspire our film.

We aim to keep the film within a budget of £40.00, as we have limited funds. With this finance we plan to accommodate the expenses of travel, props, actors and costumes. To capture our film will be using a camcorder, tripod and boom mic, whereafter we will be using Final Cut Pro to edit our footage. Although this equipment falls out of our budget we will be borrowing what we need in order to film our project.

For our film we will be using 3 actors, 2 male and 1 female, casting from outside our group, whilst we will we fulfill the production roles we require, mainly operating the camera and boom mic in each scene. However we will both be producing and directing together, as well in post production we will have an equal input towards editing.

The film we are producing has some ethical issues, the issues are that one of the scenes involve a replica firearm, this could cause a problem as it may be seen as a real firearm especially if it is used in a public area. another issue we are concerned with is the actions in scene 3 where one of the actors is seen running through a street with a duffle bag (and possibly the replica firearm) this scene could cause suspicion within the public as they may think the event is real.

http://www.reelviews.net/movies/a/alien.html

http://www.reelviews.net/movies/g/gi_jane.html

He is known for portraying strong female actors in films, this includes Sigourney Weaver in Alien (1979), Geena Davis & Susan Sarandon in Thelma & Louise (1991)

Ellen Ripley is a fictional character and the main protagonist of the Alien film series played by American actress Sigourney Weaver. The character was heralded as a seminal role for challenging gender stereotypes, particularly in the science fiction genre, and remains Weaver’s most famous role to date.

Surrealism is a cultural movement that began in the early 1920s, and is best known for the visual artworks and writings of the group members.

Surrealist works feature the element of surprise, unexpected juxtapositions and non sequitur; however, many Surrealist artists and writers regard their work as an expression of the philosophical movement first and foremost, with the works being an artifact. Leader André Breton was explicit in his assertion that Surrealism was above all a revolutionary movement.

Famous surrealist artists:

HANS ARP (1886-1966)

HANS BELLMER (1902-1975)

VICTOR BRAUNER (1903-1966)

LEONORA CARRINGTON (BORN 1917)

GEORGIO DE CHIRICO (1888-1978)

SALVADOR DALI (1904-1989)

PAUL DELVAUX (1897-1994)

OSCAR DOMINGUEZ (1906-1957)

MARCEL DUCHAMP (1887-1968)

MAX ERNST (1891-1976)

LEONOR FINI (1907-1996)

ALBERTO GIACOMETTI (1901-1966)

VALENTINE HUGO (1887-1968)

FRIDA KAHLO (1907-1954)

WILFREDO LAM (1902-1982)

RENE MAGRITTE (1898-1967)

GEORGES MALKINE (1898-1970)

ANDRE MASSON (1896-1987)

ROBERTO MATTA (1911-2002)

JOAN MIRO (1893-1983)

MERET OPPENHEIM (1913-1985)

RICHARD OELZE (1900-1980)

WOLFGANG PAALEN (1905-1959)

FRANCIS PICABIA (1879-1953)

MAN RAY (1890-1976)

PIERRE ROY (1880-1950)

KAY SAGE (1898-1963)

JINDRICH STYRSKY (1899-1942)

YVES TANGUY (1900-1955)

DOROTHEA TANNING (BORN 1910)

TOYEN (1902-1980)

ROMEDIOS VARO (1908-1963)

One of the most famous artists of surrealism is Salvador Dalí he produced over 1,500 paintings in his career, in addition to producing illustrations for books, lithographs, designs for theater sets and costumes, a great number of drawings, dozens of sculptures, and various other projects. He has an extensive list of surreal paintings that he has painted throughout his life.

Sigourney Weaver as Ripley, the Warrant Officer onboard the Nostromo and protagonist of the film. The decision to make the lead character a woman was made by Giler and Hill, who felt that this would help Alien stand out in the otherwise male-dominated genre of science fiction. Weaver, who had Broadway experience but was relatively unknown in film, impressed Scott, Giler, and Hill with her audition. She was the last actor to be cast for the film, and performed most of her screen tests in-studio as the sets were being built. The role of Ripley was Weaver’s first leading role in a motion picture, and earned her nominations for a Saturn Award for Best Actress and a BAFTA award for Most Promising Newcomer to Leading Film Role.

Ridley Scott -

Ridley Scott is a well known film director and has three well known films that casts women actors as the lead roles in all cases they are in place of stereotypical male role such as Sigourney Weaver as the lead in aliens as the ‘protector’  of the group and is the only female in the film and protects the men. Another film he casts women in main roles where Thelma and Louise where both women where lead roles and killed a man which is usually men killing women. Also G.I Jane the lead actor was a women (Demi Moore) who took on a typical male role as a solider and throughout the film proved women where good enough to join the army and takes on the male role and saves the males later on in the film. Overall all three films he casts women as lead roles showed how women could do a stereotypical male role and be the ‘hero’ while the males are shown as weaker then the females.

Mulvey’s article engaged in no empirical research on film audiences. She instead stated that she intended to make a “political use” of Freud and Lacan, and then used some of their concepts to argue that the cinematic apparatus of classical Hollywood cinema inevitably put the spectator in a masculine subject position, with the figure of the woman on screen as the object of desire. In the era of classical Hollywood cinema, viewers were encouraged to identify with the protagonist of the film, who tended to be a man. Meanwhile, Hollywood female characters of the 1950s and 60s were, according to Mulvey, coded with “to-be-looked-at-ness.” Mulvey suggests that there were two distinct modes of the male gaze of this era: “voyeuristic” (i.e. seeing women as ‘whores’) and “fetishistic” (i.e. seeing women as ‘madonnas’).

Mulvey argued that the only way to annihilate the “patriarchal” Hollywood system was to radically challenge and re-shape the filmic strategies of classical Hollywood with alternative feminist methods. She called for a new feminist avant-garde filmmaking that would rupture the magic and pleasure of classical Hollywood filmmaking. She wrote, “It is said that analysing pleasure or beauty annihilates it. That is the intention of this article.”

Some feminists criticized “Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema,” claiming that, while Mulvey believed that classical Hollywood cinema reflected and shaped the “patriarchal order,” the perspective of her writing actually remained within that very heterosexual order. The article was thus said to have contradicted its “radical” claims, by actually being a covert perpetuation of heterosexual patriarchal order. This was because, in her article, Mulvey presupposes the spectator to be a heterosexual man. She was thus felt to be denying the existence of lesbian women, gay men, heterosexual women, and those outside of these identities.

“Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema” was the subject of much interdisciplinary discussion among film theorists that continued into the mid 1980s. Critics of the article objected to the fact that her argument implied the impossibility of genuine ‘feminine’ enjoyment of the classical Hollywood cinema, and to the fact that her argument did not seem to take into account spectatorships that were not organised along the normative lines of gender. For example, a metaphoric ‘transvestism’ might be possible when viewing a film – a male viewer might enjoy a ‘feminine’ point-of-view provided by a film, or vice versa; gay, lesbian and bisexual spectatorships might also be different. Her article also did not take into account the findings of the later wave of media audience studies on the complex nature of fan cultures and their interaction with stars. Gay male film theorists such as Richard Dyer have used Mulvey’s work as a starting point to explore the complex projections that many gay men fix onto certain female stars (e.g. Liza Minnelli, Greta Garbo, Judy Garland).

Feminist critic Gaylyn Studlar wrote extensively to contradict Mulvey’s central thesis that the spectator is male and derives visual pleasure from a dominant, sadistic perspective. Studlar suggested rather that visual pleasure for all audiences is derived from a passive, masochistic perspective, where the audience seeks to be powerless and overwhelmed by the cinematic image.

Mulvey later wrote that her article was meant to be a provocation or a manifesto, rather than a reasoned academic article that took all objections into account. She addressed many of her critics, and changed some of her opinions, in a follow-up article, “Afterthoughts on ‘Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema’” (which also appears in the Visual and Other Pleasures collection).

Video Games Industry Video games have rapidly grown over the past 20 years, from shop arcade games to high definition multiplayer games. These games allow adults to go back to their childhood. Video games are consumed by any age from 3 years olds playing Disney games to older generations playing wii fit. Certain games release certain packages. For example, Modern Warfare 2 released a version with night vision at a price of £100+ (over double the price of the game alone). Alien Vs. Predator released a facehugger model. Merchandise is also released including Game Guides which are costly at around £15. Add-ons are also sold across the internet, which can cost from £5 +. Traditionally games existed in arcades where consumers would pay to play. Games consoles became increasingly popular after the release of the Nintendo 64, of which many games are now cult classics. In modern times, game consoles can handle high definition and blu ray, and are often called media systems due to the multi-task operations they can handle (internet, downloading, listening to music and watching films). Games are advertised similary to films such as on TV and the internet. Games are also advertised on the consoles ‘dashboard’ or home. Free trials are released online to download free, and on demo CD’s, usually released with gaming magazines. The internet contains screenshots, trailers and reviews to give the audience a primary view on and upcoming game. I think these techniques are successful, as the media used is easy to access and is used by nearly everyone daily. The use of advertising reaches the vast majority of the target audience. I feel that the internet has a positive impact on the gaming industry, as playing online is one of the biggest reasons for gaming nowadays. The internet also allows easy purchases instantly. However, piracy of games is becoming more and more popular, with older generations of consoles being able to download online for free. Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 Released map packs, add-ons, different game versions including night vision. Followed by 5 other Call of Duty Games (large fan base) Advertisements through the internet, websites, youtube, on the console, magazines and TV. Most profitable game ever. Grand Theft Auto IV Released add on games, priced the same as normal games Followed by other Grand Theft Auto series – a popular franchise Advertisements though the internet, websites, youtube, on the console, magazines and TV. Ranked as the best reviewed game ever. 97% for ps3, 96% for xbox 360.

Martin Luther King, Jr. (January 15, 1929 – April 4, 1968) was an American clergyman, activist and prominent leader in the African American civil rights movement. His main legacy was to secure progress on civil rights in the United States, and he has become a human rights icon: King is recognized as a martyr by two Christian churches. A Baptist minister, King became a civil rights activist early in his career. He led the 1955 Montgomery Bus Boycott and helped found the Southern Christian Leadership Conference in 1957, serving as its first president. King’s efforts led to the 1963 March on Washington, where King delivered his “I Have a Dream” speech. There, he raised public consciousness of the civil rights movement and established himself as one of the greatest orators in U.S. history.

In 1964, King became the youngest person to receive the Nobel Peace Prize for his work to end racial segregation and racial discrimination through civil disobedience and other non-violent means. By the time of his death in 1968, he had re focused his efforts on ending poverty and the Vietnam War, both from a religious perspective. King was assassinated on April 4, 1968, in Memphis, Tennessee. He was posthumously awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1977 and Congressional Gold Medal in 2004; Martin Luther King, Jr. Day was established as a U.S. national holiday in 1986.

As a 1960′s era Conservative, who has become even more so in my elder years, the hoopla surrounding Ted Kennedy’s death this week simply has been too incredible to believe in both its scope, and also the coverage given by the mass media of his life and funeral.

Ted Kennedy was the patriarch of a truly controversial family, after all, in the history of Americafrom any real factual or logical perspective.  The Kennedy myth has been contrived and contributed to much over the years by the liberal leaning press most of all.  And they responded to his death true to form.

Space Race

On April 20, 1961, about one week after Gagarin’s flight, United States President John F. Kennedy sent a memo to Vice President Lyndon B. Johnson, asking Johnson to look into the status of America’s space program, and into programs that could offer NASA the opportunity to catch up. Johnson responded about one week later, concluding that the US needed to do much more to reach a position of leadership, and recommending that a manned moon landing was far enough in the future that it was likely the United States would achieve it first.

Everything that we do ought to really be tied into getting onto the Moon ahead of the Russians. …otherwise we shouldn’t be spending this kind of money …the policy ought to be that this is the top-priority program of the Agency, and one of the two things, except for defense, the top priority of the United States government. … But we’re talking about these fantastic expenditures …and the only justification for it, …to do it in this time [then estimated late 1967 or early 1968] or fashion, is because we hope to beat them and demonstrate that starting behind, as we did by a couple years, by God, we passed them.

Another remake would follow in 2006, titled Night of the Living Dead 3-D; however, none of the original cast or crew had anything to do with it.

Initial reaction to this remake was largely negative. Roger Ebert awarded the film a mere one star out of a possible four stars. Leonard Maltin assigned it two out of four stars. Recent criticism has been more appreciative, and the film currently holds a 70% “fresh” approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes.

Budget

$4.2 million

Directed by

Tom Savini
Produced by

Declan Baldwin
Christine Forrest

Actors
Tony Todd – Ben
Patricia Tallman – Barbara
Tom Towles – Harry Cooper
McKee Anderson – Helen Cooper
Heather Mazur – Sarah Cooper
William Butler (actor) – Tom Landry
Katie Finneran – Judy Rose Larson
Bill Moseley – Johnnie
Walter Berry – Mr. McGruder