Dawn of the Dead Opening Credits

The opening credits of Dawn of the Dead shows many scenes where chaos is happening throughout the location, which is presumed to be North America. It shows scenes of flesh eating humans being reanimated into zombies, which is extremely affecting everyone near them. The president is even confused of what is happening as he is asked if the reanimated zombies are dead or alive and he responds by saying he doesn't know. Many scenes also show fires breaking out, which is done by the rampaging zombies, connoting to how aggressive and dangerous they are. This leads to many police and even army officers being called upon in order to mitigate the damage that these zombies are causing. The opening credits also show multiple scenes of what seems to be cells mutating out of control and this could be the cause of the reanimation, which consequently leads to the disastrous zombies, causing major havoc .

The institutional logo is denoted in a bold red color, in the middle of a pitch black background, which will continue to be the same concept of the opening credits. By doing this, the movie is able to connote that the movie will have violence and blood in it because that is the connotations that color red has. Consequently, this gives the audience a clear idea of the genre that they can expect when watching Dawn of the Dead. The black background gives off the feeling that there is nothing but darkness and deaths in the movie, as when you think of pure black, you think of nothing but negative things.

The logo of "Dawn of the Dead" is again shown in a big, bold red characters in the opening credits but unlike the last screen grab it shows the transition every title goes through in Dawn of the Dead. Each title shows for at least 2 seconds and you can see the logo dissolving and splattering into the surrounding background. This makes it seem as if we are already watching people dying and again enforces the fact that Dawn of the Dead is a sinister movie.

Below shows the timeline that i have made for Dawn of the dead. It contains all of the titles and the time they appear at. I have annotated the timeline to see what type of order the Dawn of the Dead lays out it's titles. They start off with the institution company because they have rather high importance out of the rest of the other titles; they are the company that allowed the production of the movie, so without them Dawn of the Dead wouldn't have been produced. For the next minute or so, the movie shows all of the actors/actresses names because this allows the audience to know who is going to be in the movie and if they are the right fit for a horror movie. After all of the actors/actresses has passed in the opening credits, the rest of the people that have had a major part in the production of this movie is casted. For example, the production designer, Andrew Neskorommy is responsible with the overall look and visual concept of this movie. So he chooses how the zombies move, the amount of blood that is shown and more. So this is why production designers have one of the essential creative roles in the creation of motion pictures and television and why they deserve credit during the opening titles. Furthermore, another example is the director of the movie: Zack Snyder is shown at the end of the opening of the credits. This is done because just before the audience starts to watch the movie, they will remember the last title of the credit, so they will know who is directing this movie. By doing this, the movie will allow the audience to think whether or not if the director is well known and good at directing movies.




By creating this timeline and looking at the opening credits of Dawn of The Dead I have a clear idea about institutional information in opening credits that I will use in my own opening sequence,

Commissioner Factfile to Film Four

What is film four?  What does it do? How did it start?
Film 4 is a British terrestial TV channel, that has gone through a number go guiles, since it's inception along with channel 4 in 1982. It develops and co-finances films and is known for working with the best and upcoming new talent in the industry. It has also been responsible for backing a large number of films made in the United Kingdom. The specialists in co-production - traditionally contribute 15-25% of an independent film budget. Some examples of the critically acclaimed films include: Last King of Scotland, Slumdog millionaire and Attack the block.

Themes that are usually used?
Film 4 has built a reputation for producing great social realist movies to the audience as a way of showing everyday life to everyone. This is in contrast to Hollywood films, which shows unrealistic features in life and society. Some examples of these popular social realist movies include: Dead Man's and This is England. The themes that are connoted and denoted in Dead Man's shoes are drug abuse, violence and aspiration and crime. This is England has themes that include: corruption of the youth, racism and violence, which connotes of the everyday life themes that happen in society.

In this clip of This is England, it shows all the themes mentioned above of: corruption of youth, racism and violence. First of all, the young boy, Shaun,  sternly demanded for cigarettes and alcohol. The tone of his voice was nasty, as he said it in a way as if he was above everyone else - arrogant. When the shopkeeper rejected him he reacted furiously: "Just fucking get it you Paki bastard!" Immediately we can see the corruption of youth that plays a heavy part in This is England; a boy who looks as if he was ten to twelve is being extremely disrespectful. His whole attitude is a disgrace, and you can tell by the look of disgust by the innocent shopkeeper. Later on, when the gang leader comes in, as the shopkeeper grabs a hold of Shaun he brings out a large knife and screams: "Get your hands off him!"The man named Combo says racist remarks and aggressively threatens the shopkeeper for touching Shaun. This again connotes the racism and violent themes that heavily influence the movies that Film4 produce and show.

This is the trailer of Four Lions and is one of the uncommon humorous movies that Film4 shows. It is a British dark comedy film that has themes that contains: aspiration, terrorism, and already mentioned: comedy. Four lions show the life of a group of British Muslim men who aspire to be suicide bombers. However, their lack of knowledge and skill in terrorism is very low, so their plans and execution of each of their attacks are amusing to the audience. The moral message of Four Lions is that not all Muslims are terrorists, which is evident in their poor terrorist skills.

What is it's ethos?
Film 4 has a general rule to not produce family style movies but movies that express the daily lives and themes of society in our world. It currently invests around £500,000 per film, at a rate of around 20 films a year. By doing this Film 4 will be able to showcase new and popular actors/actresses to the audience and promote their channel and institute. This is what makes Film4 different to other film institutes and will continue to rise in both fame and popularity.

Week 5 Reflective Post

This week we looked at how the timeline of British social realism has changed and stayed the same over the past couple of decades. Generally the themes of British social realism movies is linked with violence, drugs and gangs. The technology wasn't that great back in the 1960's so the editing and camera conventions was very limited to what was available. We also looked at the news about Britain in the past to pain a better insight of the lives people went through during the olden times and how different it is now.

We also looked at and analysed Billy Elliot. Billy Elliot is an iconic British social realism movie, that we looked and analysed in depth. To summarise the story of Billy Elliot: it was set during the miners' strike (1984-1985) and the main character is a young boy, who wishes to become a ballet dancer, even to the objection of his family. The location of Billy Elliot is in a rather poor area, and shows the lives of many working and lower class people in the hierarchy of society. The main moral of the story sends a message to people that you should never give up on something that you really enjoy and wish to do. This is shown through Billy Elliot; even though his dad and brother hated the idea of him becoming a ballet dancer, they later saw the talent and potential that he had, which amazed and shocked them.

British Social Realism Timeline

1960's The loneliness in the long distance runner

This British social movie symbolizes the freedom that was not respected by many people and a way to escape the corruption of the horrid society back then. The main theme of the film is aspiration and escape as Smith is hoping to escape prison by starting long distance running, attracting attention due to his impressive physical prowess. This movie shows how someone who is at their lowest points, is still able to always get back up and never give up on life. The movie is based in Essex and the dietetic sound of the steam train in the trailer, indicates that this is a really old movie. This means that the lighting and other editing techniques are extremely limited in The loneliness in the long distance runner.

1970's A Clockwork Orange

This British Social movie is a dystopian crime movie that was subject to a lot of uproar due to the dark themes that it portrays to the audience. These themes include: juvenile delinquency, psychiatry, youth gangs and other negative themes that are linked to a dystopian Britain set in the future. Alex, the main character is a sociopath delinquent, that has two interests which are extremely horrible: rape and "ultra-violence". However, he also has an interest in classical music and leads a small gang in which he calls his "droogs". The background sound of the trailer, which is a non dietetic sound, is an example of the classical music that Alex listens to and enjoys. Furthermore, most of the narration done in the movie, is by Alex himself in Russian, English and Cockney rhyming slang.

1980's The long good Friday

This is a British gangster film about Harold Shand, an old-fashioned London gangster, who wishes to become a legitimate businessman. His plan is to to redevelop the London Docklands as a venue for future Olympic games. The theme of this movie includes: political and police corruption, violence and property development. As mentioned it is set around the London Docklands and the characters include Harold Shand co-operating with the American Mafia. We can hear many dietetic sounds in the trailer and movie, of things crashing, exploding and gunshots.

1990's Trainspotting

Is a British crime comedy drama film produced in 1996. The film focuses on the life of heroin addict Mark Renton, and his attempt to give up on the drug, as well as the concerning heroin habit affecting his relationship of family and friends. This movie goes through the darkest recesses of Edinburgh low-life, through the example of Mark Renton and his friends and family. The themes that are included of this movie are: drug abuse, crime, aspiration and escape. The music played in the background of the trailer is rock music, which indicates how lively and upbeat the movie will be, but at the same time convey how crazy and ignorant Mark Renton actually is. There are different types of shots used, for example: the long shot of the group shown in the trailer or the close up of Mark Renton putting on a different appearance in order to hide his identity.

2000's Billy Elliot

Billy Elliot is an iconic British film, which is about a young boy, Billy, who wishes to be a ballet dancer, much to the objection of his father and brother at the start. the film is set during the miners strike during 1984-1985. Billy Elliot is set in run down areas in Newcastle and other places up north of England, where protesting was very serious. This connotes to the lack of money people had during the old days and made us the audience think back during the times. The themes of the movie are: aspiration and escape, rioting, depression and poverty. Most of the characters of Billy Elliot are working class people, which is shown by the large amount of rioters gathered in scenes and the average clothes worn by all of them. This as a result, adds realism to the movie, which will appeal to the audience. The lighting of Billy Elliot tends to be dark at the start, indicating Billy Elliot's sad life, however later in the movie, when he learns his love for ballet, the lighting turns from dark to bright lighting. This shows how doing something you really love and enjoy can change your life forever, as he is shown to be someone with great potential in ballet.

2010's Four Lions

Four Lions is another British social comedy movie, about a jihad satire, showing a group of homegrown British Muslim men aspiring to be suicide bombers. The movie shows many ways that the group of Muslim men try to plan out their unorthodox way of planning and executing their plans, which is it is a comedy - it amuses the audience. The themes that are included in Four Lions are: terrorism, comedy, crime and violence. The characters include all Muslim men, as well as a white Muslim convert called Barry. The reason of doing this by Four Lions is to inform everyone that anyone can be Muslim, even white people and it is not just restricted to Asians. The location is set in Pakistan, where Omar, the main character go to a terrorist training camp and it is also set in Sheffield.

Comparing BSR to Hollywood

I will be comparing camera and editing conventions between British social realism films and Hollywood films. There are major differences in the conventions between the two for different purposes in order to engage the audience.

Editing Conventions

Short and long takes

This clip shows fast paced action in the fighting. The suspense builds up as Kick Ass angers the drug dealers, which initiates a fight between them. The takes between the fighting are extremely short, connoting to the speed and pace of the fight. This engages the audience to focus on watching, as many things happen in the short cuts between the scenes. If the takes of the fighting scene were to be long, then this would take away the fast pace and dynamic feeling of the scene, which would disappoint the target audience.

In contrast, this scene from meantime has long takes. This is shown most obvious, in the scene of the washing machine breaking down. The take lasted nearly 2 minutes, which is a really long take in comparison to a Hollywood movie such as Kickass, where takes sometimes lasted up to 2-3 seconds. This scene connotes to the dysfunctional families' boring and mundane life; a scene showing the washing machine breaking down is not appealing in any sense or form. This is emphasized when the rest of the family members goes to find out what is wrong and happening with the washing machine, connoting to the theory that family maybe to always have nothing interesting to do with their lives.

Advanced and simple/minimal editing

This scene from the Avengers depict the advanced and complex editing you usually see in Hollywood blockbuster films. For example straight away, all of the crushed debris and even the fire have to look perfectly realistic, in order to continue engaging the audience. Furthermore, the transitions that happen when the huge monster comes to attack, prompts more advanced editing; the fighters shown are getting ready to fight back. Hulk in particular shows us his transformation, so the editing of his color, size, and voice for example needed to be in great synchronization.

 
This scene from This is England has very minimal editing in it, even though the scene is intense and bold. It shows Combo and the young boy being very racist and offensive to the Asian cashier. The only editing you can say that is in the scene, is the cuts from one shot to another
 that allow the match on action to flow continuously, even though that is in every single movie. The reason why British Social Realism movies have considerably less editing then Hollywood movies, is due to the fact that it adds realism and purpose to the movie. In other words, you wouldn't want or have the sort of editing in the Avengers implemented in This is England.

CGI/Effects

The Cowboy and aliens movie has many CGI (Computer-generated imagery) effects in it. This clip shows an example of some of the CGI effects being used, around the spaceship. These CGI effects allow the audience to feel as if the spaceship and the aliens in this movie are coming from another world and puts into debate whether they exist or not. The audience will feel entertained because they will want to know what the aliens and spaceships are going to do, and what sounds they make. If CGI effects weren't put in place and replaced with ordinary effects, then the audience will feel disappointed and confused because it isn't as engaging and unique.

British Social Realism movies have almost or no CGI effects in their films. This is simply because they do not need to have them in their movies; BSR movies mostly show the daily lives and themes of ordinary people. They do not require major visual/CGI effects in their movies because this takes away the sense of "realism" and adds a sense of false meaning.

Camera Conventions

Color palate

Man of Steel has a wide range of colors that are affiliated within it. It can range from dark colors in Krypton to the bright red of Superman's cape. The reason why many colors are in Hollywood movies such as Man of Steel is because of engaging the audience with a diversity of colors; people would be frustrated if all they saw were dry, mundane colors in a superhero movie. The colors are also iconic to different characters. For example Superman wears red and blue, whilst Zod is mainly seen wearing black or brown.

Kes is shown to be an emotional and dark movie about a young boy's life and a kestrel. The colors in Kes are really dull and unattractive, partly due to the lack of technology being able to enhance the visuals that are shown. Another reason is because, the creators of Kes wants the audience to primarily focus on the life and feelings of Billy and not the surroundings of him. This lets certain people being able to sympathize with Billy, as they get to know the sad life he is currently living - being bullied at home and at school.

  Medium/Close ups of main characters

Both BSR and Hollywood movies have medium and close up shots of their respective main characters. They do this in order to tell the audience who they should be focusing their eyes on throughout the movie. These shots will be able to help the audience, identify the feelings and emotions that they are going through, as a way of empathising or/and sympathising to them.