Release Forms (templates)

Here are the release forms I will get the actors I'm using in my film to sign, I also have a seperate one for the childrens parents to sign, as they will be under the age of sixteen.

MINOR APPEARANCE RELEASE

Working Title: ___________________________________________ (the “Film”)

Person Appearing: ________________________________________________

Parent or Guardian: _______________________________________________

Production Date(s): _______________________________________________

Production Location(s): ____________________________________________

As parent or guardian of ______________________________________ , I authorize

_______________________________________________ Producer,

successors, assigns, and designees to record his/her name, likeness, image, voice, sound e

interview and performance on film, tape, or otherwise (the "Recording"), edit such Recording

as Producer may desire, and incorporate such Recording into the Film, any versions of the Film

and all related materials thereof, including but not limited to promotion and advertising

materials. It is understood and agreed that Producer shall retain final editorial, artist, and

technical control of the Film and the content of the Film. Producer may use, and authorize

others to use, the Film, any portions thereof and the Recording in all markets, manner, formats

and media, whether now known or hereafter developed, throughout the world, in perpetuity.

Producer, and Producer’s successors and assigns, shall own all right, title and interest, including

the copyright, in and to the Film, including the Recording and related materials, to be used

and disposed of, without limitation, as Producer shall in Producer’s sole discretion determine.

I represent, as parent or guardian of ___________________________________, we shall

both be bound by the terms of this Appearance Release.

Signature of Minor: ______________________________________________________

Signature of Parent or Guardian: ____________________________________________

Address: _______________________________________________________________

City: __________________________________Postcode:__________

Telephone: _____________________

E-Mail: ____________________________________________

Date: __________________________

APPEARANCE RELEASE

Film (Working Title): __________________________________ (the “Film”)

Person Appearing: ________________________________________________

Production Date(s): _______________________________________________

Production Location(s): ____________________________________________

I authorize____________________________________________ (“Producer”), successors, assigns, and designees to record my name, likeness, image, voice, sound

e

Recording as Producer may desire, and incorporate such Recording into the Film, any versions

of the Film and all related materials thereof, including but not limited to promotion and

advertising materials. It is understood and agreed that Producer shall retain final editorial,

artistic, and technical control of the Film and the content of the Film. Producer may use, and

authorize others to use, the Film, any portions thereof and the Recording in all markets,

manner, formats and media, whether now known or hereafter developed, throughout the

world, in perpetuity. Producer, and Producer’s successors and assigns, shall own all right, title

and interest, including the copyright, in and to the Film, including the Recording and related

materials, to be used and disposed of, without limitation, as Producer shall in Producer’s sole

discretion determine.

Signature: ________________________________________________________

Address: _________________________________________________________

City: ____________________________ Potcode:__________

Telephone: _________________________________

E-Mail: _____________________________________

Date: ______________________ffects, interview and performance on film, tape, or otherwise (the "Recording"), edit suchffects,

Plan: Deadlines

30th November: Finish StoryBoard
5th December: Contact the drama group, and find male actor to play my lead role.
8th December: Find three children that fit my Character Profiles.
10th December: Props and locations are sorted.
12th December: Assure scripts, props, locations and actors etc. are all in place and ready to go.
15th December: Begin filming scenes

COMPLETE ALL BY 15TH JANUARY 2012.

Ideal Characters:

Below are some character profiles, describing their characteristics and what I would like them to appear as, although in my short film the audience won't actually see any of the characters, only certain features, this is to help build up suspence and leave the audience guessing...

Barry: Barry is a middle aged man, in his 50's, who however looks a lot older than what he is, due to his ill health and bad hygiene. He is slightly overweight, and has got greyish hair, and pasty skin. Barry is married with no children, but is now a widower, due to his wife dying of mysterious causes. He loves going fishing, cooking and has an obsession with the afterlife and cannibalism. Barry now lives alone in a 3 bedroom house, with his pet cat, Theo. He does not work full time, however he does some mechanic jobs in his garden for his friends, however he isn't fully licenced to do so, meaning he does not have much respect for the law. Barry is not a people’s person, and keeps himself to himself, and has no other family, except from his mother, who is in a care home, at the age of 98. He has no contact with her anymore.

Casper: Casper is a school boy, aged 14. He is the oldest of all three of the children, and is best friends with Jessica, and Benny. Benny is his cousin and Jessica is his next door neighbour, and they all go to school together. Casper loves playing football, and lives with his mother and father and younger brother Sid, who is eight years old. Casper is quite mature for his age, and is trusted by many people.

Benny: Benny goes to school with Casper and is his cousin. Benny is 13 years old, and loves mountain biking. He lives with his mother, and is the only child, and looks up to Casper as a role model. Benny can be quite naughty sometimes, but is also a very caring boy. He has dark, curly brown hair, and dark eyes.

Jessica: Jess is the same age as Benny, and lives with both her parents, and has an older sister and younger brother. Jessica loves playing with her friends and singing, and is part of the school choir. It was Jessica's idea to go Christmas Carolling as the school encouraged them to get into the Christmas spirit, so with the parents’ permission to stay on their street, she persuaded both Benny and Casper to join her. Jessica is a very innocent and sweet girl.

Video explaining our ideas...

Audience Research

This is my Audience Research, which i carried out using a video camera, and asking a selective few people certain questions, based around short films, and my selected genre. I believe the research went quite successfully, as we got some good, helpful answers and gathered key information which could improve our production work.

Questions we asked included:

-Do you know what a Short Film is?

-If you were to watch a short film, what is more likely to engage your attention?

-What genre would you most likely choose to watch?

-When watching a short film would you like to be force-fed the information, or be kept guessing?

-Are shots and angles in a film important in building up tension?

-Range of ages important in a short film?

-Do you enjoy films with twists involved, and why?

-Do you like films with definite endings, or ones which make you ask questions?

-Are you a fan of crossing mediums with visual, e.g. like animations with live action?

We had a range of responses, which again was interesting to see, and how different things are important within a film to different people.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6YoLufe13l0

Story Board

The Script for my Short Film...

Monday, 14 November 2011

The Script for my Short Film...

“SILENT NIGHT”
By
Nicole Rance
Fade in:
EXT. House on a small street. Night -

(Benny, Casper AND Jessica are looking up at a middle aged, working class women, Jackie)


                         Benny -

                         Thanks


(Benny, Casper and Jessica are walking away cheerfully from the house. They are looking at the coins they just received from Jackie, with a happy expression on their faces)


EXT.  – Dimly Lit Street. Night


                         Casper –

She was nice (they all laugh). So what have you asked for, for     Christmas?

INT. KITCHEN. Night -
(Old, Dirty kitchen, sweeping shot shows the kitchen being dimly lit with old wax candles, there is meat boards, knives and cooking tools on the work surfaces. There is blood on the walls and also on the work tops, with slabs of meat on the side and in a boiling pot. There are a few old, faded photographs on the side with a picture of an old lady, which the old man, Barry looks at a number of times and smiles sweetly. He grunts and sniffs the meat, and begins stirring the boiling pot of meat.)



EXT. Dark Street. Night –
(Benny, Casper and Jessica are still walking along the dark street. Jessica bends down to tie her shoe lace up as Benny and Casper remain walking ahead. Jessica feels a sudden breeze upon her face and turns round. A howling noise can be heard. Jessica quickly finishes tying her lace and runs to catch up with Benny and Casper.)



INT. Kitchen. Night –
(Barry’s face begins to sweat, as it trickles down his forehead. He licks his lips and his eye’s gleam with excitement. The candles are gradually melting and the wax spills onto the sides.

     
                        Barry –

                      That’s better.

(He sniffs the boiling meat in the pan, and looks up at his cat and smiles. The cat is perched on the work top. Barry then grabs a rolling pin and starts whacking the slab of meat with it, bits of blood and flesh fly everywhere. The radio suddenly tunes in and the Christmas song, ‘Silent Night’ begins to play. He starts to sing and whistle along with the radio as he remains playing with the meat and adding herbs and spices to it.)


EXT. Dark Street. Night –
(Benny, Casper and Jessica are now walking along a gravel drive towards an old, dark house.)


INT. Kitchen. Night –
Doorbell rings. Barry slowly raises his head; with a smirk expression on his face.

                        Barry

                    – More Visitors?


(Barry rushes to the dirty sink and washes the blood off his hands; he then takes his apron off over his head and rushes over to a cupboard which he then pulls open. Children’s toys and belongings such as a wrist watch and a toy car are shown within the cupboard. Barry glances at the objects and quickly flings his apron into the cupboard and rushes towards the kitchen door whilst wiping sweat off his face and trying to straighten out his clothes and hair.  


                       

                        Barry –

                        Coming!


EXT. Outside Barry’s House. Night -
(Casper, Jessica and Benny all look up at an old wooden door, which has cobwebs in the corner and a couple of candles in the small windows either side. Casper looks at Benny and Jessica with a slight hesitation.)


INT. Kitchen. Night -
(Barry walks out of the kitchen door, slowly pulling it shut as he leaves.)


EXT. Outside Barry’s House. Night –
(The front door opens. Casper, Benny and Jessica look up at Barry, who is smiling back at them.)


                Benny, Casper & Jessica – (SINGING)

         Jingle Bells, Jingle Bells, Jingle all the way….

(Barry is looking down at the three children, Benny, Casper and Jessica and see’s their three faces singing joyfully.)


EXT. Outside Barry’s house. Night –
(The camera moves further away from the house and rises above them , where we can still see Barry and hear the children singing ‘Jingle Bells’ faintly in the background. Barry feels his front, then back pockets for change with a dazzled and disappointed look on his face then opens out his arm, and ushers them into his house, Benny, Casper and Jessica each look at each other, an give an approving nod. One by one they all enter the house, with Barry holding the door open for them. As they all disappear inside, Barry stretches out his arm for the door, with a very happy expression on his face. He slams the door shut)

The shot fades out. The tune of ‘Silent Night’ is being whistled slowly by Barry.

END.

Use of Sound

Using sound in any film is more technical and important as people actually think. With both diegetic and non diegetic sounds, it plays such a huge role in building up suspense or creating a specific mood and ambience, and it can give the audience something that can't necessarily be done just by showing something on screen.

Non diegetic Sounds are practically always used in most genres, with many using an opening soundtrack to introduce you to characters/scenery etc. Again this music is usually chosen very carefully as it wants to make the audience feel a certain emotion as you watch the selected scenes, e.g. uplifting, happy music containing lyrics = relaxed, comfortable and excited OR slow, sudden music without lyrics = trouble, tense and on edge.

In my Short Film, 'Silent Night' I am not 100% certain that I will definitely use non diegetic sound, however i am considering using a quiet instrumental song within in the background just to build up tension, and give the audience the feeling that something bad may be approaching. I am however going to be using Diegetic Sound throughout my short film. Although I am not using much speech, there will be a lot of action which will create a range of sounds, and there will be a radio used within the main scene. All these types of sounds make my short film more realistic and engages the audiences attention without distraction.

Examples of Non Diegetic Sound, within the Horror genre:

'Jaws' is one of the most iconic soundtracks of all time, with the simple two notes (mirroring the shark's heartbeat) that increasingly intensified the horror and suspense leading up to their deaths.





'Physco' is such a famous, well-known horror film, produced by Hitchcock and Herrmann, the piece of music used in the 'shower scene' is extremely iconic, and is almost always recognisable to many. The music being very high pitch and hypnotic almost, resembles the trauma and horror that is being experienced, not to mention definitely makes the heart beat faster!


Example of Diegetic Sound:



'The Texas Chainsaw Massacre' presents the perfect horror scene, by using the chainsaw as the main, lethal murder weapon. As soon as you hear the chainsaw being fired up, the audience become tense and terrified as to who is going to be murdered next!

'The Grudge' originally a Japanese Horror Film, but was remade in America, uses an extremely distinctive Diegetic sound. The noise which the Grudge makes is very distinctive, and you immediately are aware that the Grudge is within the scene. This again causes huge tension and nerves among the audience, as you link the sounds to a murder.

Use of Narration

The main purpose of narration is to tell a story through a series of events. This is a very important and
significant aspect of any story or film, as it's the main thing that draws the audience into it. It can be used in many different formats, but the typical 'voice-over' is the most common of these, and is usually used as a non-diegetic sound, however it has been known in some cases for films to play around with this, and use different methods of narration, such as using the actors in a freeze frame shot to tell the story.

Narration has become very popular over-time, and has been used in a range of Medias, including music videos- the famous Michael Jackson video, 'Thriller' and also TV Series- Desperate Housewives.
Vincent Price an actor known for his work on horror films does the narration, including the evil laugh at the end of the video, which made the video even more unique and interesting, as this was a rather new thing to do in music videos in 1980's.

In my own short film, I am not planning on including any narrative, as I believe my idea is pretty straight forward, and easy to follow, so if I did include narrative I think it would over complicate things too much, and distract the viewers. However I do think that narrative suits my chosen genre very well, (horror) as it gives it an eerie presence and can emphasise the horror involved.

Different styles of Magazine Reviews...

Empire is a British film magazine published monthly by 'Bauer Consumer Media.' It is the biggest selling film magazine in Britain, and consistently out-sells most of it's major rivals, with features including film reviews, best sellers, news, blogs, videos etc...

Total Film is another British film magazine published thirteen times a year by 'Future Publishing.' This also includes a number of film-reviews, features and news.

I'm comparing both magazine reviews on the new sci-fi, action film, 'In Time' featuring stars such as Justin Timberlake, Cillian Murphey and Olivia Wilde, and is directed by Andrew Niccol. The first review I looked at was in Empire Magazine(http://www.empireonline.com/reviews/review.asp?FID=137316) which initially I found to be quite short but sweet, and got straight to the point. It included a short summary of the plot, then went on to the review, and finally to the verdict. This makes it simple and easy to understand and follow, which is suitable for people who don't want to read loads, and also leaves room for them to come up with their own opinions. The review side of the article was also short, but quite blunt and made it clear as to what the writer thought about the film, "handles the action well and has a credible lead in Timberlake" and again didn't give to much away.  Then finally it features a very short verdict, consisting of three lines, "Interesting ideas and howling anger at the 1 percent drive the first half, but the Bonnie and Clyde styling's of the second feel a little rushed and strangely out of sync." This rounds off the review with a brief summary of what they believe the film has achieved. The article also shows a star rating, film details, such as Director, and Certificate and also shows pictures which draws in your attention, and gives you even more of a feel as to what the film is about, where in this case is an action short.

The second review which features in Total Film (http://www.totalfilm.com/reviews/cinema/in-time) is more detailed and plays out the plot a bit more. Again it features a review, a verdict and a star rating like Empire's review, but the writing style is a lot different, and I believe it's easier to understand. The review plays out the pros and cons, and the performance of the actors, which gives people an understanding of the film as a whole, "the performances are just as insubstantial. Timberlake doesn’t embarrass himself, but he’s not exactly a rugged, wrong-side-of-the-tracks action hero, while Seyfried and co drift between underwritten and insipid". It also features a number if rhetorical questions, which leaves readers questioning it themselves, and wanting to see the film so they can also understand what the writer is saying. The verdict is very short but sums his opinion up well, and the action shot picture again gives readers an insight into what will show on their screens.

I think the ultimate difference between each review, is that Empire is a lot shorter, and snappier and aims more at someone who wants to read a quick, short review and gets an understanding of their opinion in the first couple of lines, whereas Total Film review is more detailed and let's you think about what the film is about and how it plays out.