Codes and conventions of short films...

With short films there are many features, I have found while watching short films that there is mainly just one or two characters in the film, and there will most likely be a central protagonist who will remain centre frame throughout the film. Another thing i found with short films is that there is always a message to the plot so for example with 'Miss Newton' the message is to prevent young suicide.

With short films because most of them are funded by not so famous companies their budget isnt high so they tend to use point of view shots and handheld shots because they cannot afford the bigger more technical equiptment.

Voice overs are a very popular method of sound in short films because it is cheaper to record a voice over than use a high tech boom, however in most short films there is hardly any dialouge used at all. 

A short film tends to be between one to five minutes long.
A last point I have found with short films is that most of them are low budget, and this can be noticed wile watching them, there are no expensive titles used, but instead the ususal white font, black background. It is also very noticeable that in quite a lot of short films actors tend to be quite young (age 16-24)  

Examples of short films...

                                                    
                                                                        New Boy.....

This short film Captures the experience of being the new kid in school through the eyes of Joseph, a nine year-old African boy. Winner of Best Narrative Short at the 2008 Tribeca Film Festival and nominated for an Oscar. This film was giving a 7/10 rating. This short film shows how it is to be a new student at a new school and the problems they will face at first but later on it will be sorted. It is an urban realist film which you can tell by the way that it is filmed that it is not an expensive film to make.

                                                                   Miss Newton.... 

This short film was directed by a young man called Moufy, he came from a family where his father was in and out of the picture, Moufy does an excellent job depicting the trials and tribulations of everyday teenage life. Moufy’s ability to tell a story in the form of song is something that is hard to come by these days, with this short film he expresses the problems that young tennage girls get into drinking and sex so young and in turn leading to suicide (Newton is town in America where it was famous for young girls commiting suicide) so the message he left througn this song is very powerful and memarable. This is also like 'New boy' a urban realist film it is almost like a music video you dont view it as a film straight away.

Shane Meadows

Shane Meadows born 26 December 1972, is an English film director, screenwriter, occasional actor and BAFTA winner. He has directed plenty of full length fims and one that was a success is 'This is England'.

 

His shortest film, The Stairwell, was shot on a mobile phone and is just 40 seconds long. It consists solely of a man and woman, played by Meadows regulars Andrew Shim and Vicky McClure, violently bumping into each other on a stairwell.

Most of shane meadows films have had some sort of inspiration for the making for example the film Dead Man's Shoes was inspired by a close friend who had been bullied, developed a drug problem and then committed suicide. Shane felt angry with the bullies that had leed him into drugs and wanted to bring out a clear message against bullies and what it can lead to.
Shane has been a very successful man in the media life, five of his films were shown at the 2007 Flourish Festival, held annually in Uttoxeter, to mark the release of This is England, and as said before won a BAFTA and been an actor in some of the movies.

Narrative theory:

Propp theory:  
Vladimir Propp, a Russian critic, active in the 1920’s, published his Morphology of the Folk Tale in 1928. While the Soviet cinema was producing excellent films, Propp was essentially interested in the narrative of folk tales.

Folk tales were similar in many areas. They were about the same basic struggles and they appeared to have stock characters. He identified a theory about characters and actions as narrative functions.

Just like in a fariry tale you have the main characters you have the; The princess, hero, villian, the doner, the helper, the father, the dispatcher and the faulse hero.

In my story we have 2 characters we have a villian who is the mother who is verbally and physically abusing her daughter. And in a way the girl (daughter) is the hero because she is the one giving the message about abuse and how it should not be allowed.

http://www.adamranson.plus.com/Propp.htm

 

Todorov:

He suggests that most narrative's start with a state of eqilibrium which life is 'normal' and the protaganists are happy. The normal life is disrupted by an outside force which if fought against in order to turn back to normality. This can be related to a variety of films.

Barths:

He suggests that narrative works with 5 different codes whihc activate the reader to make sense of it they are;

• Action
• Enigma: a puzzle or riddle to be solved which teases the audience.
• Symbolic: (Connotation)
• Semic: (Denotation)
• Cultrual: In where the audience can recognise as being part of a culture

Claude Levi-Strauss

He examines how narrartive can unconsciously reflect the values, beliefs and myths of a culture.

Binary Oppositions:

A conflict between two qualities or terms.

The histroy of short films

Longer films were rare before the 1920s, Short comedies were especially popular, and typically came in a serial or series.

Animated cartoons came principally as 'short subjects', as did newsreels however they were noot yet called short films. Virtually all major film production companies had units assigned to develop and produce shorts, and many companies, especially in the silent and very early sound era, produced mostly or only short subjects. However, after the 1930s, the short films were starting to die. There were fewer short films. Most of these short films were produced in-house. Sometimes these short films were financed by big film companies.  There were companies that would force owners of short films to sell the short films to the big companies. These big companies or theater-chain-owners would then turn these short films into big-name features ( block booking). Later shorts include George O'Hanlon's Joe McDoakes films, and the animated work of studios such as Walt Disney Productions.

Early American actor William Garwood starred in numerous short films, many of which were only 20 minutes in length.

But eventually by 1960's short films slowly dissapeared, however over the last few years short films have become popular and have been some supporting acts for longer length films which has made them more successful and because of short film producers for example Shane medows of whom i will talk about later.

Introduction

My project for year 13 is to create and research into short films and that includes creating a review, film and research. This blog will document the steps i have taken to create the final piece.