R+P Post 10: Reflections so far/looking ahead

So far, I have been very pleased with the progress of our group, we have managed our time well and have often come to quick conclusions and decisions due to good planning. We have all put in our fair share of work and contributed equally and importantly, we all get on well which is great for the future of the group.
We shall continue the project by creating a timeline and animatic. After that, we will create a shootboard and finally we will have a test shoot before our real shoot to make sure everything works and is a realistic target. If we carry on working like we have been up to now, I have no worries about future success within the group on our upcoming tasks.

R+P Post 9: Our Script

We decided to include some dialogue in our opening sequence, however, the majority of the speech in our opening will come from a voice-over. The voice-over is common in rom-coms such as 'John Tucker Must Die' where Kate talks about what her life has been like.

Script

Guy: 

'Hi, I’m Guy. I’ve been single for the past 19 years, which is my whole life.

I’m so unlucky… it seems nothing ever goes my way

But… last month, I met the girl of my dreams. We met online and today I’m finally going on a date! Me! Going on a date! My first ever date!

The last time I tried talking to a girl, she completely ignored my presence.

It’s awkward because that’s the closest I’ve ever got to a girl who isn’t my mum.

For the first time in my life, I feel like my luck is changing.

I’ve got to try my hardest to get this right, that means no talking about games, science or chess.

I’m wearing my best shirt, styling my hair and putting on my best aftershave.

I’m even wearing a tie.

Anyway, got to go! Don’t wanna be late.'

R+P Post 8: Our opening sequence idea

Our opening sequence will follow the date routine of our main character, Guy. It begins with a shot of an alarm clock and Guy getting out of bed. Feeling, invigorated after a shower, it is clear to see Guy's excitement as he skips along his hallway. After spending an age picking out an outfit, which turns out to be hideous, Guy does his hair which also looks ridiculous but Guy seems to think he looks good as shown by his dialogue where he is complimenting himself on how great he looks. He dances down the stairs and it is clear to see his flamboyant nature here. Guy then looks at the clock and realises he is very late. He curses and sprints out the house. We see him running up the hill to his date who is waiting outside a restaurant for him. When he arrives, he looks a mess and Bella, his date, makes up an excuse to leave. We see Guy's sad face and we cut to the title of the film, 'The Life of Guy'.

We have made a timeline to help us to map out our opening. It's useful in terms of helping us to realise what should happen, when it should happen and for how long.

Our Timeline

All of our titles will be overlayed apart from 'The Life of Guy' which will be on a black screen as it's the tile of our film. Also, our distributor, 20th Century Fox, will have its own title at the beginning which they use on all of their films. Our titles will mainly include the names of actors but also the name of the director. Our text will be in white as they overlay their text in white in 'John Tucker Must Die' which is similar to our film.

Most of the opening will be filmed in my house for all the inside scenes. We will then shoot in the surrounding streets and finally outside a restaurant where Bella will be waiting for Guy.

We will attempt to use continuity in a variety of places. We will use graphic matches in lots of different places and we will also use a shot reverse-shot when Guy has his brief conversation with Bella.

We will have a pretty upbeat song playing throughout the opening to connote the fact that we should also be excited for the date. However, the song will cut out when Bella leaves to highlight a sad(ish) silence.

R+P Post 7: Our film's title and plot outline

Our film's title is 'The Life of Guy', this has clearly been based on the real film, 'The Life of Pi' due to the fact that we feel it rolls off the tongue very well and is also quite a humorous name due to the the play on words of the real film.

Our film is about an unlucky 19 year old, called Guy, who happens to be relatively nerdy and just in general a complete fail at life. At the beginning of the film, we see Guy getting ready for a date with a girl he meets online, however, he gets in a real state over the date and the girl, Bella, ends up leaving the date when she sees him due to how awful he looks. The middle consists of Guy meeting another boy who befriends him, he takes him under his wing in order to teach him how to be around people. We also, see some of his uni life and how he struggles to fit in. Finally, by the end of the film, Guy has completely changed and is no longer the awkward man at the beginning of the film. He has lots of friends and even gets the girl. We can finally see that Guy has changed his own luck.

Our film follows several narrative theories. The first of which is Levi-Strauss' Binary opposites theory. This will be especially evident at the beginning of our film where Guy will be describing how he feels his luck may have changed by the fact that he has a date etc. but we will see him completely failing at basic activities at the same time. This will create an oxymoronic feel that will come off as quite humorous to the audience seeing as what he's saying is just completely different to what he's doing.

The second theory which we will be following is Todorov's theory. This is where the film will start with an equilibrium which will be disrupted by something to cause a disequilibrium towards the middle of the film. By the end of the film, this will have been solved and there will be a new equilibrium. In our film, the equilibrium will start with Guy going about his usual business being an 'outsider' like he's always been used to. However, a disequilibrium to his usual life will come about when he meets his new friend who will guide him, taking him out of his comfort zone and normal life. The new equilibrium will be reached by the end of the film where Guy is happy with his new personality and finally fits in.

R+P Post 6: Our chosen genre and how we plan to connote this

Our chosen genre is Rom-com. To highlight the genre, we've used a range of different methods such as:

-Light-hearted takes on sad situations. This will be seen in our opening sequence by the fact that Guy gets ditched outside the restaurant by Bella but it's in a light-hearted way where Guy makes an exaggerated face so we will laugh as well as feel sorry for him. The light-hearted take idea has been identified in multiple Rom-coms such as 'John Tucker Must Die' where the girls team up to take down John after being played. This is also clear in 'The Inbetweeners Movie 2' where we laugh at the fact that the boys don't get into the party at the university.

-The romantic part of the genre will clearly be connoted by the fact that Bella is waiting outside the restaurant for Guy, however, this may not be that clear to see solely from the shots so it will be anchored by a voice over which will explain Guy's excitement for the date clearly highlighting the romantic element. Romance is clear to see in the opening of 'She's the Man' due to the fact that the main girl, Viola, is kissing her boyfriend and also playing football, therefore showing the 2 main elements of the film.

-We've decided to use the geek stereotype mixed in with a complete fail at life to create an uncomposed character. The 'fail at life' is a common stereotype in Rom-coms as highlighted by the film 'Bridget Jones' Diary' which features a similar character who just can't seem to get it right.

-Our opening will be anchored with upbeat music to connote the positivity of the opening rather than the dwell on the unluckiness of Guy. This is similar in 'Superbad' which also uses upbeat, positive music. This has the effect on calming the audience and also getting them ready for the hilarious endeavours of the main character.

-We have decided to overlay our titles as this is a common feature other Rom-coms such as 'John Tucker Must Die' which features a very similar opening scene to ours with the morning routine of the main character and the date routine of John. Also, by using overlayed titles, it doesn't draw away from the action which is the main focus seeing as we're not using eye-catching titles which would be more of a genre convention of an action film.

R+P Post 5: How we plan to attract/address our target audience

I believe our film will attract our target audience in a variety of different ways:

-Anybody who has ever been on a date will be attracted to the opening due to the fact that they are most probably familiar with the pre-date rush and jitters making it a very relatable opening, although probably not as extreme.
-Once again, most people should find the comedy aspects very entertaining, particularly seeing as most of the comedy is slapstick making it easy to understand for anybody, no matter what country they are from.
-Men should find relief in the fact that they are not as much of a walking disaster as Guy (most probably) creating a comfortable viewing experience in laughing at the misfortune of someone else.
-Women are likely to have a similar response to the men but may feel sorry for Guy and may almost find his misfortune cute.
-Overall, the opening sequence is supposed to highlight the excitement of Guy on finally achieving his first date but also works to show the audience why Guy isn't the type of person you want to go on a date with at the moment through a range of humorous moments designed to make the audience laugh at Guy's misfortune.

Other examples of similar openings are 'John Tucker Must Die' which features the main character's routine followed by John Tucker's date routine which he does to multiple girls. This features various funny scenes and is designed to introduce all of the main characters as well as make the audience laugh. They also feature the same concept of relief at not being one of the girls being 'played'.

22 Jump Street also shows a routine but this time it's the routine of being a cop. They incorporate comedy through the use of a really poor accent put on by one of the cops and this is very effective at entertaining the target audience.

R+P Post 4: Representation of social groups in our opening sequence

Our main character, Guy, is quite a geeky character but is mainly just a complete fail in life.

-Guy's bedroom is seen to have game posters up highlighting his geekiness and he also has Xbox games lying about.
-He is clearly seen as a complete fail, connoted by when he turns the shower on and its too cold, then by the way he dresses, the way he does his hair and finally when he spills coffee on himself. However, although the way Guy conducts himself may be negative, the audience is supposed to love him and almost find his complete failure at life adorable.
-Generally, there are both negative geeky stereotypes and positive ones but the positive ones tend to be focused in films where the geek is the main character such as 'Superbad', this is similar to ours.
-I think that Guy is such a lovable character, that he will appeal to all groups. In addition to this, we haven't gone overboard in terms of making him overly geeky in order to not alienate this group of people.

R+P Post 3: Our Production and distribution institutions

Our Production Company is 'RC Productions' which stands for 'Rom-com Productions'. Our Distributor is '20th Century Fox' who have distributed multiple Rom-Coms including 'John Tucker Must Die' which we have taken a lot of inspiration from. Also, they are a mainstream Distributor with a global reach which is what our film needs to reach its global audience.

'John Tucker Must Die' is very similar to our film in terms of its production deal as it was produced by 'Landscape Productions' and distributed by '20th Century Fox' to get the wider reach that it wouldn't be able to achieve by itself. The plot itself is about 3 girls who all fall for Basketball player, John Tucker. They learn that he is playing all 3 of them and team up to get their revenge. The film is again similar in terms of a sad situation (John is cheating on the girls) being turned upside down and into a positive for the audience who manage to find the situation hilarious whilst still being sympathetic towards the girls.

R+P Post 2: Our Target Audience

As a Rom-Com, our film has a naturally wide Target Audience but often this base is fairly full of women. Our aim is to skew this slightly to men in order to attract a more gender neutral audience.

Our core target audience are fans of Rom-coms and similar genres. These fans will be easy to attract because when it comes down to it, our film idea is a typical story of boy meets girl. A similar example to this is 'John Tucker Must Die'. This is as typical as you get in terms of a Rom-com with 3 different girls chasing after one guy. However, the film is skewed towards teenagers and young adults by using the 'High School' sub-genre. This is a concept that we are trying to follow by using young actors in order to promote a wide audience appeal to younger people.


Having said all of this, our core audience will be the sort of people who are a 'sucker for love'. They would typically have been female but we are aiming to break this by attracting men who aren't necessarily as in touch with their emotional side but still enjoy the comedy aspects of the film. I believe our core audience is skewed towards teenagers or young adults between 15-25 due to the age of the cast and also the university life background of the character. A similar film to this is 'Pitch Perfect' as it has a really strong identity of the Uni life and the target audience. Our main audience will be British but we also feel our film is strong enough to break the global market as a rom-com is a pretty universal concept highlighting the global appeal for such a film. 'The Inbetweeners Movie' is a great example of this as although it is clearly a British film, it has a very global appeal through its use of comedy which is globally understood.