Production Planning

Today, we discussed the idea of a combat scene featuring in the production. This lead to a joint decision that a combat scene will be featuring in our production however there were still issues of contrasting opinions.




An example of this is whether or not we would feature on screen deaths with a vote of 3-1 in favour of having an onscreen death. We watched fight scenes from various films and discussed whether or not we would be using weapons. Once again it was a case of voting which came out as 3-1 in favour of featuring weapons in order to make the on screen death more realistic.






https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3_tqt4GCqCk




https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7GSgWzmR_-c




https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QLL9plgz0pg




https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7VKAggGisCc

Timeline

November 2015 - Planning comes underway, starting with a storyboard. As a group, we settled on the genre of the film, Action.

In what ways is Age of Ultron a typical Hollywood film?

A common trait shared by most high grossing and blockbuster Hollywood films is their extravagantly large budget. Marvel Avengers: Age of Ultron is consistent with this tradition as they're film held a very extensive budget of 280 million USD. With such editing and CGI effects as creating the colossal figure that is The Hulk and creating such epic battle scenes over vast plots of land would help aid their budget to be achieved.

An example of the intricacy behind the beast's features.

As well as the Hulk's obviously costly creation process, another majority of the money used in the film will be spent on the booming amount of Superheroes and their powers. With a full team of 9 characters, all with individual powers, The Avengers must pay a super price in order for them to have the VFX that can properly showcase their abilities. This may not completely be seen as all positive, as blatantly obvious effects can destroy the film's mise én scene, however, it certainly does provide enough evidence to show a correlation between itself and a vast majority of other Hollywood films.

Another reason as to how Age of Ultron is a typical Hollywood film is found through it's cast membership. With such a large array of protagonists, the film will need a relatively large cast and, being a Hollywood film, all parts must be filled by a "larger than life" actor, who will generally create an ongoing buzz, promoting the film by just being a part of it. The latest installment into the "Avengers" series is no different to other Hollywood productions with a cast of huge names such as Robert Downey Jr., Chris Hemsworth, Scarlett Johansson, Idris Elba, Jeremy Renner and Samuel L. Jackson to name a few.

Overall, the most obvious reason behind Age of Ultron being a typical Hollywood film is evident through the box office success of the film. In total, Age of Ultron grossed over 1.4 billion USD during its running course in theatres. This gargantuan success, is parallel to the success of it's predecessor film, "Marvel's The Avengers" which was released in 2012 and had a recorded gross income of over 1.5 billion USD. The correlation between the abundant mass of money made by Universal in both films proves that Age of Ultron is another typical Hollywood film. Due to the success in terms of money that the original film had, Universal decided that they could make a sequel to the first Avengers title, in hopes of making another heap of money as the end product. Through achieving this goal, they have proven that their job is predominantly money oriented as opposed to being more about the creative aspirations of the producers and directors.

Potential Location

Oval Field/Bebington Cemetery



Pros: Perfect location for a horror film to occur. Large open land. Field has floodlights in case it's too dark to film.

Cons: May require permission to film on land.

Location of filming

Bidston Hill

Pros: Large open space for filming, lots of natural seeming props as a forest setting.

Setting is perfect for some form of horror action film.

Cons: The area is open to public at all times, lighting may be a problem if filmed during the night time.



Feminist and post feminist review - Shut up and drive by Rihanna.

In the song, Rihanna is clad in very tight clothing from the beginning and progressively loses more clothes as it goes on, revealing more of her body. This forward and seductive approach to videoing can be seen as very attractive to make viewers of the song, causing them to grow and interest with the songs video itself and thus the song itself, increasing the revenue Rihanna will make from doing it. 

Rihanna also uses her body in order to potentially gain more male viewers as she poses suggestively to the camera, once again stifling a positive reaction from the make audience who see the video. 

However the lyrics to the song, along with some parts of the video make Rihanna seem more dominant than some of the male audience, proving that women can be seen as equal to men. 

The lyrics, "Shut up and drive" combined with low angled shots of Rihanna prove to work well together in making her seem more powerful. The imperative she uses as a hook to the song makes her sound like she is some sort of boss, giving a worker orders as well as the low angle shots making her seem more superior as she looks down on you are evidence of Rihanna's dominant role in the video. 

It can also be argued that Rihanna is not using her body in order to exploit men in her videos and that instead she is showing confidence in her own appearance and can be seen as empowering for the female audience of the video. 

ABC1

The ABC1 table is a way that film producers categorise their audiences and estimate which demographic of people will watch certain genres over others.

Those who reside in the social grade of  "D" and "E" will spend money on basic essentials more than they would on luxury items where as, those in the higher social grades will have more money to burn and will, in turn, spend it on luxuries.

The lower grade classes of D and E will steer away from the drama genre more often than the higher social grades as many of these people may be going through hard times and don't wish to be reminded of this through a film or show that follows a similar plot to that of their own lives. Instead of the gritty dramatics of a slow film such as "To Kill a Mocking Bird", they would be more likely to watch something more action packed and fast, keeping them easily, and mildly, entertained, for example, "Fast and Furious".


The same can be said about the higher classes of social grading, too. The more wealthy population of the "A" to "C1" can be known to be attracted to the more detailed and intensely-dialogued films, rather than those that are entwined with action and violence. For these people, the gritty dramas, that the lower demographic of the social grading tend to avoid, are more interesting as it is different form what they're used to in normal life, giving them less to relate to and draw from. These people would be less likely to sit through the lower budgeted action films with lots of explosions and blood as they tend to keep a professional mind-set when spectating.