Week six - The final film

This week we were given the opportunity to re-film or improve a previous film or create something entirely new. Since last week was one of our best productions, and certainly could be improved on, I thought the group would be wanting to refilm it, but in fact the majority were keen to try something completely new with an original script.

Ideas were thrown around on facebook chat, and it was clear that we all really wanted to do this thing properly and really plan, storyboard and shot list a film as well as we could - but first we needed an idea and a script and so, ideas were listed by the group.

An idea where one person was preparing for another person to arrive, while another was journeying to see them was conceived. The motivation for this gradually evolved into a blind date situation, until it eventually turned into the sinister script that is "Dinner Date".

Research

A recollection of a serial killer back in the 80s who lured young men to his house for dinner and company, sex and murder, led to exploring Dennis Nilson, who killed 15 young men.  

Dennis Andrew Nilsen (born 23 November 1945) is a serial killer and necrophiliac, also known as the Muswell Hill Murderer and the Kindly Killer, who committed the murders of 15 young men in London, England, between 1978 and 1983. He retained his victims' bodies for extended periods of time before dissecting their remains and disposing of them via burning or flushing the remains down a lavatory. Nilsen was convicted at the Old Bailey in November 1983 of six counts of murder and two of attempted murder and is currently incarcerated at the HMP Full Sutton maximum security prison in the East Riding of Yorkshire, England.

Nilsen became known as the Muswell Hill Murderer as his later murders, which led to his detection, were committed at his home at 23 Cranley Gardens in the Muswell Hill district of North London. The description Kindly Killer came from his own belief that his method of murder, strangulation and drowning, followed by a ritual in which he bathed and dressed the bodies, was the most humane method of murder. (Wikipedia)

An interview recorded with Mr Nilsen in 1992 gives some idea of how normal he seems, and yet when you listen to him calmly explaining how he used to get "blind drunk" before dissecting bodies on his kitchen floor, it is quite chilling.

 

Production Meeting 10/03/2014

On Monday morning we had our first proper production meeting.  Copies of the script were passed around, discussed and improved on.  Roles were decided within the group.

Director/editor - Chloe Hudson
Writer/editor - Liz Hutchinson
Cinematographer/editor - Tom Howitt
Producer - Dan Griffiths
Sound designer/photographer - Ben Grantham

Everyone enjoyed being part of this creative process and we all expressed how sad it was that we'd finally got the hang of it just as the module was about to end. Once the script had been tweaked the director, Chloe, got to work on the storyboards and shot lists.  These needed to be detailed and comprehensive since we had a lot of scenes to film, and her and Tom as cinematographer needed to be very clear about what they were trying to achieve.  Actors needed to be found and locations.

Chloe's storyboard comprised of 7 pages with 12 scenes and 34 seperate shots.

Important transition shots were listed by Tom.

Liz and Chloe got together on the day of the shoot to organise practicalities such as making a huge pile of sandwiches for the crew and the actors to eat later that night.

Actors

We were incredibly lucky when the two actors we asked to perform in our film both agreed.  Shaun Butler and Tom Hanratty were immensely patient, even though the filming night ended very late and inevitably involved lots of hanging around.  Their performances were superb and Group C remain enormously grateful for their contribution to our film

Locations

The Station Cafe in Aberystwyth agreed on the phone to let us shoot the first scene there, and the taxi shots were clearly going to have to be my Nissan Micra.We obviously couldn't film the interior scenes convincingly in student halls, so we had a dilemma on our hands.

Scene 1 in the New Station Cafe - the owners were more than happy to let us film before they closed.  When we saw the footage in editing we realised that we should have used extra lighting.  Lesson learned.

Tom's family agreed to let us film the dinner preparation scenes in their home in Ynyslas, but unfortunately they had a shower instead of a bath tub and we felt the bathroom scene was important.  Gavin, Tom's mate stepped in and offered his bathroom - tiny as it was - but as long as it had a bath tub and we could decorate it with night lights we were happy.

The outside scenes we decided to film on the streets of Borth, since the logistics of driving backwards and forwards to Aberystwyth were unrealistic.

Props

The mise en scene for this film was crucial, and the prop list was considerable.  It included items to be bought such as flowers, matches, and candles, and a huge list of things like a record player, tablecloth and towel to be found from home.

The bottle of wine and  bunches of flowers we ended up leaving with Tom's mum and dad as a gesture to say thank you for letting us use their home for filming.  We were there until nearly midnight.  The bubble bath was donated to Gavin, the guy who kindly let us invade his bathroom.

The lonely hearts advertisement was created as a Word document and filmed in close up.  It didn't actually look very much like the newspaper the character was looking at in the cafe scene, but when the film is viewed you don't question that this is the same text the guy has circled with his pen.  Similarly it is presumed he is in a taxi, not in the back of my little car, as we led the audience to presume this by showing him hailing a cab.

Filming

The crew started filming the cafe scene at 4.30pm, then the hours before dusk were spent transporting everyone to Tom's family home in Ynyslas for the dinner preparation scenes.  A smaller crew headed out onto the streets of Borth to shoot the outside scenes and the car shots.  We attracted a bit of interest from the local pub visitors and children.  The local kids, in fact, helped us out by pointing out an empty house that we decided to use as the front door of the killer.

Another crew headed off to film the bathroom shots.  The bathroom was incredibly small and it was impossible to film it from the landing without including the door in the frame, and Chloe had to balance on the corner of the bath to film the shots of Shaun from above.  Tom had brought his own kit with him luckily, and his SLR camera proved a more maneuverable tool for the job here. 

The shots from above the bath look really effective.  We were  lucky we had no space as  I doubt we would have gone for that angle if we'd had a choice.

While some of us were shooting the footage of the street, car and bathroom, back at Tom's house the props were getting organised for the next scene,  and the  record player was being filmed.  Horrifyingly, when we checked the footage in the editing suite, there were only 5 second clips of the record playing.  Luckily it was still in the boot of the car, and we brought it in and filmed the close-up of the needle going onto the vinyl record in the editing suite.

Editing & Sound

The music process was very quick for us this week.  The moment the group heard this, from Madame Butterfly, the images we had been discussing could be clearly imagined blending with the music to create a chilling effect.

Click on the YouTube link below to hear the track we used for our final piece:






In terms of editing this track in, it was a case of syncing it to the visual of the record player being switched on. Once this was achieved we spent some time adding effects such as a 'scratched vinyl player', 'ticking clock' and 'doorbell' to enhance the aesthetics of the overall film. These were edited in levels of sound accordingly using the sound mixer tool and in one case, key frames.

For a more glossy and professional sound we changed the levels of the main track "Madame Butterfly" in accordance to the room our main character was in. It also proved a good way of creating tension as the viewers attention should be more drawn to the visual on-screen as the sound becomes an interesting device.

    

                             

We were able to be more experimental with the editing of the visual this week because the large quantity of scenes meant that no time was lost in the ordering and contemplating of different shots. Once these shots were nicely ordered by scene we could then produce a rough cut of the footage. By the time we had trimmed the shots down and put them in the right order it was time to add some sound effects which would enhance the overall aesthetic of the piece. Below are two examples of the sound effects we used:

 

To create a greater sense of reality within the establishing scene of Des (the host) we added the sound effects of a vinyl player first scratching, and then a undertone of static which would come with the actually piece of music.





After we added these sound effects we also embedded the sound of a doorbell. This ironically ended up being the sound of an alarm because we decided that all the general bell noises were too soft and welcoming. Once all these sound effects were in place and at the right sound level alongside the main track of 'Madame Butterfly' we could then focus on the credit sequence.

At this point we were very short of time and ended up very quickly adding a credit scroll to recognize the people involved in the project. However, because of this rush we forgot/ didn't have time too thank the people who kindly offered their homes or premises for the shoot. The details are in the YouTube description of this final video, but are as follows:

'A special thank you to Mr & Mrs Howitt who let us film in their home. The Station Café in Aberystwyth who let us film on their premises. And finally to Tom's friend Greg who let us film in his home also.'

Reflections on Week Six

Chloe - As the director it was a fantastic experience to be so highly involved in all stages of the film's production. Due to time constraints in editing and filming we will always be finding small issues with the piece such as 'I wish that shot has been held for one more second' or 'It would be good if the music changed there' or 'If only someone had moved that object in the background of that shot', but I think overall we created a successful film.

It was always going to be an ambitious task having four locations in various areas of Aberystwyth and Borth, with such a small crew to control the conditions of each shot. It demanded high levels morale and efficiency and sure enough, everyone was every tired by the end of the shoot. However, going back to this notion of a 'successful film'; I think for the first time we properly pulled together as a group and knew exactly what we were doing, which was great to be a part of. Using Monday as a planning day really helped in this process as everyone had a chance to get together in their roles and discuss what they could do to benefit the film personally.

So, overall I am very happy with the level of professionalism and proficiency achieved in 'Dinner Date'. It is exciting to wonder what we could have done with more time since we effectively completed this film in three days; and I look forward to working on more practical productions in future.