Dissertation Plan

Upcoming Vampire Films

For part of my dissertation research, I am looking at vampire films in production in the next few years and how they portray the vampire. I was very surprised when only two came up when I Googled it. There was also another vampire film released late last year/early this year (a part of the famous Underworld franchise) which I am also looking at.

Underworld: Blood Wars (Anna Foerster, 2016)

Vampire death dealer, Selene (Kate Beckinsale) fights to end the eternal war between the Lycan clan and the Vampire faction that betrayed her.

All I can say about this film is, oh dear. Reviews are poor and they did not make back their budget nor achieve a good opening weekend box office. According to numerous reviews, it's very similar to the previous Underworld films and offers nothing new for old and new fans. Maybe the production company wanted to play it safe and go with what the franchise likes? 

To link to my dissertation, this goes against the idea that the vampire changes with societal context. The Underworld franchise is 14 years old and it is still the same in storyline and in their vampires. 

The Last Voyage of Demeter (David Slade, TBC)

Based on a chapter in Bram Stoker's "Dracula," which describes the arrival of the vampire count in England on a cargo ship that has crashed into the rocks at Whitby with no crew and the dead captain lashed to the steering wheel. Stoker tells the story via the captain's log of the voyage, which begins in Bulgaria and becomes increasingly disjointed as members of the crew disappear.

There isn't a lot of information or clips on this film as it is still in production by the looks of it. The story itself sounds like an old fashioned vampire tale. With the star studded cast of Viggo Mortensen and Jude Law, and the recent final Pirates of The Caribbean franchise, the film feels like it could do well, with people wanting more out to sea action.


The Redemption of Cain (Will Smith, TBC)

An epic re-telling of the Biblical sibling tale, Cain and Abel, this time with a vampiric twist.

Again, there is not a lot of information on this film. It certainly does sound interesting though, and curious to how Cain and Abel will be portrayed. There has been a few biblical blockbusters such as Noah and Ridley Scott possibly doing a Moses film, there is a franchise for it and they could be playing on that. There is definitely a franchise for Will Smith too so the film could do fairly well. However, biblical films don't seem to earn huge profits, and with quite a lot of religious people going to see it, they may be put off with the vampire twist.

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Another notable project (not film related) is The Vampire Chronicles (Interview With The Vampire) being turned into a TV series. There is a lot of hype behind it with rumours of a star cast and a huge fanbase of Anne Rice's novels and of the film. However, there has been a few TV series based off films before, one good example for my dissertation is From Dusk Till Dawn. There is a huge fanbase behind the cult classic film, however the TV series plummeted and received terrible reviews.

The market is very unpredictable and it's hard to say what films will do well or not, even with a franchise, it does not secure a film will do well or people will enjoy or be affected with the take on the vampire. 

Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales - Review

My ticket got damaged from a rough ticket person

Today I went to see the new (and last) Pirates film. I only went to the 2D one as my Mam also wanted to see it and the only 3D one was very late at night. I still really enjoyed the 2D and was a stunning film. It was also nice to see the cinema pretty full (the £5 tickets must be doing the trick), even if the family behind us talked all the way through and thinking Will Turner is Jack Sparrow.

Anyways, the film had some really enjoyable moments. My personal favourite scene was the bank robbery when they intended to take a safe but ended up taking the whole bank. It was funny and oh how I've missed the infamous soundtrack. 

http://imgur.com/r/MovieStunts/HtY2rSP

However, most of the comedy moments were Jack falling flat on his face, which, don't get me wrong, were funny, but a bit repetitive. There were a few jokes I could appreciate such as pirates having "heavy balls", "she breeds donkeys" and also this scene, but it didn't make me laugh out loud. 

http://johnnydeppskank.tumblr.com/

There were a few moments that I disliked or just ruined it for me (apart from *that* death, no spoilers). I don't really like the new cast and were not likeable nor had particularly strong backstories. However I do like the idea of a woman of science being labelled as a witch. I couldn't really feel any sympathy towards them. I also found it annoying how dead Salazar suddenly grew hair??? And also the weird motion of it which just constantly drew my eyes to it and ignoring everything else in the scene (I do understand why it has that motion, but it was still distracting). I also couldn't understand a word he was saying with his heavy accent and I was praying someone else would repeat it or it would become clear in the plot (it did). 

https://www.tumblr.com/tagged/pirate-ghosts

People have been saying the plot was hard to follow, however I found it very easy to follow, even a bit basic. They conveniently solved the riddle very fast, etc, etc. (maybe they found it hard to follow because of Salazar's accent). 

Overall, an okay film. Better than Pirates 4. The ending was left open so I doubt it will be the last one. I also liked Will and Elizabeth's appearances. 

5/10

Minor Ideas

I know, it's probably way to early to start thinking about Minor, but I've had a few ideas I want to write down before I forget them. I also need to look carefully at the brief as I have no idea if it will fit. 

After going to the Kodak Awards last weekend (mostly gatecrashing since I missed out on this due to the different pathway system), we heard that a year previously has done the Kodak briefs for their minors. I asked Mike and Lee if this is a possibility and it looks doable. I would like to look into 16mm and cinematography as I want to be as adept in all formats as possible and would also be nice to enter the awards if they are good enough. I would probably need someone to help me with ideas (as I am not good at coming up with plots and scripts).

My other idea if the first does not get approved is how does camera framing, composition and movement effect a film? I will find a few famous film scenes and change the framing of some of them to see of they still have the same emotional impact. This idea is loosely based on the Cineflix videos on YouTube but it will be more researched and focused on cinematography. I may also put into practice what I have learnt and do different framing edits with a scene of my own.

Level 5 Links

Live Project 2: http://sarahmaherfilmblog.blogspot.co.uk/search/label/level%205+live%20project%202

Visual Culture: http://sarahmaherfilmblog.blogspot.co.uk/search/label/level%205+visual%20culture

Professional Studies: http://sarahmaherfilmblog.blogspot.co.uk/search/label/level%205+professional%20studies

Digital Production: http://sarahmaherfilmblog.blogspot.co.uk/search/label/level%205+digital%20production

The Heist - Camera B

Completely forgot to put this on my blog. I went down to The Heist filming today. After their first lot of filming went down the drain, they decided to film a short scene. I offered to help out and they said I could operate another camera so they get more filmed in a shorter amount of time. I went down shortly after dinner and they were already set up. I stood around waiting for about half an hour, then asked what I should do. I was told to set up the camera and they asked their main camera op where I should put it. Then I was told not to touch it and he would do it. I tried to argue my case and said it would save time, but they were having none of it. So I took some of their food and drink and left. What could I do? I was very annoyed at the time I wasted there, they could have told me half an hour ago that I wasn't needed or even before the shoot. I did take a few production stills for their blogs and just to say I was there.

Tag - What Have I Learnt?

Even though Tag did get a self contained scene filmed (with a few minor issues), pre production for the whole film itself failed due to a number of reasons which I will discuss in this post and will be as self-critical as possible;

1) Communication. Probably the biggest issue we had. I have no idea why, probably due to this film being our 'secondary roles', we may have lost a bit of enthusiasm for Tag. To be honest, I did, I was getting very tired of actors and locations dropping out (it's never been this bad before). 

2) Drop outs. A LOT of locations and actors dropped out or had issues (e.g. going into surgery and loosing both arms (worst continuity error ever)) The Grand Hotel take paid bookings up to the day before which resulted in a lot of cancelled shoots. So we decided to do the self contained scenes with few but reliable actors and with an easily replaceable location.

3) Indecisiveness. A lot of the time, for actors and locations, the director did not get back to me and did not like a lot of the suggestions. For Oren's apartment, there was 3 places in mind. The first dropped out, and the other two were not good enough so the director cancelled the shoot. I could have took initiative and filmed anyway, but I did not want to take over job roles. 

4) Organisation? Some people may say it failed due to poor organisation, but like I said, I had multiple backups for each location. I also have lots of paperwork on the VLE as proof of all the work I did. I am usually quite organised, but I do get stressed easily (this module was no exception). I even said I didn't want to produce ever again after Bad Luck, but I still gave it my all and ended up doing more for Tag than Circus. 

5) It was still alright on the night and we filmed! The atmosphere on set was great and it was a fun day of filming. I am glad we have still managed to finish something, and we could come back to it next year as a Final Major.