Scriptwriting: R.S.V.P.

I really enjoyed the scriptwriting part of this module, more than I had expect actually.

As we approached the 2nd part of this module, we knew what was in store for us. Everyone had to write an original script, that was to produced a 5-8min film. I guess I hadn't expected that to be too difficult in terms of length, but I found the context extremely challenging. Writing a student film is potentially one of the hardest scripts as there is no budget. Everything has to be film-able, especially as it is to be shot over a weekend.

At the beginning of the year I was inspired by a music video for the Cinnamon Chasers called "Luv Deluxe" (2009) [Dir. Saman Keshavarz]

What captured me in this film was the amazing way in which it is cut together. Despite it only being 5min long it manages to tell 3 different stories.

What I then decided I wanted to do was take that real, fast paced element from Luv Deluxe and combine it with a party atmosphere in which the story is told through two separate characters; the 'Host' and a 'Guest'. The visual idea being that each time their paths crossed physically the story-line switched character perspective too.

Of course, there is no fun in that, unless it is the party from hell. I was thinking, Rules of Attraction (2002), Donnie Darko (2001), Skins (2008) all squashed into one. Keep it really messy and absolutely abusive; sex, drugs and rock'n roll to its extreme.

Hopefully the party will bring the two characters together, minus the love interest. We've seen it before.

I think in total I spent about 3 weeks writing my script. One week researching; I appealed to loads of my friends to share some of their party horror-stories with me. Then two weeks writing, drafting, and re-writing. Eventually titling it: R.S.V.P (Original, i know!)

I felt as though the script I wrote was ambitious as a student film, mainly due to the vast amount of cast required. However I thought the nature of it, might have been quite appealing to some.

Rules of Attraction Unofficial Trailer

Skins Trailer

Post Production: Editing & Final Cut.

Editing

This has to be one of my favourite parts of the filming process, putting it all together.

Luckily I’ve been brought up using Mac’s and final cut pro so this wasn’t foreign territory for me. We uploaded all of the rushes onto one of the Macs at Uni. But because everyone in our team had different weekly commitments we did most of the editing on my laptop using final cut express. This just allowed us more freedom for when we could get together and work, and then we weren’t restrained to booking time in the editing suite on campus.

Everyone in the team seemed to have similar ideas of how we wanted our film to look and feel, so making discussions was easy.

A mutual friend of Elspeth and I is a musician and he very kindly wrote the main piece of music. We did also use some music from K.P.M. Music Company, which we needed a licence for. Unfortunately this licence hadn’t cleared before our film was uploaded to you-tube. So these 'corporate bastards' were surprisingly quick to catch onto this, and flagged us for copyright. Hopefully this is all sorted now.

Also when we came to export our final copy of the film we discovered that a few scenes were letterboxed whereas others weren’t. This was only so weird because we hadn’t adjusted any of the settings between edits. The looking at the original footage they were there too. So perhaps this was something that actually happened whilst we were filming. It only occurs during the bedroom scenes, which was the first location we shot in.

I felt really pleased with the final cut, and I believe everybody else in the group did too. I think we got as much out of the film as the effort we put into it.

And for something a little bit different.... Here in all it's glory is our finished piece.

Script Writing

Now that the editing process is over, I have already started considering the next project, for which we write our own scripts. Until this year, I had never written a script in my life. I was encouraged by my creative writers workshop tutor Joe Roberts to start reading and writing scripts now to help me focus my ideas. I was also really excited when my screenplays from amazon came through, Tarantino's Inglorious Bastards, Ritchie's Snatch, Curtis' Six Weddings and Two Funerals (a collection of Love Actually, Notting Hill, and Four Weddings and a Funeral) and Singer's The Usual Suspects.

I have been researching other directors and their work/careers. Floria Sigismondi particularly fascinates me. I have become such an avid fan of her style. Sigismondi began her career as a fashion photographer, and then made the jump to directing music videos. Her clients have include artists such as David Bowie, Marilyn Manson, Bjork, The Raconteurs and Christina Aguilera to name a few. This year she brings out her first feature film The Runaways (2010) based on the story of the band of which Joan Jett was part of. The Film stars Dakota Fanning and Kristen Stewart.

Below are a couple of her videos, Postmortem Bliss is a short film she directed in 2006 and Sigismondi's music video for The White Stripes Blue Orchid (2005)

On shoot

Our filming went really well. Better than expected I believe, considering the weather conditions were so awful.

Over the 48hour time slot we were given, I think in total it took us 15hours to get everything we needed, and all the crew members did a brilliant job with their assigned roles.

Being director was more challenging than I'd anticipated. I've made a few films in the past, but they were all solo projects and animations. Actually having to express my ideas and to the rest of the crew I found quite difficult. It forced me to think about shots, and set-ups a lot harder. Also I think continuity nearly blew my mind.

Working from our shotlist and schedule, we managed to keep good time, and got more than we needed for the editing too. There were certain things which I think we hadn't taken into account during our meetings which then became a bit of a surprise during the shoot:

Firstly, whilst writing the script we'd meet up at Elspeth's and decided that her room would be perfect to shoot the bedroom scenes in. However when we actually stuck the camera in there (on our first day of shooting) we discovered it would be impossible to get any of the wide shots we needed as there wasn't enough room. In the final cut this is very clear.

Then we had our tripod break too. Quite a lot of our scenes ended up being hand held, especially where there wasn't really enough room, or when we needed a particularly high angle.

Our lead actress Evie McGuckian Jones was excellent and really easy to work with (despite her diva demands). We got a great performance out of her despite the nasty weather conditions and not letting her wear a coat.

I personally found the weekend draining, but this was mainly due to traveling to London sat night, and consequently having to get up at 5am in order to be back in Bath to start filming at 10:30am