BRICK ANALYSIS

Brick is a film that helps to carry and reinvent some of the classic noir techniques in brick a teenage boy is the anti hero who is like an anti hero should be very morally questionable, he is looking for something he has lost this starts out as his ex girlfriend he is then looking for “Brick” after the death of his ex girlfriend after that point he is fighting to find something out, who is brick? This movie is a great example of a modern noir, not only the dark and edgy plot but the execution of action, deliverance of dialogue and classic cinamatic techniques. The snappy dialogue and exchanges pair with shot reverse shots keep you involved and engaed in the conversation and the action. Brendan’s an anti-hero like Sam Spade (the postman always rings twice), aggresivly inteligent and ruthless in his convictions, an outsider and loner with few friends, a model noir anti-hero. The Fem Fetal of the film ,Laura is just like phyllis dietrich in double indemnity; playing innocent and victimised but truly a dangerous and minipulative woman who tricks brendan all the way. Low key lighting is used in the more dangerous and suspenseful scenes like when Brendan is in the strange underpass drainage type area.

 One reviewer said  “ you will not see a cooler film this year. Witty, gripping and massively original, Brick is this year's cult hit, hands down. As Brendan would say, "Don't heel it.” The reviewer also mentions this film is a classic example of how noir has evolved and he dubs this film a “Smart noir”

MES is used in this film just like a film noir would use it by using shadow, darkness and poor lighting to conceal characters. There is an urban setting like most noirs and the classic characters dress in the conventional way the femme fatale in Brick has piercing red lips and near enough every scene and figures of authority are always in suits or uniform.

The classic characters are all in this film, femme fetal there is a sidekick type character a fellow loner called The Brain, there is a character who is just caught up in all the trouble without realising this is Brendans ex girlfriend she is similar to phyllis’ husband in the fact that they both seem to end up dead without doing a lot wrong. There is no corrupt police officer but there seems to be a similar character in the fact that the vice principle seems to take on that role.

PRELIMINARY EXERCISE EVALUATION

In groups of 2-3 we were asked to create a preliminary filming exercise, For our preliminary exercise we had to make a 30 second clip of somebody walking down a hall into a room sitting down and having a 5 line conversation about something and We also had a 6-8 shot limit to create this scene.The purpose of the exercise was to familiarise us with the camera and the editing software, and also some of the rules of filming such as the 180 degree line rule and the rule of thirds.


i think that given the task we were we done well as there were no continuity mistakes we stuck to time limit and we kept to the rules of filming. In our Preliminary exercise we used a wide variety of shot types such as close up, long shot, medium long, two shot and over the shoulder/reverse over the shoulder shots.  one of the over shoulder shots felt uncomfortable to me as it did not show the girls entire head where I would have liked to show all of it. the dialogue was not very good as we did not write a script so it was improvised and this did not work so if there was something i wish we had have done different it would have been a written script.

PRE PRODUCTION PAPER WORK I COMPLETED and ROLE SPECIFIC TASKS

In our group i undertook the role of cameraman but I also did some acting in the film and had a large part to play in the editing of the film, picking effects to go over clips to make them look like flashback sequences and various clip placements. A selection of music was gathered by a member of the group and we all had our say the piece that ended up in our film I was the one who placed it in and adjusted it accordingly to any other factors and sounds in our film the final thing I done in editing was to place our titles in making them fit into screen and not take away from the action.



For the preproduction i wrote up the original voice over script which somebody else then integrated into the main screen play. i also done a rough copy of the storyboard so that we could then get a idea of the shots we wanted to do this was then done in neat by our art director

<--- neat version of the story board.









I completed a production schedule so we knew our filming dates. I then found our locations with help from our art director who allowed us to use her home as a film location, I then did a risk assessment for one of our locations. After editing I then as well as every other member of the group done an evaluation sheet taking down thoughts of our film from other classmates and our tutor.

REPORT ON EXCHANGE EXERCISE

In a group of 4 we were asked to create a exercise to be called the exchange where we would use our current  knowledge of filming and editing to develop and learn new techniques and stylistics so that when we came to make our final piece we would have more experience editing and filming . This project further increased knowledge of group work and also got us familiarised with the group we would be in for our final project.

Our task was to create a minute long clip with a minimum of two characters that would exchange an item in our case it was a envelope of money. The scene wasn’t allowed any dialogue but non diegetic music over the top, in order to set the mood for the action. We needed around 8-12 shots to create this scene, in our clip we had 11 different shots . In this exercise we used a wide variety of angles including, close ups long shots cut away shots and also shots through objects such as a fence, which creates effects which are similar to those which are used in classic noirs, this shot also made the character look much more menacing almost giving the effect you get when you see a criminal in a film walking though or up to prison bars.

In our piece we kept to the 180 degree line rule, so our piece made sense and kept continuity. Even though we kept to this rule our group we did have a slight problem with continuity where the held object switched hands, we realised this as we edited and that shot was eventually cut from our final piece as it caused too many problems.

overall I would say our exchange exercise was a good learning curve helping us to bring in a wider variety of skills to our final piece, it also fit the brief very well keeping to the restraints that were set and I am pleased with the final outcome as i believe it was a good attempt at making something feel like a thriller. 

If I could re-film this piece  without the restraints I would film a larger number of shots so we had plenty to create our piece out of also to act as a safe guard to any clips that did not have good continuity so they could easily be replaced with another, I would also keep track of shot continuity throughout filming, which would have prevented the lack in continuity which we experienced in one of our shots when we came round to editing.

COMPLETED SCRIPT

COMPLETED STORYBOARD

GROUP MEETING NOTES ON EDITING STAGES

Tuesday march 8th

• We added Light ray effects added to the flashback of the dead body give mysterious look to it.
• We added car sounds to the main (street) flashback create an urban effect 
• We lowered the sound from the main flashback because it was a windy day and the sound gear picked up too much unwanted noise
• We moved the flashbacks of the dead body to make it fit to the character, because it didn’t fit in because it didn’t make sense being flashback straight after flashback.
• We added an effect called “over drive” To the flashback of the fight scene  and we changed the white and gray colours to create an effect so it was clearly a flashback.
• We shortened the fight scene and sped it up to make it appear more violent and more physical to the audience.

Tuesday march 15th

• We put a fade on the shot where Ashley is opening the bathroom door and we also put a fade on the flashback where the door is being opened in order for the shot to swap over nicely and smoothly from the present to the flashback.
• We put on the title of the film “Bill” and also the production titles such as “ a teleport production” and “BXU” which are our production companies.
• We added a bit of non diegetic music at the beginning of the scene, this is our start off point for music in the scene.
• We deleted the close up shot of Ashley as it appeared too quick on the edit and so was unappealing to the eye.

Tuesday march 22nd

•  We recorded the voice over and cut and paste it onto our film noir style opening
• We typed out and researched the audience views via a questionnaire 

Tuesday march 29th

• We changed the colour on a clip of Ashley as the colouring stood out compared to the other clips as it was too red/orange. Because of the colour difference we altered the orange clips with a colour altering effect.
• We placed the voiceover clips in the correct place so it made the best out of the scene, we placed a large section of the voiceover on a large shot so that the clip appeared less boring to the audience.
• We decreased the volume of the music where the voiceovers were also playing so the voiceovers were audible.
• We faded the music just before the voice clips so the alteration in music was not too noticeable
• We added character titles in so the actors are known within the opening sequence, we placed the titles over the shots on an invisible background so the titles linked in well with the opening scene.