Group 044's film presentation focuses on a social realism genre opening scene set in Reigate. The scene introduces two muggers who need money and two drug dealers preparing drugs. It shows the "good guy" character delivering drugs but getting mugged, with the muggers discovering the drugs. When he reports this to the drug dealer, he is shot. The group researched social realism films to inform their story, characters, and techniques like using realistic locations, costumes, and cuts between scenes. Their target audience is teenagers who can relate to the characters' situations.
6. Target Audience For social realism films, teenagers are the target audience, so therefore our target audience are also going to be teenagers. We researched this by looking at professional films of the same genre and to see the majority of their audience and to see what the age group could understand the character’s situation. Another research approach is a questionnaire that we gave to members of the public to see which age group liked social realism films the most.
7. Characters The first character is the person who delivers the drugs, the “good guy”. The “bad guy” is the drug dealer and maker and two characters who mug the good guy. The audience will fell attracted to the good guy because he is doing this as he has no choice, which makes him innocent. The audience will hate the bad guy because he forces the good guy to do his dirty work for him. The audience will also hate the muggers as they are beating up the good guy who has done nothing. We are going to confirm the audience’s preconceptions as it will make the characters and their situation easier for the audience to understand if they know the characters well.
8. Settings and locations For our location, we will use Reigate. This is typical for social realism films as Reigate has some urban areas, like an social housing estate, in it that will give the feel that this is everyday life for some people in low income areas. The location is also practical for us as it is easy for us to reach and it doesn’t take much time to get to Reigate. An example below of the location that we’re looking for.
9. Key scenes and effects Suspense will be created at the end of the opening scene when the character will be shot and the audience will be left to wonder whether he survives. Action will be created when the character gets mugged as the pace will be fast when this action takes place. There is enigma around all the characters as we don’t know why the two drug dealers are dealing drugs for or why the muggers need to mug people.
10. Mise-en-scene Costumes that we are going to use are hoodies and jeans because this is commonly worn by the people who have this lifestyle in real life, so therefore the audience can see who the characters are meant to be. Props – ladies handbag, powder (sugar/salt or flour) for drugs in a clear plastic bag Lighting/colour – dark setting in the house, normal day light in outside scenes (ideally cloudy, grey day).
11. Institutional details Title: Working progress Production company: Working progress Distributor: Film 4 Sponsors: Screen South Film festival link: Edinburgh Film Festival
12. Editing Techniques Straight cuts for most transitions to keep it as realistic as possible (e.g. as in beginning of Lock Stock, Shifty) No Special FX as they are not used very much in social realism films Fade to black may be used at the end of the opening sequence where character is about to get shot. This will let the audience think about what has happened and what will happen next. This will also avoid having to show the shooting which could be very difficult to do properly. Titles will be superimposed over the top of the film content.
13. Group Roles Louie Script writer, director, acting. Elle Editing, Special effects, acting. Carla Story planner, camera angles, angles. Lee Acting, scribe, props manager, in charge of scenery.
14. Outside advice Have the two muggers at the beginning of the scene arguing that both of them don’t want to mug this person and that this is a last resort. This way, the audience feels sorry for these characters, and will forgive them when they do mug the male character.