Choosing a Title

In order to find out what film title to use we conducted a questionnaire to ask our target audience. After doing this we found out that Last Laugh was the most popular so now we have our film title.

Costume Planning

BBFC Rating

We have chosen the rating of our film to be 15 because it will allow us to demonstrate violent scenes that would not be allowed for anything below a 15. However, we didn’t want our trailer to be all about violence so the rating of a 15 will also restrict us on what topics we can portray.

The 15 rating means No one younger than 15 may see a 15 film in a cinema. No one younger than 15 may rent or buy a 15 rated video work.

Topics that can be covered are -

• Discrimination – The work must not endorse discriminatory language or behaviour but there can be racist, homophobic or other discriminatory themes and language.
• Drugs – Drug taking may be shown but the work as a whole must not promote or encourage drug misuse.
• Imitable behaviour – Dangerous behaviour should not focus on the details that could be copied.
• Language – There may be strong language.
• Sex – Sexual activity may be portrayed, but usually without strong detail.
• Violence – Violence may be strong but should not dwell on the infliction of pain or injury.

Plot Ideas Mind Map

This is a mind map of our plot ideas that we came up together as a group. We will now think more about each one and eventually choose one that we think we can produce effectively.

Our Chosen Genre

As a group we have decided to make a trailer for a crime drama. During the process of picking a genre, our two favourites were crime drama and horror but we then decided to do crime drama because it is something that hasn’t been done before. We also chose to do horror for our AS media coursework so we didn’t want to repeat all of last year’s work.

Crime films are a genre of film that focuses on crime. Crime drama is a combination of crime and dramatic films.

Characters

Crime drama films are centred on the actions of criminals or gangsters, particularly bank robbers, stealing and murdering their way through life.

Narrative

This genre often highlights the life of a crime figure or a crime’s victim(s). They can also glorify the rise and fall of a particular criminal(s). Rivalry with other criminals in gangster warfare is often a significant plot. Questions such as how the criminal will be apprehended by police, special agents or gangs. 

Genre Research

Films are put into different genres depending on common conventions. Each genre has a list of conventions that an audience would expect to see when watching the film. Genres help to target a specific niche audience. 

Genres do change over time and can merge together to become hybrids. This means the genre of film is more than one, such as rom-com.

Some of the classic film genres are listed below:

• Action
• Thriller
• Science Fiction (Sci-Fi)
• Comedy
• Drama
• Horror
• Musical
• Adventure

Romance Trailer Codes and Conventions

The narrative of romance trailers usually follow the conventional "boy meets girl" plot, which consists of the main male character meeting the main female character and eventually falling in love. This has proven to be a successful narrative structure of romance films and the target audience often expect to see a plot like this. Often the film will involve some sort of disequilibrium which forces the characters to break up or be separated, the cause of this could be one of them moving away or even one of them dying, for example, P.S. I love you.

The location used is often somewhere rural, because it is known to be beautiful and peaceful which are both associated with the romance genre. Close up shots are used to emphasise the significance/importance of certain things in the narrative, this shot also shows the characters emotions. Shot reverse shot edits are used to clearly show a connection or relationship between two characters and establishing shots are used to show the location.

Sub-genres of Romance

• Romance Drama
• Romance Thriller
• Rom-com