Tuesday, 17 April 2018

Research Dossier


Research Dossier

Competition
I chose the blue cat short screenplay competition. The rules for this completion are:
·                 All submissions must be original, and the sole property of the applicant(s).

·                 All ages are eligible.

·                 All entries must be in English (or subtitled in English for film submissions.)

·                 Short screenplays must be between 1-49 pages in length.
There is no limit to the number of entries you may submit.

·                 You may submit a script or film once. You may not submit the same script or film more than once.

·                 All script entries must be uploaded in PDF format.

·                 Under absolutely no circumstances will substitutions of either corrected pages or new drafts of the entry script(s) be made. Scripts will not be returned.

·                 If a submitted script becomes optioned, produced or purchased between the time of submission and the end of the judging period, that script will no longer be eligible.

·                 Competition judges, readers and employees of the BlueCat Screenplay Competition, past and present, and their immediate friends and families are not eligible to enter.

·                 Previous winners of the BlueCat Screenplay Competition are not eligible.

·                 Scripts, including outlines, treatments, pitches, log lines or any developmental material related to the script, that has previously won any contest, competition, grant, lab, fellowship, mentorship, reading or award of any kind, are not eligible.


·                 Screenplays that have been submitted to any competition or contest prior to February 1st, 2015 are not eligible.
·                 Films must be produced after January 1st, 2016.

·                 Scripts or films submitted under a pen name will be immediately disqualified.

·                 Script or film titles cannot be changed after submission under any circumstances.

·                 Past and present scripts and films consulted on through Gordy Hoffman’s screenplay consultation service or the BlueCat workshops are not eligible. Past and present USC and UCLA students of Gordy Hoff (3)

Annotated script from Casualty


Pretty Little Liars series 2 episode 1:
I think this is a well written script because there is inner presence, outer presence and context.
There is inner presence, an example of this is Spencer having 3 sugars in her tea, she has these because she doesn’t like coffee she just likes the effect. This shows that she is a tired person. Emily also shows some inner presence as she is still wearing a bracelet from Ali even though she is dead. This shows that Emily still feels as though she has a connection with Ali.
An example of outer presence is that they are all wearing black funeral dresses. This shows that they have just been to a funeral. Jenna is showing outer presence because she has dark sunglasses on and a cane, this clearly shows she is blind, however this also gives a misconception to British viewers as she has a red tip to the cane. In Britain this shows that she is also deaf as well as blind however, in America which this is based it only shows that she’s blind.

There is also context because the girls are talking at the beginning about ‘the Jenna thing’ which meant Jenna went from being the pretty popular girl to the blind girl because of this incident that happened. 

Screenplay examples:
Penned
I like this because it has limited speaking in it, however, they portray the story well. Which is about a pen which he borrowed in an exam because he pen ran out. He draws with the pen whatever he does with the drawing happens to that object in real life. For example, he drew a picture of his cat drinking milk. He left the drawing on the table and went to bed. In the morning the cat was still drinking and was not moving at all, he then got angry because he didn’t really understand what was happening. He drew a can of drink next to him and scrunched it up, as he scrunched it up the can also did. I also like the music which they used because it is soft dreamlike which is used for effect and also leads to suspense. I also really like how they have done the credits at the start of the film because they had placed them on objects in the room, of books and object on the desk. I think this could have been better if they show what he was drawing in some of the film.


The Applicant
Like Penned I like the credits at the start of the film how they have put it on the question paper which appears later in the fill. The film is about some people applying for a job and they have to do an exam paper however, one persons’ pen ran out and he decided to write the rest of the exam in his own blood.  







My target audience is teenagers and young adults. This is because there is violence in it.

What pulls you into a film straight away?

Do you watch drama?
Yes
No

What top 3 things do you expect in a drama?
Death
Suspense

What sort of film do you watch most?
Drama
Comedy
Romantic
What sort of ending do you like?
Happy
Sad
Annoying
Cliff-hanger

What do you think of my ending?



Locations I need:
House: someone’s house

White room: the studio

Police interview: an office

Living room for news report; same room as the start

Characters I need:
Dan
James
The colleague
Police Officer
News reporter

The Source code is similar to my script as it has a similar story line to mine. They are also both about codes. (1)


Themes:
My screenplay is a modern version of the classic 'heist' double cross story.  It uses contemporary ideas like the internet and new technology, and also uses the modern idea that governments have lots of secrets and surveillance and spying techniques which use new technology.  It is topical because these issues are present in modern day life. There are many stories in the news about misuse of data for example the GDPR issue and the ways in which Russians might have used Facebook data to influence the US election and the Brexit vote. Facebook uses your data to target advertising to you.  In this world I thought a story about how someone who pretends to be someone else and gets an expert to give them data was a topical one. 

Real Media Text Influences:
I started off my story after watching a Youtube video about someone pressing a red button
LINK: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F99LYU8dVSE

I enjoyed this video because it explore the unexpected consequences of an action and it was told with humour.  This is where I got the idea of pressing the button on the computer from, but as my story developed it moved away from comedy into a much more serious film about a double cross crime.







References:
1.       Jones, D., Ripley, B., Gyllenhaal, J., Monaghan, M. and Farmiga, V. (2018). Source Code (2011). [online] IMDb. Available at: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0945513/ [Accessed 17 Apr. 2018].
2.       Downloads.bbc.co.uk. (2018). [online] Available at: http://downloads.bbc.co.uk/writersroom/scripts/Casualty-S31-Ep44-One.pdf [Accessed 17 Apr. 2018].
3.       BlueCat Screenplay Competition. (2018). 2018 BlueCat Screenplay Competition Rules & Guidelines. [online] Available at: http://www.bluecatscreenplay.com/2018-rules-guidelines/ [Accessed 17 Apr. 2018].







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