The brief we got to create the doors scene was to create it in a simple way, with conventional techniques, and we did just that.

The pacing of my edit was pretty dodgy. There are long parts in the scene where no edits happen and in contract with the conversation between Van and Cine where the switch between the over the shoulder shots is extremely fast it does not really work.

There is no camera movement at all, every shot being is stationary and relies on the actors to move about to make the space interesting.

There is a moment where Van crosses the line and looking back on it, simply flipping the clip over would have fixed this.

The location good for the scene, while there is often space where nothing is happening in the shot, there is never a dead space in the frame, the door always adding to the aesthetics of the shot and the story as a whole.

The sound works to join the edits together, atmospheric sound running throughout the scene, as well as sound cues leading in.

In my edit I chose to keep the range of shots from a long shot, to a mid shot, I tried putting in a close up, but I felt as though there was too much going on when another shot was introduced to the 30 second clip. However seeing other people’s edits of the same footage, I now see that I could have incorporated them and it could have even made my scene more dynamic.

My favorite parts of the final edit are the ones without interruption from edits, for example the opening shot of Van coming down the stairs. I think that this shows I need to work on making my edits more seamless and unnoticeable.

Jean-Luc Godard began his career in the filmmaking industry as a film critic in the Cahiers du Cinema magazine, Godard, and other critics featured in the magazine, went on to begin the French New Wave; Godard’s films and writings have been studied ever since in film schools and cinema courses everywhere.

Godard said that he has always considered himself both a critic, and a filmmaker. When he was solely a critic he thought of himself as a filmmaker, and now as he creates films he sees himself more of a critic ‘than ever before’. He creates films as if he were constructing essays, constantly creating a conversation about filmmaking industry as a whole.

Godard’s theory of film bought about the idea of the self-reflexive film. While watching a film, audiences should be aware that they are in fact watching a film and the film itself should be aware of its situation within the film industry in which it was created. Godard’s films are made with this idea in mind.

Godard is well – known for his use of jump cuts, dramatic cuts in the middle of scenes that cause the audience to be drawn out of the fiction world created on the screen and back into the real world, in which they and the film industry exist. In his first film Breathless these jump cuts are extremely relevant, as are the moment in which the protagonist is talking directly to the screen, which work to the same effect as the jump cuts.

It is interesting to note that the jump cuts used in breathless were not a creative choice, he said that his first film, as many others are, was too long as he had too much to say. Rather than cutting out whole scenes he decided he would cut out the less important parts of individual scene, thus creating the jump cuts he is so well recognized for. This had to happen, as he did not have the budget or time to shoot these scenes again. This technique also aided his theory of films being self-aware and creating a conversation with the audience.

One of the major intentions of Godard’s filmmaking techniques is that is causes the audience to question certain things about the world and themselves, just as the film is critiquing itself and the world in which it exists. Godard’s films film theories were born in a time that the American Genre Film was dying and there was a sense that you could do anything, even without money in France. Both the dying genre film as well as the environment that he was in inspired Godard to create films. In creating these films he puts his critics of cinema into another form and practiced what he theorized, all the while continuing critiquing, changing and inspiriting the world of cinema.

Godard’s style and way of filmmaking was created out of a desire to create something new with a medium that he loved; in doing so he inspired the future of filmmaking and changed filmmakers’ approach to cinema drastically.

REFERENCES:

Where Film Meets Philosophy : Godard, Resnais, and Experiments in Cinematic Thinking 

Godard’s “Breathless” and Richard Linklater’s “Slacker”

Godard inspired today’s greats

The Avant-Garde Feature Film : A Critical History

 

PLAN FOR REST OF SEMESTER:

These are the things I need to do before my shoot:

 

• Try out different environments to get good at camera.
• Find people I work well with.
• Practice working by myself
• Practice doing a planned out shoot as well as fully improvised and then do one to try and create a good medium.
• Create a scene or two every week leading up to the day of my final scene shooting, try and do it on the days I especially don’t feel like doing it.
• Find people for following roles:
  • 1^st AD
  • Sound
  • Boom (Potential)
  • Cam Ass
• Practice tracking shots and gain more knowledge of point of view

I can do this by doing a practice shoot that incorporates different elements that I need to work every week, if not twice a week. For example:

In the next week I can do a shoot where I use the camera we have been using in class to get my skills up to scratch with the camera, I will do this shoot on my own in an outdoor environment, this shoot will be planned out extremely well, this will be a long single shot.

The week after that I may do a shoot just on my phone to experiment with points of view, this time incorporating actors.

This way I will be able to cover the large basis of things I need to before my shoot, all the while doing the research to find which combination of factors works best for me.

RESULT OF SHOOT

As I spoke about in my week seven reflection, the filming of the scene by myself that I played with point of view was a very informative exercise. It confirmed that I still need to do more work by myself in order to be able to tackle my final scene. It was a distrust in my instincts that lead to the final product being a bit of a failure.

The great thing I got out of it was that I really enjoyed playing with the point of view in shots. I didn’t get it right in this scene but I would like this to be the focus of my final scene; shifting point of view in a single shot.

This shoot also made me consider what kind of shots I want to do, in terms of lots of shots to edit together, or perhaps and long shot that covers the scene in one shot. I had not considered doing a long shot before this exercise, and I think again it was my idea of having editing as a safety blanket. I thought if I took lots of shots, I would definitely be able to edit something good and effective together, whereas if I do long shot that is that, I have to get it perfect on the day of the shoot.

I now realize that that thought process is just me holding myself back again. For me to be able to get the most out of my exploration of shifting points of view, it think it needs to be done in a long single shot, that covers the scene.

REST OF SEMESTER: Practice tracking shots and gain more knowledge of point of view

POINT OF VIEW

While doing my preproduction for the task we were given to do over the weekend by ourselves, I seemed to be drawing shots that changed point of view a lot. This caused me to think about how we do not see many interesting point of view shots in cinema, mostly, once they are established in a shot they do not switch. I like the idea of playing with this in my scene. When filming this scene for class over the weekend I am going to really try to use it to experiment with this idea, as well as using as a shoot to work well on my own. I will see how take to the idea of changing points of view in a shot, to consider making this the innovate approach I take to my final scene.

PRETTY VS. POWERFUL

I recently saw a film that was very good! However there was one part that I wasn’t quite sure what the director was trying to do. It was the climax of the story and everything was getting very intense, as it was a thriller. A scene began situated in a pool, the lighting was incredible, the music was brilliant, the location was extremely cool, the acting was great, the storyline was interesting, however I felt as though I had seen the scene before, it was just a bit ‘mergh’.

Everything was set up for it to be the most powerful moment of the film, however for me, this did not happen. One a wider note, the scene did not progress the film or enhance it in any way. We were left in the exact same position as we were before the scene. Sometimes this happens in films, but when you take the scene out to view it on it’s own it is a powerful entity on its own. This was not the case for this scene. I just found that it was a bit boring and that is had been done a million times before. There were no interesting or exciting shots or coverage of the content. This made me think to my first idea for this scene; I basically wanted to make something ‘pretty’.

With enough practice and the right instruction manual anyone can make a shot look good, I am now realizing that what can make a scene even more powerful is that if it is covered and captured in a unique and interesting way. This is the direction I would like to take my final scene.

I am not sure exactly what I mean by this, but I want to capture something in a new way. I will need to come back to exactly what this means.

I still want to make my shot look good, I am not giving up on that inspiration, however that is not going to be the main focus of my scene, I now see that I was thinking too small for this scene could become.

ROLES I WILL NEED

As I am now planning on having other people perform vital roles on my shoot, I should decide what those roles would be exactly. I think I would like to operate the camera on my shoot, as well as direct. I may reconsider this, however it is what I will spend the next few weeks preparing for. This is why it will be important for me to have a 1^st AD to help keep control of the shoot, especially when I am shooting. I definitely would like someone on sound, I guess it will depend on my final idea for the scene but I will also have to decide whether just one sound person will be enough, or if I should have a boom operator as well. At this moment in time I am not sure if the camera will be moving or not, however I do not think it will only be in one place, this is why a camera assistant will also be important to include in my crew. Depending on where I end up shooting it could also be important to have someone on safety.

 

REST OF SEMESTER: Find people for following roles:

1^st AD

Sound

Boom (Potential)

Cam Ass

RETHINK WORKING BY MYSELF

Thinking about how my shoot will go, and how I want it to prepare me for future work I do, I think the concept of working completely on my own is unrealistic. This is not how shoots will work in my future work in filmmaking.

I still want to incorporate the practice of gaining confidence in my work and trusting myself to make decisions and taking control of my scene. However I am beginning to think that I should incorporate other people to take on some vital roles. I will still want to practice filming by myself to better understand myself as a filmmaker before to shoot, however I would like to use some other people to help out for the right reasons at the shoot.

The right reasons being collaboration and support, rather than a safety net and me relying on their ideas and therefore second-guessing my own.

WHAT I LIKE TO WATCH AND WHAT I LOVE TO WATCH

I get most excited about films when I see something new and or aesthetically pleasing.

I am a sucker for a story, any story, and I often find that after every film I watch, I like it to some extend because it had a story. So basically I like every film.

What makes me love a film and go and tell people about it, and get really excited about it, is when it looks incredible or has a certain scene that does something new and innovative, when it has that WOW moment.

REST OF SEMESTER: Try to incorporate this bit I love, the WOW, into my own scene

MOTIVATION TO WORK AND CREATE

I have found that I am most excited to work on something when it is new and exciting. The biggest flaw I have with ‘getting excited’ about doing creative work is that I really struggle to do it when I am not in a creative mood, if I am tired, or not feeling 100% I put it off for another day, or take a backseat when doing things in groups. THIS NEEDS TO CHANGE.

 

I think in order to create anything this semester, and in fact for the rest of my life, I need to get over this ‘only working when I am in the mood’ thing that I find myself doing. By doing these reflections so often, I have started to find the benefit of doing work when I am not in the mood and pushing through until something is created. I have found that I am a creative person and that there is not an on off switch for this ‘creativeness’, just some days it is buried deeper than others and I have to push a little bit to find it.

 

REST OF SEMESTER: Create a scene or two every week leading up to the day of my final scene shooting, try and do it on the days I especially don’t feel like doing it.