My Poster

 

Film Noir Posters

     

Film Noir Posters are typically dark and mysterious to represent what the film is like. However a lot of them are actually quite colourful with most posters using the colours red and yellow somewhere. It is usually the font of the title of the film that is the most colourful as it would stand out a lot more than if it was a mundane, black and white colour. The aim of a poster is to sell a product and I think these posters were very good at doing that. Whereas these days posters are photographs of the actors, to make them more dramatic and interesting film noir posters were actually paint based. I think this gives a very interesting edge to them.

In the posters it is very likely for the actors in them to be smoking as this was a very common practice for that time. Also it is likely that there will be some sort of violence or horror in these posters such as there might be a weapon or the people might be looking frightened in them.

Femme Fatales

A femme fatale is a seductive and mysterious character who use their charm and beauty to persuade other characters to do dangerous and even life threatening things such as murder. The earliest known femme fatale characters are demons, vampires, enchantress's and witches. The french phrase 'femme fatale' translates in english to 'deadly woman'. Although in most films the femme fatales use their sexual charm, some just lie to men to get what they want and sometimes they are in situations that they cannot escape from. Not all film noir films are the same but most of them have the same typical storyline of an evil woman character and a gullable male character, however there are some where the femme fatale actually turns into the heroine of the story and becomes good.

New Build Evaluation

The powerpoint that I presented to my class about the new Barnet College building was successful in some ways and unsuccessful in some other ways.
To improve my presentation I should of been more confident when talking about my powerpoint and should of said more while my photos were up. I should have also used some quotations of the students at Barnet College.

I am happy however with how my photographs and powerpoint turned out.
My photos were not boring and I think I showed Barnet College in a good light.
The photos showed many aspects of the college such as having fun and doing work which I was very pleased with.

New Build Plan

Shots I am planning to take :

• close ups of people working in different departments such as English or Art to show how it is to study at Barnet College,
• long shots and close ups of people inside the college, for example sitting at tables talking to show that it is a fun place to study,
• long shots and close ups of the inside of the college to show how modern it is,
• shots of people outside with friends to show that Barnet College is a friendly place.

Film Noir Brief Plan

Time-line

• The photographs need to be in black and white,
• They need to have high contrast,
• Different angle shots - low, high, close up, long shots, etc,
• The music that I use needs to be suitable for 'film noir',
• There needs to be limited light used in my photographs,
• Cigarettes are used a lot in film noir films so if it is possible I will use them in my shoot,
• I want to use a lot of shadows or objects in my photos,
• The time for each photograph that will be shown will be the same amount of time so that it is even,
• Doesn't have to have a storyline but it can do,
•  It will be taken outside, maybe lit by street lamps?
• If I do use a storyline in my time-line I will have typical 'film noir' characters,
• Some sort of weapon held by the man? A knife?
• Difference in speed in the transitions of the photos.

Poster

• Can be in colour and can be in black and white,
• I want to use a cigarette in the poster because they are used in most 'film noir' films,
• The models in the photo will be a male and a female, the female will look seductive and the man will seem addicted to her,
• Needs a good title for the film and a font that is simular to typical film noir posters and also the actors names underneath the title,
• Age rating in the corner, just like a real film poster,
• Show some violence? Maybe by showing some sort of weapon?
• Show romance between the man and the woman? Some sort of physical contact?

Double Idemnity

Double Idemnity is an Amerian film noir.
It was co-written by Billy Wilder and Raymond Chandler and was directed by Billy Wilder in 1944.
 The film was based on a series written by James M. Cain  in 'Liberty magazine' in 1935. Double idemnity is what happens in some life insurance policies that pays double the payout when someones death was caused by an accident.

The main actors and actresses in the film are Fred MacMurray who plays the insurance salesman, Edward G. Robinson who plays a claims adjuster who finds phony claims as a living and Barbara Stanwyck who plays a provocative wife who wants her husband dead.


The film seems to be shot in a way where the audience feels as if they are actually there seeing it all happen and I think this is really inspirational and it reminds me of Alfred Hitchcock.
 

Plot

An insurance salesman for Pacific All Risk called Walter Neff comes back to his office in Los Angeles at night at the start of the film. He is in pain, sits at his desk and starts to saying a memo into a dictaphone machiene for his colleague Barton Keyes. This dictation is what starts the film which is a flashback of what happened to Walter.

During a routine house call to renew an automobile insurance policy for her husband, Neff meets Phyllis Dietrichson. He is very attracted to her and they become flirtatious to one another until he become worried when she asks if it was possible to take out a policy on her husband's life without him finding out. This is when he realises that she is contemplating whether to murder her husband and he doesn't want to be involved in it at all.

Phyllis follows him to his house and starts flirting with him a lot more.
Even though Neff told himself he doesn't want any part in this murder, her flirtation and his gullibility gives in and he agrees to kill her husband with her.
As he knows a lot about how they could trick the insurance company, he creates a plan in which her husband will die a very unlikely death in which he will fall from a moving train.

As this death would be seen as an "accident" this will trigger the 'double indemnity' part of the policy, which will cause the insurance company to pay Phyllis twice the normal amount of money.
They carry out the murder and no one suspects that his death was fowl play.


Neff's colleage Barton Keyes believes at first that her husband died of accidental causes but the "little man" inside him keeps telling him that something is wrong. He then believes that his wife and an unknown accomplice are behind the husband's death. Even though he knows Neff very well and is his colleage, he never suspects that Neff could have anything to do with this. Barton Keyes is not the only thing that Neff should be worried about.

Phyllis's step daughter Lola (Jean Heather) tells him that she is convinced that Phyllis has something to do with her father's death and that her mother died of simular, suspicious circumstances while Phyllis was nursing her. Even though Neff is concerned that Lola could blow his cover if she finds out, he is also worried about what might happen to her as she is a threat to Phyllis and as both her parents have been murdered.


He then finds out that Phyllis is actually seeing Lola's boyfriend called Nino behind him and Lola's back. Her unfaithfulness to him helps him realise how much of a monster she really is and how important it is for him to save himself from his involvement with her and the murder.
He comes up with a plan to make the police believe that Phyllis and Nino actually carried out the murder of Lola's father which is actually what investigator Keyes believes now anyway.

Neff meets Phyllis at her house and she admits to him that the reason she was seeing Nino was so that she could provoke him into killing suspicious Lola in jealous anger. Neff is now completely disgusted and as he is about to kill her she shoots him. As he stands there wounded, he starts to walk towards her telling her to shoot him again. She can't pull the trigger and he then takes the gun off her.

Phyllis then tells him she was never in love with him "until a minute ago, when i couldn't fire that second shot."
He tells her that he doesn't believe her and pulls away from her as she tries to hug him. He presses the gun against her side as she looks pleadingly at him and he says, "goodbye baby" and shoots her twice and kills her.

Neff then hides outside and walks up to Nino as he walks over to the house to visit his lover.
He advises him to not go into the house and to leave and contact, "the woman who truly loves you."
He agrees and walks away avioding what could of been strong evidence against him that he had murdered Phyllis if he had gone in the house. Neff, who has grave injuries, drives to his office and sits at the dictaphone to explain all that has happened.
 
Keyes arrives in the middle of the confession and has heard enough to understand everything.
Neff then tells Keyes that he is moving to Mexico rather than facing a death sentence, but it is too late for him as he falls to the floor before he can reach the elevator.


Key Features 

• The narration is in first person throughtout the film. It starts as a man talks into a voice recorder as he confesses what has happened. The film is basically his confession as he is talking into the voice recorder.
• Every character smokes which is very typically film noir.
• The characters costumes are very film noir as the men are dressed smartly in suits and hats, the women wear little dresses and high heels.
• Light is very limited in a lot of the film. In some parts there are street lamps to cause deep shadows and sometimes show the characters as silhouettes. At some other parts of the film there is parts where light is coming from blinds so that the light is in stripes which is very mysterious and interesting.

Sin City

 Sin City was written by Frank Miler and is the title of a series of neo-noir comics that he created.
The movie adaptation of the comics was directed by Frank Miller, Robert Rodriguez and Quentin Tarantino and it was released on the 1st of April, 2005.

The film is set in a fictional town in the American west called Basin City which has the nickname of Sin City which is where the title of the film came from.
The city is filled with crime and murder which was typically used in previous 'film noir' films.





Key Features

• The film has a very dark mood which is created by the limitation of light used.
• The film is narrated in first person.
• A lot of the characters in the film smoke cigarettes which is a very typical film noir characteristic.

• Light is used in this film to highlight important parts of the story, such as an object, scenery or a character.

• There are a lot of shadows such as silhouettes used to create the idea of it being a 'film noir' film.
• Everything is in black and white apart from key people or objects such as someones hair or some blood. This is to show the importance of some parts of the film.
• The females in this are hardly dressed at all and are very seductive women. They are the femme fatales in the film.
• The men are dressed smartly in suits and long coats which is very typically film noir.

Film Noir Definition

'Film Noir' means 'black film' in French. The films that are known as 'film noir' for the fact that the lighting in them is very low-key and very limited. The story of the film is very negative with cynical characters and there is never usually happy endings. They are also very bleak and depressing and are usually set in the city or in urban areas.
Their plots usually revolve around cynical attitudes, violence and sexual motivations. The first film noir films were set in the 1940 and late 1950s.

Characters

The women in the films that have the most important roles as characters are usually 'femme fatales'. These women are very seductive and attractive and use this to seduce men in order to get them to do horrible things for them such as murder an enemy.
They are evil characters and film directors created these characters because of the way women were seen after the war because they had taken the mens jobs and were much more independent than before the war because there was barely any men who had not gone away during the war. Film directors wanted to make women seem evil and dangerous.

The main character is usually always a man who gets in trouble because of a 'femme fatale'.
Men in 'film noir' films are usually very easy to convince into doing terrible things because of an attractive woman. They seem to be very naive and predictable.


Visual Styles

• The lighting is always very limited and light is usually used to highlight important objects or people in the films which is very effective and is still used in modern films,
• Deep shadows and silhouettes are used commonly in 'film noir' films because they are so dramatic and effective,
• Black is the most used shade in 'film noir' films as it is what makes them so emotional and dramatic,
• Black and white visual style,
• The light that is used is bright which causes the high contrast and is used to highlight key individuals or objects.

Movie Structure and Plot

• The narration in the films are usually from first person perspectives which is very effective especially when flashbacks are used,
• The theme of the movies are usually based around crime and murder and include violence and weapons such as guns and knives,
• The environment that the films are set in are usually in urban cities,
• Most of the characters smoke in the films because it was seen as being sophisticated which adds to the atmosphere of film noir films.

Research for New Build

For the photos that I need to take for Barnet College here are some ideas of what I could take.

• group shots of people relaxing/looking happy,
• individual shots of people looking happy and relaxed,
• group shots of people at work,
• individual shots of people at work.

I need to make sure that my photos are not,

• out of focus,
• too saturated/desaturated,
• boring,
• having too much going on,
• showing flaws of the college,
• showing people being unhappy.

Notes on my Multiple Image

What I am pleased with

• I like the way that all of the girls look upset and are looking down apart from the one standing in the middle.
• I am pleased with the layout of the image such as the way the girls are sitting in a circle.
• I am happy with the mood of the image and how it is mysterious and confusing as it does not tell you what exactly is going on in it.

Improvements I would make

• Make the image sharper and more in focus.
• Make the image more dark and moodier, not as bright and colourful.
• Make the girls more symmetrical and in a circle.

Multiple Image Evaluation

I am quite pleased with how my multiple image turned out.
It is basically what I pictured in my head when I came up with the idea of it but I did picture it as more moodier and darker. I like the way that all of the versions of the girl look upset and their heads are down apart from the one standing in the middle. I tried to keep what they are actually doing a mystery, I don't even know what they are doing but I felt that if it was not obvious what they were doing it would be a more interesting picture because it would make people think.

 It does look as if they are doing something spiritual or religious which I am pleased with. The fact that the girl in the middle is holding a phrenology bust is supposed to represent the mentality of the girls and is supposed to show that they have problems. The fact that there is so many of them may even represent that the girl has schizophrenia or another mental health issue.

Her hair and make up is supposed to be messy as if something has happened to her. I smudged her lipstick to one side and made her have messy curls in her hair and it was quite windy which helped. She is wearing a dress because I thought it would create more questions such as why is she wearing a dress in a muddy field?

If I could do a better version of my multiple image I would make the image a lot sharper, some of the photo is not that in focus such as the grass although I did use a tripod. I would prefer this image a lot more if it was more dark and depressing because that is what it was supposed to be like. It is too bright and colourful for what the mood was supposed to be like. I would of also liked the girls to be perfectly in line, some of them are not completely in the circle. I wanted them to be scarily perfect.

My multiple image

How to create a multiple image on photoshop

1. On photoshop open up the image that is going to be your background image. Then open up another image which you are going to put over the background image.
2. Go to layer, then layer mask and click reveal all so that you are able to rub in or out your image into the other.
3. To rub in or out an image you need to make sure that the two squares at the bottom of the tool bar on the left are completely black and white. If they are not black and white when you use the brush tool it wont rub the image it will draw a coloured line onto your image. What these squares do are that they switch from the image below the image you can see and to the image you can see so that you can rub in the image from under the image you can see or rub out the image you can see so that some of the image below is shown.
4. To add another image ontop you need to open up the image you want to add and then repeat step 2.
5. Once you have done your multiple image you need to go to layer and at the bottom of the list click "flatten image". This will flatten your image so that it is just one layer.

Photoshop

Steps to use photoshop

• open photoshop
• open file
• choose file
• duplicate image
• image - adjustment levels
• adjust the levels
• save the file

I like this photo because I think it is an interesting subject.

There is a good use of colours in this photo as the telephone box is bright red and has bold colours whereas the wall and floor around it are very dull colours such as grey and white. This makes the phone box stand out and look quite attractive. The subject is interesting because the artist has taken a very ordinary object that many of us are familiar with and have taken it out of the ordinary by adding some violence into it such as the dripping red paint which looks quite like blood, the pick axe slammed into it and the way it is slumped on the floor as if it is a dead body. 

Before

After

My plan for my multiple image

Where?

• the woods?
• central london?
• fields?

Model

• man dressed in suit? gas mask?
• a girl in a dress?
• an animal?
• an old man?

Position of model

• random places around the picture?
• holding hands in a circle? sitting or standing?
• london?

Objects

• gas mask?
• flowers?
• phrenology bust?
• musical instrument?
• doll / toys?
• animal?
• knife? weapon?

Multiple Image Comment

http://www.paulmsmith.co.uk/portfolio/artist-rifles/artist-rifles.html

I like this image called Fog by the photographer Paul Smith because :

• it is interesting how the photo has fog which adds mystery to it,
• the way that the man  in the bottom right corner is not fully in the photo, part of his feet have been cut off,
• the way colours are used in the photo, the top half of the photo is basically completely white because of the fog and sky and the other half is basically completely green and dark colours such as the green grass and the dark tree,
• the way the man gets further away, he becomes more small and harder to see because of the fog,
• it has inspired me for what type of multiple image photos that I am going to take.