Plot 7 actor choosing

I have decided to choose actors for Plot 7, set in a post-apocalyptic future where people have special powers. I have analysed 5 leading roles to which famous stars can be applied. The main character, the evil dictator, the rebel leader, the love interest and the toad like enemy.
For each I will say the actor I have chosen to play them and give backing as to why.

Main Character : Will Smith

I have chosen Will Smith as the main actor as he is generally a very good all round actor. He can be funny, serious, violent, peaceful, intelligent, dumb and sometimes all at once! He has a good repitoire of sci-fi films such as Men In Black, I Am Legend and Hancock. Hancock is most similar to this plot as he had super powers in that film and so he obviously will be able to fit the role. He is a widely loved actor and has a huge fan base in both music and movies so will attract many fans to the film

Evil Dictator : Sean BeanAnother flexible actor who has been in a variety of films. His performance in Goldeneye and The Lord Of The Rings is what drew my attention to him. In Goldeneye he plays the main villain and so obviously has had a past experience with this role. He is very good at playing sinister roles and has a look to him which suggests he is a good deceiver. A big trait of these sort of films is a leader who deceives his people into thinking he is good when really his motives are evil. Also in LOTR as Boromir he was drawn to the ring which brought out the anger and hate in him and gave him an aspect of betrayal. I think all these qualities will go well for an evil dictator and as he has a history for action films fans will know he is suitable for the role.

Rebel Leader : Bruce WillisFrom his performances in Die Hard, Unbreakable and Sin City it was obvious to choose Bruce Willis for this role. Action hero extraordinare, he has played the role excellently on so many occasions. Sin City, a comic book film, and Unbreakable, a comic book style film both portrayed him as a hero and he has the typical do good sense to him while also being able to appear rugged. He looks very well built in most of his films which would be good for this kind of film and I see him as a sort of Riddick like appearance from Pitch Black, but with the same Star Wars like persona as the rebels, leading the good side to victory. I think he will be a perfect supporting character for Will Smith and the two would work well together.

Love Interest : Jessica AlbaBesides being constantly polled as one of the sexiest women in acting, she has managed to pull of age ranges from 18 in Sin City to mid 30s in other films. She is a very attractive actress and so will obviously appeal to a male audience but is also a very talented actress. After being in the Fantastic 4 films and Sin City it is also obvious that she has played this sort of role before and will therefore be well suited to this role, being flexible to many different personas. I also think that she will contrast well with Will Smith and the two will create a good romantic interest. Also having worked with Bruce Willis on Sin City the two have a good on screen connection.

Toad like enemy : Owen WilsonAs soon as I saw this character I was reminded of the character Toad from the X-Men comics and films. He is a witty character and brings comic relief to serious situations. Therefore I think Owen Wilson will be great for the role. He hosts a massive list of past comedies that he has starred in but has equally proved he can be semi-serious. He will be a good contrast to all the other characters and actors who are all quite serious in their careers and he will bring some good humour to the film. Also I'd love to see him looking green and toad like!

FDA notes

Release of a film

• What the movie is
• Marketability : who it is going to appeal to
• Develop a campaign that appeals to the audience
• How much money spent making it?
• What can the movie take in the UK box office?
• Working with 3rd party promotions
• Publicity
• Talent of the film, will they travel to UK for interviews?
• Will their be a premier?
• What type of media, TV, posters, newspapers etc?

Positioning & Audiences

• Define your audience
• Does film have a specific genre?
• Speak to a certain age group?
• Who directed the film?
• Actors in the film, do they have fans?

Target Audience

• Identify target audience for smaller films
• Past comparisons
• Research data
• How frequent, sex, where do they watch the film, etc?
• Pinpoint target audience
• Audience will view advertising in a certain place
• Place adverts where your target audience will see them, e.g TV
• Different age groups targeted differently

Competition

• Film distribution is about competition
• Stand above others to make your film noticed
• Holidays, weather, audience patterns
• E.g. Not as much TV in July/August because of weather so advertise with posters

P&A budget

• Costs of film prints
• Technical elements
• Shipping
• Advertising costs
• Designing posters, press ads, TV spots, trailers etc
• How best to use money

Word of mouth

• Depends on the movie
• If famous film people will spread word about it
• Work with media partners to spread the news about film
• Advance screening programs

Marketing Plan

• Place adverts throughout all types of media
• Free forms of advertising, through press
• Get support from directors and actors

Film Trailers

• Trailer is key to selling film
• Public's first exposure of the film
• Trailer has right impact and message
• Sound, graphics, concept of film

Link Between

• Convince exhibitors to take the film
• Difficult films, got to sell the film to the cinema's

Digital Marketing

• Viral marketing
• Creating something that because of it's nature it is sent on like a chain
• Most effective is word of mouth
• Telling other people that the film is good will convince them more than adverts

Test Screenings

• Research important and comes in to play at different times
• Can be done well in advance of actual production
• Visuals, trailers, meeting people's expectations
• Test screen films with a target audience, get questionnaires filled in
• Focus groups

Opening Weekend

• Very frustratingly important
• Way the cinema industry works
• Box office takings work on first 3 days
• Film has to have been successful in the weekend or will be pulled from the cinema

Piracy

• Piracy in UK has escalated over the past 5 years
• Piracy counts for 20% of all DVD sales in the UK
• British consumer believe they're getting a bargain
• Money from piracy funds other criminal elements
  

Sin City Shot Sequence Analysis

Shot 1

This shot is a close up but also a high angle shot. It shows a man clutching his ear and aiming a gun past the camera. He is looking up past the camera so we can safely presume there is someone out of our vision behind the camera. He is on a wooden floor which looks damp so suggests either a cellar or a dock. However, due to the lighting it is more likely a dock as it is a high key lighting shot. The fact that he is clutching his ear and looks in pain suggests that he may have been hit in the side of the head by something or even shot. From this shot the director has not given us much insight to what is going on but instead there is an element of mystery and tension as we do not know precisely what is going on.

Shot 2

This shot is a long shot at a high angle with mostly high key lighting but a few natural shadows left. We now see for certain that they are on a dock and see the man who is on the ground is also being aimed at by a character above him. The long coat suggests a typical detective or private police officer so we presume the man standing up is the good guy. We see blood on the floor next to the man which is coming from his arm which suggests it has been shot. The man's body language and facial expression adds to this as he looks in excruciating pain. From this shot we can fill in quite a bit of storyline in our head as an audience as it looks as though the man on the floor could be a criminal that the police man/detective has been sent to bring in but there has been a fight. The director has thought carefully about this as we have multiple ideas of what is going on.

Shot 3

This is a long shot at a normal angle. We see the same scene as before but from a different angle. We can see slightly more of the surroundings and it seems like they are in an old town which isn't very modernised. The whole area looks quite run down. We see a young girl up against a post in the corner. She is put there so that our attention is not immediately drawn to her but it adds to the mystery as we do not know whether the man standing up is an ally of hers or an enemy. Was she being defended or has he come to take her away. This is very clever from the director as the story has many different routes it can take depending on what happens next.

Shot 4

This shot is a long shot but also in its own sense a very long shot. It is at the same angle as shot 3 but has zoomed out a bit. The man on the floor is clearly still alive due to his body posture and language but now the man who was standing up looks in pain and is falling over. There is a new character behind him holding a gun. From this we can assume that the middle character has been shot by the man in the black cloak yet we don't know whether he is on the side of the man on the floor or not. The girl is now in the centre of the frame almost which suggest she has been thrown in the middle of this whole situation. This shot suggests another plot as the man in black could be there to protect her while the other two were fighting over her, or the man in the middle could be saving her while being ganged up on, or thirdly the man on the floor and the man in black could together be saving the girl from the man in the middle. This is a cleverly thought out sequence as each frame adds a new character creating more and more mystery for the audience as we do not know the back story behind the shots.

Shot 5

This shot is a close up. The lighting has still remained high key throughout so that all details are clear. This is the first time we see the girl's face and we see that she is crying and looking downwards at the floor. Behind her we can see that there is rope on the post suggesting that she may have been tied to it. The fact that she is looking down in relation to the sequence tells us that she could be crying over the man in the long coat who was just shot, or over the man who was originally on the floor, or out of horror at all that is happening around her. Yet again the director has used the fact that we do not know the situation and character's well to help us come up with many answers in our head leaving us to decide for ourselves whether or not they are right.

Shot 6

This shot is a long shot at a normal angle but with a vanishing point (meaning that everything is angling towards a certain point so that certain things are more in the foreground than others). The shot uses the rule of thirds well to draw our attention to the centre. We see that the middle man has now walked to the edge of the dock. He still looks in pain and is holding his chest suggesting either a pain in his heart or that he has been shot (which we presume from shot 4). The man on the ground still is lying there having not done much in the sequence. The little girl is now looking up at the man in black either out of fear or because he has saved her. It seems that the man in black is talking to the man holding his chest as he is looking towards him. In the sequence the director would probably start to reveal everyone's roles in the scene at this point as the action seems to have come to a halt and dialogue has replaced it.

Conclusion

This sequence works very well as the first four frames are used to introduce the character's in the scene and let us decide what we believe to be going on and the final two shots are used to try and clue us in more to the actual plot line. The sequence also starts close up and slowly zooms out as it is revealing more. The whole shot is at night time but is very well lit so we have an element of secrecy but at the same time can see what is going on and have a clear analysis of the set and characters.