JI: Evaluation 1

At the beginning of our film opening process we had to decide on the genre of our film, and we came to the selection of a boxing/thriller, where we could use typical conventions of other similar film openings which we were going to technically decompose.

We wanted to use the normal, recognizable conventions so the audience could gain a good understanding of what we were trying to achieve, and relate to. This meant iconography was vital when planning our opening to achieve this.




During the beginning we both looked and films in the sport/thriller genre and technically analysed them. I looked at “Million Dollar Baby” (Eastwood 2004), “Raging Bull” (Scorsese 1980) and the training scene from “Rocky 6” (Stallone 2006). During the analysis of these films I established some main conventions which were predominately used such as;

• The Rocky film portrayed a montage training scene between the two fighters included; emphasizing the different conditions each one is situated with one boxer training within an urban location, which is something we used to gain that style. Also we used the montage to allow the audience to feel the realization of the intense training which is involved and the time process it needs.












Here are some shots from both our training montage in comparison to the montage scene in “Rocky 6”. As you can see there are some real similarities within the training, so this especially helped us to make sure we included the key conventions and include the correct mise-en-scene.
















• In “Raging Bull” the non-digetic music used throughout the opening scene really emphasized the beauty of boxing, and portrays the sport as an art not a war, with the music being quite a slow tempo and a major key. The music is very soothing but at the same time still entices the viewer to concentrate on the hooded figure in the centre of the ring. We used this convention within our opening near the end to add a gold title against the black and white footage which we felt was effective as our film was called “Golden Boy” along with the figure of our main character in slow motion to emphasize that beauty.















We used the similar style as “Raging Bull” here and this is where we first got the idea for having the footage in black and white as we felt it gave it a rich, authentic feel. Also we felt the costume was also appropriate with the hidden identification making it have more suspense. The shot with the ropes in main focus, however with the boxer in the background is very effective I feel as it emphasizes the conventions of the sport, and the sense of it all happens inside the ring.

• When analysing “Million Dollar Baby” I saw the mise-en-scene of the boxing equipment clearly situates the audience within a gym, along with the casual, plain costumes of the characters, showing their dressed for training. We felt the old school location portrayed in that would be ideal for our film opening, especially along side the black and white footage. We went on a location recce to Sevenoaks Amateur Boxing Club, and straight away we realized this was an ideal location.





The main plot of our film was:

• A young character playing a boxer is working his way up through the levels of amateur boxing and soon fins himself one of the most notorious boxers in the country.
  




• His dad is his inspirational figure within his life, being a boxer himself.
  




• His dad tries to re-live his life through his son.
  




• The boy reaches 16 and the dad’s past criminal life comes back to haunt him and he gets brutally murdered. The boy doesn’t take the hard hit too well and finds himself in major depression.
  




• He knows he must fight through and do what his dad wanted for him and continue on boxing, and be the best.
  




• Like other films of this genre they have a storyline going on away from the sport involved to make the film more interesting and something to think about and engage into.
  




• Also the audience engages into an emotional event within a film like his dad’s death, and with it being established at the beginning it allows the audience to go through his battle along side with him, and support him.
  

Key features to our opening were:

• The voice over we used all the way through to give the audience a greater understanding, and a slight insight into the main protagonist’s mind. We used a cockney type accent to try and establish the location class of the character, and get a feel for an urban type location. I feel it worked really well and was a main point into the audience’s engagement of the opening. It brings a philosophy to the sport and creates that sense of beauty towards it with our soundtrack used.
  




• The soundtrack helped to create a build up of euphoria in our opening to give the audience an insight into what is going to happen afterwards with the uplifting tempo major key.

With our editing we wanted to make it:

• A fast watch, to gain the sense of the sport and give the audience a feel for how it is really like.
  




• Fast edits and transitions through the montage scene gave our opening the quick pace we wanted which was emphasized by the non-digetic soundtrack.
  




• POV shots to add an extra element of involvement for the audience and position them through the boxer’s character.

So when considering and analysing the styles and conventions of our film opening, we used a great deal of iconic styles used in similar genres we looked at through our research, such as our training montage, plot, costume and location. Generally it is fairly typical of the usual conventions to a sport/thriller film, with the euphoria being created through the soundtrack and fast tempo within the shots to make it feel a fast packed, interesting watch.