My CCR

My Creative Critical Reflection

Final Project

The final cut of our film opening "The Leroux's"

Final Thoughts

As I sit in Panera Bread typing my last real blog post right now, I cant help but reminisce on the great  adventure that this project was.

From crazy film ideas back and forth between Alex and I to seven hours of shooting on our day off at my house, I must say I am grateful for the memories and so proud of all of our hard work. I believe in the saying "you get what you put in" and that is exactly what we did. We worked our butt's off filming, creating, and editing and the results we got are truly more than satisfying.

Alex loaded all of our footage onto a USB so he can spend his Spring Break creating the complete Leroux's film. (it will definitely be longer than two minutes..haha) He's also going to compile all of the hilarious bloopers we have into a short video to look back on whenever we need a laugh. Im so excited to see the potential short independent film he will create! Hey, maybe I'll post it here if my readers are still begging me for content three months from now.

Next Tuesday, the final due date, Alex has been so kind to offer to submit both of our projects since I will be out of the country and with little to no computer access. Today, is actually the day I leave and I am trying to calm my nerves with a strawberry banana smoothie, warm bagel, and some therapeutic blog writing. For those of you that don't know, I hate flying! It is my absolute worst fear and just thinking about having to be confined in the plane for 8 hours soon makes my entire body cringe.

Anyways, to my readers, it's time I say goodbye and thank you all for being a part of this wild, sometimes stressful, but mostly fun, journey.

-L

Youtube Stars

Last night I fixed the background noise on some of the scenes to finalize our film. I saved it and emailed it back to Alex.


And just like that, our film is finally done and uploaded to Youtube! You can find it under "The Leroux's" or through our name "Lara and Alex".


Disclaimer: on Youtube it says our film is 2:01 but I can guarantee you it is 2 minutes on iMovie.


Go check it out and let me know what you guys think!
-L

CCR Mode

Last night I stayed up late finishing the critical reflection. (Again mine needs to be done by Wednesday because I will be in Spain for Spring Break!) I still am not sure whether I'm going to do a podcast or video but that will be all figured out soon. Once that is done, I will post my final CCR. Stay tuned,
-L

Here is my final critical reflection script:

Hi everyone! Today I will be talking about my film opening titled The Leroux’s. The film falls under the Crime genre and the Film Noir sub-genre. Film noir is a stylistic 1930’s/40’s crime genre characterized by stark lighting effects and the common plot of a murder investigation. The Leroux’s is set in the 1940’s with two main characters named Adele Leroux and Detective Briggs. I play Adele and my partner Alex Medina plays the Detective. The story follows the investigation of Adele’s deceased husband. Detective Briggs is responsible for the case and places Adele as the leading suspect whom he questions. Adele is uninterested and emotionless throughout the questioning which infers the idea that she may have something to do with her husband’s death. The ending is both ominous and suspenseful as Detective Briggs leaves Adele’s home and the final shot focuses in on her smile and quick wink just before she shuts the front door.  

The Leroux’s challenges the conventions of a typical old fashioned crime film in which the victim is a helpless female and the criminal or murderer is a dominant male. In our film, the roles are reversed. Adele Leroux is the killer and displays a high level of confidence throughout the film, while Detective Briggs is somewhat subordinate as he attempts to investigate the case. We thought it would be unique to create the film in this way because typically, crime or suspenseful films revolve around the so called damsel in distress.

Our film was inspired by director Wes Anderson’s common stylistic approach. His films are quirky and weird in their own odd way. Anderson has a distinct style that is prevalent in all of his films, a style that is recognizable from the first shot of the movie. We took heavy inspiration from him in terms of his camera placement.  He uses symmetrical framing to engage the audience in the characters and the characters only. His shots, especially in conversations, place the characters in the center of the frame, drawing all focus to them and their immediate surroundings.  Since our opening has a conversation at the forefront, we wanted to make our shots lined up perfectly symmetrical to give that feeling and personality of Anderson’s films.

Because of the era we wanted to portray in our film, we chose specific costumes for the characters accordingly. Our film is set in the 1930’s/40’s, so this tasked us with the problem of finding a wardrobe for our characters that matched the era. Luckily, my mother had many vintage pieces in her wardrobe including clothing and jewelry that I was able to borrow. My character, Adele Leroux, is a woman of high class during this time period, so I made sure to incorporate key pieces like pearls, heels, and leather gloves to convey the typical rich 1930’s female. Alex’s outfit had to portray a detective from the era. Typically that meant, a long trench coat and a fedora as the two main tropes of the typical detective outfit. Fortunately, Alex was able to find the whole outfit for just under $15 at Goodwill and Burlington Coat Factory.

My house was the set for the movie, we used my parents bedroom/office, the dining room and my front porch. For the opening credits, which were filmed on the office desk, we shined two lamps on either side of the center image to brighten the shot. We cut out the letters for the credits ourselves from magazines because it contributed to the crime genre, as if the mismatched letters were put together by the detective. We had to place the letters individually each time for each shot, which was the first struggle we faced while filming. Also, we did not have a tripod for the Nikon camera we were using, so that called for intense improvisation on our part. We took about ten to twelve textbooks and stacked them high on my dining room table. We were able to successfully place the camera on the books and add or remove any to raise or lower the shot.

The entire editing process took place with the iMovie software on my Mac laptop. iMovie is a simple to use editing program that Alex and I are familiar with from using on past projects, so we agreed it would be the best tool to use for the film. Apart from video edits, iMovie contains many filters to choose from that can be placed on each clip. We went with the “old world” filter because of its dark shadows and old fashioned look, similar to the film noir style.

I would first submit this film to an independent film festival like Sundance Film Festival or South by Southwest to capture the attention of a smaller audience which will promote the film to a much larger audience in the long run. If it is picked up by a distributor at a festival, that would allow us to commercialize the film at Movie theaters across the country.

This film opening project has truthfully, improved my production skills tremendously. I previously never created a film and the entire process of this project taught me so many valuable film techniques and editing skills that I will cherish for a long time. The majority of this lessons learned I must thank my amazing partner Alex for. Without him, none of this would have been possible.

Until then,

Thank you for watching!

Weekly Update

First off, HAPPY BIRTHDAY to Alex!!! He is 18 today.

This week, Alex and I spent each day editing our film. We ran through a big struggle in the last couple of days because we had more footage than we had time (the film must be a maximum of two minutes) and we felt that every scene/shot was so crucial to the whole story! When we finally got to the 2 minute mark we still had an ending shot we wanted to put in to tie the entire scene together. The film ended after a response I had to Alex who was interviewing me and it just felt like it stopped in the middle of such an important part.

Luckily, today I kept messing with the film on iMovie and I was able to make it exactly 2 minutes with the ending shots we wanted! How? I went through every single shot and cut any unnecessary pauses or camera lingering that we had and miraculously, created a two minute film opening. I'm going to bring my laptop next class to show Alex the finished product and see if we need to make any final tweaks/changes to it.

Up next, the Critical Reflection!

Whew!
-L

A Finishing Touch

Throughout the editing process, I knew I really wanted to put some type of filter onto the film to emphasize the time period (30's/40's) as well as to add a feeling of suspense.

At first, we considered to make it a black and white film since that is typical of the film noir genre. But, we agreed that the colors in each shot were crucial to the wealth and feeling we wanted to portray.

We settled on the "Old World" filter provided by our cooperative partner iMovie. It has dark shades in it but doesn't totally take away from the color in the shots, so it works perfectly.

Here's a sneak peak! ;)
-L

A Change in 'la Musique'

As usual, Alex and I kept searching around the "Bensound" website for more songs to see if we could find an even better piece of music for the opening credits.

And of course, we did! While going through the Jazz section again, we listened to every single song and came upon this one below, called "Jazz comedy". The guitar in it has a pace that flows so well with the timing of the credits and even when Alex swipes away the letters. (you will see this soon)
So, here is the final music for the opening and I will keep you posted if anything changes again!
-L

Music, Música, Musique

Alex and I spent all class this week editing our film. We had every crucial shot together and needed to figure out a perfect song for the opening credits. Since our film is based in the 1930's/40's, we wanted an old classic jazzy sound. We thought it would be unique to have an upbeat happy song playing in the beginning while the underlying plot is suspenseful revolving around a missing person's case. I guess you could call this a juxtaposition!

We googled "royalty free music" because again, with our short turn around time, we really don't have the patience to contact a company and try to get permission to use their music. We found a cool website called "Bensound" which has all types of instrumental songs for free! So, we searched around their "jazz" section and found the song below, called "jazzy frenchy". We thought it fit the opening perfectly so we went ahead and downloaded it to my computer and edited it in! I will keep you updated.
-L

Weekly Update

So far, the whole process of the film portfolio has gone very smoothly. I am so glad I have a cooperative and creative partner like Alex that has made every step of the way so much better!

This week, we finalized the script and story board so we could film every shot over the weekend. We went ahead of schedule and shot the entire film all day friday on our day off instead of breaking it up in two days. This was exhausting but well worth the work. Now we have all of the footage loaded onto my laptop and synced into imovie so we can spend the rest of our class periods editing, editing, and editing some more!

As I mentioned before, Alex and I unfortunately have a smaller time frame to finish our portfolios because I will be traveling for Spring Break. So, we have given ourselves a personal deadline and agreed that we need to submit our final film portfolio by April 6th. (three days before the actual due date). Until then, we will be working diligently on it! I will post more updates soon.

If you need me, I'll be behind my computer screen.
-L

And....Action!

Whew! Acting and directing is exhausting. Alex and I shot the entire film opening from 9:30am-4:00 pm today at my house.
I woke up pretty early around 7:30 to finalize my costume (from my mom's closet), charge/set up the camera, and organize the downstairs of my house. Alex shopped at Goodwill for his costume and found an awesome 'detective' trench coat for five bucks! I quickly did a low tight ponytail, natural but bold makeup, and threw on some pearls. (also my mother's)

Alex came over shortly after I was finally ready and we began a long day of shooting.
We decided to first shoot the opening credits (the magazine letters we cut out) on my dad's office desk. Boy, was this a struggle! Any movement made the tiny words go flying and made us set it up all over again. This took a lot of patience but we were able to do it. I used two bright lamps on either side of the desk to shine on the letters as we shot them from above. Once we were done with that we headed downstairs to film the rest of the scenes in my dining room and front door area.

We had a tripod but were missing the important piece that connects the camera to it, so we improvised. I took a huge stack of old yearbooks and piled them onto the dining room table to place the camera on, and it worked great! All we had to do was raise and lower the camera by adding or removing books and our shots were pretty steady.
The whole process took longer than we expected it to, but we realized that that is the process of creating a great film. All of our creative ideas took time and effort to execute but with our determination we were able to do it! Also, the hilarious bloopers are well worth it in the end.
-L

Ready for Our Close Ups

As I mentioned before, Alex and I are going for the 30s/40s style in our film opening. Of course, that means costumes are a key factor in representing that era. I decided to go through my mom's closet because she always has random vintage pieces that I knew could work for my character, Ms. Leroux. After scouring the deep ends of her wardrobe I found a black mid length dress with ruffles on the neckline and black suede pumps. I also took a pair of black leather gloves and a fringy shawl to complete the look. The day of shooting I needed accessories so again, I went through my mom's things, (sorry mom if you're reading this) and I took a pearl bracelet, necklace, and earrings. It looked perfect with the outfit! The goal was to make myself look at least fifteen years older than I am and I think I accomplished just that.

Alex is playing a detective so I suggested he find a specific coat and hat to portray his character, Jeremy Briggs. He shopped at Goodwill and found an awesome grey trench coat with buttons and a thick collar for just five bucks! You can't beat that. He then went to Burlington Coat factory and got a typical detective fedora hat. I must say, he and I really hit the nail in the head with our costumes and we can't wait to film!
-L

Schedule

Scheduling is definitely the most stressful part for two reasons: 1. I have a generally busy schedule as it is between school, work, and dance and 2. I have one less week to complete the film because I am going out of town for Spring Break.

Thankfully, Alex and I worked it out. Next Friday we have no school so we are going to take advantage of that and film for 4 hours. That Saturday we are also going to film for another four hours and finish up any final details. Our goal is to finish shooting in that one weekend so we can spend the next weeks editing and updating our blogs. -L


Here are the exact dates and times of our film schedule:

• Friday-      March 24th 9 am - 1 pm

• Saturday-  March 25th 10 am- 2 pm 

location, location, location

The title of this post sounds a little like I'm a house hunter on HGTV but that's okay because it is catchy and is relevant to our decision making for the film!

So, Alex and I had a tough time figuring out where exactly we wanted to shoot our film. We needed a specific space with symmetrical lines and a certain aesthetic. Since our genre is film noir, the typical aesthetic is old fashioned and classic black and white, so we had to come up with a place that encompassed that idea. Also, in regards to symmetry, since we want to follow the Wes Anderson style, we needed a space that when shown in a wide shot, is for the most part symmetrical. 

We first decided to possibly film at Alex's house. He mentioned that his bedroom has two windows side by side and create a pretty symmetrical space. But, he has a bunk bed and computer in the way that we would have to take apart so we ended up deciding to figure out a new place to film. That is exactly when a lightbulb went off in my head and I realized that I have a formal symmetrical dining room in my house. There is a big window with paintings on either side of it and tall candles on the table with six chairs. I took a picture of the room and edited it to make it black and white and Alex and I agreed it was perfect for the film. The filter I used is actually called 'noir' which couldn't be more fitting!
-L

Storyboard!

In two class periods, Alex and I came up with the majority of scenes for our film opening. I sat with the paper and pen and decided to be the designated drawer while Alex described to me in detail what he imagined each scene would look like. We have a pretty good idea of how we want to go about filming each part so we did not draw out every single shot. Hope you enjoy what we have so far!
-L

Meet the Leroux's

Here is a rough draft of the script/screenplay for our film opening Alex and I came up with!

-Murder/Mystery

-Widow being interviewed

-Wes Anderson Two-Shot

-Opening with the case file and a detective is interviewing the victim’s family member(s)?

-French sounding name, detective mispronounces it, family member/Widow corrects him.

adds comedic value to the scene setting the tone for the film

Open on a black screen with Brady bunch music

Directed by: Alex Medina and Lara Finan

Written By: Alex Medina

Executive Producer: Lara Finan

Executive Producer: Alex Medina

Costume design: Lara Finan

Hair and Makeup: Lara Finan

The music stops abruptly interrupted by a file being slammed into the frame that reads “THE LEROUX’S” in big bold letters. The camera zooms in quickly on the file.

The file is pulled offscreen

Detective

Mrs. Leroux (pronouncing the x)

Mrs. Leroux

Leroux(Correct pronunciation)

Detective

Excuse me?

Mrs. Leroux

Its pronounced Leroux

Detective

Right, I’m sorry, Mrs. Leroux, Where did you last see your husband?

Mrs. Leroux

We were out one night. The night before the incident. Something came up and he had to leave. I never knew what for-- Well of course I know now. He just looked at his watch and left.

Detective

(Writing down on a pad and mumbling) looked at his watch and left. Ok Mrs. Leroux, was your husband known to deal with any shady characters. (air quotes on shady)

Mrs. Leroux

Shady characters? How do you mean?

Detective

You know like people that aren’t of the normal everyday citizen type.

Mrs. Leroux

My husband was a well respected man, he had no dealings with criminals if that’s what you're asking. *beat* Besides he was a pussy anyways he couldn’t handle being a criminal.

Detective

(Writes on notepad, mumbling) pussy anyways. Ok Mrs. Leroux we will contact you with any information regarding your husband's case. We will find the bastards that did this.

Mrs. Leroux

(sarcastically) Oh I hope you do

The detective signals the man behind the door and the door opens.

Guard

Right this way Mrs. Leroux (pronouncing the x)

Detective and Mrs. Leroux

It’s Leroux (correct pronunciation)

Mrs. Leroux looks back at the detective who smiles. Mrs. Leroux scoffs and walks out.

THE LEROUX’S

Research Time

        It is about that time to start my research on our film's genre; a crime drama (with comedic elements) specifically under the sub-genre of a film-noir. First and foremost, what exactly is a crime film? I found online (https://thescriptlab.com/screenplay/genre/crime) that a crime film is a genre that surrounds the action of a criminal mastermind, often revolving around his rise and fall. Some crime films tell a story, while others will follow the character in pursuit of the criminal. The criminal's character is typically male, middle aged and the victim is female, however these roles can be reversed which will be seen in my film opening. Also, it is typical for this genre to be mysterious, either through the plot or the characters themselves.

        Here are some examples of crime films:

• Fargo- A car salesman is in debt and orders two men to kidnap his wife to collect her ransom money
•  The Silence of the Lambs- An FBI agent forms a relationship with a serial killer to find another serial killer
• Reservoir Dogs- a group of professional criminals are brought together for a robbery that fails   

Within the crime genre, there are a few sub-genres that exist (which I will list and briefly explain below) however, my film opening falls under film-noir so I will focus my research more into that specific area. Here is where I found all of this information: http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/FilmNoir

• Film Noir: a stylistic 1940s and 50s crime genre that is characterized by a black and white visual style and stark lighting effects. The main character is typically a cynical hero and various flashbacks are used to explain the plot. Common plots include murder investigations, heists, and innocent men/woman wrongly accused of crime. Cigarette smoking is a common element of the mise-en-scene seen in these films as well, which is what Alex and I want to show. In addition, camera angles are often unique and unusual, heightening the viewers sense of unease, adding to the atmosphere. Finally, protagonists in film noir are often normal people who get involved in crime because of psychological or personal motivations, not social or circumstantial. Example: Sunset Boulevard

Other sub-genres of the crime genre!

• Neo-Noir: A modern film that takes on the characteristics of the film noir with modern updates in terms of visual and media elements. Themes are updated to fit with current society. Example: Sin City 
• Crime-Thriller: incorporates the suspenseful aspects of a thriller with a crime film plot. This sub-genre's plot centers on a serial killer, murderer, robbery, or manhunt. It is unique to crime films because the storyline focuses both on the criminal and protagonist. Example: Fugitive     

Buffam, Noelle. "Crime." The Script Lab. The Script Lab, n.d. Web. 18 Mar. 2017.

"Film Noir." TV Tropes. Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License, n.d. Web. 18 Mar. 2017.

Inspired by Mr. Anderson

       Yep, you guessed it, a major change has just happened! Alex sent me a document last night with a totally new idea for our film opening, and I loved it. Inspired by director Wes Anderson's iconic two shot films, Alex wrote up a short script for a crime film with some comedic elements. The opening scene consists only of a woman and male detective, so we agreed to each play those parts. That way, we don't have to rely on any actors/actresses to be available when we need them, making the process a whole lot smoother. Also, we have the resources more readily available to us for this type of film over my first idea.

       So now, is time to do some research. We are going to focus on Wes Anderson's common stylistic approach (symmetrical shots shown to the right) in his films and also conventions of crime/mystery films. We are currently bouncing off cool ideas which makes me super excited to start creating! Specifically, I came up with the idea of having the opening credits spelled out with mismatched magazine letters, which is typical of crime shows and movies. Alex came up with playing the Brady bunch instrumental theme song before the scene to contribute to the film's comedic and uplifting elements. 

      So far, we have really gotten the ball rolling on our project and if anything else changes I will make sure to let you know. Thanks for bearing with me.

-L 

And so it begins!

        This is the very start of a long and exciting journey ahead! My partner Alex and I have always wanted to do the film opening since we first started this class. We both know it will take a lot of time and hard work, but we are willing to do it because our personal area of strength falls under filmmaking and editing.
         Initially, we had no idea what our film should even be about, let alone the genre. So, we brainstormed for weeks until I finally pitched to Alex my idea; a boy and girl in love living on opposite sides of the world. Essentially, a romance film about a long distance relationship. This is something I've always wanted to create ever since I saw "Like Crazy", an independent movie where a British girl falls in love with her American classmate while studying in LA but must eventually go back home to London and leave him behind. That movie really tugged at my heart strings for two reasons: 1. Long distance relationships don't get enough screen time! 2. I am in a long distance relationship myself. Since most romantic films typically don't feature a couple living in different parts of the world, I really wanted to base my film opening on that idea.
         Alex also came up with a cool film idea shortly after that we considered. It was a drama surrounding the occurrences of a homeless man, something on the complete opposite side of the spectrum. We agreed that it would be difficult to find an actor and specific setting for that storyline, so we settled on the long distance romance film! If anything changes, I will keep you updated.
-L