Preproduction: Exposition of Film " Trust Fall"

 Introduction

In this post, the exposition of our film's structure is more clearly defined. The structure in this section takes reference from the previous blog post's "Save the Cat Beat Sheet Narrative Structure," uses a beat structure, which is commonly used in the film industry to organize thoughts and ideas about a film in sections. Therefore, Peyton P structured and annotated information our team collectively agreed on in class today, and used that information to categorized into "Save the Cat's" example of a film industry narrative structure. Below is a chart, where information about our film's hook, opening image, and theme was stated in the form of  "Save the Cat Beat Sheet Narrative Structure."

Beat 1- Opening Image: Our film would start with an upbeat, catchy song that juxtaposes what is shown in our beginning image. To further explain, we would show Christine picking flowers in a field chanting “she loves me, she loves me not,” or showing her walking up in her room filled with images and love poems of Mercedes. For extra drama, we could paste on or wrap a doll of plushie with Mercedes face plastered onto it, in which Christine would wake up next to, before checking her laptop to watch videos of Mercedes that she captured while following her.
Beat 2: Theme-stated	Mise-en-Scene  Dialogue: The scene begins with Merlene, (Mercedes’ mother) and Cherie, (Christine’s mother) having a conversation about their own daughters. One of the mothers introduces the idea of Mercedes and Christine becoming friends with each other.   (This conversation led Christine to get to know Mercedes and become fully infatuated with her.)  Our theme of being weary in certain surroundings or companies, mental health awareness, and taking heed to warning signs/ red flags was established all throughout our film. More specifically, an example of vigilance in our film could be established by our main character, Mercedes, going through a series of scenes on different days where she is being consistently watched and followed by Christine no matter where she goes, and by Christine always attempting or making excuses to be near her.    Dialogue: Another way to start the scene is a visual of Christine sitting in a field of beautiful flowers. She has a flower in one of her hands, and she starts to pick each individual petal off the flower, as she chants “She loves me. She loves me not.”
Beat 3: Set-Up	A set up we could use is through constant warnings given by characters in the film, a teacher or friend of Mercedes warning her about Chrstine, or through (the previous step’s suggestion), we would show Mercedes leaving the bathroom and regularly continuing her day, while being unconcerned about Christine, and as the camera does a tracking movement of her walking in the hall, something unexpected or bizarre could occur, such as her or the person who warned her about Christine ending up kidnapped.
The Hook	Our hook that we have planned is one recommended by our instructor, which is to display Christine picking petals from a flower, whilst sitting in a bright outdoor space, while chanting and humming, “she loves me, she loves me not, she better love me!” As she picks the final petal, she would stare intensely and psychotically at the camera (in an extreme close-up shot, shallow focus), and say sternly “she better love me!” If this plan does not come into fruition, our group intends to similarly match the tone of that unsettling, uncertain tone by filming an equally disturbing clip of Christine such as showing Christine in her picture-plastered room or humming a love song in silence while drawing Mercedes.

Preproduction: Save the Cat's Beat Sheet Structure

 Introduction

During our production's teams research process from previous blog posts analyzing the 2022 horror, dramedy "White Noise," we learned that this step in the planning process of a film is crucial, and understanding key terms in this process will help our group to efficiently organize, and structure our ideas and film information in a clear, cohesive way that would organically flow when we are ready to record our film footage. We referenced a video linked in the bibliography of this post, and we use it as it was presented to us by our instructor in class to take note of when doing this task. Ultimately, completing this task was simple, straight-forward, and helped us in the long run as it helped for our ideas to remain in a comprehensive, structures order that we easily could follow. Below, our group used the "White Noise" film opening and analyzed its structure, in order to use as reference to remember how to structure our film. 

Define each beat by describing the plot points of the film opening.

Beat 1: The Opening Image  The film’s opening of white noise began with Jack Gladney’s Suburban, an upper middle-class family staring blankly at a grocery store in front of them, before entering. Upon going inside, they were met with random dances amongst shoppers around them, which caused them to dance, too.

Beat 2: Theme-stated  A reoccurring theme that “White Noise,” makes is stressing the overstimulating, repetitive, yet unpredictable state of the world, and this film captures the feeling of uncertainty through the spontaneous motions of the film’s characters.

Beat 3: Set-Up  The main character, Jack Gladney is shown in full focus after nearly a full minute into the opening, as the Gladney family walked towards the checkout line, after dancing simultaneously. At (0:46-0:52), Jack Gladney is shown wrapping his arms around his wife’s shoulders and smiling and shows his comfort and unawareness/ disassociation to the world around him, or that he masks his internal emotions, as he frequently switches from blank expressions to giddy grins instantly throughout the film opening.

The Hook  The exaggerated spontaneous dance moves, the catchy melody of “New Body Rhumba” (the song playing in the beginning sequence), the dramatic shopping experience all juxtapose the film’s message about the overwhelming, uncertain reality of daily life, which is one that resonates universally across most audiences, regardless of their backgrounds.

Sources:

-www.youtube.com. (n.d.). Story Structure Explained — Avengers Infinity War vs Save the Cat’s Beat Sheet (Is Thanos the Hero?). [online] Available at: https://youtu.be/BDIayz-hyKk?feature=shared [Accessed 7 Apr. 2024].

‌-www.youtube.com. (n.d.). White Noise | Official Clip | Netflix. [online] Available at: https://youtu.be/nJblPY5hVHI?feature=shared [Accessed 7 Apr. 2024].

Preproduction: Defining the Setting

Location (Where?)	Time Period (When)?	Landscape (Indoor/outdoor)	Tone		Social Economical Status, governing principles of the place and culture
The general setting of the world is at Piper High.	The film is set in the present.	This film mostly takes place inside Piper High school. But there will be some scenes that are off campus (i.e. Mercedes’ home)	Tense, Suspenseful, Unnerving		Urban, lower middle class, and American culture
Some Locations in our film are:  Mercedes’ House  On Piper High’s campus. This includes:  Outside the school’s buildings, in school hallways, the bathroom, and the cafeteria   A dark room in Christine’s home
Number of Locations	Location (Where?)	Landscape (Indoor/outdoor)	Time of Day and  Tone		Lighting Source	Explanation
8	Mercedes’ House	Indoors	Daytime  Unsuspecting, nice atmosphere		The lights inside of her house	At Mercedes’ House, Merlene and Christine are conversating about their daughters Mercedes and Christine. They introduce the idea of the two girls becoming friends, since they are close in age, and because they attend the same school. With this scene, the audience does not suspect anything wrong to happen later in the opening.
	On the way to school	Outdoors	Daytime    Awkward, unexpecting,		The Sun	Mercedes is seen walking to school, when suddenly she bumps into Christine and drops her class schedule. Christine introduces herself and exclaims “Wow, we have the same math class! Can’t wait to see you then.” Mercedes thinks it’s a weird thing to say but doesn’t think much of it.
	Inside the school’s counselor's office	Indoors	Daytime    Intense, Shocking		Ceiling lights inside the office	In the next scene, the audience finds out that what Christine previously said was a lie, because Christine is shown at the school counselor’s office asking for her original math class to be switched to the math class Mercedes has.
	In School hallways	Indoors	Daytime	Unusual, abnormal  Lights inside the hallways, unsettling tone		In the next few scenes, you can see Christine actively stalking Mercedes in random places. She keeps popping up wherever Mercedes is, and Mercedes has finally noticed this.
	Bathroom	Indoors	Daytime	Creepy    Lights inside the bathroom		In this scene, Mercedes’ and her best friend, Lizzy are chatting in the school bathroom. The audience gets to view Christine stalking Mercedes secretly. Christine says, “Who’s this?” to Mercedes, because she doesn’t know that Lizzy is her best friend, so she’s jealous.
	Cafeteria	Indoors	Daytime	Suspenseful    Lights in the school cafeteria		Mercedes is finally done with Christine stalking her everywhere. She finally confronts her, telling her “Leave me alone you creep! I don’t want to be your friend.” Christine does not take this confrontation very well.
	A dark room in Christine’s House	Indoors	Daytime	Tense    There’s very little light, so the lighting is very dim (it comes from her room’s lights)		After Mercedes’ confrontation, Christine is very irritated and upset. She rushes into this dark room in her house, covered in pictures of Mercedes. She takes a second to think about her next move before coming up with the “perfect” idea, mind controlling her.