When titles and names appear in comedy films

To gain understanding of when titles and names appear in comedy films I watched the opening credits for Superbad (2007).

*Production company; though this is the same with every film genre.

*Title of the movie - the title isn't glamorous and like most other comedy films it fits in with the frame instead having its own one.

*Followed by the actor's names starting with the main characters to the little ones. This is usually what happens in most other genres though not always the case.

*Followed by whom casted the film.

*Followed by the costume designer name.

*Followed by the co-producer name.

*Followed by music supervisor name. This may be a coincidence but the music has a funky little part as this name appears. This is either planned or ironic as the title/name is linked to music.

*Followed by who did the music. This funky part of music continues for this and as the name vanishes the music turns back to its previous state.

*Followed by the editor’s name.

*Follower by the production designer name.

*Followed by the directory of photography name.

*Followed by the executive producer’s names.

*Followed by the producers' names.

*Followed by the writers' names.

*And finally followed by the director’s name; though this is the same with every other genre like the titles.

Besides learning the order to put the titles and names during our opening, I also learnt that you can change things such as images on screen or music to fit with the titles like Superbad have done in their opening for the music crew.

Film Opening Final Storyboard

Today we created our final storyboard and script. We estimated the time to be around one and an half minutes. We had many discussions about what order the scenes should be placed in within the script and storyboard. However, we now feel it is the best it could be. We asked for feedback from other groups, in which we receive no criticism. However, our teacher queried if the title should appear earlier on in the opening. The choices for the titles introduction is when the boys close the doors of their homes when leaving for school. Or when they meet up and the camera tilts to the sky revealing the title. We decided to stick to our initial idea but end the clip after the titles. Previously after the titles we intended to have a few more seconds of our geeks getting harassed by bullies. However, this would have moved on from the film opening; a fault we are being careful to avoid.

Film opening Rough Storyboard

Today we started planning our storyboard for the final plot of our film. In a twenty five word film brief I would describe the film by saying 'Three geeks love the same popular girl, creating a competition who can bed her first. However, the girl turns out to geekier than all three combined.'

 In the opening we wanted the audience to ask questions about all three geeks regarding their identity. With the girl we wanted the audience to straight away be aware she’s a secret geek camouflaged as a popular girl. So we want to start the opening in the girl’s room as the alarm clock rings '07.00' to wake her for school. We then will vary shots from all four characters of them getting ready for school allowing the audience to be fed an enigma code of what each character is like. We plan the location of the girl’s room to be very pink or purple looking cool and when she opens draws for socks you see something geeky such as a comic book allowing the viewer to understand both sides of her personality, we won’t just show this geeky side through her draws but through many other methods throughout her room each time the nerdy prop hidden away.

We have already created character profiles and have our presumed final plan wrote down, throughout the next few lessons we will tweak the final plan through our storyboard.

Auidence feedback

The results of my audience expectation for comedy genre questionnaires included all ages, however, we mainly focuses on 16-24 year old people as they are the target audience we are aiming our film towards. The feedback told us that most of the audience don't want to think about what their watching but instead just enjoy the film. This could be seen as a demand for the Hypodermic Needle theory. It also tells us that many want jokes or catchphrases they can share with their friends by the end of the film. Props they expect to be included vary from drugs, alcohol and sex related objects such as condoms.These results also show that the characters should not be too serious, but instead very laid back and easy going so the viewers can relax and feel comfortable watching the film.

Film Opening Final Idea

Today we thought of our final idea for our comedy film and its opening. Instead or writing scene to scene i have created a short film brief 'Three collage geeks all like the same popular girl, however, the popular girl turns out to be secretly as geeky as all three boys combined. But who will win her love?' Our opening will go alongside some non diegetic rocky fun music and will show all three lads getting ready for a day at school. We have created all three boys in a fare amount of details which gave us ideas of what they shall wear and also what props their rooms will include. The opening will continue with all three boys arriving at school when suddenly a bully throws a sandwich at one of their heads, the girl they all like is hugging the bully laughing at the boys misfortune. Then our opening will end.

Film opening initial idea

           To help us create an initial idea for our film opening we used jelly babies and sticky notes to make a brief rough idea. Our idea starts with a young sexy woman walking down the street to some non diegetic saucy rock music.This is shown by a tracking shot or a crab shot starting with a tilt from feet to head, showing off her figure.                                                           

The woman approches three geeks, shown by an over the shoulder shot from their point of view. They get excited as she approches them just for her to flick her hair and carry on walking past.

Finally, the woman reaches a handsome popular man and they kiss, the geeks eyes dont leave the woman as the camera shows close ups of the trio to help the auidence understand and gain better knowledge of their characters. The scene ends with the diegetic sound of one geek saying 'fuck'.

03/02/2011

Today our group had the task of selecting a genre for our film opening. The sci-fi genre was swiftly ruled out as the task of finding a location that looks sci-fi in which we would have permission to film would have been too hard to achieve. We also ruled out the action genre as finding suitable props that look realistic would also be a near impossible task without spending lots of money; we do not have a budget. Horror, romance and drama genres were also ruled out simply due to the fact they did not appeal to us. After several minute of debate we narrowed it done to the genres psychological thriller and comedy. Psychological thriller was very appealing however, the members of my group me included all favour the idea of creating a comedy opening. Despite not settling the issue what audience is this opening going to be aimed for we have confirmed that we are defiantly creating a comedy opening.