For our media project we decided to do a movie around the sub-genre Boxing.
In terms of stereotypical characters and how social groups are shown, we have two dominant men which are boxers which does involve the stereotype of boxers being hard and having a rough personality although we have one boxer that is a lot meaner looking than the other, him being Russian in our film which we stereotyped Russian men that boxed to be scary and to be feared. There aren’t any women that have a dominant role in our film, we only use the women in our press conference scene, so in a way, we have men dominating women who follow the stereotype that men are dominant and women are passive. We have stereotyped class a bit in the boxers everyday where in the press conference where we have our Russian boxer that has come from a poor background wearing a lumberjack type jacket which shows that he is of a poor background and that he might have to do manual work to earn some extra money, it also shows that he comes from a foreign country as we associated attire like that with the Russian men with how we’ve seen the on films like Rocky.
I feel that our film would be a small-budget film that would be mostly shown at an art house as it wouldn’t cost as much to make as a film like Rocky and also that they have big-named actors and a storyline that you can tell it’s a big budget film where as ours we have it set in a room and a gym, and the storyline shows it is unlikely to be a big-budget film. I think that the film would be like to go into the cinema but only at an art house as the bigger cinemas would be unlikely to want to play a film like ours and we would like to have a good base for our film being shown, and that it would be released on Freeview TV viewing within 6 months of the cinema release meaning people can watch it and hopefully they could buy it on DVD the only disc release we will have as I don’t feel the movie will be popular enough to compete with big budget films on Blue Ray, I think it would be good if we can get legal downloads available for it too as it would all be revenue and people can find it on iTunes and online store like that. I don’t think our film would offer much in franchising or merchandising as it would be a small budget film so it would be pointless to bring out merchandise people wouldn’t be interested in. I feel a distributing company more likely to distribute our film would be Metrodome as they distribute small budget films and they are quiet successful in it.

As a group we came agreed that our film would be a 15 rated film as if it was a full film not a 2 minute opening then there would be inappropriate material for under 18’s to view as there will be links to prison and brawling in prison, quite a bit of swearing and violence of a nature that is inappropriate for under 16’s. I feel it wouldn’t be something we would want to bring onto the streets to young people so it would be best at a rated 15. I feel that the target audience for our film would be males in the age gap of 18 to 35 as they are more likely to be interested in this sort of film. I feel our film would be more like Undisputed than Rocky films as it as different storylines and more violence and obscene drama. And undisputed as a similar storyline to us in that there in a boxer convicted of an offence and sent to prison and trys to work his way back up again.
I feel that Undisputed would appeal to the same type of audience as ours as it is of a same nature.
I feel that our desired target audience cannot be attracted by our opening scene as there is no obscene language or behavior to show that we would like to attract males aged 18-35. More likely by our opening we will attract males aged 12 – 17. I feel that if we did the whole film, we would need to get into some obscene language very quickly as we would lose our target audience if not cos we wouldn’t keep them interested enough in the opening. This also is because of our camera shots and facial reactions, they seem too petty and not good enough to grab our attended audience but attract the lower age males that we wouldn’t like to attract to our movie.
We found out that during our filming we did some shooting for our building up to our press conference and the camera we used failed and we had done it for nothing so we learnt a lot about camera work, like checking it regularly to see if it is still working correctly. Other wise I feel we had no other interruptions by the camera but by ourselves either not being there or not having the correct wear on to shoot. We also had to re-film part of our press-conference to enhance the belief it is a real life press conference. We resolved this be re-filming and also filming in our own time after lessons to catch up, we feel also the camera we used was of a basic standard with the sound being not very good but the quality is decent and it was very easy to carry round.
We used Final Cut Pro on the Apple Mac’s to edit our film and we found it was harder than we thought to edit our film into sync correctly and to have everything there within 2 minutes. The effects we used most was the Fade in Fade out as it was the only effect we really needed to use.
For our music for the film we used the Copyright Free Cd’s provided by our media groups so we had an adequate choice to what we wanted to use and in the end found it very easy to choose music for our film. For our planning, we decided what genre our film was going to be and we had quite a few discussions that did turn out into arguments about what genre and what movie we was going to do as everyone in the group had their own ideas. From the preliminary we learnt that we had to plan things better and have back up actors and back up ideas in case we was unable to follow up on original ideas, although we learnt this, we didn’t put it into plan and we may have struggled doing this, and also I feel we struggled to get the grasp of this genre as a whole as it not one many good films have been made out of boxing genre, and it may have been easier to go with a genre where there is more knowledge and more ideas to be thrown around. I think after doing this we as a group are more confident with the equipment.
The things in our film that make it a boxing film is that we have a press conference which is usually associated with events and fight hype towards boxing fights. We used rocky to help us with this part of the film as it has had a press conference between rocky and Apollo creed. We also feel that the scene at the end of the film with the boxing bag also promotes it to be a boxing film, as you associate hitting a bag to be training for boxing matches.
I think that our opening is different to most boxing films as they do not have a press conference to promote the fight at the beginning of the film but introduce the main character so throughout the film we get to know what he’s thinking and feel the same as him.

www.bbfc.co.uk

Updated Script- Ian Uttley

INT. CORRIDOR TO PRESS CONFERENCE – DAY
Jermaine is walking down the towards a function room where a press conference is being held for an upcoming boxing match. He arrives to find his coach waiting nervously outside the door.

COACH HOWARD
(firmly)
Where the hell have you been?
Jermaine continues to walk towards the door as Coach Howard begins to walk along side him.

MIKE (quietly)
I got held up, sorry.

COACH HOWARD
Well yer late, you’ve got people waiting come on hurry up.
Coach Howard opens the door and walks through in to the press conference where the sound of reporters echo out the room, Jermaine follows him in.

INT. PRESS CONFERENCE-DAY
Coach Howard walks across the front of the hall toward a long table of which had been laid out in the front of the room and where Jermaine’s opponent and his coach are sitting.

COACH HOWARD
(as he is walking)
Hello ladies and Gentlemen, I’m sorry about the delay. I would like to begin by thanking you all for coming and thanking our opponents for coming as well and if we may begin asking questions thank you.
Coach Howard sits downs down and scans across the room and toward the opposing boxer.

REPORTER #1
Hi Jon Davidson Barnsley Times, Coach Howard I understand that Jermaine has recently been released from prison, how has this effected his training?

MIKE
Well prison was a stressful experience for me but now that I’m out I have a new strict training routine which i stick to every step of the way

REPORTER #2
Charlotte Taylor Sky sports news.This question is to, Vladimir Zhirkov. I understand that you were supposed to fight Jermaine before around a year and a half ago but he got sent to prison, how has this affected your opinion of him?


VLADIMIR ZHIRKOV
(Russian accent)
I think he is scum...and I shall crush him.

MIKE
What tha se.
VLADIMIR ZHIRKOV
You heard me
MIKE
Hows about yer sit darn before i sit yer darn

Vladimir and Mike lock in to a staring match as the scene ends.

INT. BOXING GYM-EVENING
Mike and coach enter in to the boxing gym and walk in to main area of the gym. Mike then sits down in a small chair and gets out his boxing gloves and puts them on. Mike then stands from his chair and walks to a punching bag and starts punching the bag with coach watching in a analytical fashion.

Questionnaire Review - By James Allen

after conducting our questionnaire into the public, we went throught the answers thorghly and these are the conclusions we made about our findings.

We found that the majority of people that answered yes to going to see a boxing movie at the cinema or to buy on dvd was between the ages of 16 and 35 and was male. We also found out that the majority of females in every age group said that they would not be interested in a boxing themed film. Although there was a couple of exeptions as some females between the ages of 17 to 21 said they would watch a boxing film.
We also found out that the majority of people that did our questionnaire, both male and female, would watch films on a regular basis or watch one every so often leaving only 2 or 3 that did our questionnaire to not watch films at all.
We also found out that the genres comedy, horror and action are the most popular with not many people stating that they like to watch sport movies. We feel that this is because there arn't many good sporting films apart from the Rocky movies or Goal which as come out in recent times.
Around 60% of people that took our quesrtionnaire said they would not go to watch small budget films at the cinema, and some of the reasons they gave for this was:
-That their local cinema rarely screens small budget films.
-They prefer to watch big budget films as they can afford to make their film good.
We also found that many reasons that make people go to watch certain movies are that they have to have a good, catching trailer and that big name actors draw them towards going to see the film. Other people that used the option 'other', said that the name of the film could make them go see a certain film. The option 'Company that produced it' was rarely clicked so we assume it was not important about what companys are associated with a movie.

Many people said that they would either would want to see RnB, HipHop/Rap style music or Rock in a boxing movie with the other option rarely used, but from that option we got some different answers whioch included the blues.
And we got around the same answers for our final question which was What would you associate with a boxing film? and we got mostly, fighting as the answer but some wrote, a dramtic turn of events, a goody and a baddy and some people wrote, a certain person in a gang or something becoming a fighter.

Questionnaire - By James Allen

The following is our questionnaire we created to find out the public's ideas about films in general, and about our specific genre for our film. Please note that there are no check boxes as the questions have been typed up from paper onto our blog so boxes wasn't available.

1. Are you male or female?
Male
Female

2. What age group are you?
Under 12's
13-16
17-21
22-35
36-50
Over 50

3. Do you watch films regularly?
yes
sometimes
not a lot
never

4. What genre is most appealing towards you?
comedy
action
thriller
horror
sport
other
if other, please state:

5. do you like watching small budget films?
yes
no
if no please state why:

6. What makes you want to go watch a certain movie?
big-name actors
the trailer and storyline
the director
the company producing it
other
if other please state:

7. Would you ever go see a boxing themed movie?
yes
maybe
no
if no , why?

8. what genre of music would you prefer or expect to see in this sort of movie?
rnb
dance
hip hop
rap
metal
rock
indie
drum n bass
other
if other please state:

9. Would you buy a movie like this on DVD?
yes
maybe
no
if no, please state why not?

10. What would you associate with a boxing film?

Editing Comments - Luke Green

Today we have been starting on creating the title sequence for our film, including one main title as well as credits for the cast during the film, these all fade in and out.

The main title serves as an introduction to the film, so that it doesn't start straight in the action with no lead up.

Whereas the individual character titles all fade in and out and go by the format 'Starring ??? As ???" we thought this went well, and we also continued sound editing to meet the deadline of friday.

Shooting Script-Ian Uttley

Shooting script-The redemption
Interior-Corridor-Daytime
SHOT 1 Long shot of doors with Mike running through them
SHOT 2 Medium long shot looking down the corridor with Mike running from right to left of shot running past the camera
SHOT 3 Long shot of Mike running towards the camera, the camera then pans slightly as he begins to go round the corner
SHOT 4 Low angle shot of Mike emerging from the corner and runs near but not over the camera
SHOT 5 Medium shot of Coach leaning against a wall, the camera quickly pans round as Mike comes in to shot pans back slightly to get both of them in to shot
SHOT 6 medium, backwards tracking shot of Coach and Mike walking towards the press conference
SHOT 7 Medium shot of coach and mike arriving at the door, shot from behind them
SHOT 8 reverse of shot 7 Small bit of dialogue
SHOT 9 Medium shot from behind them with coach beginning to open the door
Interior-Conference room-Daytime
SHOT 10 Medium shot of Coach and Mike entering the conference hall
SHOT 11 Establishing shot of conference room with the press seated with slight pan
SHOT 12 High angle shot of Coach and Mike walking toward table and Mike gets seated and Coach welcomes the journalists
SHOT 13 Medium shot of the table with Vladimir (opponent) in shot as Coach leaves the table
SHOT 14 Close up of the first journalist asking a question with a reverse shot of Mike answering
SHOT 15 CU of a different journalist with Vladimir answering
SHOT 16 Medium Long shot of Mike and Vlad standing up to square off with each other like they’re about to fight
SHOT 17 CU hand held, over the shoulder shots of the Mikes face then a reverse shot of Vlad
SHOT 18 CU hand held shot of Mikes clenched fist
Interior-Boxing Gym-Evening
SHOT 19 Medium shot of Mike and coach entering the gym reception and the camera follows as they enter the main part of the gym
SHOT 20 Medium shot of them going through the opening to the main part of the gym abd the camera pans to follow them going towards the chair
SHOT 21 Medium close up of Mike seated in his chair as he reaches for his bag
SHOT 22 High angle close up of Mike opening his bag and taking out his gloves
SHOT 22 Close up of Mike putting on his gloves and punching them together as in to get them comfortable
SHOT 23 Medium shot of Mike getting up and walking towards the punch bag and beginning to punch it
SHOT 24 close up of his fist hitting the bag

Filing comments - James Allen

We would have liked to have re-filmed some of the training montage scene to add a bit more boxing on the punch bag and also to have added a bit of jogging or skipping to it as well to make it look more like a boxing movie and that by the opening two mins, we would like the viewers to know what type of film the film is and not to have them guessing. Unfortunately due to commitments to other things , we was unable to re-film this scene or add shots to this scene. We would again like to thank Mu-Sa Martial Arts, Wombwell for letting us use their gym for shooting the original scene for our movie.

comments on filming - 1 - 04-2010 - By James Allen

as advised we was to re-shoot some shots of our press-conference scene to make the quality of our film better, and we also crossed the 180 degree line during the Q and A. We got a bigger audience that was to be journalists, and we was to re-shoot the questions that the journalists ask and the answers of Mike Dawson. We re-shot quite quickly and it was edited back into our film. Overall we thought as a group that adding more people to the audience and having a camera flash every so often gave the press conference a great effect to how we wanted the press conference to look as real as possible.

Character Profile - Charlotte Taylor - By James Allen

Name: Charlotte Taylor
Age : 23
Proffesion: Reporter for Sky Sports News
Bio: Charlotte is going to have regular updates for this fight between Zhirkov and Dawson, has regular parts in film, but not as much as Jim Davidson.

The Redemption - Film Age Rating By Alexander Martin

It has been decided in accordance to the film age rating system and through research of the boxing film genre that our project is made into a rate 15 movie.

This is due to the heavy implication of violence linked with the boxing sport and because of the use of profanity by the actor’s characters throughout the story. However these instances are not so extreme as to entitle the film an 18 rating since while there is violence it is done within a humane and moral system since it is part of a sport which has established rules.

The violence and profanity is done mildly and in such a degree as to refrain from insulting any specific peoples in terms of their; ethnicity, religion and social standing. There are no death sequences and the characters involved are not subjected to any inhumane treatments throughout the stories development that are not within the boundaries of an age rating of 15 years.

Official 15 years rating standards:

Contains strong violence and language, once very strong

Film Age Rating By Alexander Martin

A motion picture rating is designated to classify films with regard to suitability for audiences in terms of issues such as sex, violence, substance abuse, profanity, impudence or other types of mature content. A particular issued rating is called a certification and can range from a U (suitable for all ages) to an 18+ (suitable for audiences over the age of 18 years)

This is designed to help individuals and parents to decide whether a movie is suitable or not for viewing. However, the effectiveness of these systems is widely disputed. Also, in some jurisdictions a rating may impose on movie theatres the legal obligation of refusing the entrance of children or minors to a movie that is rated above the customer’s actual age.

Depending of the state or country the decisions made on behalf of media censorship are usually done by elected bodies of a type. In countries such as Australia, an official government body decides on ratings; in other countries, such as the United States, it is done by industry committees with no official government status. In most countries, however, films that are considered morally offensive have been censored, restricted, or banned. Even if the film rating system has no legal consequences, and a film has not explicitly been restricted or banned, there are usually laws forbidding certain films, or forbidding minors to view them.