CCR 1 Outline

 CCR 1 Outline Below is the script I will follow during my response to the first CCR

Explain your product: 

This film has two male protagonists. The first protagonist, Jeremyah, is a pretty laid-back person. e is introverted, studious, but liked by many. The second protagonist, Viktor, is the opposite. Vik is extroverted, loves doing things sporadically, and often is the center of attention where he is at. The movie follows the two boys as they go out to a random party at night with the mindset of just having fun. Jeremyah, being the responsible one of the two, tries to warn his buddy, who is fresh out of rehab and still recovering that attending this party may not be the best idea. Nevertheless, Viktor reassures him they'll be safe as the party has only their friends there so nobody will be a Stanger. But most importantly, he just wants to have fun. However, that fun is quickly ruined when Viktors drink unknowingly get spiked. Now the boys must deal with the issues that follow from Viktor relapsing. Jeremyah is afraid of seeing his buddy lose all the progress he has worked so hard to make. Viktor must keep him being drugged a secret as it put him at risk of losing his job if anyone was to find out. But the boys are yet to realize what other trials are on their way cause of this mess. Meanwhile the question lingers between the two, what friend would do this to hem? 

Social Groups/issue: 

My goal is to represent young adults/students in the intro. While it can happen to anyone, most victims of drink spiking consist of university students who attend bars, parties, and clubs often. But the truth is all it takes is one time for someone to go out and become a victim of spiking. The issue represented in the intro is to focus on the less covered part on the issue of spiking, that it does not have to be from a stranger. Spiking is often portrayed in shows where a person meets a cute guy at the bar, but the girl later finds out the man is not as charming as he seems. By then it is too late. Our intro showcase Viktor is being spiked in a room full of trusted friends. Being a victim in a trusted environment makes it hard for the victim. You don't want to accuse the wrong person and ruin a friendship. You don't want to believe a friend would do this to you. Numerous factors that can make the victim less likely to speak up on the assault. These are issues we want to bring awareness to through our film. 

My reason for choosing this topic to represent was simply because I found it interesting but important. Many people have seen spiking being used for sexual crimes. At the start of this project, I researched it and saw that spiking is not always done by a stranger. This caught my attention. I did more research and saw that it happens to be more in a trusted environment than a person would think, and so I choose to incorporate it into my film. 

 

Codes/Conventions: 

Casting- For my film, we kept the casting crew in-house. While I did reach out to a few people and asked if they would be interested in helping, ultimately, we would end up playing the two roles ourselves. This decision came down to the fact that asking other teenagers to help is sometimes risky as they can be unreliable. What if we needed to do reshoot for a few scenes, but they decided they did not want to help anymore because it was boring or too long for them last time. These potential problems we discussed and decided we did not want to risk in our film. 

o Locations- To Better represent university students as they are the main group of victims when dealing with the spiking issue, I could have done better with the room Viktor woke up in. The start of the movie shows off his room with personality, its spacious, which the average college dorm is not. In a way I feel as we challenged this typical convention as while it is possible a college student can have a room like Viktors due to living off campus, the typical small, crammed college dorm I feel could have helped create more relatability with young viewers. 

A convention I followed was the setup of a college party. The background party we used on the TV made the shot of Viktor appear as if he was in a very crowded room. 

o Props- Our film did not require many props. The biggest prop to follow the conventions of our genre was the red solo cup used in the party scene. This cup is very iconic and is widely known for college use when drinking at a party. 

o Makeup- We both used our natural look to film our scenes. 

o Lighting- In our shots, most of the scenes were good with natural lighting. The time we decided to use artificial lighting was during the party scene. The party on the TV set in the background. But to help, I set the LEDs in my room to strobe that way there would be color on Viktors face to make it appear as if Viktor was in a full party room. 

o Sound- In order to follow the conventions in the movie, we used a diegetic sound during the party scene. The music in the background can be heard but cannot be understood. This is to show the influence of the mysterious substance put in Viktors drink and shows how it is affecting his sense. 

The film also used a non-diegetic sound in the first half of the movie when playing the eye of the tiger. This song helps follow the conventions of establishing a quick emotional connection at the start of the movie. 

Storyboard Layout/Inspiration: 

My imagination is one that I would say is constantly on, 24/7. When creating the movie, the final product deviated from the original story board by ALOT! I started off by just putting a few ideas together. First, I just wanted to go to the beach. Next, I wanted us to be police officer. I suggest my partner go on a date and then he would see the police sirens drive by his restaurant and he would quickly have to bail, and me on the other hand would have would quickly leave the beach. Once production started, I realized how hard some of these tasks would be to fit in given the time frame of 2 minutes. So, changes were made. We kept the initial idea of cross cutting between the two characters. We replaced the idea of using a police siren as our call to action and simply made it a phone call from one to the other and dressed it as a typical hangout. Initially we were going to be two police offers arriving at a crime scene. After production started, we decided it would be easier to have our characters arrive at a party instead. From the bigger changes we made, the necessary smaller adjustments followed, such as making our issue. Overall, the layout of our movie came from ideas I had, and we just shaped them to be coherent with one another and put them into one intro. 

Social Issue Representation: 

My social issue is represented throughout the whole movie. When you examine the issue of drink spiking, most victims of this issue never expect to be the victims. According to “Alchol.org” one study found that 38% of drugging's reported by victims happened in a house or apartment, and 29.7% in a fraternity. This means that when arriving at these places the people felt safe and did not think they would have to worry about anything. This same setup is shown in the intro. The two boys get ready for a night out and while Jeremyah is concerned for both him and his friend Viktor, Viktor believes he will be fine. This eventually ends up not being the case as shortly after they enter the party Viktor drink unknowingly gets spiked. This setup of events shows how the least expected thing can happen to anyone, representing my issue in its most fitting light. 

 

Showcase: 

Through my film I wanted to showcase my creativity. I wanted my film to be more than a person waking up, going to a party, and getting roofied. I wanted to incorporate the idea of cross cutting to keep it refreshing at the start. The use of the intro song was to build the mood and make the viewers excited right off the jump. Nobody knows anything about our two protagonists yet so why not take advantage of this opportunity to make the audience ask more questions about the protagonist before giving them answers. That's why I added the line where Viktor said he just came out of rehab. I wanted to make the audience ask Why was he in rehab? How long was he there? My goal was to get the audience as excited as I could before the unfortunate happens in the end. 

Building the emotions up, just for them to crash down when they see their new favorite character gets drugged at a party. But this was more than just making people happy. I wanted to simulate how the victims feel when this horrific event happens to them, flipping their world upside down in just moments.