LO1 - Task 2: Textual analysis of The Day After Tomorrow

LO1, Task 2

Hi, today I will be analysis a film by 20^th Century Fox, The Day After Tomorrow. I will also be explaining in depth about the features of the film that you probably won’t have seen when watching to start with.

Purpose:

The purpose of the film that I have chosen, The Day After Tomorrow is to entertain the audience that is watching, however there is an element of educating as the film is about climate change and how it can affect the earth if nothing is done to relieve it. The main reason why the film has been made is to make money. The film company, 20th Century Fox, has to make large revenue otherwise the production process won't have been worth the while. The target audience would be young adults as it provides a gripping story with edge of the seat action, this is designed for this audience but older adults could be interested also. The film would be released on an international scale to a mass audience as 20th Century Fox are a business and want to sell their products to as many people as possible. The overall gross of the film was $528 Million world-wide on an estimated budget of $125 Million.

Genre:

As described by David Chandler in 2001, a genre is a type or category. In the case of The Day After Tomorrow, it is Adventure/Action. It does have a subgenre however, Climate Fiction-Disaster. This genre sums up the film as thrilling and exciting, with extra intensity thrown in to make you more nervous of those non-existent sea waves.

Form:

The Day After Tomorrow is a full-length feature film and runs for two hours and four minutes. It will have been distributed to cinemas worldwide as the target audience is a younger audience. Younger adults go to the cinema now so this was an ideal place to release the film. The film can also be bought on DVD in shops, streamed online on sites like Netflix and downloaded on services like iTunes. Releasing the film a variety of platforms broadens the market that the film is appealing to, therefore gaining more viewers and money.

Style:

The film uses lots of Special FX, in particular CGI and Chroma Key (Green/Blue Screen). These aesthetics give the film a realistic, modern look. Having these realistic features creates verisimilitude. Verisimilitude means 'the appearance of being true or real'. The film gives a surreal reality of what could happen if we do not act on climate change soon. 

Content and Meaning:

The narrative of the film that I have chosen to talk about is set out in different ways. The main point of the narrative of The Day After Tomorrow is that it tells a story. Throughout the film from the beginning, the middle and to the end, the story is told on a level that the audience understands. It isn’t too confusing and you can keep track very easily if you’re watching at all times.

However, the story does put you on edge every now and again, as there are scenes of disequilibrium where the main characters get caught up in the storm and only just make it into the safety of the library in time before the tsunami tears through the streets. This tension signifies drama as the audience wouldn’t expect this to happen considering the film is only just getting to the middle of the narrative. This is relatable to Todorov’s narrative structure theory as this scene can be related to his five stages of narratives; the equilibrium was indeed “disrupted” when Laura went back into the torrent of water to retrieve the woman’s handbag, Sam “recognises” that there has been a disruption so goes to warn and save her, Sam “attempts” to repair the disruption by running back with Laura to the library and the equilibrium is “reinstated” when they both make it back into the safe environment of the library. 

In terms of the narrative theory of Kate Domaille in 2001, which is where any story can fit into one of eight narrative types, The Day After Tomorrow I’d say would fit into the ‘Candide’ (the indomitable hero) type as the main male character, Sam, is always there to save Laura and he survives the cold and natural disasters that are thrown his way in the film.

Sound:

Next I'm going to be talking about the types of sound that could be found in a film like The Day After Tomorrow. A diegetic sound is one that is natural to the story world, so noises that only the characters and audience can hear. Some examples in this clip of the film could be the noise of the tornado, the sound of the rain splattering against the ground, the noise of the engines roaring to get away from this disaster and the horns of the cars when they're all trying to get away at once. Non-diegetic sounds are sounds that only the audience can hear, like a voice over by a character that isn't in the story. A few examples of non-diegetic sound in The Day After Tomorrow are the dramatic music playing over the top of the clip, the dialogue of the news report (that is where the TV isn't shown), and the phone beeping over the top of the speech of the characters.

Now, I'm going to be talking about the denotation and a connotation in the film, a denotation is the precise description; a connotation is a description that has wide range, positive or negative associations. For example (show clips of sound analysis), the tornados denote that there is a serious problem globally with climate change. Which in this film, isn't exactly that hard to see. The news report denotes that the tornado is heading for the Hollywood sign and the reaction of the public denotes that there is serious panic in everyone's mind. Some examples of connotations are as follows, the connotation of the storm in the film is danger, fear is connoted by the reaction of the members of the public when the tornado approaches and the earthquake reader connote disaster. The incidental music played in the background is a genre of dramatic music. It's played at a fast pace to create suspense within the viewer and lure them into feeling worried for the characters. This kind of music also creates disequilibrium in the film as you start to believe that the characters won't make it out of this situation alive. In terms of dialogue in this clip, the main male character is more dominant over the main female character. I can infer this from the way in which he shouts at her to get back into the safe surroundings of the library. It follows the traditional story of a man saving a woman, and them getting together to "share" their experience. The mode of address that's being conveyed in this scene is teacher to pupil as the conversation is very formal; the main male character is screaming at the main female character, warning her of the tsunami that is heading straight for them down the street.

Mise-en-scene:

The next area of the film I'm going to be talking about is the mise en scene. Mise en scene is derived from the French language and is literally translated as 'everything within the frame'.

The location of The Day After Tomorrow fits in with the plot of the film as a disaster film normally threatens a large, well-known area. Los Angeles fits all the criteria for this and provides the perfect architecture and scenery for this film. In this second clip, the location connotes a bustling atmosphere of ordinary working men and women. I can back this up with the fact that there are only ordinary human beings characters being played in this scene. The location expresses verisimilitude as the buildings and scenery looks extremely realistic in this clip. An example of this would be the skyscrapers as the CGI editors have gone into very deep detail of things like bricks, windows and the ripples on the waves hitting the buildings.

The costumes of the characters are very ordinary and plain as the events for the characters are unplanned. In the clip, they are living their daily lives, and then all of a sudden a tsunami rocks up in the centre of Los Angeles! The clothes the actors and actresses are wearing reflect who they are as characters, not their moods. The audience can then relate to the characters as they both would normally fit in day to day life and signifies togetherness. This gives the audience the effect of being with the characters in the story.

A few props were used in this clip too. A prop is something that is handheld; it's also short for property. Some examples of props that were used are the handheld radio that the bus driver was using while trying to listen to the news of the storm and the handbag that Laura (the main female character in the film) tries to retrieve for the woman.

The 'icon' in this scene is the rain. This is because it is a dominant feature in the film as a whole and represents why the characters are in danger. An icon is something that creates stereotypical representations that becomes well-known and recognised. This links to the disequilibrium and is better known as iconography'.

As this scene is set outside mainly, the film uses CGI to create scenery and backgrounds for the 'disaster' scene, the producers and director can use electrical lights in the green screen studios to create brighter scenes or add in virtual lighting in the post production process. The dim lighting used in the outside scenes connotes suspense and danger, as the storm is bringing darkness upon Los Angeles. This dim lighting can also be phrased as 'Low Key lighting', this is lighting that reinforces disequilibrium. Dark colours are used to generate a gloomy atmosphere for the characters and the audience. The clouds and the thunder and lightning emphasise the scene.   

Finally I'll be talking about gestures, Sam, (the main male character), acts as the hero by running to save Laura who is unaware of the torrent of water heading directly for them. They then both run straight for the Public Library and only just get inside before the water bursts through the windows that would've certainly killed Laura if Sam hadn't acted. This representation in the diegesis is what would normally be expected to happen in a blockbuster film as this is the general stereotype that circulates society today. This also backs up John Berger’s theory of “men act, women appear” (1972).  

Camerawork:

There are a variety of camera techniques used by the directors and producers of The Day After Tomorrow in such short spaces of time. In the Climate Change discussion scene for example, (around 5 minutes into the film), the techniques that is used is a panning establishing shot. This gives the effect that the audience is there in the room, walking around the hall like one of the representatives. The fact that you can see all of the surroundings in the clip gives an understanding of what it would be like to be in there.

Another camera technique that is used towards the beginning of the film is a close up. Around nine and a half minutes in, a man is struck by falling ice in Tokyo while he is trying to find shelter from the atrocious weather. He is on the phone at the time to someone, presumably his wife or girlfriend, at the time he is killed, the camera then zooms into the phone which is still in the dead man’s hand. This would make the audience tense as they would not be expecting a death like this so early on in the film. This scene also relates to the genre as there is a lot of action in this particular part of the film.

At nearly thirteen and a half minutes in, a shallow depth of field is used by the camera crew make the background characters on the aeroplane out of focus and focus only on the main character, Sam. This denotes the importance of Sam and his role in the film. However, gender representations are not challenged in this scene as in the background, out of focus, are two other male characters, not female characters.

The high angle shot at around twenty one and a half minutes in signifies that the people on the lower floors working on the computers and listening to the instructions are less powerful than the people above them giving the instructions. This high angle connotes superiority for the bosses and weakness for the workers. 

The low angle shot at the beginning of the narrative where the workers are digging into the ice shows the job that they are carrying out in better detail, rather than just a regular panning shot. This low angle shot denotes the exasperation that the worker is going through as he looks very weary of the work he is carrying out. This gives the audience the idea that the workers are working tirelessly and that they are carrying out their jobs in a focused manner.

Editing:

The first editing technique used in The Day After Tomorrow that I’m going to be talking about is cross cutting. Cross cutting is the cutting of scenes to show different perspectives of the film to the audience. One notable example in my film is at nearly twenty two minutes in; the Hollywood sign is destroyed by a tornado. The film is edited to show the audience the perspective of the news reporters in the helicopter and the people watching the news when it cuts to a TV with the news report on. This is very clever imagery as it gives the viewer’s more than one visual idea of what it would be like to be caught up in this kind of situation.

The second editing technique that I am going to be talking about is eye line matching. This type of technique shows the audience what a character is looking at. At nearly twenty five minutes in, you can clearly see the main characters in the background staring intently at the news on the TV at the bottom of the picture in a room after the party of the competition. This gives the audience a full on view of what is happening in this short scene.

The final editing technique that I’ll be talking about is the insert shot. An insert shot is a type of close up shot that’s designed to draw the audience’s attention to something that was only part of the previous shot. In The Day After Tomorrow at around thirty three and a half minutes in, the climate analysts are frantically worrying about the storm that has already struck, in this scene they are looking at a screen with information about the intensity of the storm. To start with you can see the screen as the operator approaches it to have a look, then it cuts straight to the screen with the diagrams of the storm.

Production Process:

To start with, the film crew would have to go through the post-production process. In this process; the script for the film would be written, all equipment required would be hired and organised and the locations where real filming and not CGI or green screens are required, locations would have to be booked like the Los Angeles Public Library.

In the production stage of filming, all of the scenes must be filmed so they can be edited in post-production, any audio must be recorded so it can be synced to the footage to provide excellent quality sound, any make-up or prosthetics must be applied to the actors/actresses and all the costumes must be gathered for all of the different characters for all of the different scenes in the film.

The post-production stage is the stage which finishes off the film. All the hard work of filming the scenes, achieving the correct angles and tracking the characters is over. Now it’s down to the editors and producers to finalise the film and get it ready for release. Some things that the editors will have to add includes a chroma key background for the green or blue screens, any audio to be synced up to the footage, CGI for the waves in the Los Angeles scenes for example and any transitions to smoothly change from one scene to another.

I hope you enjoyed my talk today on the analysis of The Day After Tomorrow and I hope to see you next time for another video very soon.  

LO1 - Task 1: Ownership of 20th Century Fox

Introduction

Intro: (SAM) (Music starts playing) Hi, my name’s Sam; and no you haven’t just clicked onto one of those over-dramatised news reports with their over the top graphics and presenters that have no idea what on Earth the technology does, that’s right I’m going to be talking to you plain and simply about the corporation 20^th Century Fox and its owner, Mr Rupert Murdoch.

Ownership

(SAM) First I’m going to be talking to you about the ownership. 20^th Century Fox is owned by Rupert Murdoch, (Music stops) who would’ve guessed, (Music starts) and also 21^st Century Fox (Music stops) (which he also owns). (Music starts) He is the head of a bi------g commercial corporation called NewsCorp. NewsCorp owns lots of big companies like The Times, The Sun and the list goes on. All of these companies working under the watchful eye of NewsCorp are part of a conglomerate. (Music stops) Yes I have said that right. (Music starts) An easy definition for this word is that it’s a company made up of other companies. Simple as that. For example, the BBC is a conglomerate. It has TV channels like BBC 1 and BBC 2, it has Radio Channels such as BBC Radio 1, 2,3,4,5 and 6. It also produces films, under the name of BBC Films, like Jane Eyre starring big names such as Judie Dench and Jamie Bell. All of these separate organisations are part of the BBC.

Let’s move onto some simpler stuff. Independence. 20^th Century Fox is NOT an independent company. There are two main reasons for this. A) The company is still owned by 20th Century Fox and Rupert Murdoch and B) it doesn’t make, edit, and produce the films all on its own. 20^th Century Fox and most other big name production companies usually collaborate on projects. For example 20^th Century Fox recently collaborated on a joint vernture project with DreamWorks Studios on the “critically acclaimed film” (Music stops) Penguins of Madagascar; a spin-off of the mildly popular Madagascar franchise. (Music starts) Now all credit to them both for making the films but seriously (Music stops) that zebra will be applying for his pension soon. (Music starts) Collaboration projects on films are normally a repeating pattern. Other companies 20^th Century Fox have collaborated with in the past are Marvel, on X-Men, and Lightstorm Entertainment on Avatar. In fact, from 2010 to the present day (September 2015 flashes up on screen), Rupert Murdoch’s subsidiary (I’ll come onto that in a moment) has collaborated on every single film that it has made in that time. If you were listening you will have heard me mention yet another ridiculous word, subsidiary. A subsidiary is one of the companies in a conglomerate. So The Times and The Sun are subsidiaries of NewsCorp, the conglomerate. Still with me? Good, let's continue.

(Music starts) Cross Media Ownership? (Music stops) Nope, ok that’s another thing for me to talk about then. (Music starts) 20^th Century Fox is actually a Cross Media Company as it produces Film and TV. Now, they can really take advantage of the fact that they produce so many different products. For example, in the video games that they produce they can advertise the films they produce and in the comics/books they can put a reference to any other books/comics that are available from them thanks to NewsCorp. This is called Cross Promotion (a.k.a Synergy).     

Operating Model

Now, you’ll be wondering how a film by the likes of 20^th Century Fox is actually made. Right? Well, here you are. It all starts off with pre-production. This idea is then developed by brainstorming ideas and developing the script. However, this will require money, so the producer has to pitch their idea to the managers to have any chance of gaining financial support. The co-ordinator would then hire some script writers to write the script. While they are writing the script, other roles will be given out like director, editor, grip, etc. For the more important roles, people will be commissioned to do their jobs. Now all the equipment must be organised, the final budget must be set, the actors and actresses will be cast for the roles in the film, a storyboard must be planned and the locations for filming must be booked and organised. Now all the organisation has been done, the filming can commence. The scenes must be filmed; any props, costumes, make-up and sets required must be brought in for this, any prosthetics in case a horror film is being filmed, any pyrotechnics if explosions are needed, lighting must be applied where necessary, chaperones are required to look after the children/extras in a movie, lots of food and drink is a must as there’s never a crew that doesn’t require lots of breaks! If Special FX are needed, a green/blue screen could be used to provide an animated location and microphones must be worn by all actors and actresses so that maximum audio quality can be guaranteed. Now, some say that the Post-Production stage is the most vital in a film’s success and to a degree, they are certainly not wrong. Any transitions must be applied in the editing software like a Jump Cut, Fade and Glow, any CGI (Computer Generated Images to you and I) must be applied to characters or visual characters that aren’t played by a human, any overlays or colours can be applied, scenes can be cut and cropped, any audio recorded by the mics must be synced to the camera footage and if a green/blue screen was used, any backgrounds must be applied.

A big corporation like 20th Century Fox usually work in horizontal integration. This is where the main company is promoted by other companies (in this case in the form of 20th Century Fox's subsidiaries; FOX TV, Sky, The Sun Newspaper and the list goes on). An example of this would be The Sun having maybe a single or double page poster of 20th Century's latest film.

Vertical Integration also occurs in this company. Vertical Integration is where a company produces, distributes and owns companies that can help earn "extra dollar" by cross promoting, they can therefore control The Film Production Cycle.

Products

As 20^th Century Fox has lots of subsidiaries, they can help promote the film or TV Show that has been produced. Different sectors can help promote different products.

These subsidiaries do in fact produce their own media. National Geographic are famous for their documentaries that give a deep and impactful insight into life from around the world. “Explorer”, the company’s award-winning and longest-running show has provided some of the most iconic scenes in documentary history like when a chimpanzee tenderly reached out for renowned primatologist Jane Goodall. National Geographic specialise in three main types of Media; they are Photography, TV, and magazines and books since they were formed 127 years ago in 1888. The main target audience of National Geographic is adults but over the past couple of years they have opened their eyes to the younger audience by making shows such as “Science of Stupid”, which is where Top Gear presenter Richard Hammond takes a look at all the ludicrous clips of people falling, driving or just being darn right stupid from the Internet and depicts the "sciency" side of them. (Insert clip of waterslide guy) For example, this man will travel down this waterslide at 22.7 mph. The ramp is 150.62m long so the little paddling pool has to be X distance away from the end of the ramp. Unfortunately no-one will be able to work out the exact distance the man travelled as this video is in fact fake and is actually an ad for Microsoft Germany, believe it or not. 

One more subsidiary of 20^th Century Fox I’ll be talking about is Blue Sky Studios. (Tweet sound effect). Blue Sky Studios was founded in 1987 by a guy named Chris Wedge (Wheezing guy). I wouldn’t be laughing if I were you, he's won Academy Awards for his films . He’s also produced shorts such as No Time for Nuts (Shorter clip of Wheezing guy),  films like Rio, Rio 2, the Ice Age Saga and is currently producing the next Ice Age movie, Collision Course (explosion), set to be released in 2016. Aside from Films, Blue Sky Studios also produce TV Specials (1 off shows) for their films. Their best known shorts include Bunny and Gone Nutty, both were nominated for the Best Animated Short at the Academy Awards. Blue Sky Studios have collaborated on film projects, for example Rio and Rio 2 were made and produced with 20th Century Fox. The Films and TV Shows are generally aimed at a younger audience as Blue Sky Studios specialise in movies for kids.

Market Position and Competitors

20th Century Fox are a very successful company. We can see this from the list of awards that they have won; including the Golden Globe Award for Best Motion Picture for 'Walk the Line' and the Golden Globe Award for Best Motion Picture – Drama for 'Alvin and the Chipmunks'.

They acquire Big Name stars for their movies such as Colin Firth, Samuel L. Jackson, Cate Blanchett, Keanu Reeves and Morgan Freeman (Music Stops) (Insert MF Quote), (Music Starts). 20th Century Fox produce a variety of films of a variety of genres for a mass variety of audiences. They produce films for kids like the Ice Age and How to Train Your Dragon sagas, films like The Fault in our Stars, for teenagers, horror films like Poltergeist, for fans that like to be (Music Stops) scared by moving pictures (Music Starts) and more family orientated films like The Three Stooges. They have built themselves up as one of the most well-known production companies in the world and continue to produce content for audiences of all ages and show no sign of stopping.

However, 20^th Century Fox has many rivals in the film industry; these include the likes of Walt Disney Studios, Sony Pictures and NBC Universal. The products that are made by these other companies are very similar to those of 20^th Century Fox as they all produce films, merchandise and all the other regular items that a movie company produces. However, Disney produce animation films such as Toy Story and Frozen which are aimed at children. Universal produce more films to suit a wider ranged younger audience (5-30 year olds) like Despicable Me, Ted and The Purge. Sony Pictures are only innovating films for two specific markets (Children and Young Adults) with films like Hotel Transylvania and The Interview (Screen goes Black) I never thought I'd be putting those 2 films next to each other when I started writing this, (Normal Pictures resume) and 20th Century produce films for audiences of all ages. 

With Walt Disney Studios earning a Net Profit of over $8 Billion in 2014, NBC Universal possibly overtaking Time Warner in value and Sony Pictures growing on the ever more populated market, 20^th Century Fox is in no position to relax. That’s why they’ve been working hard by releasing 83 feature-length films from 2010-2014 including the very popular ‘The Fault in our Stars’, ‘The Maze Runner’ and ‘The Kung-Fu Panda’ series. 

21^st Century Fox, is a very charitable company; they are raising money for Cancer Research UK by running the ‘corporate challenge’ which is where companies from across the UK compete against each other and raise money for charity in the process. 18 of their employees also took part in the 2015 London Marathon. So far the company have raised over £103,000 for the cause.

I hope you learned a thing or two in the time that you spent watching this video. Maybe it was the definition of a conglomerate or maybe it was who’s going to replace that Zebra from Madagascar… (Thank you for watching appears on screen)