The series managed 2.5 million viewers on its first episode, which is Channel 4’s biggest breakthrough since 3 years beforehand. However the show quickly lost popularity overnight, with episodes after only having 1.2 million watchers. Afterwards it was released in France on the france 2 channel where it had 5.46 million viewers.
The series was based off of the crime investigation, station and workers of the greater Manchester police and was recorded in Manchester from 5 may 2015 to the 18th of October 2018 until it was discontinued on the 28th November 2019 and confirmed by Martin Carr on twitter.
The plot revolves around the investigation of 3 cases, a drowning, a murder and a disappearance. Which all turn out to be linked, someone is specifically targeting girls with down syndrome.
Mainstream attention was from work with the Soulquarians
Won a grammy for best R&B Single, with the song “Love of My Life”
When acting he played in films like; John Wick Chapter 2, Street kings and American Gangster along with many others.
Birthday: March 13, 1972 (age 49)
A letter to the free quotes:
“Slavery’s still alive, check Amendment 13” – references proof for the song, makes people realise that they haven’t actually seen that slavery is gone, they’ve only heard and thought they knew. However in Amendment 13 its said that you can still be a slave if you’re a criminal.
“Prison is a business, America’s the company” – shows that America is profiting off of arresting people, specifically black people.
“Instead of ‘n***a’ they use the word ‘criminal” – this is an example of how slavery hasn’t disappeared, its just changed to be something else that people turn a blind eye to because its behind a prison wall. As well as this, the racial slur used displays that its those same, white, racist people that still have the power and instead of openly acting in slavery, they “arrest” black people for little or no reason at all, then getting them into slavery in prison.
13th Amendment:
The film explores the “intersection of race, justice, and mass incarceration in the United States”
the Thirteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution, adopted in 1865, which abolished slavery throughout the United States and ended involuntary servitude except as a punishment for conviction of a crime.
She examines the prison-industrial complex and the emerging detention-industrial complex, discussing how much money is being made by corporations from such incarcerations.
Culture is what influences people’s hearts, minds and opinions. This is the site of popular change.
○ Attempts to change to laws or legislation ○ Organised political movements ○ Public protests ○ Petitions, marches
Antonio Gramsci: 1891 – 1937
● Antonio Gramsci: Italian philosopher writing in the 1930s Key Terms: ● Hegemonic: dominant, ruling-class, power-holders ● Hegemonic culture: the dominant culture ● Cultural hegemony: power, rule, or domination maintained by ideological and cultural means. ● Ideology: worldview – beliefs, assumptions and values
POSTCOLONIALISM:
The Shadow of Slavery:
Most locations wealth comes from the 400 years of slave trading. Places like the UK thrived off of slave trading between America and Africa. African kings traded other tribes prisoners for guns, plants and guns, then America traded plants, guns and substances for slaves.
Edward Said:
“thepower to narrate, or to block other narratives from forming or emerging, is very important to culture and imperialism” – Edward Said Culture and Imperialism, 1993: xiii
Edward Said – “In this view, the outlying regions of the world have no life, history or culture to speak of, no independence or integrity worth representing without the West.“
ORIENTALISM:
Europe’s view at the oriented of the world, implying the the west side of the word is better than the east, promoting stereotypes. For example stereotypes like Muslims are terrorists and black people are criminals, orientalism is what those races define the wests views on them.
Jacques Lacan:
“We cannot actually see ourselves as whole, we use a reflection to understand who we are / who we are not“
We can never discover who we are, because we cannot look at ourselves from the outside. We can only apprehend a reflection of ourselves. Finding ourselves is useless, we will never find out who/what we are, however we can find out who we are not.
Film scene 1: John Wick Parabellum Hotel fight scene.
The scene starts with quiet, mellow opera/orchestra music that slowly ramps up over the course of the scene. This quiet mellow music is a connotation to how the scene takes place within a hotel where typically the music played in the lobby is opera/orchestra. As well as this the start focuses on the dominant signifier, John wick, picking out his preferred weapons knowing he’s being ambushed, the reason I know he’s being ambushed is the music slowly picks up in volume and Johns expression of intensity and heavy breathing is focused on. As well as this, the scene is a montage that switches between the upstairs and downstairs of the hotel, with the downstairs being John wick and his apprentice picking guns with close shots of their weapons, ammunition and faces to show their emotions, compared to the upstairs which is wide, still shots of the agents ambushing the building in full protective gear with assault rifles and flashbangs, occasionally a close up shot of the agents is shown to display to the viewers what john is going up against.
The Uncharted (2022) poster uses a screenshot of a scene in the film to capture a key moment of suspense to gather the viewers attention, as well as this the code gives the idea that this scene is taking place in the sky, high above ground due to the expression on Tom Hollands face. The dominant signifier here is Tom Holland and the box he is holding onto. The poster can be seen as anchorage for the film as it provides context to reveal things to the viewers.
This John wick (2014) poster has Keanu Reeves as the dominant signifier and no other code or anchorage. This is done to make the poster enticing and interesting to the viewer so that they can fill their own story in and make the suspense until the film release more intense. The signified here is that John wick is mid-chase, his calm but angry expression with his moving legs and flying jacket imply he is in pursuit of someone.
The Golden Eye 007 poster (1995) is seen to have multiple dominant signifiers, these being Pierce Brosman, the two woman behind him and the explosions below him. This displays the importance of all 3 of the characters as well as the action the viewers should expect going in to see the film.
This John Wick (2014) poster is similar to the first one, displaying just the dominant signifier and his weapon to create suspense and questioning when it comes to the film, the viewers wouldn’t know what to expect when going to see the film. The signified here is that John Wick is executing someone, he looks relaxed, angry and not distracted, just focused on the person he is killing.
This No Time To Die (2021) poster has the dominant signifier being Daniel Craig holding an assault rifle, the signified here is that he is sneaking around due to the intense aim down sights, shadow and crouched stance. The connotation here is that he is within enemy ground.
Editing stiches together your camera work and can repair or fix any mistakes or issues with the video, as well as this editing can be used to correctly time shots and focuses so that the viewers attention is focused on exactly what the producer wants.
In my own work I did this when the action running scene was playing out.
Types of cut:
EDIT ON ACTION
EDIT ON A MATCHING SHAPE, COLOUR, THEME
EDIT ON A LOOK, A GLANCE, EYELINE
EDIT ON A SOUND BRIDGE
EDIT ON A CHANGE OF SHOT SIZE
EDIT ON A CHANGE OF SHOT CAMERA POSITION (+30′)
Montage: Montages are short, fast and snappy collections of shots that tell a big story in a short amount of time by taking key information from that story and focusing the shots on those key bits.
parallel editing: two events editing together – so that they may be happening at the same time, or not?
flashback / flash-forward – allowing time to shift
Logical shot progression:
A set of shots that are in order to show the viewers what is going on with a different view every time to not lose focus or attention. The use of sequential editing (editing one clip to another) allows for a number of key concepts to be produced
Shot/Reverse Shot:
The basic sequence runs from a wide angle master shot that is at a 90′ angle to (usually) two characters. This sets up the visual space and allows the film-maker to to then shoot separate close-ups, that if connected through an eye-line match are able to give the impression that they are opposite each other talking. The shots are usually over the shoulder.
Looking into how films are created, planned and produced. Language of moving image is about space, time and scale, films following a typical production technique that viewers are so used too, they look by it.
The Importance of Focus:
The best tool a producer has is the camera, the camera can control focus which is the most powerful tool in film making. The focusing feature can be used to direct the viewers attention to or away from something, which is when a new hint, moment or object is revealed that the producer brings attention to.
Tracking / Panning / Craning / Tilting / Hand held / Steadicam
Establishing Shot / Long Shot / Medium Shot / Close-up / Big Close-Up / Extreme Close Up
Application in my own work:
Low angle – to use when focusing on the protagonist running, getting the legs in focus.
Insert shots:
Insert shots are inserted into a sequence that gives the sequence or section meaning or dramatic emphasis. Like quickly snapping on the wine the spy is about to poison or cutting in on the book that gives the character an idea so that the viewers know what happened.
This theory breaks the film into 2 distinct elements, kernels being extremely important and are essential, but satellites are not essential, they hold info like emotions, locations and time.
Steve Neale: “Genre is a repetition of differences and similarities to create different stories”
He argues that definitions and formations of genres are developed by media organisations. Furthermore it is seen that genres can change massively overtime, for example in 2002 Spider-man was released, which showed characters with super-human abilities to defeat villains with an opposing power, the films were seen to be comic like and colourful, whereas films from the exact same company like x-men were darker and more rough. But fast forward 20 years, action films are seen to have a lot more aspects of comedy and adventure in them to intrigue the viewers and keep the genre fresh and interesting.
This goes with Neales idea that genre keeps changing as society and humanity changes as well, film genre’s represent what is going on in the current moment in history, that could be opinions, events, politics, anything.
Genre: a style or category of art, music, or literature.
Genre is mostly associated with music, films and shows. It mostly displays the idea of what the media is about and what the viewer should expect going into it.
Genre is about being predictable and expected, however it should innovative and different as well.
Genre is important for both those who consume it and those who make it.
Institutions make the same types of films due to the fact that the company invests a large amount of money into certain props, certain lighting and certain cameras, this makes a style for the company and their viewers begin to expect it. So the company can make the same type of films, with a different storyline using the same props and the same sets to make more money without spending anymore.
