Film 1: Skyfall

Media Research, Film 1: 007: Skyfall
GENERAL STATISTICS
Director:
Sam Mendes
Film Studio:
Eon Productions
Box Office Figures:
 $1,108,561,013 - £677,377,338.51
Budget:
 $150–200 million
Distributor(s):
-Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer
-Columbia Pictures
Age Rating:
12A- Contains moderate action violence and one use of strong language

International Trailer

Skyfall International Trailer [HQ] from Avinash Varma on Vimeo.

Before we analyse the film itself, I would like to look at the general statistics. As we can see the film has a hefty Box Office accumulation, In connection to this the Budget is set rather similarly to other films in the category such as 'White House Down' which has a budget of $150,000,000 or £91,664,700 and generally follows a similar plotline of an attack on the government, all be it the White House instead of MI5 yet still similar.

For the distributors, Metro-Goldwyn-Meyer does have a hefty filmography behind them, however strangely they do not in fact have large quantities of thrillers, more Action/Sci-fi and drama. However this can be forgiven as the other distributor has a lot of credited fame for a number of thrillers, most of which have been critically acclaimed such as 'Zero Dark Thirty' aswell as a number of critically acclaimed Crime films such as 'The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo'. Clearly this gives me an option for the distributor at the end of this project as it seems a rather strong choice. Metro-Goldwyn-Meyer seems something of a one off company, they may be fairly synonymous with the bond franchise yet I don't believe they have too great a claim to fame, given the lack of strong titles in their listing, as successful as they may be, I don't believe they have that much experience in the Crime/Thriller Genre and would therefore be less suitable as a choice.

In terms of the Films rating. The BBFC classified it to be a 12A with "moderate action violence and one use of strong language" which refers to Judi Dench's Character 'M' uttering the Phrase "Well I F***ed this up didn't I?". This is only minor and in fact something common in Thrillers, In Quantum of Solace the phrase
"I don't give a S*** about the CIA, Or their chopped up evidence!" was used yet it was used in scenes where the characters were conversing in a quiet situation, maybe voices were raised slightly but the use of swearing in these films comes across as... Comical, they rarely use swears in these films to show the characters frustration in the heat of battle, more during social situations to heighten the drama, the reason it comes across as comical is because it is actually kind of rare, this is most likely due to the fact that it helps to keep the films age rating down, therefore opening it up to large numbers of audiences. Many other Thrillers classify themselves as 12A; One of the main classifications for a 12A is the permission of swearing, so long as it is infrequent. Many other Thriller hold this rating including:
-'White House Down'
-'Escape Plan'
-'The Dark Knight Rises' (Despite the Controversy surrounding it)

 For this analysis I have had to find several clips to put in order to create the opening, yet it is quite clearly sufficient enough.


                                                                                                                                                                     
First things first, as you can clearly see, Skyfall decides to lead itself into a cinematic Car chase scene, one that involves plenty of destruction and carnage, yet before this we must look at the scene that the film directly fades into. In the scene Agent Ronson is found dying in a room where a Hard drive containing the listed names of all NATO Agents in the world.

The Silhouette of Bond remains ominous to the audience.

The first thing I picked up on was the use of depth of field in the scene,

Bond is slowly revealed to the Audience

The director has purposefully, started this scene of, by having Bond (Daniel Craig) be hidden in the background, thereby adding an air of mystery to him, even as he gets closer there is still that darkness with him that continues on, Even when he is brought into focus the lighting still works in his favour, giving him the near perfect cover in which to operate. What this as an example tells me is that one can create a mysterious character by utilising the environment around them with some clever skills. In the entirety of this opening however we never clearly understand who Bond is besides him being an agent of sorts, this tells me that perhaps one element of this style is to have the main character be slowly revealed, not straight away as this allows audiences to be pulled into the chase as it were, unaware of the characters skills and abilities beforehand, it keeps the audience guessing whether or not bond will be able to survive this endeavour or be injured in the process and as a result they wont immediately know what the ending will be, its essentially an interesting surprise for them.


Concerning the props we can clearly see that we have a character who is dressed rather smart, equipped with a stealthy weapon of sorts. Personally I would think that one of the things that sets Thrillers aside from Action films is that in action films, The audience is certain the main character will come out on top, be it Rambo's unstoppable rampage or otherwise. In a thriller things tend to be much more grounded in reality, Bonds character is never overly armed and his attire is suitable for the job, essentially he should be evenly matched for his foes. For reference, I do understand that Pierce Brosnans Bond escaped a Space Laser on an Ice runner but I believe times have changed from that.

An Aggressive action is chosen, regardless of stealth

Moving into the audiences view, Ready for a fight.

Moving on, as that scene unfolds into Bond uncovering the room, laden with dead Agents we see something of an immediate change, the scene turns immediately more lively, the score becomes one much more dramatic, with the occasional bang and clash. Even bonds attitude changes, he becomes much more physical, throwing down the laptop without care. By seeing this I would think that one of the aspects of a Thriller category is the strength of the tension breaker, Bond spends a fair few moments in silence leading up to this and at the first sign of action or violence the story catapults him into being much more mobile and physical. I find this to be one of the main strengths of the thriller category, many scenes start with a slow and very precise pace and then suddenly the audience is pulled into an all out fight scene or rather a chase scene. Interestingly enough, chase scenes are very prominent in this film as well as many Thrillers, From this chase scene, to the subway chase scene later on, all of which are some of the films key moments. I find that another standalone feature of a Thriller is its focus on Chase scenes as opposed to fight scenes, In action films the characters generally find themselves to be evenly matched and tend to fight out their troubles, in thrillers the characters generally chase each other, given that in a much more realistic manner, external factors alter the odds of fighting e.g. Injury or Transport form.

Bond is distracted and attempts to help Ronson

In this scene, Bond attempts to stabilise Agent Ronsons wound, regardless of how likely his survival is or how this potential waste of time could jeopardise the mission. From this I can interpret that the main character in this thriller at least is one who can be respected by the audience. While bond is well known to be a cocky individual, at the end of the day he is still a fairly moral individual.

Agent Moneypenny is seen to be a very competent driver

She is also just as effective with a firearm as Bond

Accompanying Bond on this mission is Agent Moneypenny, There isn't much to say about her except that she is definitely a very strong female character both in wits, humour and of course physical strength. What this would suggest to me is that in the Thriller genre, woman aren't used solely for the purpose of attraction, despite how crude that sounds, while Moneypenny is an attractive Agent she still keeps her appearance and attire in line with the mission, nothing is seen as over the top here and she is somewhat level with Bond in terms of capability. The main difference between the two is that Bond tends to get much closer to the antagonist here than she does, this in turn suggests that she is still a support character regardless of her skill, while phrased like that it seems sexist but for my piece I would like to keep in mind that a skilled female character would sit very well with the piece, both in balance but to also appeal to the female audience.

The Aim of the enemy is actually usually terrible

In terms of what is used to 'Thrill' the audience here we have a lot of shooting, car crashes and stunts. A rather simple formula but most scenes actually lead to gunfire, Bond crashes into the BMW which causes the antagonist to shoot, Which leads Bond to shoot. Moneypenny stops him on the bridge in which she may fire of a clip or two. Even after this clip, the conclusion is a sniper shot. Because of this, I think it may be crucial to look into having Firearms as possible weapons in my final piece. Fake of Course.

'M' is responsible for the commands given to Bond.

Wilson acts as bond Tracker in this Scene

In terms of additional characters we have 'M' and Agent Wilson. Both of which side with Bond, helping him on another level, seeing this an additional team may be more effective than having a standalone character when it comes to my piece as it gives the audience muliple reactions from different characters with different connections to Bond. Given that I have spoken about female characters, I would quickly like to adress, as a very strong female character, in terms of where the heirarchy stands, she holds herself above Bond and in fact most of the Protagonists.

In Conclusion, I would say that this piece has given me a lot of ideas about what to expect in the genre. Firstly, I can see that the main character should have the ability to act stealthy, yet also have an agressive side, he/she can also be one to work alongside others effectively. The main character can quite easily be moderately developed within the first few minutes including his ability, his general attitude and his morality. While Female leads can be very effective in the story, they are never the ones taking most of the action, that is something usually left to the men in this genre.

Choice of Genre and Movies to Research

I have recently sat down with my partner to discuss which genre we think we should pursue and for which reasons. The genre we have settled on has been Crime-Thriller for a number of reasons.

#6 Highest Grossing Thriller

#19 Highest Grossing Thriller

Firstly, the thriller aspect of the film would suit most audiences as films in the thriller category are among those that generate the most ticket sales, good examples of this genre include films like 'Skyfall' ($300 Million) and 'The Bourne Ultimatum' ($227 Million).

Secondly, Thrillers are something of a connective genre, in a lot of cases thrillers can be combined with other genres to make very successful outcomes such as the Sci-fi-Thriller category ('Hunger Games' $408 Million) or the Mystery-Thriller category ('The Da Vinci Code' $218 Million). On this subject I would like to draw attention to one key factor in this, most thrillers are tagged alongside the Sci-Fi genre, it seems to be the most common use for it with titles such as 'Transformers', 'Gravity' and 'X-Men'.



The Opening Scene to skyfall uses lighting
to intensify the suspense of the situation

Thirdly, The reason why we  have specifically chosen the Crime genre as the connection to the thriller is because it suits our limitations much better than any other genre, the crime category uses much more subtle effects for suspense, effects like lighting and sound design add an air to the scene that wouldn't work with CGI. The key point here is that Crime is a genre that is grounded in reality with situations that could relate to the viewer giving them a much more intense experience. Given that we have limited use of CGI in terms of skills we can focus more clearly on factors such as Lighting, Dialogue and Composition.

Given that I now know which genre to operate in, the 5 Films I will be researching and analysing the opening of, are as follows:

1. Skyfall- I have chosen Skyfall as one of the research focuses as I believe that it is an interesting film to see, the opening sequence is one many are familiar with and I think looking into the mass popularity of it would be very worthwhile.

2.Batman Begins- For many Christopher Nolan is seen as a genius in bringing the well beloved comic book hero to the big screen in his 2005 Blockbuster. I for one largely enjoyed the film and I think that given the movies focus of stopping crime it could give me a much more raw look at the whole Crime aspect of this genre.

3. Limitless- This spot was going to be between 'Limitless' or 'Now You See Me', The reason why I have Chosen Limitless is because I think it would be good to see how the story develops one particular chracter throughout the entire film, Now You See Me seemed to ride its popularity solely on its CGI which is something I'd rather avoid. It also gives me insight into the Mystery aspect of a thriller to more accurately see what still remains in the genre when you change its style, which key elements are crucial to a thriller that will remain no matter what genre focus you take.

4. Panic Room- For these last two research items I am going to keep them solidly focused on Crime-Thriller working hand in hand, for this reason I have chosen Panic Room, having seen this film many times before I can say that the suspense in some of the scenes is incredibly tense. Most notable are the moments where Jodie Fosters character (Meg Altman) is skulking through the house avoiding the criminals, the darkness of the scene also helps to increase this tension and the story from there on takes many twists and turns creating an interesting piece with something new around every corner. Being remembered as a classic this films lighting effects and pacing are superb and it would be useful to see what it does to keep the audience thrilled as it were.

5. Red Dragon- This classic Crime-Thriller is one that takes the Psychological nature of crime and ramps its up to new limits, among the intense moments with Hannibal Lecter the pacing is once again one of this films key feature, the tension and suspense is simply incredible and could be a key asset to my production.

Research Task Breakdown

For this new part of the course I will be required to research 5 Openings for films in the genre I will be using for my final project. The purpose of which is to allow me to see from a professional stand point how the genre is usually tackled and what special traits those who create them place in them.

In order to do this there are a number of things that I must do, Firstly, I am going to have to collaborate with my work partner on the genre of choice to make sure were both in agreement as to what road we want to take with this.

Secondly, I will need to come up with a list of films that have been successful in conveying the nature of the chosen genre.

Next, I will acquire the footage, either through YouTube or Vimeo, Failing that I will resort to screen shot breakdown but I think that it is highly likely the openings can be tracked down.

Having done this I can begin to look at these openings in detail, Picking out interesting features, Common connections in the dialogue, similar compositions and timings. Even outside the film itself, I can look at the company and its track record for this genre which will make my final projects evaluation slightly easier to create.

 To physically do this I will be creating a lengthy post on each one with an additional post at the end to allow contrast and similarity analysis as a whole. Where possible I will try to include alternate media outlets as they are much more interesting.