Research: The History of Film

I have been carrying out more in depth research about the history of film to enable me to have a greater understanding of film for my advanced portfolio.The beginnings of film in the 1890s filming was done manually. The Lumiere Brothers were groundbreakers in film making, they created the earliest films. As the filming was done manually to create a film less than a minute in length it would take 17 metres of actual physical film.
The Lumiere Brothers made short films called actualities, everyday mini documentaries. They were pioneers in film making not only creatively because of their artistic and realism attributes but also they also contributed to the advance in technology.

Postmodernism

Postmodernism is very closely linked to intertextuality within media forms. Postmodernism is when one text references another text. Postmodernism is seen as evident in things such as pastiches. For example, 'Anuvahood' is a pastiche of 'Kidulthood' meaning it references to and takes influence from an existing media product.

Le Voyage Dans La Lune 1902 saw a change from everyday documentary style films to more fictional short films with more of an actual narrative and plot. Le Voyage Dans La Lune shows an actual stage set and costumes and so on. The Smashing Pumpkins music video for 'Tonight Tonight' shows that the director behind the video was heavily influenced by the film from 1902 and this is an example of postmodernism.

Research: 'About A Girl' Short Film

As part of my generic research I have watched and reviewed an award-winning short film.


Background 'About A Girl'

• Brian Percival, the director of 'About A Girl' had decided to choose a gritty and shocking script for his first short film as it it goes against 'the glossy commercialism' of adverts he had mostly worked on before.
• The piece was filmed in Manchester and the cinematographer Geoff Boyle described that filming was sometimes difficult because of lighting however he also said how he and the director needed to remind themselves that it was not a commercial and they were filming something different with a different purpose.
• Fourteen year old actress Ashley Thewlis played the main role and her performance was described by Ewan McGregor as 'very hard hitting and brilliant'.
• 'About A Girl' recieved several awards including 2001 Bafta - Best Short Film and the Edinburgh Film Festival Prize for Best Short Film.

My Response
I think the 'About A Girl' short film effectively sends a message to the audience. After watching it for a second time I could see the significance of the stream of conciousness, as although it was witty, certain lines became more important and poignant. The young actress portrayed the role really well and the everyday scenes created a more gritty and realistic tone to the film. The disturbing twist at the end evokes a response from the audience which overall makes the film succussful in being thoughtprovoking.