'The Eagle' - Production Diary

Week 1 (19/02 - 25/02):

The first week of the FMP has mainly been workshops and research. I have worked with AI to create images for the concept art for my film, to try and come up with some ideas. I started off with asking AI to create me an image inspired by Guy Ritchie giving me this photo:

I then noticed one character in the image, so I then asked AI to create an image of a scary man wearing a flap cap and leather jacket. AI gave me these images:

Using AI, I have created a character for my film and has also helped me with coming up with some ideas for a story. This character is going to be the main antagonist of my film. When it comes to creating the other characters, I think using AI will be good tool to get a visual representation on what they might look like.

My targets for next week are to work on my SWOT Analysis, UAL proposal form and my map of influences for the 1-to-1 with Lee on Wednesday.

Week 2 (26/02 - 03/03):

During the second week of my FMP, I had a 1-to-1 with Lee discussing my SWOT analysis, the UAL proposal form, a map of influences and my AI created images from last week. I have been working on my SWOT analysis this week which discusses my career ambitions, strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats within the course. Another thing I have been working on this week is my UAL proposal form which goes through my thoughts on the course so far, my FMP idea, and how I will conduct my research for the project. The final thing I have been working on his week is my map of influences, which helps me understand how my influences were made and to enhance my knowledge on the genre. For example, Guy Ritchie's debut film Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels was inspired by the 1980 film The Long Good Friday which is considered by some as the greatest British gangster film ever made.

I also went out and bought 2 books which I think will help massively with my research. The first book is called 'The Godfather of British Crime' which is a autobiography written by Freddie Foreman. He tells his story during his time in London Crime from the biggest robbery in UK history to the chilling accounts of life as a freelance enforcer for the Kray twins. The second book I got was called 'Peaky Blinders: Aftermath' which tells the story of the change in the criminal underworld as a new era of British gangsters unfolds. I think buying these two books will help massively in my research for context so I can get a understanding of the history of British Gangsters and what kind of things gangsters get involved with. My targets for the upcoming week is to do a lot of research into genre, audience and context whilst also writing my script. Another thing I am planning on doing next week is to go on a British Gangster Tour. It is on Saturday 9th March and is done by Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels actor Vas Blackwood. During the tour, he shows us famous locations in British Gangster History and also locations where Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels was filmed. I think this tour will help with both my research into the history of British gangsters and into how a gangster film is made.

Week 3 (04/03 - 10/03):

In my third week of my FMP, I did a lot of research into context, audience and genre which has helped enhance my knowledge. I started my genre research by researching into how the gangster genre became popular in the UK, how gangster films evolved during the 80s, 90s and 2000s and how Guy Ritchie has impacted the genre. British gangster films became popular in the 60s and usually featured an actor with a very heavy cockney accent, like Michael Caine. The most popular films of this era were 'The Italian Job' (1969) and 'Get Carter' (1971). In the 80s and 90s, gangster films saw a rise in much darker films that contained a lot more drug use and violence. The film 'The Long Good Friday' (1980) reflects on how dark and gritty this period was, the film has inspired many of the gangster films made in the past few decades. In 1998, Guy Ritchie released his debut feature film 'Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels' (1998) and quickly became one of the most notable filmmakers of the genre. He has influenced many filmmakers of the 2000s such as Nick Love and Matthew Vaughn. Ritchie went on to make many more British gangster films such as Snatch (2000) and The Gentlemen (2019). Ritchie's film making style is unique, making them funny whilst also being serious.​ Finally, in the post 2000s, gangster films began to include more street and knife crimes and the criminals have become much younger. Some examples of these types of films include Green Street Hooligans (2005) and This is England (2006).

I then researched into the context of gangsters and how they have changed over time. I started with researching into the story of the real Peaky Blinders and how they ruled and feared the people of Birmingham during the late 19th century. Next, I researched into the most notorious British gangsters of all time, Ronnie and Reggie Kray. I researched into their early life, how they ruled London with their gang 'The Firm' and how their criminal lives ended when they got arrested in 1969. The Kray Twins were some of the best-known faces in 60s London and were seen by many as celebrities. I watched the film 'Legend' (2016) which gave me a visual aspect of the Kray Twins life. A lot of the things they did during their rule of London influenced the plot of my film. The final bit of context research I did was into how gangsters run their operations in today's world. Today, London is not only the heart of England, but is also the heart of organised crime throughout the entirety of Europe. The British criminal underworld is essential for the economy as it provides thousands for jobs for many people. The NCA reckons there are 4,629 organised crime groups across the entirety of Great Britain. Gangs have started to use young people to do a lot of their dirty work. Knife crime involving people under the age 22 has increased massively and are usually between other gangs. A young former gang member said to The Guardian 'If you’re doing five keys (kilos) a week and then suddenly you’re only doing three a week, it doesn’t take long to realise that someone’s out there taking your customers. So, you have to eliminate the opposition. How do you do that? By either taking them out, or tipping off the police. You are never supposed to snitch". The last part of my research was to research into the audience of the genre and what they like. I have decided that my target audience for the film is young adults and mature audiences due to heavy themes of violence and crime.

On Saturday, I attended a London Gangster tour run by Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels actor Vas Blackwood. The tour took us to important locations in the history of the Kray Twins, and we saw some of the locations where they filmed 'Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels'. The tour started at The Blind Beggar pub; this is where Ronnie Kray famously shot rival George Cornell. The day of the tour was surprisingly the 58th anniversary of the killing. Learning about this moment in history was interesting and has become one of my influences for the film and I plan on doing some more research on the event to help with my plot and story. Another location we went to was the Repton Boxing Club, this is where Ronnie and Reggie went boxing when they were growing up. The boxing club is also where they filmed the 'poker scene' in 'Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels'. We then walked down the street where Reggie and Ronnie committed a lot of their crimes during their mid/late teens and where they were seen by Jack 'The Spot' Comer who saw potential in them and became their mentor. Also along the street was the pub where they filmed the scenes set in the cocktail bar in 'Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels'. Some other locations we saw on the tour was where the Krays childhood house was, the pub they brought for their mum and their primary school. 

Week 4 (11/03 - 17/03):

During this week of my FMP, I continued to work on my pre-production such as the colour palette, location recce, primary research and the script. For my colour palette, I was influenced by a shot from The Gentlemen (2019), which uses a mixture of bold, dark and bland colours which represents to the audience the dark and gritty side of London, which is where the film is set. The colours show the type of buildings that you would find around London, and it also represents the many locations where a gangster might visit, such as a pub or an alleyway. The other colours, such as the blues and greens, brings all the colours together and makes the palette very city like.

I started to find some locations for my film this week as the script is almost done. I started with this local car park, which is where the start of the film is set. I was very fond of this location but I am thinking of changing it to suit the London style of the film. I also finished my script this week and am planning to gather my actors in the next few days and do a focus group. This way I can get any feedback on the script to see how I can improve it. The second location I scouted was my kitchen as some scenes are set in Harry's house. I have used this location in my previous film and has worked pretty well. Some problems that may occur is the very little space in the room. Next week, I'm planning on doing a location recce for the main location of the film, which is The Eagle pub and I am hoping that the landlords let me film there as the pub fits the mise-en-scenes of the film.

To help with my Primary Research, I sent out a questionnaire to my fellow students gathering information on what they expect to see in a gangster film. The survey helped massively with things such as characters, influences, colour palette, plot ideas and many more.

Week 5 (18/03 - 24/03):

This week in my FMP started off with my rehearsal pitch which went very well. I presented the pitch in a great way, and sold the idea really well. My feedback was mostly positive such as my research and presentation skills were great, but I did have some feedback for improvement. The first one was to research into the painting on my 'Blind Beggar pub' slide, which led me to come across a whole collection of Kray Twin paintings painted by Joe Machine. I have taken this feedback into consideration and am going improve my presentation ready for my final pitch next Monday.

On Wednesday, I had a meeting with The Eagle pub to discuss filming there for a day. They were super nice and were very interested in my project, and have allowed me to film, which is a great outcome. I then recced the location for any possible problems/risks and also how to lay the scene out. This task has also proved that my project management skills have improved since the documentary project, as I sorted this location out sooner rather than later. Here are some pictures of the location:

For my test shot, I did the opening scene for my film. Archie, Riley and Jes helped me with it with Archie and Riley acting as Harry and Freddie with Jes as the camera man. The plot was Harry and Freddie were at a car park to retrieve a bag of money for their boss. The opening of my film is a fun and entertaining way of introducing the characters and give the audience an insight on what the story is going to be like. When the audience watch the opening they instantly know that the main two characters are British gangsters, from what they are up to and also they outfits. From the dialogue, the audience are also told that one of them is quite serious and professional, whereas the other one is quite clumsy and stupid. I am going to show this test shot during my final pitch next week to try and get some feedback on what works and what doesn't work.

Week 6 (25/03 - 31/03):

This week was our final week before Easter Break so didn't get as much done as I would of liked. The week started with our final pitches, which didn't go well for me. Since I had my rehearsal pitch the week before, this led to me not putting as much effort as last time as I felt like I was repeating myself from last week. I also felt very nervous and didn't have the passion and energy that I had last time. This is definitely something I need to improve for next year as our presentation skills are something we are marked on.

I have gotten a lot of feedback from my test shot that I filmed last week. I sent out a form to some people asking them for some feedback about my test shot. I got some great positive feedback such as the cutting on action, the voiceover, the music, the POV punch and the over the shoulder shot of the buyer with the two characters either side. The weather got mentioned quite a few times such as it should be duller and the glare from the sun is distracting. I have taken his feedback into consideration and am planning on filming the scene on a dull day, possibly in the evening. I also got some feedback on stuff to add to the scene. Someone suggested a different location which is more abundant as the location is quite open. This I agree with and am going to look at different car parks which might work better. During the voiceover, there needs to be more shots to go with what is being said. An example of this type of film making is in Shaun of the Dead, when Shaun goes through the plan with Ed. While he is saying his line, there are shots that go with what is being said, this makes the scene more visual for the audience. When I come to write up the shot list I will use this feedback and include shots that go with what is being said in the voice over. Some other things people suggested were to add a more grittier filter, more dynamic camera angles and some tense music in the background.

With some of the feedback being about the location, I went out and tried to find a new car park. I came across Lysses Car Park which is not far from Fareham shopping centre. This car park, in my opinion, is better than the one we used for the test shot. It is more enclosed and has a dark and gloomy alleyway near by which might be useful to the story. It has a pathway near by which could be a good spot to do the deal, instead of in the middle of the car park. We won't have any problems with dog walkers, like the other one, but we might have a problem with the car park being quiet since it's near a shopping centre. What I am thinking is to film on a Sunday afternoon at around 5 o'clock when all the shops are closed, meaning the car park will be very quiet.

EASTER HOLIDAYS (01/04 - 14/04):

Week 7 (15/04 - 21/04):

This week in my FMP, I completed my shot list ready for filming next week. I have used a range of shots such as Low/High Angles to show who is powerful and who isn't, Close Ups to intensify the scene and Over the Shoulder Shots during conversations.

To prepare for next week, I sorted out the final props and costumes need for the film. I brought 2 shirts to finish off the character's costumes. The first shirt was for Riley who is playing the character of Freddie, his shirt is a long sleeved blue shirt which he will wear with his suit. The second shirt was for Archie who plays the character of Harry, his shirt is a white polo which he will wear with a brown jacket and beige/tan trousers. I also brought some props for next week such as fake cigarettes, fake money and a lighter.

Next week, we are starting to film and I am hoping to get it all done so I can start editing in Week 9. On Wednesday we are filming all the scenes in the pub, on Thursday, we're filming the house scenes, and then on Sunday we are filming the rest of the house scenes and the car park scene.

Week 8 (22/04 - 28/04)

On Wednesday, we started the filming of my FMP. We did all the scenes at The Eagle pub, which in the film is owned by the villain Frankie and is where he does all his business. Filming took about 6 hours, which is longer than I estimated. The filming itself went really well and we didn't have many problems. On set we had all actors (Archie, Riley, Barnaby and Simon) and I was the cameraman. I have started to look back on the footage and everything looks ok so hopefully I won't have to re shoot anything in the pub. I was very happy with the location and I am glad I talked with the landlords weeks in advance, showing my project management skills have improved since the last project.

The next day, we started to film some of the scenes at my house which went ok. The main scene we did was the scene were Tommy kidnaps Freddie and takes him to Frankie's pub for interrogation. We did a few smaller scenes like Harry stashing the money in the suitcase, and the introduction to Tommy when Frankie calls him. Looking back on the footage, there are a few scenes I think we'll have to re shoot due to things being in the background, but I will make that decision in the next few days. Sunday was supposed to be the final day of filming so I could have the next few weeks editing but due to scheduling issues with other projects, Sunday didn't go ahead and I will now have to re-schedule that filming day.

On Sunday, we filmed some of Archie's film at Thorngate Hall. He used a hall-like room which was used as Charlie's office, who is the main villain. I played the character of Geoff, also on set there was Stewart (Charlie), Graeme (Goon), Archie (Director/Danny) and Jes (Cameraman). Together we filmed a total of 3 scenes. This filming day ran over by quite a lot, which was the reason why I had to cancel the second part of the house filming for my project. I have started to arrange some new dates and will rebook the equipment out.

At the opening of my film, Harry punches a drug buyer in the face and I want the buyer to have a realistic nosebleed so it can set up the end of the film. At the end, the buyer comes to Harry's house looking for the money, ending the film on a cliffhanger. But the buyer is going to have a black eye and a bandaged nose so the audience can remember the scene from the beginning. I want this to look quite realistic, so I decided to do some make up tests for this scene, with my sister helping out. We started off with just a bandage on the nose, but didn't look that great, so decided to add some fake blood to the bandage and to use dark colour makeup to add a black eye. I am very happy with how this turned out, and will go for this look when filming the end. We then started on the nose blood, using fake blood again. We got this look by placing two drops under my nostrils and then using a tiny bit of water to smudge it across my face, looking like I had been punched.

Week 9 (29/04 - 05/05):

On Sunday, I filmed the opening of my film which is set in a car park. Harry and Freddie are here to do a drug deal, but what the buyer doesn't know is that he is going to get robbed and beaten up. The filming went ok, it started raining which was not great but we had an umbrella and it did stop eventually. Archie, who plays Harry, was drunk on set because he was at a party before filming. This of cause delayed the shoot, but me and Jes dealt with him well and it went better than I thought it would. I had no action on this and couldn't really do much about it. This was the only day I could film this scene, so I could not postpone it and do it another day. I think looking back, I should of communicated with the actor better to sort something out.

Week 10 (06/05 - 12/05):

The only thing I did this week was a lot of editing. I've started to put together all the scenes that I have filmed so far. By the end of the week the ending of the film was basically done, with all the audio and sound effects in place. All the shots that we filmed on the main road had a lot of audio problems due to the wind and cars, so I had to use layers of ambient and foley sounds to get rid of the bad audio. The scene that took the longest this week was the introduction of Tommy. This scene used a lot of Guy Ritchie editing techniques that I had no clue how to do, so I watched a few tutorials to try and teach myself. The editing techniques that I learned were how to do a spilt screen conversation and writing appearing on the screen.

Week 11 (13/05 - 19/05):

This week contained a lot of filming, for not only my project, but all the other projects I am working on. On Tuesday, we did half of the filming that we were supposed to do a few Sundays ago. We did the scene were Freddie picks up Harry and explains why he's in a Fiat 500. The scene didn't take that long to film but we did have many problems with audio, and looking back on the footage, the audio is really bad due to the cars on the main road and the wind. I'm going to try my best to fix it in post, with using layers of ambient and foley sounds. We don't have enough time to re-shoot this scene but even if we did it wouldn't really change anything, but if I was going to re-shoot the scene I would film it on a more quieter day, or don't film by the side of the road. In the evening, me and my Dad went to the car park to re-shoot some scenes for the opening that I wasn't happy with. The reason we had to re-shoot this was because the nose blood got smudged and didn't look very realistic, and some of the shots were very shaky and not in focus. On Wednesday, we were supposed to film the final house scene but one of the actors couldn't make it. I've had to move it to next Tuesday, leaving me with only a day to edit the scene. I couldn't do anything about this, but it just shows the struggles of trying to make a film. Finally, we filmed the ending of my film, where the buyer comes back to get the bag of money back from Harry. This is where we used the black eye and nose bandage from the make up test a few weeks ago. Filming didn't take that long as it was only 4 shots and we had no problems.

Week 12 (20/05 - 26/05):

For the last week of FMP, it was a lot of editing to try and get the film done ready for the screening on Thursday.

On Tuesday, I had to do some last minute filming which was really stressful. I was supposed to do this scene last week but one of the actors couldn't make it, so I had to move it to this week. This scene was a conversation between Harry and Freddie, where Harry tells Freddie that he not taking the money back to the boss. We also filmed a small little montage of Harry making a cup of tea. This led to the conversation happening but is also a genre convention in Guy Ritchie style films. Filming went ok, I would of liked it to go a bit quicker but I was waiting for the actors to stop messing around a lot of the time, I think they were just fed up and didn't want to do it.

On Thursday, we had the final screenings of all our films. I was very happy with how it went as the audience loved it and I got some amazing feedback to help support my final evaluation that I will start in the next few days. Here is some of the feedback I got:

Pros:

• Cinematography

• Pacing

• Soundtrack

• Opening

• Story

• Montage

• Comedy

• Costume

• Make Up

• Editing Style

• The comedic part doesn't take away from the serious part

• Foley Sounds

• Acting

• Very Engaging

• Mise-en-scenes

• Professional

Cons:

• Windy

• Some of the lighting was jarring due to the change of exposure

• Some of the fading to black felt out of place

• Too long

• The ambient sound was noticeable

• The music playing louder than the people talking