The Filmmaking style of Quentin Tarantino (Analysis)

Whether you like or dislike the man Quentin Tarantino is definitely a man who has made a name for him just from his films, starting with My Best Friend’s Birthday (1987), but the film was never fully released because a fire destroyed 34 minutes of the film so only 36 minutes of the film was screened at several film festivals in 1987. Quentin Tarantino himself has gone on record saying that the film was poorly directed.

Quentin Tarantino’s next film Reservoir Dogs (1992) is where Quentin Tarantino’s directorial and film-writing style came into fruition. Instead of a basic 3-arc structure of a beginning, middle and end Quentin Tarantino uses a different narrative structure, which is distorted. The story will move forward a little bit then pause for the audience to gain some background information on the characters, cleverly enough this is information about the characters that none of the other characters know about each other because of the premise of the narrative. The film centers around a group of criminals put together to rob a jewelry shop. The organizers of this heist Joe Cabot and his son “Nice Guy” Eddie Cabot thought things would run smoother if the criminals Mr. White, Mr. Brown, Mr. Pink, Mr. Blue, Mr. Blonde and Mr. Orange didn’t know anything about each other, not even their real names, that way if one is caught they can’t snitch on another person.

Theatrical release poster for Reservoir Dogs (1992)

Pulp Fiction (1994) is a similar story with narrative structure being distorted from what is the “Classical Hollywood narrative”. If the seven sequences were ordered chronologically, they would run: 4a, 2, 6, 1, 7, 3, 4b, 5.

1. Prologue—The Diner (i)
2. Prelude to “Vincent Vega and Marsellus Wallace’s Wife”
3. “Vincent Vega and Marsellus Wallace’s Wife”
4. Prelude to “The Gold Watch” (a—flashback, b—present)
5. “The Gold Watch”
6. “The Bonnie Situation”
7. Epilogue—The Diner (ii)

Theatrical release poster for Pulp Fiction

I think he uses a non linear narrative structure to provide his audience with more information about characters, which shows he focuses on developing his characters throughout the film having the narrative revolve around them rather them live in the narrative.

Kill Bill: Vol. 1 (2003) also follows the non-linear narrative style set by these two films. But, what really connects these films via Tarantino’s directorial & film-writing style is the levels of abrasive dialogue and violence presents in all films. Tarantino uses race as a point of shock to entice his audience in Reservoir Dogs and Pulp Fiction, not so much so in Kill Bill: Vol. 1 racism is very much a real problem in society and I think Tarantino uses racism in his films to show how present it still is in society. Society is a macro scale, hard to pinpoint racism and be shocked at it, whereas films are micro, when racism occurs in a film you are going to recognise it. The violence shown in his films also shocks his audience, as a film maker he doesn’t care if people are talking badly about his films, to him it just shows he has effected their emotions, that’s what he really cares about.

Theatrical release poster for Kill Bill: Vol. 1

I demand the right to be them, I demand the right to think them and I demand the right to tell the truth as I see they are, all right?

Quentin Tarantino- in response to Spike Lee questioning his use of race in his films.

Top Gear Review (Other)

Top Gear is a car review show primarily shown on BBC 2 and is repeated on BBC 3 and Dave. Top gear was originally introduced to British T.V in 1977 and was rebooted in 2002 to its current format.

Jeremy Clarkson, James May and Richard Hammond present the television program. Usually one of presenters will produce a visual review of a car to start of the program. The review, visually is very exciting to watch. The editing style of the review very creative and has high production values. Editors of the show use colour very well to demonstrate different moods which relate to a cars overall performance e.g. the review of ‘The Brutus’ motorcar, which produces 493bhp at just 1500rpm. The colour saturation of the shots are dark and cool, signifying power and strength, the soundtrack also added to this part of the review also signifies power and strength, relating back to the size and the power the car actually produces.

Another example of Top Gear’s editing style is when Jeremy Clarkson reviews the Bentley Continental Super sport. The review starts off by the camera circling Bentley with different shots layered over the main shot in different transparencies. A boxer punching the camera with boxing gloves also transmits the metaphor that this car “packs a punch”. They use restricted lighting to make it feel as if the car is slowly stalking the camera (its prey) and is getting ready to pounce. After Jeremy is done talking about the specifications of the car it cuts to a mid-close up shot of Jeremy still talking about the car with it in the back ground, the picture colour is now warm and there is no sound, the mood of the review has changed from dramatic to calm. When Jeremy begins to race the car the colour saturation changes to cool to represent drama and to compliment the colour of the car, which is white.

After a car review the show may then go on to show its “put a star in our reasonably priced car” segment where Jeremy interviews a celebrity then a clip of their lap around the top gear test track in “a reasonably priced car” is screened. At the end of it all they have a time that is then posted on the lap time board for celebrities who have been there before. The show is witty in humour and sometimes controversial which makes it a good watch. Moreover, sometimes Jeremy, James and Richard are set challenges by the producers to buy a certain type of car on a strict budget and put it through real life tests such as how useful is it in getting around town.

Overall rating: 7.6/10

Team Supernova’s Cabinet of Curiosities presentation (Evaluation)

Today my group comprised of Ade Shittu, Christopher Williams, David Sanni, Karan Dedhia and Reynold Maunze and I was meant to present our Cabinet of Curiosities project to Clifton Stewart and Matthew Hawkins. I was two minutes late to the presentation, we were scheduled to start at 10:15am but we started at approximately 10:20am. Unfortunately, Reynold Maunze didn’t attend to present our project with us.

The presentation was well put together we started by giving detailed descriptions of the main character, Marcus Hu Tang and then moving onto his immediate family, his brother, dad and mum. Next, we described the character of Tunde Belo, the main suspect of the missing person investigation of Marcus Hu Tang who went missing shortly after the closing ceremony of the London 2012 Olympics. We then discussed the process of creating the materials we produced to make the missing person report realistic and believable. I think that this worked well; it showed we actually thought about different aspects of what really happens when a person goes missing. We produced a news report and a police interview of Tunde Belo. The news report is what really authenticates the missing person aspect of the project. Then we explained how our research informed our project. I played Matthew and Clifton the interview I conducted with Ade Shittu about the London 2012 Olympics. I think that we could of researched a bit more by collecting more information from different sources of information such as books or websites, but our forms of research were different and satisfactory.

Overall, I think the information included in the project was of a good quality, we covered all aspects of the project, our character’s profile was developed and with the addition of Marcus Hu Tang’s Tumblr blog and the constant updating of it too made him come to life even more. Pictures from the Olympics were added just before he went missing to symbolize he was there.  However, my group members and I do feel we could of presented it better to make the actual presentation ‘flow’ better.

Cabinet of Curiosities powerpoint presentation

Hollywood- Corporations, Narrative & The ‘High-Concept’ Film (Research)

“Classical Hollywood cinema or the classical Hollywood narrative are terms used in film history which designate both a visual and sound style for making motion pictures and a mode of production used in the American film industry between 1927 and 1960. This period is often referred to as the “Golden Age of Hollywood.”

Hollywood 

Everyone has heard of Hollywood, every person wanting to break into the film/T.V industry aspires to work for a Hollywood studio, but what is Hollywood? Well, Hollywood is the home of many film studios and has been since October of 1911. The ‘big six’ all have studios in Hollywood due the iconic nature of Hollywood and it was the beginning of mass production of film.

The Iconic cliff of Hollywood.

The ‘Big ‘Six’.

The ‘Big Six’ film studios, located in Hollywood. They dominate the film/t.v market.

 

What is the “Classic Hollywood Narrative”?

 The ‘classic Hollywood narrative’ is a type of narrative stylized by film studios in Hollywood. It has a basic linear narrative structure of a beginning; middle and end as opposed to the non-linear narrative structure employed by Director Quentin Tarintino in his Pulp Fiction (1994). Also known as ‘high concept’ films, these types of films can stand alone in a genre and are made with the audience in mind, an example of this is the simple narrative structure; everyone from five years of age to one hundred years of age can understand the movie. The movie is also very goal orientated, as in the main character or a group of characters usually have some sort of goal whether it is financial or personal. There is usually some sort of resolution at the end of ‘high concept’ film

How do you know if you are watching a ‘high concept’ film?

Well, the aesthetics of the film will usually be spectacular and cost a lot to produce. ‘High concept’ films usually have a big Hollywood budget that means they can produce great cinematography and CGI if needed to enhance the aesthetics even further! Due to the continuing struggle of getting funding for an independent film (a film not produced by one of the ‘Big six’ studios) the budget of an independent film would be very small in comparison with the financing provided by a ‘big six’ studio, which allows the director to get the best people for the job and the best equipment in the industry for the job too.

Marketing of a ‘high concept’ film.

 The marketing of a film can make or break a film. A expensive advertising campaign like that of The Dark Knight (2008) can really push a film into different markets and reach different types of audiences. The Dark Knight used an extensive viral campaign to promote their movie, also lots competitions, free giveaways and publicity stunts.

One of many posters designed by the marketers of the film part of their extensive marketing campaign.

List of ‘high concept’ films:

• The Dark Knight (2008)
• Snakes on a Plane (2006)
• The Matrix (1999)
• Chicken Run (2000)
• The Fast and Furious (2001)
• Jaws (1975)

Process/Development

Cabinet of Curiosities

At the first my group and I didn’t know what to do. Create a character? That’s nonsense, which should be easy, right? So we jumped straight into it we selected our characters ethnicity, which is Oriental Asian as he is from China. We chose this ethnic group because we didn’t go for the obvious choices of ethnicity and our character being from China opens up a lot of doors for us such us:

• It gives us the option to make him go missing in any country in the world.
• Why is in that country in the first place?
• The politics in China, such their emigration and immigration laws.
• How others around him treat him because of where he is from.

Then we decided a name for our character, we wanted to give him a stereotypical name so when a person hears the name they will think straight away “He is Chinese”. His name is “Marcus Hu Tang”; he also has a nickname, “Marcus Power” due to his infatuation with Technology. Marcus is a 21 year-old student aspiring to be an architect.

Marcus Tang is 5″8″, he is of a slim build, has short black hair, his eyes are brown, he likes to keep fit by regularly visiting the gym and his dress sense is casual/smart. Marcus Tang is the son of Jintao Hu Tang and Yongqing Hu Tang. His father Jintao Hu Tang is the President of China and is apart of the Communist Party of China. We then discussed how Marcus should go missing, what is actually realistic and what is believable. Our first idea was that Marcus was an exchange student from China, he is transferred to Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States and studied Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, representing his love for technology. Two ideas stemmed from this background:

• He travels to the UK to meet a girl he met online and goes missing on the way there
• He is kidnapped by a organised crime gang who want security codes to his security software which protects banks in China and USA.

The third and final idea is the one we are using, Marcus goes to London, England to see the London 2012 Olympics & Paralympics. “Tunde Belo”, an official London 2012 steward, then kidnaps Marcus. Tunde Belo is a Black British male whose parents are from Nigeria, he is 21 years of age. Tunde Belo the motivation to kidnapp Marcus after recognising him from the T.V. The kidnapping takes place after the closing ceremony of the Olympics.

After we discussed the narrative of Marcus Tang and how he goes missing we discussed the materials needed to add to the project. I made a screenplay for an interview, we then produced the interview where Tunde Belo (Ade Shittu) is interviewed by DC Banks (David Sanni) and we found an actor to play Marcus so we took pictures and used Adobe Photoshop CS6 to put him at the Olympic stadium. We also made voice recordings of Marcus and a missing person news report; we planned to present the project as a news report.

Cabinet of Curiosities- Week 1

Today we discussed the basics of creating our character. Firstly, we chose his Ethnicity which is Chinese, then we thought of his name (Marcus Tang). Tang is a stereotypical Chinese name that you would affiliate with a Oriental Asian person. We then decided what stage of his life he should be and what he wants to do with his life, whether or not he came from a good home had a troubled childhood and his relationships with people.

Marcus’ studies at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, he studies Electrical Engineering and Computer Science. In his spare time he likes to develop software and it is this particular hobby that gets him into serious trouble. We have continued to post from the perspective of Marcus on http://marcpower.tumblr.com/.
We post what Marcus is interested in and things that will relate to him, we do plan to create a facebook profile for Marcus too.

Development/Process of making “CV1”

The idea for the film “CV1” came from the dream of Christopher Williams who also directed the film. It started out as a rough idea and we all agreed that we should make it because it sounded interesting and there was a lot of ways we could shape it e.g. make it into a proper gangster film or make it into a film realistic enough that it seems like it could happen to anyone. We chose realism. First we developed the narrative structure and the details of what happens in the film. Then we created characters to place in the narrative. The first of the characters we created was ‘Jamal’, an eighteen-year-old sixth dropout who has a drinking problem. We all agreed not to show his mum because we knew that could be another narrative on it’s own and we didn’t want to add too much details as to why she is an alcoholic. He’s mum is Jamaican and is forty-one-years-old. ‘Jamal’ was meant to represent the teenager who has to, but shouldn’t have to support himself with no help from his parents. So ‘Jamal’ gets involved in illegal activities just to survive because his mum can’t do it herself, deep down though, ‘Jamal’ knows right from wrong.

We then selected who should be the one to kill ‘Jamal’. We selected ‘Charlie’. He would be the one to kill ‘Jamal’ because he is jealous of ‘Jamal’ for many reasons, one of which being ‘Jamal’ is more respected in their peer group and is liked more by girls too. ‘Jamal’ is much more successful than ‘Charlie’ in the department of making money via illegal activities whereas ‘Charlie’ is a cleaner and makes minimum wage. He isn’t respected enough to handle the “big” jobs like ‘Jamal’ is.

‘Ricky’ is the third character we developed. We wanted to semi develop him because of his role in the narrative. He steals the camera to cause a disruption in relation to the equilibrium theory. So we wanted the audience to see him as a “bad guy”. We also wanted the audience to dislike ‘Jade’ for sending the text to everyone about where ‘Jamal’ was so in the end ‘Jamal’ would get more sympathy. Other characters include gang member 1 & 2 and Jamal’s mum whom I slightly discussed earlier. ‘Hugo’ known as ‘the boss’ was a character we wanted to include but we couldn’t because we had difficulty in casting.

Emma Garner booked out a handheld video camera and a larger video camera. We used the handheld camera to film the POV shots. First we filmed the scenes where ‘Jamal’ wakes up, gets ready and leaves his house at Sherbourne House. In the same day we decided to film the police station scene where you see the traffic outside of the police station, Jamal leaving the police station and him meeting Jade. We then moved locations to an alleyway next to Sports Centre to film the final scene of the film. In the final day of filming we filmed the texts being sent by Jade. Charlie, Ricky, Jamal and gang member 1 & 2 meeting up, Ricky showing off with the stolen camera and the chase scene where Charlie pushes over Jamal.