Making A Movie Essay Example For Students

Making A Movie Essay Imagine a young child, eye level with a floor full of miniature toys, concentrating intently on building a make-believe world. To the child, the toys are not miniature figures made of plastic or wood. They are real characters with real adventures. The child frames the action, crafting scenes that unfold in a world of imagination. Looking through the lens of a camera as actors bring to life a writerquot;s story, the filmmaker is also peering into a world of imagination. The director, producer, actors, screenwriter, and film editor are all essential players in the journey from concept to finished film. In this remarkable process, thousands of small details-and often hundreds of people-come together to create a Hollywood film. In the Beginning The year is 1890. Directors, editors, and cameramen are making silent films with the help of a scenarist, usually an ex-vaudeville actor who invents humorous situations. But where are the screenwriters? These early films donquot;t need them. Without sound, there is no need for dialogue. Motion Picture Association of America , 1999 The Storytellers All of that changed with the advent of sound for film in the 1920s. Suddenly, actors needed something to say. Writers flocked to Hollywood in droves from Broadway and from the worlds of literature and journalism. For a brief time in the 1930s, some of the worldquot;s most famous writers wrote Hollywood scripts: William Faulkner, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Bertolt, and Thomas Mann. In 1932, William Faulkner earned $6,000 in salary and rights for a story, a substantial of money at the time. Just five years later, F. Scott Fitzgerald earned $1,250 per week, more money than he had ever earned in his life Brady, 1981, 26 , and enough to get him out of the serious debt he had fallen into. Despite generous pay, the conditions under which these world-renowned writers labored were anything but ideal. Hollywood was a factory system, churning out movies at a furious pace. Screenwriters found themselves at the bottom rung of the studio ladder. By the end of World War II, screenwriters were complaining about their place in the Hollywood machine. Leonard Spigelgass, editor of Who Wrote the Movie and What Else Did He Write Brady 1981, 50, summed up the situation: Over the years we have been called hacks, high-priced secretaries, creatures of the director or producer, pulp writers, craftsmen, sell-outs, cop-outs, mechanical robots. No Pulitzer Prizes for us, no Noblequot;s, no mention of our names. Brady, 1981, 51 Screenwriters continued to earn little prestige for their hard work, until the filmmaking system experienced some important shifts. The status of movie stars began to increase, and writers often found to be powerful allies. Occasionally, stars would request a script by particular writer, as happened with Katherine Hepburn and the movie of the Year. Hepburn brought the script to the attention of studio head Louis B. Mayer, and the scriptquot;s writers, Ring Lardner Jr. nd Michael Kanin, received $100,000 for its use indieWire, 1999. A few writers also managed to obtain creative control over their work. John Huston, a well-known filmmaker who began as a writer, demanded a clause in his contract with the studio that would give him the opportunity to direct. A screenwriter gained more respect if he demonstrated a real talent for directing. Increasingly, writers became more important players within the studio system. Even so, some left the security and good pay of the studio to freelance for whoever held the reins-studios, stars, or other players. By the late 1940s, screenwriting was a lucrative occupation. Screenwriters today are important and often powerful players in the filmmaking process. They are paid as well as directors and producers are, and their work is considered an art. Screenplays are often published and sold to the general public in bookstores just like novels and plays. Malkiewicz, 1992, 33. Chernin 3 Though rare in the 1930s and 1940s, many screenwriters today are asking to direct in order to guide their script through the filmmaking process. The number of writers who turn to directing steadily increases year after year. Even if they do not direct, screenwriters often have a say in the project from script through production, collaborating closely with actors and directors to advance their ideas through to finished film. The Directorquot;s Vision The directorquot;s vision shapes the look and feel of a film. He or she is the creative force that pulls a film together, responsible for turning the words of a script into images on the screen. Actors, cinematographers, writers, and editors orbit around the director like planets around the Sun. Despite the directorquot;s pivotal role, most Hollywood movies are designed to pull you into the story without being aware of the directorquot;s hand. Many talented film directors with long lists of feature film credits are so skilled at being invisible that they are little known by the movie-going public. Goldman, 1989, 17 Imagine youquot;re being considered to direct a Hollywood film. Youquot;re handed a screenplay has been greenlighted given approval for production by a major studio Wordplay, 1999. As you read through it, you begin to imagine how it might play out on screen. You see the characters coming to life. You envision the lighting and hear the sound. You are absorbed in the world of the story until you see the scriptquot;s final words: Fade Out. When youquot;re done reading the script, you ask yourself some key questions. What is the main idea or theme of the screenplay? What does the story say about the human condition in general? You also think about the script cinematically. How will the script translate to the visual language of the screen? Who is the audience? As the director, you must feel passionate about this soon-to-be film. Feeling connected and committed to the story will help you do your best work, and therequot;s an enormous amount of work ahead Movie Maker Magazine , 1999. If you are hired as the director of this film, you may need to help shape the script for the screen. A good script is the foundation for a good film, but even the best one may need to be developed or molded to work well on the big screen. Sometimes the producer will develop a script and then hand it over to the director. In other cases, the director may work with the writer early on to help develop a script from its beginning stages. Chernin 4 Nowadays, the planning for a film is often underway before there is a script. A director or producer purchases the rights to a story and then hires a screenwriter. Whatever the route from script to screen, the director plays an important role in shaping the way the story is told. Assembling the Cast and Crew The people you work with, both the actors and the crew who will make things work behind the scenes, are crucial to the filmquot;s success. The right people will understand and respect your vision, work well with one another, and bring their own unique gifts to the filmmaking process. The filmquot;s producer normally hires the crew, but the director will have input into crucial hires such as lead actors. A production designer is responsible for the believability of a filmquot;s scenery and sets. In essence, the production designer is the architect of the film, working to make your vision, as director, a reality. The production designer also works closely with the art director and set decorator, making certain all the visual details are accurate and the style and period of the film reflect your wishes. Bone, 1996, 62 The cinematographer, or director of photography, helps to translate your vision to film, scene by scene, planning shots and supervising camera operators. Often, cinematographers are artists with experience in painting and photography. Their job is to create and capture the images that best tell the story. Malkiewicz, 1992, 56 The actors you choose will bring your story to life. Your casting decisions will be based on such factors as availability and whether or not an actor is suitable for lead or ensemble acting, as well as on a healthy dose of intuition. Character Analysis - Ordinary People EssaySometimes this involves prodding the director to finish the shots planned for a particular day, or hunting down actors if they are not where they should be on the set. The assistant director also functions as a record keeper and handles time cards and minor union disputes. Wordplay, 1999 During filming, you are told exactly where to stand and where to move. Every time you stop, someone places a piece of tape on the floor. The camera follows you slowly. You rehearse the scene on the directorquot;s command. Once. Twice. Then the director says, Letquot;s go for a take. The assistant director yells, Quiet on the set! The actor who appears in this scene with you moves to his position. The cinematographer instructs the cameraman to take a medium shot. Roll it, says the assistant director. Someone says, Rolling. Speed, says someone else. Thirty-five, take one. An assistant holds a slate in front of the actorquot;s face and snaps it shut. This clacker will later aid the film editor in synchronizing the picture to the sound. Action! commands the director. Seconds later, the director calls out, Cut. Do it again. The process is repeated until the director yells, Cut. Print it. The makeup person moves into the scene and adjusts the actorquot;s makeup. The director now wants a close-up shot and the cameraman films several takes until the director is satisfied with each one. Finally, itquot;s your turn for a close-up. You know that the camera and microphone will be within a few feet of you, so youquot;ll need to communicate ideas and emotions at a very close range. Action! You enter the room. Youquot;re careful to hit your mark and stop exactly where the tape was placed on the floor earlier in the day. Cut, the director says, and tells you to do it again. Wordplay, 1999Finally, he calls out, Thatquot;s a wrap. You take a deep breath of relief. The assistant director gives you your callsheet, or your schedule, for the next dayquot;s shooting. The crew begins to pack away the equipment for the night. The film shot that day is sent to a lab where it is processed and made into dailies. Dailies are film clips that are viewed after each dayquot;s work in order to evaluate performances and spot any technical problems. They are shown to only a few people-normally, only the director, producer, and director of photography. Cuts and Transitions: Assembling the Scene The film editor must know how to tell a story, be politically savvy when working with directors and studio executives, and have a calm and confident demeanor. Millions of dollars of film and the responsibility of guiding the picture through post-production and into theaters rest in the editorquot;s hands. Scenes may have been photographed poorly and performances might have been less than inspired, but a skilled and creative editor can assemble the film so that the audience will never see these imperfections. Murch, 1995, 28-29 To better understand the editing process, imagine you are seated in a movie theater. The lights are dim and credits appear over an establishing shot of a seacoast town in Maine. The title appears on the screen: Arson Hill. After the last credits evaporate, you see a long shot of a vacant summer cottage, then a medium shot of a mysterious-looking man pouring lighter fluid on the grass near the house and striking a match. The grass catches fire; the man flees. The vivid crackling of the fire dissolves into the sound of a young girlquot;s laughter as she packs clothing into a cardboard box and sings along with her CD player. Who created this scene? The screenwriter, director, cinematographer, actors, lighting designer, sound designer, and, finally, the film editor. Working with the director, the film editor shaped the scene into its final form. After hours and hours of reviewing the unedited film, he created this one-minute scene. The scene appears to take place in a seacoast town in Maine during an autumn afternoon. In truth, little of what the audience sees on screen occurred in Maine, and it certainly was not all filmed in one afternoon. The actor who played the mysterious man was most likely filmed on a Hollywood set in late summer. The young girl was filmed on a different set in early fall. The establishing shot of the seaside town was filmed months earlier in California, not Maine. The song on the girlquot;s CD and the sounds of the crackling fire were recorded in a studio. But when you see the finished scene, all of the sounds and images work together. They appear to have taken place at one time and in one place. That is the magic of film editing. The Big Cut Editors select sounds and images from all the film that has been shot and arrange them to make the movie Murch, 1995, 46. They also plan how one shot will best transition to the next. Assembling the opening scene of Arson Hill, the editor might choose to begin with a wide shot of the bay, focusing on the white caps and buoys that dot the water. From the shot of the grass catching fire, the editor might decide to dissolve to the girl packing clothes into a box. There are dozens of possible transitions the editor can choose, each of which will create a different feeling. Editing often begins as soon as film has been shot. Early scenes are assembled for the producer and director to view. Occasionally, the actors will also view these early scenes. Many directors choose not to show actors these edited scenes for fear that they will affect the actorsquot; performance. The first cut of a film, called arough cut, takes up to three months to complete. The final cut may take another month to finish indieWire, 1999. Sometimes the editor works alone, sometimes with the director. The sound designer and music composer join them for the final cut, adding sound effects and the musical score. In the past, editors worked with copies of negatives called work prints to plan a filmquot;s scenes and transitions. When an editor was satisfied with the final film, he or she would create an edit decision list, a list of each shot in the film and its length. The list would correspond to numbers, edge numbers, printed on the edge of the work prints. These numbers helped a negative matcher accurately copy the work print and cut the negatives. Today most editors use computers or nonlinear digital editing systems to compile a film. This is more efficient, but for the most part, the process is the same. The work prints, complete with edge numbers, are stored in the computer. The editor arranges the work print, and then creates an edit decision list. Murch, 1995, 49-51 When the editing is complete and the director and producer have approved the final version of the film, this final cut is sent to a negative matcher. The negative matcher makes a negative of the film that exactly matches the final cut, and the negative is then sent to a film lab where prints are created. These prints eventually end up in theaters. Like many productions in life, numerous counts of setup and preparation are involved. The film industry is the largest grossing enterprise ever, employing millions of specialists to take on the great feat of creating never before told stories to share with the world.