CCR

  



1.      How do your products represent social groups or issues?

 

My short film does a critical thing to represent social groups of film enthusiasts by forcing the audience to look for specific details to figure out that the mystery has not been solved in order to try to connect with the audience on a deeper level. The short film tries to talk directly to the audience through the character's thoughts being told to the audience. For them to not be held back from any information. Another social group I tried to focus on was teenagers. By having the characters be teenagers and have a relatable club setting, it will attract that age group. This will benefit my marketing strategy as other locked room mysteries usually have only adult characters like Knives Out and Clue. I think that employing this unique technique as well as focusing on dialogue it will help make a unique mystery. I feel like the mystery genre overall is pretty saturated with the same format but a different setting (think the murder of the orient express). Sadly, my movie did not do anything in the terms of social reforms or political issues, but that’s because for a mystery I am more focused on presenting the case to the viewers than anything else. With only 5 minutes for the movie, I simply did not have the time to address social issues without wasting time to develop my characters.

 

 

 

2. How do the elements of your production work together to create a sense of ‘branding’?

 

 

      I am proud of my marketing for the project so far as I put a bunch of effort into my postcard and have started on my website. I have gone for a more mysterious branding on my postcard and website. I am going to try and not reveal anything about the plot for my marketing other than the genre of the movie. Other mysteries have done this and seen success such as the marketing strategy for Knives Out. While filming parts of my movie I think I will use a filter to make the setting darker. While filming the walls are white which kind of ruins the vibe I am going with my movie. Luckily, I did this technique for my last movie in AS-level media, so I already know how to do this. I think in order to do the majority of things I want branding-wise in the movie it's going to come down to postproduction or editing. In the past couple of years in comm tech, I have become certified in After Effects and Premiere Pro. I may be able to use those in order to do some editing techniques. One thing I want to do for branding is with my social media websites. I am trying to think of some posts I can make to create a sense of mystery. Maybe make a teaser that also works as something to generate excitement for the movie.

 

 

 

 

 

3.      How do your products engage with the audience?

 

 

            As I said earlier, my product engages with the audience by trying to get them to think about the mystery as they watch it. I am going to try and make there be obvious holes in the mystery such as with the ending. This way the audience gets the opportunity to think. I think this is important for the mystery genre as a whole. Furthermore, I want to make some teasers that interact with the audience and talk to the audience. I don’t know how I am going to do this yet, but I have some ideas. One idea is by hinting at the cast and then making it so the audience can guess who the cast can be. I did something similar when running the social media for a club I am in. I have experience working with Instagram but not Facebook or Twitter so I don’t know for sure if it would work there. Engaging with the audience is one of the most important things you have to do when making a film and I will make sure to do so when filming. I hate when mysteries don’t give you some time to think about what just happened and breaking the fourth wall is debatable for how well it works. Overall, though, I think the plans for engaging with the audience will be sufficient for how big the scale of this project is.

 

 

 

4. How did your research inform your products and the way they use or challenge conventions?

I did a lot of research when it came to choosing my topic. Last year I had done a drama, so I felt comfortable making those but decided that I didn’t want to make another drama. When I decided to make a mystery, I knew I was setting myself up for a challenging experience. However, I took the risk and decided that I would make the common locked door mystery. My research tries to challenge the conventions by having a female lead. A lot of these mysteries have male leads taking the charge in the mystery. I cannot think of any of the popular locked door mysteries or popular court movies where they solve a case having a female being part of the detective solving. In my movie, I will challenge that convention. I also did research on the mystery genre and as I said earlier, I will be using teens which is uncommon. It is mostly adults who act in these mysteries, and I feel like it would be more interesting with teens as leads. One thing I will not include is a red herring. A red herring is a distraction from the main problem of the mystery, which is something that is usually obvious, and I hate when mysteries do this. I find it a waste of time and just annoying. For those reasons, I am not going to have any red herring or related distractions in my movie.  I may find more conventions in the future that I might try and not use in my products. I know I am trying to make a more unique advertisement than some of the generic ones I’ve seen.