Wednesday, 27 November 2013

RED 2 Challenging my current practices



R.E.D 2
Challenging my current practice
When I looked at the assignment brief  I knew exactly  what RED 1 would be straight away and I knew that If there was any certain way to  ensure that RED2 does what it needed to do and that is to be everything that RED 1 isn't. I knew that I had to create something that  so far removed from what RED 1 was that you may wonder if I had made the film at all. This meant I had to go from conceiving a story with a beginning middle and end, working in locations and using actors to construct a  film with no actors , no locations and no sense of a conventional story.
Essentially looking back at my work, I haven't really "said" anything, there's something of a directorial identity to be seen but I there's nothing about my work that really makes a statement or comments on anything, My films may give the audience the impression that I like comedy, which I do, but there is nothing in my work which gives a portrayal of my world view. I decided to go for the darkest, bleakest subject matter I possibly could and use this film as a way of creating a mood, a feeling, a tone. I wanted this film to be anything but about a story or a conventional outcome.
Maybe I had chosen to try and hide behind absurdist humour and  not reveal my ideas, in fear that they may upset or disgust others, My intention is never to purposefully upset people, I don't think that should ever be a goal with art, but I almost wanted to present something that would almost be an amplifier for my darkest, bleakest, most nihilistic  thoughts.  I literally wanted to show something that was said something about me  and how I see the world when I see it at its worst. As far as I was concerned it needed to be the inversion of RED 1, that was how I understood the brief. I had to actually challenge myself and my practices and as dramatic as it sounds, I had to challenge myself  If I was ever to come out the other end as a better film-maker.
I would have to primarily rely on editing equipment for me to make my film and I knew that If I was going to make the film that I had in my head I needed to sit in the edit suite for as long as it took to create the images that I wanted. I almost need to push myself in situations where there is no other outcome, otherwise I would just back away. Although I did capture some footage from a car passenger window the exact same day as when I shot the footage for RED 1, Most of my media would be from other sources,  mostly from the internet, and from films that I had seen before, where the dialogue or images struck me as being important. I decided to re-appropriate the footage that I picked and the audio  and that I would mix them together and against each other in such a way that the audience would be trapped and almost oppressed by it. I knew to do this successfully that I would need to learn how to edit correctly and precisely, every cut should be important and intentional, because that's where the message , the heart of the film resides, If I failed to cut , even a frame , the way I wanted to, I would feel like I had failed.

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