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Motion Pictures: Behind the Scenes

Ben Gale

“i vamos al cine!” “Allons au cinema!” “Eiga ni lkimusho!” “Let's go to the movies!” When you go to a movie theater, and you view a movie for the first time you become a part of that movie. When the movie is funny, you laugh', when it is sad, you feel sink with depression. Movies provide an avenue to experience a wider range of emotions in one setting than many other works of art. The importance of motion pictures can be broken down into several parts. In order to make a successful film, producers and directors have to achieve certain requirements to get the emotional reaction they are looking for. Entertainment is the number one ingredient needed in a animation, documentary or any other type of motion picture. A film must be able to present a subject, story, event in history or social problem. Feature films are the most popular because they cover vast amounts of genres such as comedy, romance, adventure, and music. Other films may present entertainment through social issues such as alcoholism or racial prejudice. These films provide a form of entertainment that can provoke debate or stir people toward a cause. It takes extensive research and time to publish films like these. In order to keep the audience entertained, the length of the movie cannot be too long or the interest will fade. Most often, feature films are about ninety minutes. However, special epic productions like “Gone With the Wind” or “Pride and Prejudice”have lasted for more than three hours because they have a excellent subject, and have great funding which enables the movie to have well know actors, music and special effects. These types of movies become classics and are timeless. Education is yet another factor in making a motion picture. When a documentary is made, it is entertaining, but its primary purpose is to educate people about its chosen topic. Many documentaries like those from PBS or the History Channel are even used in American classrooms. This educational component adds to the value of the motion picture. The most difficult issues or events can very often be explained or demonstrated more clearly through the medium of film. Motion pictures have changed the way people learn and get their information. Even manuals or training in technical fields are very often produced on film. In the classroom and even in the military, training videos are produced to help teach men and women, boys and girls skills they need to do a certain job or achieve a certain goal that may have taken much longer to explain or learn without the film. Information is also threaded in among travel films, news programs, and even commercials. In order to publish a news program or documentary, there must be careful reporting and research. The purpose of a news program or documentary is to inform people about a specific topic or event. Yet again, information displayed on the screen has been a quicker and more entertaining way of imparting information. People are better informed about what is happening in and around the world because of film. There is now a number of sources from which to get a wide variety of sides to issues that face our world. You can choose Fox News, MSNBC or CNN, for example who will all cover the same events but with a different slant or bias. In many ways, information and education are intertwined. Many factual events or current events might not be appropriate for all settings, for example, a school. So producers go ahead and release their films to the public rather than change it to be appropriate for school settings, so that the general population can use the controversial information in a variety of settings. Every motion picture needs to be advertised. The only way people will be able to know about a movie is when it is publicized. Motion pictures themselves are also a very effective way of publicizing other movies or products. Almost all products are now on commercials. Commercials are profitable ways of getting a product before the general public. Cartoon commercials can be the most effective but are also the most expensive because of the time it takes to make a cartoon. Even though they are the most expensive, they attract and persuade the consumer better than the regular motion picture commercials. Just like any other field in the arts, people who are interested in film making or producing are usually involved in making films as a hobby for most of their lives. Peter Jackson, the director of __The Lord of the Rings__ trilogy, began experimenting with home videos as a young boy making small films with his action figures. The director of __The Incredibles__, Brad Bird, also made small animation movies as a young person. It not uncommon to see an interest lead to a career. Many, however, remain motion picture enthusiasts all their lives but get no further than the hobbyist. Motion pictures combine several of the arts to make one form of the greatest arts. The motion picture can do a great many things that are not entirely possible in any other art. The motion picture is able to show excitement and angles or action that can't be displayed in a painting or sculpture. Special effects are also able to be introduced in a motion picture. Special effects are effects that create an illusion to the viewer's eye. Many movies have huge explosions that look like they are blowing up a whole city, but in reality, it is just one building that has been made on a set to look like a whole town. Many war films or action films such as the __Bourne Identity__, directed by Doug Liman, use many special effects such as slow motion fighting scenes, explosions, or jumping off buildings with a harness that is not shown. The possibilities are limited only by the imagination, which is what makes this art form so extraordinary. Films also have social influence. The power of the motion picture cannot be minimized. Many directors set out to influence their viewers and their appreciation or understanding of the topic or subject of the film. Once a viewer is influenced by a film, he or she will, in turn, influence others around them to see the film. Films with a powerful social message such as __The Pianist__ or __The Boy in the Striped Pajamas__ have the power to influence a large audience to become aware of the injustices of the Holocaust, for example. After establishing a foundation and idea upon which a movie is formed, the next step is creating the actual motion picture. Making a motion picture is a complex process. From the beginning, there must be a story. The story must have a theme that is strong enough to develop into a visual image with dialogue and memorable characters. Most story ideas come from history or the classic fight of good against evil. It all starts with the director but there is never only one person writing the story. Rather, there are three, five, or even ten people working together to refine the idea into something that could be told on a screen. The screenwriter then writes a script for the actors and actresses who are chosen by the director. This process is called the blueprint of the motion picture. After gathering the script and actors, the team then has to sell their idea to producers and directors. If the movie is associated with a well-known director or actor, investors will have assurance that the movie will have box-office appeal. In order to get appropriate funding, the producers need to put together a budget and shooting schedule. Once this is done, then the money will start being raised. The director and coordinators then need to have an organized plan of action or scheduale to turn the script in to a film. This can take anywhere from two weeks to six months. With this accomplished, the director and coordinators can then read the script thoroughly. The goal for every director is to anticipate and solve any problems that might come about. By the end of the period, every one is on the same page and ready to go. Even though everyone is on the same page, not everyone knows just what the film will look and sound like. Everyone, including the actors and actresses, must read through the script. Everyone must get a feel for their part. This is the time to pick though the script, scrapping what is bad and finalizing what is good. The director can't be everywhere at the same time, so additional production teams are needed to help preform the tasks. These teams make sure that everything on the set is running smoothly and up to status. Various jobs, such as the production manager, are given to people to make sure everything including props, costumes, and set designs fit within the budget. Other positions are photography director and art director who control the angles of film and the aspect of each shot. Others control the designing of the set and props. The costume director is also very important. The visuals in a film are very important. If the film takes place in the 1700s in the United States, then the costumes have to fit the time period. This job can very easily prove to be tedious. It is very crucial that the director have a shooting schedule drawn up. Not only does it save time, but it also saves money. When scenes one, five, and nine take place in the same area, then they should all be taken at the same time. When everything is finally set. The film shooting process begins. The production part of filming takes a lot of time and effort on the actors' part. After rehearsing a few times to get a picture of what the character is, it is time to shoot. Each shoot takes time and effort to accomplish. Several “takes” are needed to perfect it. Much of the movie will take place on a sound stage. A sound stage is a very wide open area, where there can be several different sets built. Many movies require outside areas for large buildings or to host fight scenes. __The Lord of the Rings__ was one of those movies that required the set to built outside. Almost every building that is seen in those films were built from scratch. Many films on the other hand can be shot “on location.” This means that the films take place in the city or on a farm. Films such as __Spider-Man__ and __16 Blocks__ are filmed on location in the city. When the the location is set and the actors and actresses are established, it is time to start shooting. The set must be picture perfect and the actors must all be in their costumes with makeup. Lighting and sound must also be set up and ready to go. During this process many problems are found and are fixed right away. Take one! Lights, Camera, Action! The film is rolling and the actors are acting. The director at this time is looking for problems in the set, lighting sound, and the acting. If anything goes wrong, then the the action is stopped and it becomes take two. This processes is a very tedious one, and takes a tremendous amount of patience. Much of the shot's impact comes from the choice of camera lens and position. A couple angles that are interesting to the viewer are from the feet looking up or an overhead shot. These are very interesting because it is not everyday that we see someone like that. The director must also be careful of blocking other actors. When the actor or actress moves forward towards the camera they block their surroundings out. Not only is their image increased, but they take away from the the actors. If they actors walk away from the camera, the viewer might think that the character is isolated and not that important. The director designs each scene so as to avoid these things. After each take, the director consults with the team to see what can be improved, added, or taken away. Traditionally, the director and team have relied on instinct to know how the take would look on film. Since the 1970's, however, many directors have used a video assist to help judge the takes as they are shot. Once the final shot has been taken, the crew then packs up to set up for the next location. The production stage provides a lot of raw footage with which to work with. This obviously needs to be edited before it is published. The director will have hired video editors who will then take all the video and edit it to see which take is the best in each location. After meeting with the director and choosing the best take, the process continues. Each clip has to be edited for both visual and sound quality. This process takes a very long time. The original take must be saved before saving over it, just in case the director is not satisfied with what the editor has done. In the early years of film technology, the sound and picture clips were added separately and edited separately. In the end, these two were brought together and synchronized, otherwise the actors lips would move then the sound. This process was very tedious and a lot of times not done quite as professionally as the viewer would like. Now there are computer editing programs that synchronize and render those two tracks to together on what is called a time line. All the clips are dumped into a time line and then cut and moved around and the process is accomplished ten times faster. Once the editor is done with the rough draft, he or she then views it with the director. They both give their input and the the process is yet again repeated. The editor fixes those problems and again brings it before the director. This process takes a very long time, but is very important in motion picture creation. Now it is time to add music and sound effects. During the editing process the director will either pick songs from various artists and buy the copyright, or he will have a composer compose a score for the film. The composer and sound editor will preview the film and decide on what type of music to pick. Sometimes when choosing the songs it results in the scene being reedited. Once a soundtrack is decided upon, the composer gets to work. The sound and music are then blended together to finalize the overall audio. The sound is then added to the movie and the the crew watches it again. If there are mistakes in either the audio or film, everyone gets back to work and fixes it. Again it is previewed, and if it is good, the movie is then put into a frozen define copy and printed. This final version includes the credits and titles, and a lot of times the special features on how the film was made. Copies are then duplicated and ready for sale. Over the years, technology has changed making it easier and easier for the everyday American to do the same. The process has become simpler, and not only has it helped the film industries, but the everyday person as well. Free online movies, help people use programs, cameras, and sound mixers to produce their own small movies. Motion pictures have done wonders for mankind and are always going to be valued as a unique work of art.