Monday 30 November 2009
Monday 5 October 2009
INTRODUCTION TO MY CASE STUDY -FILM 4
Film4 was originally known as FilmFour and became Channel 4's second channel (after Channel 4 itself) when it launched on 1 November 1998. It was a subscription-only service available on satellite television via the Sky Digital platform, Digital terrestrial via ITV Digital (until the platform went into administration in 2002), and most UK cable services. It cost £5.99 or £6.00 a month (depending on platform), eventually rising to up to £7. The launch night, which was also broadcast on Channel 4, was hosted by Johnny Vaughan and the first film to be shown was What's Eating Gilbert Grape.
Later, additional channels were added, FilmFour World and FilmFour Extreme which operated on a timeshare and the time-shift channel FilmFour +1. FilmFour World and Extreme were discontinued in 2003 and replaced by FilmFour Weekly, which screened four films across the week at the same time each day to make it easier to catch a film at least once [2]. FilmFour Weekly ceased broadcasting on 19 July 2006 when the subscription service ended.
The subscription service ended on 19 July 2006 and the channel re-launched (under the slightly modified name of Film4) as a free-to-air service a few days later on 23 July. When the channel became free, it also returned to digital terrestrial as part of the Freeview brand, and became completely free-to-air on satellite television. Due to the change, the channel's availability increased from 300,000 (subscribers) to 18 million households. It also changed its broadcasting hours to 1.00pm-8.45am, and commercial breaks were included during films for the first time. The first film broadcast under the new format was the British non-subscription television premiere of Lost in Translation. It remains the only free film channel available on digital terrestrial television.http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Film4
Monday 28 September 2009
CASE STUDY FILM4: HOT FUZZ (2007)
Hot Fuzz is a 2007 British action comedy film written by Simon Pegg and Edgar Wright and starring Pegg and Nick Frost. The three had previously worked together on the 2004 film Shaun of the Dead as well as the television series Spaced. The film was directed by Wright and produced by Nira Park. The film follows two police officers attempting to solve a series of mysterious deaths in a small village.
Over a hundred action films were used as inspiration for developing the script, which Wright and Pegg developed together. Filming took place over eleven weeks in early 2006. The film features an extensive cast along with various uncredited cameos. Visual effects were developed by ten artists to expand on or add explosive, gore, and gunfire scenes within the film. Prior to the film's release it was promoted on video blogs during the production as well as at a San Diego Comic-Con panel.
Debuting on 14 February 2007 in the United Kingdom and 20 April in the United States, Hot Fuzz received mostly positive reviews, earning a 90% approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes and 81/100 from Metacritic. The total international box office gross reached $80,573,774 before its home media release. Shortly after the film's release, two different soundtracks were released in the UK and US.To prepare for their roles in the film, Simon Pegg and Nick Frost had to follow certain requirements. Pegg's contract stated that he had to adopt a strict diet and use three personal trainers to prepare him for the physically demanding scenes in the film. Frost was asked by Wright and Pegg to watch around twenty action films to warm him up for his role as a police officer, but he decided to only watch Bad Boys II.[11]
During the latter half of 2005, Working Title approached several towns in South West England looking for an appropriate filming location. Simon Pegg commented "We're both from the West Country so it just seemed like it was the perfect and logical thing to drag those kind of ideas and those genres and those clichés back to our beginnings to where we grew up, so you could see high-octane balls-to-the-wall action in Frome".[12] Stow-on-the-Wold was considered amongst others, but after being turned away, the company settled upon Wells, Wright's hometown.[13] Wright has commented "and Wells is very picturesque...I love it but I also want to trash it".[14] TheWells Cathedral was digitally painted out of every shot of the village, as Wright wanted the Church of St. Cuthbert to be the centre building for the fictional town of Sandford;[5] however, the Bishop's Palace is identifiable in some shots.[15] Filming also took place at the Hendon Police College, including the driving school skid pan and athletic track.[16] Filming commenced on 19 March 2006 and lasted for eleven weeks.[17][18] After editing, Wright ended up cutting half an hour of footage from the film.[19]
Cast
While writing the script, the film's director and writer, Edgar Wright, as well as Simon Pegg, intended to include Nick Frost as the partner for Pegg's character. Frost revealed that he would only do the film if he could name his character, and he chose "Danny Butterman".[2] Cast requirements included fifty people for speaking and non-speaking parts, and there were several casting calls for citizens of Wells to fill the roles, as the city was where most of the filming took place.[2]
[edit]Cameos
British singer and actor Joseph McManners played a cameo role as a tearaway schoolboy, although his background story and an entire sub-plot surrounding his character were cut from the final version and can only be found within the DVD bonus features.Stephen Merchant also makes an appearance as one of the village's residents. Wright revealed in an interview that Cate Blanchett was given her cameo role as a result of her being a fan of Shaun of the Dead.[3] Jim Broadbent similarly revealed his interest inShaun and requested a role while meeting with Simon Pegg at a BAFTA awards ceremony.[4] Wright met with director Peter Jackson while he was filming King Kong, and Jackson suggested that he would be willing to do a cameo in the film. Edgar had Jackson wear a fake beard and pads to portray Father Christmas who stabs Angel in the opening montage.[3] In the same opening montage, Garth Jennings can be seen as a drug dealer, with the audio commentary stating Garth and Edgar Wright had an agreement to have cameo appearances in each other's films.[5] Paul Freeman, Billie Whitelaw, and Kenneth Cranham all appear as members of the NWA.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hot_Fuzz
