Story Boarding - Shots 21-77

This is the bulk of my film, these shots are the daydream sequence. It consists of 6 separate scenes all fabricated in the main characters imagination. I chose these scenarios based on rom-com research and audience feed back. They are:

                                                                                                              Scenario 1

• The two characters run towards each other in a field in slow motion. Arms outstretched ready to embrace each other. As they draw closer the male character trips and falls flat on his face in front of her. 
• Why? This is a classic convention of the romantic comedy genre; two characters running towards each other, usually is a corn field, and when they meet in the middle they hug and the man spins the woman around. Instead I have changed the ending to parody the situation.  

                                Scenario 2

• The camera tracks from left to right. They are sitting together on a sofa watching a horror film. He is hiding behind a cushion scared whilst she sits beside him unfazed by the film. 
• Why? This was rated quite well in my audience research as how highly it would likely to be seen. It's playing on the convention that women are scared of horror films; men often comfort the female when watching films. So this is a simple case of role reversal. 

                           Scenario 3

• The two characters are in a park, hand in hand they spin around. Point of view shots will be used to show each characters face as seen from the others perspective. I will film them by getting the actors to hold the camera as they spin, this way the head will stay steady in the shot but the background will spin. The woman look concerned and proceed to vomit in the others face.

• Why? The whole spinning scene has been associated with the genre for ages. The first time I thought of this film premise this is something I wanted to include. I hadn't however thought about how to end this scene. It was suggested to me the someone could vomit on the other. I think this is a perfect twist on the scenario, I asked my actors if they would mind performing this before I was set on the idea but they are happy to do it (or so they say). 

                          Scenario 4

• The next scene is of a dinner date. She is waiting at home, the table set with candles and napkins: a posh, romantic set up. The main character comes into the house with a bucket of chicken and places it on the table. He tucks his napkin into his collar and takes a carefully selected piece of chicken from the bucket and onto his plate using the cutlery. Meanwhile she eats the chicken in a medieval fashion, ripping the meat from the bone with her teeth. The bones pile up on her plate and she drinks the gravy. The guy sheepishly looks up from his plate at her. 
• Why? I wanted to do a dinner date scene and it rated well in my audience feedback. I thought about the classic Lady and the Tramp scene and though about how to change it.This is the scenario I ended up with. I like the role reversal again: you would expect this behaviour from him (if at all) rather than her). 

                                   Scenario 5

• Set at a train station, each character is on an opposite platform. The male has lots of signs, he reveals them one at a time. They say (separated by commas showing sign changes): "Hello, I have a question, Would you, make me, the happiest man alive, (at this point she expects a proposal) Will you..., lend me £6?, I need it for a taxi, and maybe a twix."
• Why? This is a parody of a scene from Love Actually (2003, Richard Curtis). Instead of a cute confession of love as it is in the film he misleads her into thinking he is going to propose then asks her for this scene, it may be my favourite. 

Here is the scene form Love Actually (2003, Curtis) that I am parodying in the above scenario. 

                         Scenario 6

• This is a split screen shot, each of the two characters walks into their shot. They each look at their phone as it goes off. An extra walks past and picks up the partition between them revealing they are in the same location. 
• Why? This scene is like breaking the fourth wall, it directly addresses an editing convention of romantic comedies. Split screens are often used and initially I was going to feature one as part of another scene. However this is just using a convention rather than exploiting to create a parody situation. Hence, this scene was created. 

An example of the split screen technique in the romantic comedy film Pillow Talk (1959, Gordon)

I have very clear images of each of these scenes in my mind, I just hope I can convert these to images on the screen. Storyboarding them has definitely made me more confident, before I hadn't worked out exactly what each scene would comprise of but now it's down on paper I feel better about it all. I haven't yet decided on shot timings too much, I have a rough idea for each but this will become clearer when producing my animatic. 

What's next?

I need to finish my storyboard. All I have left to do is the scene when the main character returns from his daydream. Following this I need to produce a script. Although there is no diegetic dialogue within the scene I do need to think about what I wan't the voice over to consist of. Then I need to produce the animatic.