Codes and Conventions Ebony Flynn 09/03/17

USED Diegetic sounds - We also used sound effects to create diegetic sounds that the characters in the film could hear themselves. We used a crackling sound effect when we showed the film of the fuzzy TV screen to show that someone has been in the house while they have been out. We also used the Kettle to create smoke to suggest that it had been used not long before they got there. As there was no background noise, the effects created suspense and may have added to the uneasy atmosphere that we wanted to create. Non-diegetic sounds - Throughout my film dramatic non-diegetic music that builds up from the opening is used, it creates tension as well as it is used to draw in the audience. Opening credits - Within our film opening we put up our main credits and the distribution company which is ‘Open Road productions’. This is seen in most films that we watched and deconstructed and therefore we decided to use it in ours. High levels of violence/action in opening scene -  We involved a large sequence of action when the two characters were running home to save the parents. Female character kidnapped - We did not feature any female characters in our opening sequence that needed to be saved, we did this to make our film different to other films that are on the market. This is because it challenges stereotypical films where the female is the damsel in distress. Costume - We used ordinary, casual clothing for the two characters as the opening scene is set as two young children just going on a causal walk with what they usually wear during the weekend.

CHALLENGES Female character main actor - In our film we used a female as the main character in our film who dictates most of the dialogue which is often not the case in action/adventure as it is usually the male character that has the centre attention. Children main actors - Within our film we used young people to base our main focus on. This is not a common convention of an action adventure film, for an example Indiana Jones is based on a white man who is portrayed as being strong and independent as well as very powerful. This is the usual conventions of action/adventure films however our film does not follow this. On the other hand, if we were to look at the film of ‘Spy kids’ you could justify that children are often used as the main characters within action/adventure films but this film was also one that went against the codes and conventions.

DEVELOPED Symbol (necklace) - We did involve a symbol like most action films should represent something but the symbol we used was not shown a lot in the opening scene, it just appeared in the end part of the opening scene. Later on, in our film it would show up again and will be a big part of the film. Dialogue drives plot - between Molly and Jamie, we used stereotypical dialogue of children which was quite simple dialogue and short dialogue. They also asked a lot of questions and were always questioning each other like normal siblings do. Molly is shown to be the more powerful character between the two siblings as she talked the most while Jamie was shown to be the weaker sibling as he just agreed with what Molly.