Analysis of Long Takes in Children of Men (2006 Alfonso Cuarón)

Alfonso Cuarón's Children of Men is a masterpiece in terms of both cinematography and long takes. Crafted in all ways around the wish for a documentary feeling, the long takes achieve that aesthetic as does the bland and dilapidated cinematography. Described by Cuarón as a kind of anti Blade Runner (1982 Ridley Scott) the futuristic aspects of the scenery have been allowed to decay and rot to add the sense of realism and grittiness celebrated in British cinema and seen in real life. 

When the film opens it sets the scene brilliantly, a future, decayed, with iconography easily recognisable but noticeably different technology. With London grey and grim no colour pervades, its ugly but real. The take is the first of many long ones following Theo out of a shop before an explosion in the background sets the tone fore the brutal destruction ahead. The president is set and the realism of the special effects, coming from where Theo just was, makes the audience feel like they just escaped the explosion along with Theo.

The lack of colour and lack of nature continues until the introduction of Jasper, Theo's salvation, the person with which he confides and can share his emotion. Jasper's relation to nature, gold and the colour green in general is clear and represents a bright change and a positive peaceful location.

The other point in the film in which art and nature unusually pervade is in the museum of arts that Theo visits. This time the colour represents the power held by the people inside the museum.

The emotion in the film often comes in the scenes steeped in nature and green, again we see an example of this after Julienne dies, our first real outburst of emotion, shrouded by green forests.

At the first fish checkpoint as Theo becomes a rebel, or at least becomes the surrogate father figure for Kee, an important change of clothes symbolises his move away from London and general aristocracy, out of his "suit" and into a new role, situation and mental state.

 Wonderfully set in a barn the cows and harvesting gear represent the production line mentality of not just farmers but society. Mixed in with the cows Kee is in danger of the same harvesting however she is not naive enough to believe she will be treated in any other way. Whilst Theo isnt as pessimistic he decides that standing by Kee's side is what is most important. Kee's clothing also represents her heritage, the sandy orange colour of her dress which flows just enough to show her bump works both narratively and symbolically. It is important to establish her heritage as racism and refugees are some of the strongest themes within the film.

After changing into "fish clothing" he immediately changes again when he is in control, not back to his suit though, to a more gentle navy blue top. This again represents the fatherly image developed as he becomes more and more of a father figure to Kee and possibly her child.

The film continues to get bleaker and bleaker, the Bexton Hill refugee camp realistically represents slums and shanty towns like that of Mexico with a bluer colder aesthetic to match the colder London climate.

Throughout the film the Long takes are extraordinary and fall into many types, one which stands out as much simpler is a gentle track forward on Theo. The stiller and simpler shot makeup gives the audience a chance to just watch Clive Owen's performance as Jasper tells Kee about Theo's dead son.

Alternatively one of the longest tracks of the film, towards the end of the film, in the Bexton Hill location, this jumps all over the scene, dancing around Theo through the street, through a wartorn battle and into a block of flats under siege. Lasting 6 minutes and covering a massive distance the shot almost continuously follows Theo in the hight of the documentary esque coverage of the film. Cuarón says in one of the special features that he wanted it to seem like you weren't watching a film as much as you are following the characters around in 2047 with a dv camera, this take is the perfect example of that. Theo is always well framed and the choreography of the shot is brilliant, it imbues an extreme sense of realism. 

One of the few unrealistically lit shots in the film is the following, the lighting is still believable however the goal of the lighting and sound is to add an angelic sense of miracle to the moment. This miracle stops all fighting around them as the baby stuns soldiers and rebels alike. The lighting audio and acting convinces the audience of the magnitude of the miracle and the importance of the baby.

Right towards the end of the film as Kee and Theo finally escape Bexhill two narrative lighting changes show that Kee and Theo are "out of the dark" safe again. Although still bleak and dim they are out of danger and the baby does have a chance.

The documentary feel of Children of Men is undeniable, the use of subtle lighting and symbolic colour in the mise en scene come together to fill the film with meaning beyond the political and dramatic narrative. Not only is the film well lit and coloured but realistically lit and coloured which, with the long takes, give the sense of realism that is the success of the film.


1. Children of Men (2006), Cuarón A., USA, UK, Universal Pictures, Strike Entertainment, Hit & Run Productions

2. Blade Runner (1982), Scott R., USA, Ladd Company, The, Shaw Brothers, Warner Bros

Storyboards and Coverage

The Script has been finalized and cut up into sections for us to storyboard. I get the first half of the all important interrogation scene. We have cut it into two, the first half being a calm interview and the second half starting when the crucial piece of damning evidence is brought to light. As this is the climax of my half I am going to build tension to this point with two long tracks inwards on both the detective and Brad. To cut between I will use a simple two shot. We talked about the second half and thought abuot using ECU's to show the tension with a quick cut rate. To prelude this I thought the first shot of the section would be nice as an objective close up of the tape recorder.

I also had a chance to look at one of the handouts that addresses a method of checking how much coverage you have of each scene. You draw a line representing each shot by the side of the script showing how much of the scene it covers. This lets you ensure you dont miss anything and looks like an excellent exorcize. Whilst its something I may do for longer pieces in the future it seems a little redundant for this project as 3 of my shots cover the whole of my section and the other is more of a cutaway.

We have also started gathering props for shooting, I have the boiler suits for the crime scene, with all the props I think it will be a convincing and decent shoot.

Crime Drama and Reccie

We have an idea! After discussing things on Facebook we decided to use Connor's idea of a basic crime drama with a few little twists, here's the synopsis:


The film is about a crime scene, the body of a local drug lord has been found.
The first on the scene and only ‘witness’ being 24 year old Brad who has a long line of drug
related crime spread across his record. An interrogation takes place and between Brad and
Police detective Steve White. Brad retells his story and takes the viewer with him. Did he do
it or is there a much more than meets the eye to this interrogation.

I think its a really nice idea and it gives us space to play with colour, long shots, POV and lighting changes. We are still talking it through a little and will be storyboarding and shot listing it soon. Today however we went to Grindleford for our reccie for the crime scene. Here are some of the images and a short analysis of them.

This first set of images are from the first part of the trek around Grindlford, fortunately George knows the area and had a good place in mind so I just got a few snaps for contrast on the way.

As you can see the majority of the land is muddy and littered with autumn leaves, in some areas it looks beautiful and in some it looks like a swamp, overall it isn't quite the right image. It could work, I could see our characters in this area however the trees are a little densely packed and the branches a little wild. One way this location may still end up in our film is through Brads run before he finds the body, this section could be used to exploit the different areas in the forest. The other location we found was much better, here is what it looks like:

Its a much nicer area for shooting in and we think we can get some really iconic images from it. We had the idea of silhouette so I played around a little with the brightness of the shot by altering the aperture, here are the reasults:

Storyboarding has to be done before we really define any shots but its looking good, the location is great and the story really lets us play around within it. Storyboarding should be fun and creative and we already have some great ideas such as using static framing to only show parts of the action, silhouettes and time lapses!

Colour and Long takes

Colour
We looked at a few different properties of colour and how to define, describe or create them. Firstly it is worth noting that daylight bulbs are 5200K and Tungsten is 3200, keeping these values correctly white balanced means your colour will be consistent from shot to shot and its extremely important. We looked briefly at the connotations of colours, red love and power, green nature ect. one thing I had not considered as I only make films for myself or similar audiences is that in different cultures colours have different meanings, this adds something to watching foreign films and is something to consider if ever making a film for another culture.

We also looked at the formation of colours, whilst I understood primary and secondary colour wheels I learned that Additive colour mixes are RGB and that Subtractive colour mixes are Magenta, Yellow and Cyan. Finally as far as colour is concerned we looked at the specific meanings and relationships between Value, Hue and Chroma.

Long Takes
We watched 4 films during the lesson and each one specifically showed off the four options when filming specifically long takes;
1.Stationary actor filmed by a stationary camera. (Hunger 2008 McQueen)
2.Stationary actor filmed by a moving camera. (La Haine 1995 Kassovitz)
3.Moving actor filmed by a stationary camera. (What time is it over there? 2001 Tsai)
4.Moving actor filmed by a moving camera. (Elephant 2003 Gus Van Sant)

Hunger is a single conversation that lasts 22 minutes with the first shot lasting over 17 minutes, brilliantly composed, beautifully acted the stationary shot is a tuning point in the film. It offers a contrast to the rest of the film and is one way to film a ling take. As long as the performance and composition are sttrong it shouldn't get boring but the length of the scene adds a realism and emotion because of the sudden break in pace. It is an interesting use of the creative device, perhaps the easiest to physically produce but the hardest to write as an emotional and poignant scene.

La Haine has stunning camera work, the camera dances around the subjects as they stand stationary looking daringly at each other. Whilst the emotional connection between characters is displayed more explicitly the dancing camera work could be distracting.

What time is it over there? lets characters wonder in and out of long stationary shots. The characters actions and the things you do see take on more importance because you dont see everything, the things that you dont see also add a mystery and intrigue to the shots.

Elephant uses a tracking camera that follows characters constantly. This adds a POV and character to identify with in each shot, the identification gained isnt exactly a POV shot but the over shoulder or MCU and tracking show nicely the characters relationships. On the downside the focus and exposure are hard to alter in order to keep the shot high quality.

Im not exactly sure what our ideas are for cinematography yet but we will keep all of these possibilities in mind for our project.

Filmography
Hunger (2008), McQueen S., UK, Ireland, Film4
La Haine (1995), Kassovitz M., France, Canal+
What Time is it Over There? (2001) Tsai M., Tiawan, France, Arena Films , Homegreen Films
Elephant (2003) Sant.G.V., USA., HBO Films , Fine Line Features , Meno Films

Lack of Prestige (Magicians Veil) Post Production

The editing process was an interesting one for me, Christi and Jordan were quite on the ball and apart from actually sitting at the computer and working there wasn't a lot I could do to help. That being said I still came into the edit suite as often as possible to check on things and offer constructive feedback and make sure everyone was on task. Most of the time they were and despite a tight editing schedule the work got done to a good standard in good time.

One creative thing that came from the edit was the way we will in future treat special effects, some of the things we wanted to do didnt work and some of the things we did do could have been achieved more easily. There are a few ways we could have figured them out before production such as test shoots and test edits but the fact that the schedule changed so much made these things difficult to plan. However I am a little glad we didn't know exactly how easy it could have been, this could have led to an overuse of things popping up added with after effects as the muzzle flashes were. I think the balance between comedy, story and effect is just right, it isnt a camera exorcise but a tasteful and playful film, a fine line we could have easily fallen off.

We also have a very different end product to the script for a lot of reasons. Firstly its because of large changes in post, Christi's original script was too much for the time scale, there were too many ideas within it. We had a really long session talking about where to take the script and came up with some good ideas and simplifying the idea a lot. However, I believe, the problem with the project on the whole is that after this meeting the other group members left it to me and Christi to plan the film. They were told to come along to the scripting discussion and the shot listing session but they didn't. This lead to lots of production issues and a lack of coherence between the team. Finally a lack of professional actors and Christi's directing style led to takes being improvised and different every time causing continuity and editing problems.

I think overall that is why we have a different product, with a lack of coherence and muddled story lines we never quite knew what we were making. With the coverage I made sure of and the voice of Christi that was written in the script and executed on set we ended up with a nice final project, cobbled together from takes a little all over the place.

Lack of Prestige (Magicians Veil) Production

Day 1

Schedule:
20.30 Meet Outside uni with equipment actors and props.
21.15 Arrive at alley location.
21.45 Start Alley Shoot. Scene 2, Scene 5.
12.00 breaktime
12.30Carry on with shoot
01.30 Finish scene 5. Walk to sitting location Scene 6
2.00 Shoot scene 6
3.00 Shoot scene 7 (costume change)
4.00 Shoot ends.

Unfortunately at 2 we lost battery in the audio at 2 and only got to shoot scene 2. This was due to poor acting and bad set ups.

Day 2
Failed Day shoot

2030 arrive at location to finish scene 3 and film scene 5 and final scene
2300 Shoot scene 2
2330 walk to carpark location and shoot scene 6 and 7
0100 break
0200 Shoot subway scene
0400 fin

This time the camera battery died and we again failed to shoot scene 6 7 and the subway scene.

Day 3
Failed to shoot

Day 4
failed to shoot

Day 5
Failed to shoot

Day 6
1800 start shoot and continue till finish... which was at 0600 the next day, a hard shoot but we got it all done over the time.

Lack of Prestige (Magicians Veil) pre production!

So scripting this one has had a lot of stages...

We began looking at it a few months ago, there were a few formatting issues and small mistakes but overall it was a strong film with some great characters, ideas and a really strong voice that bridges comedy and drama. We kept all of that good stuff but streamlined and formatted the script. The problem we then had was that there were two narratives. It begins with Nick, an aging market seller, being entranced and introduced to the world of magic and overcoming his skepticism. The second narrative was a battle with the magician and Nick against a "Prophesist". We tried as hard as possible to make that work and discussed a possible drug plot to make it grittier. However even with all the changes it didnt feel right and we had over 12pages of script so something had to go. We spent a lot of time deciding what to cut and settled on the fact that we could only use 1 narrative of the two, out of the two we chose Nick being introduced to the world of magic, to me it seemed the funnier and more relatable part of the film.

With that in mind Christi went away and rewrote/ adjusted what we had sent it on to me and I edited it a little and we think its about ready. Christi isn't happy with the ending but for now we will keep it as it is and if he rewrites something fantastic we will use it. Although the project has changed a lot I think it fits the brief a lot better and am looking forward to filming it!

All of our next film will be shot in the night time(ish) and will be outside in streets and markets so we looked around sheffield with a camera to see how it would look on film. Lights were not available so it wasn't a great test but we suspect if we can find a location where the background is lit well lighting the characters with small spots shouldnt be too tricky.

This first shot is on the market in sheffield and will be practically the same as the first shot of the film.

We got a large selection for each area and these are some of the best. We will use locations that have good lighting but are also interesting to look at we hope some of these will work out.

Through its many forms of script there have been a lot of different influences and inspirations, what we have arrived at takes parts from all of them and rejects other sections.

At its inception it was described to me as a "gritty realistic" portrayal of urban magic, despite it not turning out this way in the end it immediately pointed us in the direction of films such as This is England (2006 Shane Meadows) and many other Meadows films. They encouraged us to add an aspect of violence and or drugs that in "gritty British" films unfortunately represent Britain realistically. This model isn't just perpetuated by Meadows, many British films, specifically those set in London, portray Britain in this way such as Harry Brown (2009 Daniel Barber) and Kidulthood (2006 Menhaj Huda). We attempted to add a more violent and drug orientated subplot to the film but on development it became clear that this style was not right for the lightheartedness of the film.

For some time we moved in the opposite direction, it was suggested in one of our feedback sessions that we consider our audience, could this be a children's or family film? This lead us to look a little at films like The Sorcerer's Apprentice (2010 Jon Turteltaub) which deals with magic in a very realistic way. We kept the realistic aspect of the film but didn't want a family audience, a lot of our comedy comes from our character who's traits depend on his rudeness and brash qualities which contrast comically with the magicians manners.

Another film which springs to mind for me, in reference to both narrative and characteristic inspiration is The Fisher King (1991 Terry Gilliam). The slight arc at least of characters being introduced to new worlds fits nicely. The characters also share similar but not exact characteristics, at very least they are similarly opposite and the ways in which they react to one another and ultimately work together similarly reflects our film.



This is England, 2006, Meadows S. UK, Big Arty Productions, Film4.
Harry Brown, 2009, Barber D. UK, UK Film Council.
Kidulthood 2006, Huda M. UK, Stealth Films, Cipher Films.
The Sorcerer's Apprentice, 2010,Turteltaub J. USA, Walt Disney Pictures, Jerry Bruckheimer Films.
The Fisher King, 1991, Gilliam T. USA, Columbia Pictures Corporation