Case Study - Criminal Minds

 

Criminal Mind's is a tv show in which an elite group of profilers analyse the nation's most dangerous criminal minds in an effort to anticipate their next moves before they strike again.

Above are the key members of the Criminal Minds team, from left to right, we can see: Joe Mantegna (David Rossi), Shemar Moore (Derek Morgan), and A.J. Cook (Jennifer ‘JJ’ Jareau), Paget Brewster (Emily Prentiss), Kirsten Vangsness (Penelope Garcia), Matthew Gray Gubler (Spencer Reid) and Thomas Gibson, who plays Aaron Hotchner.

Criminal Minds only slightly represents reality, in my opinion.  Most agents spend their time doing paper work and investigating things, they aren't sent out everyday to investigate such matters, there's usually a whole lot more paper work and thigns to sort out before they are.  Also, most crimes in the world don't involve serial killers, this is just used to make the show more interesting.  While the crimes that are dealt with on the show are loosely based on real cases, most crime shows are based on real cases.  Real agents usually work on things that don't involve serial killers.  Very rarely do serial killers come up in real life crime, they definitely don't come up as much as Criminal Minds makes them come up

The majority of key investigators in Criminal Minds are male and this is, in fact, still the case today.  You’ll find there are many more male investigators than female investigators.  Female characters in crime shows or crime films are usually used for “eye-candy” for men hence their looks.  The women, all three of them, have young, attractive faces which was obviously deliberately when casting.  Also, they could be there just to give males a helping hand.  As you can see, the men have more prevalence in this photo whereas the women have been put to the back.  They look smaller and less important.  In the photo, the men are shown to be smart and clever looking because of the fact they’re all wearing suits.  Smart clothing is usually used in detective shows to imply smartness and intelligence.  The women appear to be wearing casual clothing which could connote that maybe they aren't as smart as the men.

Also, the fact that in the picture above, the order, if you think about it, goes from older to youngest,  The two oldest, more intelligent looking men are at the at front of the picture and the youngest people are behind them.  This could maybe show their status in the show or their roles in this programme.  This could also show the representation of old people in society, how much intelligence and wisdom they have and how necessary they are in some situations 

The female characters in this programme are usually portrayed to be quite intelligent but quite stereotypically flirty and fun-loving people. The team specializes in the psychological profiling of criminals – basically, their job is to get inside the criminal’s head so they can catch their target.  The women may be used to maybe use seduction to get information out of the male criminals since the women in this show are all young, intelligent and portrayed as quite flirty characters.  Also, the fact that Jennifer has blonde hair could maybe conform to the "dumb blonde" stereotype.  She can sometimes get emotionally attached to suspects which could also conform to the stereotype that women are emotional.  Male roles in this programme are shown to be more physical and more intelligent than female characters, for example:  Spencer Reid.  Reid is a brilliant psychological profiler, he is the youngest member of the team and has the highest IQ.  He has a variety of other talents though and knows a high amount of chemistry and mathematics.  He has photographic memory and can read quite fast.  This reinforces male dominance in this programme.  Women are usually made to stay at the computers and away from the action unless they're specifically needed.  

 Penelope is dating another FBI analyst but has a joking; friendly relationship with Derek Morgan, Derek calls her “baby girl” and “sugar”.  She’s a computer nerd (which reinforces her intelligence) but she cares a lot about her appearance: changing her hair colour and style nearly every episode and she also wears quite unusual accessories.  This could reinforce how women are maybe represented in this show to be quite immature.  Male gaze is used in this programme too, not just for the male audience but because the woman is usually used to gain information from criminals through the use of seduction.  They'll flirt or maybe show interest in the criminal so the criminal opens up to them.

There are more male characters than female, but only by one.  The four males and three females make up a team of experts in the “Behavioural Analysis Unit (BAU) and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI).   

Genre Conventions.

When looking at crime drama we have to establish the Conventions of this genre. Criminal Minds fits under the category of a ‘crime drama,’ as it conforms to the conventional Police Procedural drama. It contains a hierarchal relationship between officers and a fight to find the criminal. However the programme differs in its exploration of the criminal rather than the crime. The central characters of the piece are all highly trained, special agents who deal with high profile, exaggerated cases. For example – a psychiatrist serial killer who murders people using their deepest fears. This is an unrealistic storyline for a conventional crime drama, however it provides entertainment for viewers. As television progresses, the conventions of Crime Drama are also changing. We are no longer in a World of realism and sense ‘The Bill,’ we have now plunged into a state of unrealistic storylines, characters, etc..  In order to entertain the public.

The narrative of the piece as we are taken on a journey through the minds of the criminals, we see flashbacks to their childhood for example and we see a clear correlation between the way they were treated and the way they now treat others. However realism is shunned again when looking at the characters, especially the law enforcement team. They are all special agents, they all carry guns in holsters and have intense debates about the case and what they believe the answer is. These are then followed by miraculous brainwaves which give them the solution to the whole investigation. A convention we now see in so many crime dramas, however sadly not in reality.

The use of props is also important. We're going to a location where a crime has been committed, we often see the conventional objects we would expect to find, a line of tape to cordon off the area, a forensics team investigating the murder, etc.. However when the climax reaches and the officers finally find the criminals whereabouts, they often run in, wearing no armour and no reinforcements, thus glamourising the police giving them a brave, heroic status, which is again something we wouldn’t find in reality. 

The conventions of a Police Procedural drama would be investigations, which are often shown, meetings to discuss the evidence found, however these often break out into heated arguments and the excitement of the ‘chase’ without the responsibilities that the police have to face when solving a crime.

The audience are constantly made to feel a sense of tense excitement which is resolved at the end of the programme when the ‘killer is caught,’ which is a convention of all Crime Thrillers. Nevertheless, reality tells us something different, solving a crime can be an extensive task where police spend hours looking at evidence, dwelling over paperwork and waiting for a breakthrough, (The Wire) however crime dramas cut these moments out due to the lack of entertainment experienced, thus making it an hour long, action packed thriller, which may not resemble reality, but it provides the amusement we crave and means we continue watching.

 

Main Task Ideas

Timeline

First of all, we created a time-line of what was happening because it was a bit too much to take in and make sense of.  We constructed a time-line to show our scenes and when roughly they will all take place in the opening scene.  This did prove to help a lot because we could always refer to it when we needed guidance and needed to know where we were.


Title of our Film

We brainstormed a few ideas for the title of our film.  We were quite fond of "Syndicate" but then changed our mind to a film title we thought of quite a bit of time after I took this picture:  "Son of the Law", what brought upon this title was the fact that our main characters name is "Ryan Lawson" and the word "law" is in his surname.  Also, our film does revolve around the idea of Ryan running from the law because of something he didn't know about.

Action film ideas

Here, we brain-stormed a few ideas, we have officially decided to go with the "On the run" idea because that's going to be both fun and relatively difficult to film.  We expanded on it by adding in scenes of flashbacks and voice-overs.  We've also decided on the location:  Victoria Park.

Nathan's research on the Party/Coming Of Age genre

A party scene, coming of age is another idea [Written by Nathan]

My idea is to shoot the first 2 minutes of our main task incorporating ideas used in the examples below. For example point of view shots, blurry camera shots, shaky camera, flashes, smoky atmosphere, shaky camera and many more.

Examples include:

Misfits Season 4 Episode 6

Etta Bond's: Resolve (Music Video): http://sbtv.co.uk/2013/01/etta-bond-resolve-music-video/

Project X: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1Rl1TJG17Wk&safe=active

Daniel's research on the Action genre:

My group includes: Nile and Naithan

An Action scene can be exciting as there are a lot of fast cuts and editing and overall just lot to shoot a free running scene will be very hard as we need to think about where we could set the scene and the storyline.

My idea is to shoot the first few minutes of a free running scene and I have been inspired by these three movies:


James Bond Casino Royale

District 13

Research for our Main Task.

Group members:  Daniel and Nathan

I've been researching the Rom-Com film genre; the movies I've been looking at are the following:

Friends With Benefits (2011)

Just Go With It (2011)

She's Out Of My League

Crazy Stupid Love (2011)

This movie, I found quite interesting, because of the part in the trailer when Steve Carell (Cal Weaver) is putting on his suit in steps, the screen fades out and maybe I could use this to put the credits in effectively.  I could have a scene of the actor picking up his tie  then fade out to the actor's name (Nile Williams) then have the actor pick up his blazer and then fade out again to another part of the credits and so on.  I find this interesting because of a romantic guy coming to a date with a suit.

Mise-en-scene

Spider-man 2 - Train Scene

The genre of this film is action, as you can tell because of the way the man (Dr Otto Octavious) has eight limbs and is attacking Spider-man.  The mise-en-scene of this shot is a train, buildings.  The costume is one related to Spider-man and Dr Octopus. 

Continuity Editing

Continuity Editing..


Harry Potter and The Goblet Of Fire - First Task 

This scene from Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire is a good match on action scene because of the way Harry's flying his broom and it looks so fluent and it was so well cut.  When he had to fly through the bridge in order to escape the Dragon, the fast cuts brought the tension and the fact that it was so smoothly cut made it feel as if no time at all had passed between the shots.

Spider-man 2 - Bank Scene

This scene uses editing well.  Because it's an action scene, there are loads and loads of cuts and some scenes where there is no editing at all, such as:  When Spider-man and Doc Ock are falling, it's all one scene to make the audience feel as if they're falling with him.

Preliminary Task

The genre of our film: Crime/Comedy

What influenced us to create what we've created:

Yusuf (A group member) is a big fan of scam films.  He's quite an expert on the genre.  Also, shows like the Real Hustle influenced our decision to make a film involving one of the most known scams: Somebody buying something, opening the case/box and finding nothing inside.  

Enjoy the video below containing a 'The Real Hustle' scam!

Storyline:

The film starts off with a phone conversation between Nile and Yusuf.  They're planning to meet inside a private building in order to exchange a camera for money but Nile doesn't know that Yusuf is planning to scam him into buying a camera which isn't actually in the box.  They meet on the top floor and exchange their goods.  Nile then looks into the box and finds a note.  Realising that he has been scammed he puts the note into the box turns around and walks out of the door behind him.  Nile then sees the not very smart Yusuf walking away instead of running and chases after him.

Script: 

Nile: Have you got the camera?

Yusuf: Yeah, I've got the camera.

Nile: OK, where are you?

Yusuf: Make your way to the third floor, yeah?

Nile: OK, I'll see you there.

Yusuf: Alright.

(Nile walks up 3 flights of stairs before finding Yusuf on the top deck with a bag containing the "camera")

Nile: Are you Yusuf?

Yusuf: Yeah, you're Nile? 

Nile: Yeah.

(Nile and Yusuf  both walk into the room together)

Nile:  Can I see the camera please?

Yusuf:  Here's the camera.  It's all in perfect condition (Yusuf takes camera out of box) You got the money?

(Nile gives Yusuf money) 

Nile: Is that enough? 

Yusuf: Yeah.

(Yusuf walks off)

(Nile finds a note in the box and realises he has been scammed)

Nile:  The guy has scammed me. 

(Nile walks through the door behind and sees Yusuf walking)

Nile: YUSUF! 

(Fade-out) 

Shots we used:

Low Angle Shot

Over-the-shoulder shot

Close-up shot of Camera

Point-of-view Shot 

Evaluation:

The finished preliminary task is above.  

I feel, especially because we only had 3 members in our group, that we were quite able to handle our roles without much hardship and difficulty.  Yusuf was in charge of the floor plan, Nathan was in charge of the Storyboard and I, Nile, was in charge of the script and where everything was going to be filmed.  

First of all, we all were going to do a prison scene in which involved drugs and one friend setting up another friend.  We then presented our idea to our media teacher and she helped us improve the film.  We ended up, as a group, deciding that we should make a, sort of, crime/comedy film containing a scam artist and the victim.  What mainly influenced our decision was all the crime shows my friend, Yusuf, watched.  

We had some difficulty when filming our film; because we had to film it in college we couldn't exactly expect there to be no background noise.  We had to put up with students and staff coming in and out of our shots.  At one point, we had to wait 20 minutes to film one scene because it was the lower school's lunchtime when we were filming and there were students needing to go toilet, students needing to go meet teachers and staff needing to walk past us as we were shooting.  Also, there was the issue of continuity in a sense that everyone had to be wearing the same clothes as they had on when we shot our first scenes and some of us came in to college wearing different clothes so we had to film every scene again - extremely tiring.  We also conformed to the 180 degree rule when filming mine and Yusuf's conversation in the room which was relatively easy.

The camera angles we used weren't too difficult to use.  We used the low-angle shot, high angle shots and POV (Point of View) shots.  We also used a dolly shot, which involved us using a school trolley, placing the camera on top of it and wheeling along the camera in the scene which has Yusuf walking down a corridor.  We used a CCTV shot but didn't include it in the final production because we realised it didn't exactly go too well with the match-on-action we had to have in this film.  This was probably the most difficult shot because we didn't have anything to place the camera onto, Nathan (the cameraman) had to stand on a chair, holding the camera above his head in order to film it - it took us numerous attempts.

Overall, our preliminary task did go according to plan.  I just wish we had a bit more time to really edit the shots and get the camera angles we needed.  I think if I had another chance to do this, I would concentrate more on the camera angles we actually needed and how an actual film is shot - in other words, do a bit more research!  

Film Reviews

Pitch Perfect..

I went to see Pitch Perfect over the Christmas Holidays with a couple of friends and it was quite a good film.  Good plot and a good storyline and the acting was brilliant. 

The film is about a young student trying to find her way in life.  She's quiet and she's a keeps-herself-to-herself kind of girl.  She then finds interest in a group called The Bellas.  At first, the leader of the group, Aubrey, doesn't like Beca much as she feels she's taking over her role and then as the film progresses, realises she may actually need her guidance to bring the group to success. 

I'd fully recommend this film to anyone with an eye for these coming-of-age, comedic university movies.  It mixes romance, jealousy and competition theme very well... See the trailer below!

Harry Potter and The Deathly Hallows Part 2 Trailer 3 (2011)

Overview: All of the Harry Potter films are about the life of a ordinary - seeming - boy who then learns he's a wizard on his 11th birthday.  He makes his way to Hogwarts School Of Witchcraft and Wizardry; throughout his years in the school he learns an evil wizard who calls himself Lord Voldemort, makes 3 of his future best friends:  Hermione and Ron.  He's good at Quidditch (a wizard game played on brooms) and in his 6th year, he's sent on a quest by Albus Dumbledore to bring about the death of Lord Voldemort once and for all. 

Throughout the series, we are mainly with Harry Potter as the story is about him, he is the main protagonist and hero.  We're basically Harry Potter, when Harry Potter goes to battle we go to battle.  We're made to, in a sense, hate Voldemort in this series because of the fact that we learn that Voldemort killed his parents and his death-eaters have killed some of his friends/family (Sirius Black, Remus Lupin and Romilda Vane)

The use of flashbacks and editing in this film is used very affectively because when it happens, it's like we go back in time and when Harry looks into the Pensieve the use of long cuts in the scene makes us believe the flow of the film.  If they had done an elliptical cut showing him looking into the Pensieve and then cutting to us being in the Pensieve it would've looked very unconvincing but they pan the camera.  They're first looking up at him from inside the Pensieve and then the camera pans down using effects so it feels like as if Harry has dropped through the Pensieve into Dumbledore's memories.

On the whole, I'd give the film an 7/10 mainly because the storyline in the book was way better than the one they used in the film.  The end battle between Harry and Voldemort would've been much better if they had been in the great hall and they had a long talk before anything happened.  It was a good film though, excluding those faults.

The Unborn (Trailer) (2009)

This trailer fits into the horror genre conventions because it has childhood issues, it is religious and it has insanity, supernatural & good versus evil in it. 

The supernatural, the religious and the childhood issues relates to the unborn child.  The unborn child who wants to be born but can't because he's dead. 

The insanity relates to the protagonist because she's becoming insane - well, insanely scared.

This film uses camera angles very cleverly too.  When the woman awakes to find her dead son in her  bed, the camera is on a high angle shot.  To make us feel like we are looking down on her from heaven.