Half-Day Revision Course for AQA GCSE Media Studies External Assessment on Action Adventure Films - 2011

Our first session will be a half-day revision course on Action Adventure Films for this summer’s AQA GCSE Media Studies External Assessment. See ‘Programme Details’ below for more info.

Programme Details

• We come to you.

• We would suggest a Saturday if you would like the course delivered in term time.

• Each revision course is 3 hours in...

A Level Storyboarding

Pre-production Item | Storyboard

Example Brief: Create a storyboard (and video trailer) for a TV Crime Drama

The pre-production brief is to create a storyboard. Students should create a storyboard that shows as much detail as possible including camera instructions with details of camera movement, shot duration, content, details of audio tracks and details of transitions between frames.

This guide opens with a...

Contemporary Action Adventure Films (including hybrids)

• Your Highness (Adventure/Comedy Hybrid) 2011
• Raiders of The Lost Ark (1981)
• Pirates of the Caribbean – On Stranger Tides (2011)
• Superman Returns (2006)
• The Italian Job (1969)
• Romancing The Stone (1984)
• Stormbreaker (2006)
• Godzilla (1998)
• King Arthur (2004)
• Back to the Future (1985)
• Chicken Run (2000)
• Star Trek (2009)
• Chronicles of Narnia (2005)
• The Musketeer (2001)
• Blackbeard (2006)
• The...

Synopsis and Character

By 2154 Earth’s resources have been depleted and a corporation is mining a mineral called unobtainium on the utopian planet of Pandora. Paraplegic former Marine, Jake Scully (played by Sam Worthington) takes his twin brother’s place on a mission, out-posted to Pandora. This is inhabited by the 10 foot, blue native Na’vi, who live in amongst the lush and dense flora and fauna of the forestland. Jake’s mission is to...

The main aspects of marketing are:

• PR: offline/online
• Media: budget, targeting TV, press, radio, outdoor, interactive
• Research: NRG, Fame, TGI
• Creative: trailer, POS, print, TV/radio, interactive, strategy.

The main aim of marketing is to draw people into the film, but also to target audiences who the company believe will make it a blockbuster.

Star Trek provides a very valuable franchise, which has spanned a large period of time. Overall...

Cultural capital would be relevant in terms of intertextual references to the Star Trek television series and significant Star Trek film franchise (8 films) including Star Trek (1979), The Wrath of Kahn (1982), The Search for Spock (1984) and Nemesis (2001). All films were distributed by Paramount Studios, and written and produced by Gene Roddenberry, who created the original 1966 TV Series made by Paramount TV. These are characters of which...

Recommended Reading

• ‘Spectacular Bodies’ - Yvonne Tasker (Routledge) 1998
• ‘Action’ – Richard Dyer, 2000
• ‘Action Women: Muscles, Mothers and Others’ – Yvonne Tasker, 1998

Contemporary Action Films

• Your Highness (Adventure/Comedy Hybrid) David Gordon Green, 2011
• Inception (Action/Sci Fi Hybrid) Christopher Nolan, 2010
• Quantum of Solace Marc Forster, 2008
• Die Hard 4.0 Len Wiseman, 2007
• Tomb Raider Simon West, 2000
• Mission...

Action Adventure / Crime Thriller (Heist) / Comedy Hybrid

The Italian Job is a ‘British’ film starring Michael Caine that was made in 1969. It is about a carefully planned heist involving gold bullion being stolen by an ‘English Mob’ from underneath the nose of the Mafia.

The film achieved critical and commercial success and traded on the recent success of the England football team winning the football World Cup in 1966.

It remains an...

Magazine + Action Film Analysis.ppt

Additional Resources

OCR Nationals Level 3 Overview

AA Films Analysing Evil Characters Worksheet.doc

AA Films Analysing Good Characters Worksheet.doc

AA Films Camera Angles & Shot Worksheet.doc

AA Films Editing Worksheet.doc

AA Films Editing Worksheet Exemplar.doc

AA Films Hollywood Worksheet.doc

Film Marketing Analysis Worksheet.doc

Storyboard Blank 8 Frames.doc

Trailer

At World’s End was the most successful film of 2007, grossing approximately $960 million worldwide, and making it the second most successful in the series, behind Dead Man’s Chest.

It was nominated for the Academy Award for Makeup and the Academy Award for Visual Effects.

It remains one of the most expensive film ever made, with a budget of $300 million.

Definition

For an introduction to Action Adventure films for GCSE see:

This genre of films appeals to a family audience. The stories often pick up on the characters and type of stories that children have come across in children’s books – pirates, swashbuckling heroes, a quest for lost treasure and lots of adventures with monsters and exotic locations such as ancient Egypt.

The most successful action adventure films include Spielberg’s Raiders of the Lost Ark franchise, and Pirates of the Caribbean trilogy.

...

Associated Resources

CA 2011 Action Adventure Mock Preliminary Letter v2.doc
CA 2011 Action Adventure Mock Exam Paper v2.doc

Understanding Storyboarding

Storyboarding is often required as a key production skill in the exam. Make sure you practise your storyboarding skills just in case it crops up again.

External Assessment Mock Exam Preliminary Letter

Action...

This guide is designed to cover the main points of the genre of Disaster Movies, which is the designated topic until summer 2012 for the WJEC GCSE in Film Studies for Paper 1 Exploring Film and to explain what you are likely to be asked in the examination

Defining the genre, what is a disaster movie?

Like all film genres, disaster movies are recognisable because of the presence of certain key elements which we would expect to see in a film...

Functions of the Title Sequence

The functions of the title sequence in a film may seem to be fairly obvious. They are designed to tell the audience the names of the people and organisations involved with the making of the film and in this respect they do the job well.

Irrespective of the genre, there is a conventional way of presenting this information in the credit sequence. This information and the order in which it is presented follows a...

Action Adventure Films is the set topic for the exam on Monday 13 June 2011 (pm) 1 hour and 30 mins

The 2011 brief should be issued to students on or shortly after Monday 16 May 2011. The brief will provide students with a contextualised scenario. The examination will require students to respond to tasks in role.

AQA suggests there are different types of action adventure films and offers this list:

Action Adventure – Swashbuckler

The Mask...

This genre of films appeals to a family audience. The stories often pick up on the characters and type of stories that children have come across in children’s books – pirates, swashbuckling heroes, a quest for lost treasure and lots of adventures with monsters and exotic locations such as ancient Egypt. The most successful action adventure films include Spielberg’s Raiders of the Lost Ark franchise, and Pirates of the Caribbean trilogy....[ read full article ] »

Half-Day Revision Course for AQA GCSE Media Studies External Assessment on Action Adventure Films - 2011

Our first session will be a half-day revision course on Action Adventure Films for this summer’s AQA GCSE Media Studies External Assessment. See ‘Programme Details’ below for more info.

Programme Details

• We come to you.

• We would suggest a Saturday if you would like the course delivered in term time.

...