Initial Ideas

As a group we decided that we wanted to use the genre of drama to base our opening sequence on. We decided that we would make it a bit like the teenage drama Skins, in that we would use teenagers that were all having different problems either at home or with peers. We decided that we would have 4 main characters, a girl who uses drugs as a form of escape, a girl who is a dancer but is constantly beaten by her boyfriend, a boy who wants to get fit and is depressed about his body, and a boy who is a bit of a swat and so has no friends. We understood that these were very sensitive areas to film in so we would have to be very careful.


We decided that we wanted to use parts of the opening sequence to 'Train spotting' within our work, as we wanted the characters to each voice over their actions. We also decided that we wanted to use a split screen, we thought this would be an effective way to like the 4 characters together.


We then started to establish our storyline behind the children, we decided that:
The drug user was only using drugs to cope with the fact that she was the only carer for her disabled mother and that the drugs were her only form of release.
The boy in the gym was there because he was depressed about the way he looked and his body and wanted to work out so as to fit in.
The dancer is constantly abused by her boyfriend and has bruises over her body and has resorted to self harm.
The swat is sitting in the library, alone, rushing through revision.


We then discussed what these teens would be doing in the opening sequence and how to change between the scenes with smooth transitions, we decided that:
We decided that the drug user would be sitting alone in her room smoking a spliff and the voice over would explain why she has turned to smoking it, as she stands up from a chair we will film her from behind.
This will then change to a shot of the boy in the gym standing up from  piece of machinery, filmed from in front, he will then voiceover his feelings and why he is in the gym, whilst hitting a punchbag.
We will then film the dancer dancing in front of some mirrors, along with her voiceover we will have the sounds of the punchbag being hit in the previous scene to relate to her being beaten up, she will then sit on the floor and the camera will pan around her.
As the camera gets to her back it will carry on panning but will pan into the boy sitting in the library alone with his voice over.
We will then cut to a 4 way split screen of the 4 characters leaving the room and all 4 doors slamming in sync with one another.
At this point the title of the film will appear on the screen.