feedback of 'The dead letter drop'

As media film noir feedback.

Initial audience response/impressions. The good areas.

The first impressions of our film ‘the dead letter drop’ varied between good and bad. Firstly let us start with the good parts. Our establishing shot of the first meeting between the femme fatale and our male protagonist was highly congratulated. The cinematography was a main hit with the audience such as those seen at the first sequence during the exchange of the letter which once opened ‘supposedly’ kills him. Shots were that of a Dutch tilt of the dead males feet as it looks to watch the femme fatale walk away. The digetic music being played created a cross cut which saw the next shot of the radio being turned off which creates the non-digetic music to be turned off too.The panning shot of the atrium was seen as changing the infrastructure of film noir which I felt the film generally did. Instead of it being in cramped rooms with hard lights everywhere we made it in wide open spaces. The editing of our femme fatale walking towards Spencer and jump cutting the scene by seconds to create a distorted walk and the fade away of her after putting the envelope into the bag was highly praised as it left the idea to many in the case of whether she was real or not which even I hadn’t thought of it looking like that.

(That specific scene is on a blog entry to be viewed)

The bad areas were that the dialogue was seen as not being obvious In the sense that in one scene the voice over plays over a scene of the two characters discussing the ‘game’. this caused a bewilderment to a few of our audience members which we later changed to make sure the voice over and narrative was a lot clearer. During the beginning of the conversation between the Spencer and his femme fatale the appearance of a microphone comes into the scene which in pretty much ruined the whole scene. Due to our cinematographer leaving shortly after I put this down to her not really caring anymore and what was more annoying is its something which cannot be changed unless the shot is stretched which creates it to become less in focus. Also at the beginning when Spencer opens the last letter which says BANG an idea was put across to introduce a sound effect to make it more obvious on whether he was shot or not?

Use of cinematography - The different variation of panning shots such as the slow panning of the Orwell bridge and the sped up pan within the large meeting area when Spencer is trying to see who had just delivered the envelope. The variety of shots that were used within the film as well as the editing effects used with the uncomfortable scene of the 1^st meeting between the two was enjoyed.

Use of mise-en-scene - The outfits worn were a noticeable take on noir at the beginning but then it came clear on the flashback of the contemporary twist. The clothes worn for instance with Spencer was seen as a transformation from a scruffy loner to a confident young noir male protagonist. The pink envelope was commented on in being a good colour to express a female as well as being closely related to love.

Use of sound - The background music within the atrium was good in developing the scene in the sense of making it obvious that it was a meeting place and that you could easily go unnoticed in dropping of an envelope without someone realising. The voice over again was slightly criticised in the sense that it was ok but it could have been longer so that it made the narrative a lot more obvious and louder so that it was a lot clearer to hear. In some scene some of the audience said that they had to really concentrate to hear what was trying to be said. The digetic and non-digetic was an overall thumbs up.

Use of editing, titles and effects. - The pace of editing was good as it helped raise the tension of the film straight from the beginning and then let it calm down over so slightly and then raised the tempo back up just before the two meet in the car. As well as mentioned before the distorted approach of the femme fatale and cross cuts that were used within the film.

Suitability of style to noir genres codes and conventions - Everyone exclaimed yes

Suitability of narrative to noir codes and conventions - Again, everyone said yes

Suitability of characters (representation) to noir codes and conventions - Everyone said yes

Overall production values - Everyone said yes apart from a few who expressed their dislike of the low levelled volume of the voice over and the appearance of a microphone within a scene.

Who are the target audience? - We explained that it would be from 15-30 because of the violent end and the difficulty of trying to understand the narrative.