Le Mortel Liaison - FILM REVIEW

To aid reading, here is my review's text.

Le Mortel Liaison- Film Review

Producer/Distributor: RELM Productions

Directors: Matthew Williams, Emilie Cherry, Raya Renney, Luke Jones

Certificate: 12a

Running time: 6 minutes approx

Plot

Detective Barnaby Frisco (played by Luke Jones) returns to work after personal leave following the death of his partner, Bones Goodwin (Matthew Williams.) What follows is a twisted tale of fighting, anger and betrayal over the love of Frisco’s wife, Adrianna (Emilie Cherry.)

Review

 RELM Production’s first feature length film has been a long time coming. This up and coming Film Company, spawned from the Knights Templar Acadamy have kept us all in suspense ever since they announced plans to release their first production. ‘Le Mortel Liaison’ is a bold attempt to revive the Film Noir genre that was so vibrant and successful in the 1940’s. Bold casting decisions from the producers have come up trumps with actors that slip perfectly into their roles as dark, shadowy characters. In a short amount of time, we as an audience are taken on a rollercoaster of a ride that exposes us to an emotional melting pot. The most convincing of which is the portrayal of Adrianna Frisco by Emilie Cherry, who plays a perfect Femme Fatale. 

 Lies, fighting, love and deceit are all displayed perfectly in this debut feature presentation which is sure to take its place in the Noir hall of fame in years to come.

The scenes flow together brilliantly, creating a visual puzzle for the audience to piece together. Smooth transitions and swift locations changes add to the fast pace of this detective thriller.

The sound isn’t perfect, but when you look at this in the grand scheme of things, it doesn’t affect the brilliance of this piece of cinema. The cliff-hanger ending leaves room for a sequel, something that would be greeted with much enthusiasm. Le Mortel Liaison 2 anyone?

Problems whilst filming

Even with all the careful planning and preparation that went into our filming, we still ran into several problems that were beyond our control. An example of this is the heavy rain we encountered when we originally planned to film the church yard scene. As a group we decided it wasn't worth damaging our equipment trying to get the film shot. We ran out of luck the next time we attempted to film this scene too, when we ran out of light and due to this we were unable to continue filming. However these were just mere hiccups in our schedule and we managed to still get everything done on time, an example of how keeping calm and quick re-organisation is key to keeping on track.

Filming Schedule

DATE	TIME	PLANNED TO DO	ACHIEVED
Thursday 23rd February	9am – 12pm	Both office scenes	Both office scenes.
Sunday 26th February	4pm - 7pm	Bedroom Scene and church scene	Bedroom Scene. Church scene postponed as raining.
Tuesday 28thFebruary	11am - 1pm	Tunnel Murder Scene	Tunnel murder scene.
Tuesday 28thFebruary	5pm - 7pm	Intro and Church scene	Intro. Church scene postponed as got too dark to film.
Thursday 1st March	9am - 12pm	Church scene	Church scene.
Monday 5th March	2pm - 3pm	Voiceover for introduction and going to work scene.	Both voiceovers.

The final script for 'Le Mortel Liaison'

Film Noir script for ‘Le Mortel Liaison’

PROLOGUE

<echo, reverb sounds>

MATT:

‘’I cant help it, I love her!’’

LUKE:

‘’Not like I do!’’

(gun shot)

TITLE SEQUENCING – (Exterior shots of area)

~~~~~

ACT 1

~~~~~

SCENE 1

Montage of Luke getting ready.

Mirror – steamed up, clearing. Cutting between Luke and Emilie getting ready. 

- Cutting face with shaver.

- Pouring water, spilling.

- Burning toast.

Emilie is getting ready. Focus on pendant on the table. Mirror shot of her putting it on. Luke approaches from behind. Focus on feet, low angle shot. 

LUKE:

(into mirror) ‘’I’m going.’’

EMILIE:

‘’Nervous?’’

LUKE:

‘’Why should I be?’’

EMILIE:

(sigh) ‘’Just be careful.’’

LUKE:

(at doorway) ‘’I always am.’’ (closes door and gets into car)

ANONYMOUS VOICE OVER

‘’it was detective Frisco’s first day back. He had been on leave for… personal reasons. “

<Montage during voiceover and then music >

· in the car; shots inside and front of car

· walking into station/office - shot from behind, tracking forward

· through corridor

· shot opening door, light behind him, turning lights on.

SCENE 2

<Music cuts/fades out> sits at desk, and gets adjusted/climatised to room.

Raya knocks on door, see him turning around and then point of view seeing Raya by door.

RAYA:

“How are you coping without him, Frisco?”

LUKE:

“not a day goes by when I don’t think of him”

RAYA:

“Mm, it can’t be easy/it must be hard”

LUKE:

“It doesn’t get any easier”

RAYA:

“They still haven’t caught him…”

LUKE:

“No…not yet” *angered*

===“*thump on desk* We’ll catch him, don’t you worry” <looks at photo of Goodwin>

*PHONE RINGING*

LUKE:

(into phone) “Frisco (pause) I’m on it.”

SCENE 3

--- Transition cut to murder scene: tunnel, including establishing shots of the industrial area, leading to tunnel. ---

Detective Frisco goes up to body, kneels down by it. <Over the shoulder shot>.

Inspects body, goes to hand, note rolls out of hand. <close up on hand>

<close up slow motion of necklace falling out of the note as he opens it> <reaction shot>

Frisco picks up the necklace and inspects it.

<close up of necklace in Frisco’s hand.>

< Mid range shot of Frisco> standing still, holding the necklace.

Noise at end of tunnel, footsteps. <long shot of tunnel, darkness>

LUKE:

<shouting> “Who’s there?”

Noise of footsteps running away/ figure in darkness

Luke runs to end of tunnel, gives up. <close up of reaction>

~~~~~~~~~~~~

ACT 2

~~~~~~~~~~~~

SCENE 1

---Back to office----

<high angle shot> Frisco at desk, deep in thought.

· Note and necklace at desk, cigar in ashtray, smoking.

<time lapse shot> clock changing time, static/fade change. Showing Frisco in same place.

<Quick shots> now showing frustration, slides papers off desk, shouting.

<point of view shot> picture of them in church, showing hand picking up photo.

<close up on face>

LUKE:

*murmurs* “the church”.

SCENE 2

<Establishing shots of church, low angle>

Frisco running onto scene. Breathless, unsure of where to go. Looks around and moves to decided location (bell tower or church interior)

Finds wife tied up.

LUKE:

“Are you okay? What happened? Who did this?” No answer from Emilie, just head down.

Matt comes up from behind and knocks him out. <Blurry background then Black out.>

<Close up of head on floor>

<Disorientated shots, ceiling etc> Passes out again.

Bones is above Frisco, watching him. <Start out of focus, moves into focus>

MATT:

“Hello old friend. I’ve seen you in better states. (ad lib: explains how he’s still alive, his wife’s gone behind his back and the plan to get him here)

<close up of Luke clenching fist and getting angry>

They both start to fight, lots of quick shots of punches etc.

Luke strangles Matt, then shot from behind, Luke slumps off.

Shot of Emilie with gun.

END CREDITS

*It should be noted that there were several changes in the script during the editing process where it was necessary to cut small bits out in order to fit within the allotted time slot of 5 minutes. 

Roles within the group

To make the filming process run smoothly, it was important that we ran an organised schedule within the group and that everyone knew what their jobs were. To do this we came up with a list of tasks that each of us would undertake.


The whole group:

- Script writing: coming up with the plot for our film.
- Casting: Giving the actors their roles..
- Actors: Acting the parts given.


Emilie Cherry:

- Assistant Film Editor: Assisting Matt to edit the film.
- Location Scout: helping to find suitable locations that we can film in.
- Wardrobe Supervisor: deciding the costumes.

Matt Williams:

- Cinematography: making sure the shots looked good as well as filming.
- Film Editing: the main editor of the film.
- Music Supervisor: finding the music for our film.

Luke Jones:

- Main Actor
- Assistant Film Editor: Assisting Matt to edit the film.
- Location Scout: helping to find suitable locations that we can film in.

Raya Renney:

- Secondary Cinematography: making sure the shots looked good as well as filming.
- Assistant Film Editor: Assisting Matt to edit the film.
- Property Assistant: finding suitable props.
- Location Scout: helping to find suitable locations that we can film in.

Researching and Designing a Film Noir poster

Every film is released with a poster to promote, spread the word and build up the excitement before the film release. The posters released alongside Film Noir's were often hand drawn due to the fact that in the 1950's computers were not often used for graphic design.

One of the main conventions of a Film Noir poster was to include a female femme fatale as the main feature. This is used to show that male gaze theory was involved heavily within Film Noir. I have used this convention in the design of my own poster in order to make it as authentic as possible.

Another convention of Film Noir posters is the colours that are used on the posters. Commonly, Black, White and Red are the three staple colours used as these three colours represent passion, lust, danger and romance. All of these are themes within Film Noir.

Here are some examples of Film Noir posters:

By comparing ideas from other posters, I worked on several designs before settling with this one as my final product.

  For the poster I used the character profile shot of Emilie as the main point of focus, the reason being, that she plays the role of the Femme Fatale and is therefore one of the most crucial characters in the film. Using Photoshop, I subtly blurred the photo of Emilie to add a sense of mystery, before air brushing the necklace so that it stood out. This was because of the role that the necklace plays in the plot. I wanted to highlight how important it was. I then inserted a completely black background as a canvas to add text. After putting the actors names along the top in a bold white text, I then created a red and white coloured title font placed towards the top of the poster. After adding the RELM logo, I decided to include a tag line at the bottom to get readers questioning the plot of the film and to get them hooked into watching it.

Last minute location change

As mentioned previously, the setting for our Film Noir was originally chosen as Paris. This was to make our film feel like a true, original French Noir, however after careful consideration we decided that it would be for the best to scrap the idea for several reasons:

1. The footage that several members of our group gathered whilst in Paris was shaky and inconsistent. This would result in us loosing marks for filming technique.

2. We came to the conclusion that the Parisian setting made the story line too complicated. The dialogue was English, the character's names were English... so why would it be set in Paris?


Click here to see a video of the un-used Paris footage.