Project Components

After nine long weeks of Circus Monkey taking over my life, I'm beyond relieved to announce that all components of the project are finally complete!

VIDEO COMPONENT

She's finally ready for everyone to see!!! Click here to watch.

SOCIAL MEDIA COMPONENT

Click here for the link to the Circus Monkey Instagram!

PRINT COMPONENT

The print component is attached below, but can also be found in this link (click here).

Critical Reflection

The student-made short film, Circus Monkey, is an introspective character-led story that depicts the dangers of seeking validation from social media in the worst of media subcultures.  The film, which can be described as a dark drama, illustrates one man's descent into madness as he desperately corrupts himself in an attempt to provoke shock value.  

One of our major inspirations when drafting the character of Diego was David Fincher's The Social Network (2010).  This major feature film follows the story of a young Mark Zuckerberg, and one of the most intriguing aspects of the film is how Fincher doesn't shy away from depicting Zuckerberg as a nerdy, self-righteous asshole.  This characterization was a great influence, especially when writing the dialogue for Diego and Ericka's final conversation towards the end.  

Another major inspiration for Circus Monkey was Eugene Kotlyarenko's Spree (2020), which revolves around an attention-hungry Uber driver who embarks on a killing spree that he live streams in a desperate attempt to gain an internet following.  This film serves as an inspiration for the character of Diego, and the depravity that is often illustrated (albeit, to a lesser extent than in Kotlyarenko's movie) by those who discard their morals for popularity.

However, our biggest inspiration when drafting the character of Diego was the research that we conducted on incels and the enormity of their internet subculture.  We researched several incels who have been made famous by the internet, most notably the story of Chris Chan.  Chan began posting on YouTube in the late 90s, and his obsession with his fans and fame completely took over his life.  He began to make more and more concerning content as his popularity grew, ultimately resulting in the rape and murder of his own mother.  We also looked into the case of Elliot Rodger, a 22-year-old gunman who murdered 6 university students as an act of "revenge" for his inability to lose his virginity.  Rodger rose to fame for his infamous video manifesto, which we used as inspiration in our film.

Elliot Rodger

Diego, our protagonist

Our film appeals to the target audience of 15 to 25-year-olds, as this age group tends to have a deeper understanding of social media culture and the incel mentality.  Circus Monkey could be consumed by both men and women, as there are elements in the production that appeal to both.  On one hand, the harsh criticism of this overtly male-dominated sphere paired with the feminist ideology portrayed by the character of Ericka help to market the film to a female-oriented audience.  On the other hand, the film is heavily led by male characters whose interpersonal relationships aid in building a male audience, considering that they know first-hand about both the incel mentality and the video game banter.

It is very evident that Circus Monkey offers a negative representation of self-titled "involuntarily celibate" (or, incel) men.  As I've explained previously, incels are men who are incapable of getting a girlfriend, and blame that fact on women as a whole rather than taking the time to reflect on themselves.  Our film depicts these men in an undeniably unfavorable fashion, and I believe that we were accomplished in our portrayal of this subset of people as disgusting, misogynistic, and deeply insecure.  This is demonstrated mainly through Diego's last conversation with Ericka, but also in the way that he is so reliant on the validation of others.

The target audience is constantly being engaged throughout the production, whether it be with the mention of multi-player video games like Fortnite, social media apps like TikTok and Twitter, or just generally being aware of how a need for social media fame and attention drives one to extremes.

One could argue that Circus Monkey serves as a sort of "warning sign" for oversharing online, but in reality, the branding created for this film is more representative of the dangers of the incel mentality and the dark truth about the many men like Diego.  When advertising our film, we stuck with a constant gray, black, and dark blue palette; representing both the tone of the film and the loneliness and isolation expressed by our main character.  This color scheme can be seen in all the components of the project - from the social media, to the postcard, to the film itself.  We maintained continuity in all three components by incorporating the monkey illustration in both the Instagram account (as the profile picture), and also in the back side of the postcard, as well as using dust textures for both.  Additionally, we used a screengrab from the film itself as inspiration for our key art, and maintained continuity with the font choice.

The film includes a montage of Diego's deranged TikToks, which are symbolic not only of his growing fame, but also of his loss of sanity.  As the film progresses, his self-exploitation incites him to transform into the titular circus monkey, performing exponentially more outrageous acts in an attempt to grow his social media following.  The importance of TikTok as a platform is highlighted in our Instagram account, where we use one of these videos as a marketing tool.  Finally, there is a very obvious monkey motif that is followed meticulously in all elements of the project.  The monkey is unmistakably a significant element of the film, as it is this dreaded animal that inspires sexual thoughts in our protagonist, initiating his entire spiral.  The monkey can be seen in Diego's calendar in the film, as well as in the reflection of his glasses on the postcard, and as the profile picture on the social media.

After a stressful nine weeks spent thinking solely about monkeys and incels, I'm happy to say that we've finally crossed the finish line.  Working on this project has provided me with so much stability and motivation, and I am so grateful to have been able to do it with two of the most talented people I know.  Although we suffered several time constraints and filming issues (and we could've afforded a couple of extra weeks to edit), I am beyond proud of Virginia, Clara, and I to be able to say that we made this incredible short film from scratch, and I'm so excited to share Circus Monkey with the world.

Postcard

The postcard, an essential section of the project components, is a tool used for advertising and marketing.  Similar to posters for movies with a theatrical release, postcards are used as an easy way for short films to make their presence known at festivals.  Those who have worked on the project tend to pass these out, which builds intrigue and curiosity in the audience, leading them to be present in the viewing.  Therefore, we had to meticulously choose what to include in our postcard; for much of our audience, this is the only chance we have to impress them and sway them to come to see our production.

When my group and I divided the project components equally amongst ourselves, we decided that we would all play to our strengths.  For these reasons, I (as the resident art kid) took on the task of creating the postcard.  Using the knowledge I acquired through my previous research, I knew that we had to include the title, key art, major names, dates/times of the viewings, and the film festival we are showing our production at.

To create a visually interesting composition, I choose to manually illustrate our character.  This ended up being incredibly time-consuming and a little bit of a naive choice, but the payoff was ultimately worth it.  Once we had the illustrated base for our character, I was able to add in the most important (and yet, very tastefully subtle) detail: the monkey being reflected in his glasses.

Afterward, it was time to upload everything into Photoshop and pull it all together.  After playing with the text composition for a while, we chose to have the title of the film as a sort of masthead above everything, and the important names next to the character.  We then added a gradient overlay filter to the illustration and some dust texture to the background for depth.

As for the back, we knew we had to include the dates and important info, and Clara and Virginia had the genius idea to have it emulate a calendar as a sort of reference to the film.  So, we opened Illustrator and made a mock calendar that included the dates and times of the showings.  After, we added our social media handle, the logo of the film festival we are "showing" our film at (manifestation is real), and a goofy doodle of a monkey that we've been using for branding on the social media page.  And finally, we used the same textured background for continuity.  

In the end, I'm happy to say that we're all incredibly proud of how the postcard came out.  I love how it's sleek and professional, and the viewer's eyes are perfectly drawn to all the key elements.  I think that the postcard is a good representation of our film, and I'm excited to see what everyone thinks!

Editing

Thank god for Clara DeLuca.

On Saturday, she spent the entire day looking through footage, uploading it all to Premiere Pro, and creating an entire line edit for (almost) the entire film, and it looks incredible.

Today, Virginia and I met up with her to look over the entire edit, and to assert our own opinions as to how the final draft should look.  We filled in some of the gaps that were missing from the edit, but we spent most of the day searching for music.  After quite a few hours, we found something that fits the vision we all had for the sequence, which was quite an accomplishment for us.  It's the perfect mix of funky jazz and drums, and it creates the perfect ambiance of curiosity and excitement.  I've attached the song below - listen from the starting point of 1:26.

For now, I think we're at a pretty good place with editing, but it's obvious that we need to grind and get shit done quickly.  Tomorrow in class, we're planning on spending time finishing the monkey/Ericka sequence, and working on final and title credits.  While Virginia and Clara dedicate 100% of their time to this, I've been working on an illustration for the postcard.  We took a screengrab from one of our shots, and I used this as inspiration to create a drawing of Diego that showcases him at his computer, and will include a monkey Easter egg in the reflection of his glasses.  It's still a work in progress for now, but I'll be done soon. 

And that’s a wrap!

Aaaaand we're done filming! Finally! It's been a long, tedious process, but I'm glad that it's finally over.  We decided to dedicate Thursday and today to filming, and we (unsurprisingly but thankfully) finished it all!

On Thursday, we met up after school at around 6 PM at my house and knocked out all the scenes we needed of Diego in his room.  We had Ren there to help with cinematography, and we were able to film everything that we needed in the span of around 4 hours.  This schedule wasn't too long, but it was a pretty draining day for all of us.  We messed with lighting a lot, giving some scenes a darker indigo feel to represent loneliness and to give it a heavier tone, and we used a lighter blue/lilac tone for the lighter, more social scenes.

On Friday, we met up around noon outside of Publix to get the scenes of Diego and Ericka's conversation.  This was probably one of the most exhausting days for all of us.  It required long hours out in the scorching Florida sun, and a lot of re-doing the same scenes over and over again.  As a token of gratitude, I stopped by McDonalds to get a burger and coke for Jack for his help and dedication.  After this, we quickly stopped by Virginia's house to get a few scenes of the outside of Diego's room, and we finished the day back at my house filming some final TikToks.  And just like that, we're done!

For now, we're taking the rest of the day slow and using it to rest and recover from the last two days of intense filming.  Afterwards, we'll be meeting up tomorrow and Sunday to edit, and we'll use the rest of the week to finalize everything.

Day 2 of filming

A lot of filming needs to still be done.  Due to the time constraints, we're absolutely resolute to finish filming this week.  We made a schedule that consists of filming all day Thursday and Friday, and spend the weekend editing.

In order to get ahead, Clara, Vir, and I allocated time in class to record audio - specifically, we recorded Diego's two friends' banter over the computer.  The role of the two goons was played by Manny and Jack L, who are both in our media class.  We thought that their voices fit the part pretty well, and we knew that both of them had prior experience with acting and film.  So, we got our little squad together, borrowed a mic from the TV equipment closet, and set up shop in the studio (which provided the perfect isolation from outside sound).

We were able to get a lot of good clips, which we're gonna put over footage of Diego on his PC.  At first, we were a little apprehensive of recording the audio separately, as we feared it would be complicated to edit into a cohesive conversation.  Regardless, our actions stemmed mainly from necessity, and I believe that the sentences are short and snippy enough to work in the context of the overall piece.

            

After school, Clara and Virginia came over to film many of the scenes were were missing that didn't include Jack.  These consisted of the close-ups to the monkey calendar juxtaposed to close-ups of Virginia's character Ericka, which when edited together will create a montage sequence linking Diego's perception of the monkey with sex. 

             

After this, we started editing together the footage that we have already recorded.  This only makes up about half of Act 1 and about a third of Act 2, but it's good progress nonetheless.  For now, we're gonna focus on the print component and the social media page until we can film again.

Day 1 of filming!

WE FINALLY STARTED FILMING LETS GOOOO!!!!  We're finally somewhat on track!! Making progress!!!!  Although our filming schedule has changed since the last time I discussed it on the blog, we still put time aside on Saturday to film as much of Acts 1 and 2 as we could.

On Thursday after school, we had gone to Becon to rent filming equipment from Jim, and we now had all we need to set up shop.  So, Virginia, Jack, and I met up at my house where we transformed my brother's room into Diego's incel dwelling.  Filming was somewhat complicated, considering that I have very limited experience, and Virginia prides herself mainly on screenwriting and acting more than actual cinematography.  This definitely threw a wrench in our plans, and we spent way longer than we should have setting up each shot, orchestrating both lighting and composition.

In the end, I think that we got something that we can very much work with, but it didn't really hit it out of the ballpark for me.  This is a little worrying, but I just hope that we can work with Clara and possibly Ren to produce a more advanced shot composition for the later scenes.

Regardless, we made a lot of progress.  We managed to film most of Act 1 (except for a few scenes that require Diego to be talking to some friends online), and we got a lot of the TikToks for the Act 2 montage done as well.  These were quite fun to film, lol.  We were all cracking up as Jack yelled into my phone about his superiority complex.  Anyways, good progress has been made.  I'm pumped!

Having to work twice as hard

Hello all.  Today in class, we put time aside to divide ourselves into small groups and discuss our projects.  In doing so, there was a lot I learned about what direction to take.

First of all, I really enjoyed the opportunity to be table to converse with my peers about the ideas we have coming into the project, and listening to their feedback.  When discussing Circus Monkey, they all seemed really excited about the film, and they all had good things to say.

However, I've gotten to a point where I'm quite nervous about the fate of this project.  When discussing how far along everyone is with my group, I realized that most people were wrapping up filming, and had already created the print component.  This subconsciously told me that I need to hurry my shit up!

I realized that our group has developed a sense of notoriety, and that only makes me want to push harder to be able to realize out vision.  Regardless, I'm worried that we won't be able to execute it.  These thoughts of failure have been plaguing my brain for the last week-or-so, and I'm excited to finally start filming and get ourselves back on track.

We'll start filming this weekend, so expect a blog to come then!

Finally filming!

Finally, after so much time lost to conflicting schedules, we have created a cohesive filming timeline that works for all of us!  Today in class, Clara, Virginia, and I sat down to orchestrate the preferred schedule.  Despite settling on filming over the weekend, there are still certain conflicts that will make things a little difficult for us.  Mainly, Clara had to go on a last-minute trip to Boston, and won't be back until Sunday.  I'll also be occupied part of Friday, Saturday, and Sunday, and Ren (who was going to help us with cinematography) is also booked on Sunday.

Regardless, we persevere!

Virginia and I have decided that we'll be filming with Jack on Friday and Saturday, and Clara and Virginia will film some scenes on Sunday.  I believe that this timeline will work for all of us, and we'll be able to get a lot of filming out of the way.

Additionally, we've put aside time next Monday, Tuesday, and Friday to film as well.

Filming Issues Pt.2

Things have definitely gotten to the point where I am starting to panic a little, I will not lie.

We are now nearing the end of Week 7 out of 10, and we have yet to even make a filming schedule.  Originally, we were planning on filming all of Week 8, but unsurprisingly, even more scheduling conflicts have arisen.  After talking to Jack, he confirmed that the only days that he's free to film are Monday, Friday, and the weekend.  This is a big problem.

We definitely can't film on Monday (ie. literally tomorrow), as we don't have the equipment, Jack hasn't even read the script, and we haven't come to a definite conclusion on wardrobing.  Friday could potentially be doable, but I have an important event I need to go to at night, and Clara just received news that she needs to fly to Boston at the end of this week.  We could attempt to film on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday without Clara, but we also want her to be included in the production.

This left us thinking about perhaps getting a different actor.  Although that would be a heartbreaking last-minute decision to make (as I really do think that Jack is the perfect choice for this role), it is one that we have to consider.

Clara, Vir, and I have decided that we will meet up after school tomorrow and decide where we want to continue with things.  I will update y'all once we come to a definite conclusion.

Acquiring our most important prop

The year is 2056.  I sit in a dark room, plopped uncomfortably in a rickety wooden chair whose origins are unknown to me.  The darkness of the room surrounds me, suffocating me even, and I feel frightened and hopeless.  I have no idea how big this room truly is.  I have no idea how long I have been in here for.  All I do is sit and wait in this godless abyss, hoping that one day the reason for my suffering is revealed to me in a biblical fashion.  Suddenly, I hear a loud screech; it's a noise that I can sense everywhere, but the location of its origin is lost to me.  Then, I finally understand: it's an intercom system.  The voice on the other side pipes up, sounding monotonous but proud.  It speaks to me, saying over and over again "Monkey f***er.  Monkey f***er.  Monkey f***er."

I understand now.  The room is my own subconscious, and the voice on the intercom is my own cognition.  For days, this project has plagued my nights and my days.  I worry that we won't be able to pull off such a massive task with the little time we have left.  Yet, we must prevail.

Hopefully this analogy wasn't too stupid.

What I meant to say was, we've been making progress.  Slowly, sure, but progress nonetheless.  Today, we were able to get one of our most important props printed and ready to go!  As I'm sure you're all aware by now, the reason for Diego's spiral into online fame is due to his absurd claims of wishing to have sexual intercourse with a monkey.  Since this is so important to the plot, we needed to conceive of a potential reasonable scenario where Diego could make the association between sex and apes.  In the end, we decided that he would attempt to look at PornHub, ultimately fail to find anything of interest, slowly become focused on a monkey calendar that is nearby his desk, and then events ensue...

Clara, who is phenomenal at graphic design, created a calendar for us to use with a picture of an attractive female monkey on it (I mean, as attractive as female monkeys can be...?).  We then got it printed at CVS, took it home with us, and added little doodles and notes to make it seem less like a prop and more like something that has been used frequently.  Now, we're ready to set this up in my brother's room and make it look real.  I'm really contemplating putting this up in front of his desk without warning him beforehand.  I think that could be quite funny in fact.