Attack the block - Products

1. Attack The Block
Themes, narrative and genres
Attack the block is a Horror, Action, Fantasy, Comedy horror and Sci-Fi film. the film is about a
teenage gang that protects the block from militant aliens. The people that are involved in the
gang are Moses the leader of the gang (John Boyega), Pest (Alex Esmail), Biggz (Simon Howard),
Dennis (Franz Drameh) and Jerome (Leoon James). At first the youths are portrayed as troubled
by doing antics such as theft, drug dealing, smoking etc.but later on within the movie we see
how these youths save the block from extraterrestrials.
Throughout the journey of the filmwe see a reoccurring theme of bloody/gory deaths. One
death that was gory and bloody is when Hi-Hatz (Jumayn Hunter) gets maliciously eaten by the
extraterrestrials. Beside being bloody/gory this scene also appears to be comedic as we see a
hilarious 360 arc shot of Hi-Hatz face when being eaten by the zombies.
Beside the filmhorror and comedy aspect there's also Sci-Fi, Fantasy and Action. Sci-Fi, fantasy
and action is evident in the film as the filmfollows why the extraterrestrials have came into the
block. It seems they have came as the aliens are like spores, drifting through space on solar
winds until they find a suitable planet they can reproduce their species from. One of the female
species lets off a strong pheromone which will attract the male creatures to a planet so that
they can mate and propagate their species in their new world (which happens to be earth
within the area of Brixton- South London).When Brewis finds this out he tells Moses and Moses
is left to kill off all the aliens by constructing plan with Samantha ( the woman he robbed earlier)
to turn all the gas on in his flat and we are left with a slow motion action scene where Moses
runs into his flat and kills all the aliens with a huge explosion by lighting a firework within his
flat.
Camera and editing techniques
The camera shots are variety of shots to steady-cam to show scenes of when the gangs are
running away from the monsters, Wide shots to capture huge explosions such as the explosion
of when Moses blows up all the monsters, close-ups to show the fear of the gangs and the
outsiders of the gang when witnessing the monsters, Tracking shots, mid shots and pan shots
etc. and the pacing of the filmis fast as most of the gang are constantly being chased by the
aliens. There are some slow motion shots. One shot that is slow motion is when Moses run to
his flat to turn the gas on while the monsters are chasing himwith the hairless alien behind
Moses back.
Mise-en-scene

2. The location of the film is set within the council estate of South London Brixton's. Council
estates are common areas within UK iconography and are often the urban areas of where
youths of Britain live or hang out. Within attack the block they successfully depict this
representation of how some youths behave within the area and how the areas look. The filmis
set in the night of bonfire night. with the film mostly being set in the night it gives way for dark
imagery to be used adding effect for the films use of horror.
The props and costume would be the filmuse of urban clothing the youths and elders were in
areas of South London Brixton, the weaponry the gang and outsiders of the gangs use such as:
Knives, guns, baseball bat etc. and the practical costumes of the malevolent monsters within
the film. The malevolent monsters designed by director Joe Cornish was inspired by creating
these monsters by his memory of Ralph Bakshi’s Lord of the Rings Ringwraith's and the wolf at
the beginning of 300. Cornish didn’t have budget for CGI so he wanted the creatures to be
practical, using some digital effects.
Movement Choreographer Terry Notary (Cabin in the Woods, Rise of the Planet of the Apes,
Avatar and the upcoming The Hobbit films) worked with Spectral Motion to design the Creature
suits and digital effects were added by Digital Negative and Fido.
UK Stars, UK directors, writers, crew, What types of Music
The stars of the filmare most notable stars such as John Boyega, Jodie Whittaker, Nick Frost
and newly/debuted stars such as Alex Esmail, Simon Howard, Leoon James, Franz Drameh,
Jumayn Hunter and Luke Treadway. John Boyega has been notable since present years for his
role in the anticipated movie of 2015 (Star Wars the Force Awakens), Nick Frost for his roles in
popular movies and partnership with co-star Simon Pegg with movies such as Paul, Hot Fuzz
and Shaun of the Dead.Also Jodie Whittaker has appeared in films such as St Trinians.These
stars are all British and have experience in British culture and dialogue making them suitable for
the film based in South London's Brixton.
The writer and director of the filmis Joe Cornish. Raised in the UK Joe Cornish was mugged
once before which gave him the idea of the mugging of Samantha (Jodie Whittaker) in the
beginning of the movie. Beside this Joe Cornish is familiar with the antics and living of people in
Britain and successfully represented that in his filmattack the block.
The producers are Nira Park and James Wilson and the music provided is by Basement Jaxx and
Steven Price. The type of music that is played is reggae, rap,electronica and grime etc. these
music genre are popular among the united kingdom and are used in the film to represent the
culture of British people and the type of music they listen to. The production companies are Big
Talk Pictures, Film 4 Productions, StudioCanal and the UK Film council and the filmwas
distributed by Optimum Releasing and Screen Gems.