Inspiration - Sound It Out (Dir.Jeanie Finlay, 2011.)

One of our main inspirations for this film is Sound It Out (Dir. Jeanie Finlay, 2011.), a documentary focusing on the final remaining vinyl record store in Teesside.

 

 The film influences our own in many ways, but in particular in the style and approach the filmmaker is taking. The trailer alone does more than tell and show us, the viewer, about the store itself and what the positives of keeping it open and thriving are. It also gives us a unique insight into the emotional story of the subject.

One element to this film I personally find very interesting and enjoy the idea of, is that instead of focusing purely on the negative impacts that would come around if the store was no longer to survive, the feel to the film still remains quite positive and upbeat. I think this is a unique and interesting way to approach what could have had the potential to be a sad, quite moving documentary - by choosing quite light-hearted content that does the opposite and shares positive emotions of the contributors, whilst still being reflective on the memories of the store, helping to keep these alive.

Another area to the film that works well and that I feel we should take influence from when creating our own documentary is how the area is portrayed.
Personally being from the North East of England, I know the area well and feel the film captures the friendly community side to it extremely well. Within our own film, we wish to express the feel of the community around the independent Devonshire Quarter area in Sheffield, and I think we could achieve some of this by showing a variety of close ups of sights around the area that make it what it is, as achieved successfully in Sound It Out (Dir. Jeanie Finlay, 2011.).

I think we can learn a lot from this film and after watching it a few times and making a list of notes, I am looking forward to producing content for our own documentary and capturing a community of interesting people who hopefully will be able to share many positive memories of the area with us, turning a current sad story into something that instead captures the heart of the area and which once captured, will have caught on film the memory of how it stands today.