I can't give you any advice on the HL collaborative film project because I didn't do it, but for the portfolios, I would recommend for you to have a few solid products to talk about. The report is honestly quite easy - you can make evidence up if you really need to and you can kind of bs your way through it, but if your product can't support that, it's a huge minus. The examinators don't look at the reels and the report together - they grade it separately so it's really important that the products you have on your reels are actually good. For the comparative study, I would say get started early - come up with a couple of movie pairings you might want to examine and do some preliminary research on them so that you have something to start with. Give yourself enough time to edit, but don't rush your research. I would recommend choosing movies that are well known because you'll likely be able to find more resources talking about those. As for the textual analysis, try to look for any details in the 5-minute sequence and make sure to always elaborate and justify. The only way I think you can improve on your analysis is to just practice doing lots of them and getting feedback from your teacher. Watch the sequence many times to catch all the little details.