Weekly update: Week ending 29 october

Hello and welcome to our third weekly update. Since we have broken up for half term, we have created a twitter page to attract much more of the intended audience and give the coursework a bit more sense of realism. We have also posted a blog about what type of horror subgenre do people prefer.

Our twitter page

Shooting Script 2

SHOT 1: (INTERIOR) slow 180 degree crab of man working at his desk.


SHOT 2: (INTERIOR) extreme close up of mobile phone 


SHOT 3 : (INTERIOR) medium close-up reaction shot 


SHOT 4 : (INTERIOR) point of view shot with a slow, steady dollying track 


SHOT 5 : (INTERIOR) high angled over the shoulder shot 


SHOT 6: (INTERIOR) wide angle shot, to reveal the dark figure.


Cyprian

STORYBOARD1

 

By cyprian

STORY BOARD 2

 

By Cyprian

What type of horror movies do audiences like?

Rank	Title	Studio	Adjusted Gross Domestic Box Office1	Gross Domestic Box Office
1	Jaws (1975)	UNIVERSAL	$795,369,426	$260,000,000
2	The Exorcist (1973)	WARNER BROS	$686,631,452	$232,671,011
3	The Sixth Sense (1999)	BUENA VISTA	$357,566,366	$293,506,292
4	The Mummy Returns (2001)	UNIVERSAL	$221,650,716	$202,019,785
5	Jaws 2 (1978)	UNIVERSAL	$215,603,340	$81,766,007
6	The Amityville Horror (1979)	AMERICAN INT.	$213,841,738	$86,432,000
7	Alien (1979)	FOX	$200,233,659	$80,931,801
8	The Mummy (1999)	UNIVERSAL	$189,949,583	$155,385,488
9	What Lies Beneath (2000)	DREAMWORKS	$179,115,699	$155,464,351
10	The Omen (1976)	FOX	$177,620,519	$60,922,980
11	The Blair Witch Project (1999)	ARTISAN	$171,800,749	$140,539,099
12	Interview with the Vampire (1994)	WARNER	$155,538,215	$104,694,000
13	Scream (1996)	MIRAMAX	$144,714,476	$103,001,286
14	Seven (1995)	NEW LINE	$142,937,987	$100,125,643
15	Aliens (1986)	FOX	$142,545,860	$85,160,248
16	The Ring (2002)	DREAMWORKS	$137,432,001	$128,579,698
17	Scream 2 (1997)	MIRAMAX	$137,017,261	$101,273,628
18	Halloween (1978)	COMPASS	$124,730,769	$47,000,000
19	Bram Stoker's Dracula (1992)	SONY	$123,601,446	$82,600,000
20	Sleepy Hollow (1999)	PARAMOUNT	$123,550,077	$101,068,340
21	Van Helsing (2005)	UNIVERSAL	$120,177,084	$120,177,084
22	Haunting (1999)	DREAMWORKS	$111,473,051	$91,188,905
23	The Grudge (2004)	SONY	$110,175,871	$110,175,871
24	The Others (2001)	DIMENSION	$105,846,318	$96,471,845
25	Scream 3 (2000)	DIMENSION	$102,704,845	$89,143,175
		TOTALS:	$5,191,828,508	$3,110,298,537

Above is a list of the 25 all-time highest grossing horror movies. This in itself is a representation of what horror audiences like to see. Although the highest grossing film is Jaws (a monster film), this list is littered with many different supernatural/psychological horror films such as: The Omen, What lies beneath, The Blair Witch project and The exorcist. This would suggest that horror film audiences mostly enjoy psychological/supernatural horror films. For this reason our group has decided to create a teaser trailer for a horror movie in this genre as we feel it will be more marketable to audiences.

Cyprian

Weekly update: Week ending 21st October

Hello and welcome to the second weekly update. Since being placed into groups we have decided to name our group Phantom productions because the word 'Phantom' is commonly associated with horror. After narrowing the choices for the genre of our teaser trailer last week, we came up with an idea and have wrote a treatment for our trailer.

Michael

Shooting script 1

Characters
Ashley - main female character
Mike - main male character
Demon (antagonist)

SHOT 1: (INTERIOR)Two shot, over the shoulder shot, canted shots of two characters (dim room) ,

SHOT 2: (INTERIOR)180 degree crab into medium close-up of Ashley after Mike leaves (door slams and footsteps),

SHOT 3: (INTERIOR) Steady cam of Ashley walking towards light switch,

SHOT 4: (INTERIOR)Medium close-up of Ashley trying to turn on the light,

SHOT 5: (INTERIOR) Eyeline match / tilt shot of Mike holding the door knob (close-up into extreme close-up),

SHOT 6: (INTERIOR) Birdseye view (from corner of room) of Ashley on the floor and demon,

SHOT 7: (INTERIOR) Long-shot from behind Mike, as he enters the room,

SHOT 8: (INTERIOR) Extreme long-shot from inside the room when he enters,

SHOT 9: (INTERIOR) Close-up of Mike's expression,

SHOT 10: (EXTERIOR) steady cam of Mike running.

Christina & Gabrielle

Teaser trailer treatment 1

The working title for our teaser trailer is Subdued.  Reason being, the name ‘Subdued’ fits so well with the general idea and theme of our film. The film itself is a psychological horror film about an evil demon which preys on people in the dark. This idea is very unique and can be likened to the j horror and supernatural sub genres of horror due to the fact that they have similar characteristics in terms of the evil spirits and the idea of darkness conveying uncertainty.

We hope to construct a  teaser trailer around 30 to 50 seconds in length which will create the right amount of suspense and not give away the story or the plot.

SYNOPSIS:

When a young woman has gone missing at work and her supposed killer is ‘rightfully ‘sentenced to  lifetime imprisonment , watch as the consequences of the town’s naivety unfold as a evil demon attacks people one by one in the dark. Who will survive the torment?

Example of some main Characters:       

Mike:  Aged 23, recently graduated out of a city university, now in a dead end job in his hometown, accused of murdering Ashley

Ashley: Aged 21, pretty young woman who got on well with Mike at their workplace until her untimely death lead to Mike getting charged with her murder

Mayor Windsor: Corrupt official who wants nothing more than to stay in power by any means necessary

Bruce: Aged 32, Cassandra figure who knows about the sudden dark change in the town and tries to warn others about it and plead for the release of Mike

Demon: Aged???, Evil force which randomly comes to a small town and devours its existence

Main Teaser Trailer Scenes

Opening Scene: 5 to 10 seconds in length

[Fade in transition]

Beginning with a over the shoulder camera shot behind Mike as he converses with Ashley and shares a practical joke between them about Halloween before leaving work.

2^nd Scene: 5 to 10 seconds

[Cut to a Medium close up of Ashley working] 

Hearing footsteps approaching her, she jokingly thinks its Mike playing games. When the lights go off, she no longer is in a laughing mood and worryingly says “this is not funny Mike” thinking its him behind this

3^rd Scene: 10 to 20 seconds in length

[Cut to camera tracking Mike heading out to the car park when he suddenly hears a scream]

 He runs back to the door and heads for the room where Ashley was working. [Cut to CCTV camera in the corner of the room with the demon hovering over Ashley]. Upon reaching the door, Mike hesitates at first because of a strange dark feeling however he bravely opens the door and switches the light on. But there is no Ashley to be seen and the demon disappears. The audience vaguely see that this event infringes on Mike’s sanity as he quickly questions whether Ashley really did scream or to some extent even exist.

Intended audience

The intended audience for the film is people in their mid-teens to people in their late twenties. The reason for this age range is because the rating for horror films starts at 15 and the theme of the film is not too graphic. Many people within the age range particularly in their late twenties can relate to the struggle of the protagonist, Mike in terms of being in an unfulfilled job after graduating from University. By mostly having characters similar in age to those of the intended audience, it helps in some sense to allow the audience to connect with the characters in a deeper personal level as they may are more likely to understand the characters personal turmoil’s .  

Michael

What people find scary

Above is a mood board created to represent peoples fears, it includes 

pictures of horror movie icons such as Freddy Kruger and Jason. It  

also has phobias that people share such as claustrophobia (fear of 

being in tight spaces), arachnophobia (fear of spiders) and ophiophobia 

(fear of snakes).

Cyprian

   

Audience research

We chose to conduct audience research into what it is that interests young people (around our age), this was done through the medium of Blackberry Messenger, where people were asked various questions along the lines of "Do you enjoy the horror genre?", "Are you into horror films?" etc. Below are screenshots of these conversations and the responses we got:


We gained various responses that showed what our target audience thought was interesting about horror films. Firstly it is apparent through our audience research that, these young people enjoy the thrill of watching a horror film.

This made us decide that one of our main aims would be to, keep the viewers on their toes by revealing bits of action without giving away too much.

Also, we came to realise that the idea of 'fear' was important. As one of potential consumers said that horror films tend to make you feel afraid for the characters. This reinforces the importance of the audience being able to relate to what is being portrayed in the trailer.
With this idea, we thought that it would be good to have shots in the trailer that would make the viewers put themselves in the shoes of the character. We also thought that it would be a good element of our trailer because, we would be creating situations where the viewers would be experiencing escapism, in some sense escaping from reality.

The audience research results suggested that we would need to film a variety of interesting shots in order to gain their interests. For example, one person explained that they liked intense graphic, gory parts and good footage from the actual movie.

This highlighted the importance of what needs to be included in the trailer and how it should be presented. The expectation of having good shots means that we will need to make sure the concept of our trailer is interesting. To also make sure that the trailer shows a good narrative, we will need to make sure that we use a range of shots and transitions that will make it look appealing to our target audience.

So, to produce an effective trailer, we will need to consider carefully how we will combine a number of shots give a brief description on what the film will be about. As we do not want too much away, we decided that we would use a cliff hanger to leave the viewers in suspense. We feel that leaving the viewers in suspense will add on to the adrenaline and excitement that the audience will feel.

Information Gathered by Michael (Analysed by Christina)

Here are some more results obtained:

Another suggestion that was made by one of our potential viewers, was that we should create a trailer that was a bit different from what is always seen in horror films. For example, a person being in a house with a killer out to get them. From this, we noticed that it was okay to challenge a few conventions by adding new ideas to the concept of our trailer or tweaking a few of the conventions that already exist. This made us decide that the main setting of the trailer will be in an office, instead of the character being in a house or somewhere outdoors.

The research results also pointed out that the release date and film title is also an important element of the trailer. So, we will also be adding this into our trailer so that our target audience will be able to remember and identify the film. As a group, we came to a decision where we will add the film title towards the ending of the trailer, and the date at the end. This is because we want our trailer to look realistic, as this is what is usually seen in trailers done by film industry, film makers.

 We also found that our target audience expect to here good sound effects such as, scary music, sharp noise, screams etc.

So we will add banging sound effects and incidental music to help build up tension and suspense in our trailer. We will also think about including a scream at the end of the trailer, but we would like to make it look as realistic as possible.

Lastly, we considered the expectation of one of our respondents by thinking about adding a scene that will make our audience jump. By getting something to

pop up on the screen is a good way of frightening our viewers. We will need to emphasise the fact that our trailer is a horror film through the variety of techniques we use to construct it. It is important for us to leave the audience in suspense and give them a bit of a fright in order gain, and maintain their interests.

(Information Gathered & Written by Christina)

Profiling our audience

David is an 18 year old student who enjoys hanging out with friends and reading in his spare time. The types of film he enjoys watching the most are Horror & Comedies. David reads a lot of magazines and always likes to be kept up to date with films. This is one of the reasons why he reads magazines, simply because he doesn't want to miss out on the latest issues.  Also, he believes that horror films and magazines appeal to him because they present images and ideas that relate to the theme of horror which is what he is interested in.  He is a very trend-conscious person and is always on the alert for new fashionable options. He also likes to experiment with new things and loves using technology.

The type of music he listens to varies because he likes a wide range of genres. Although he spends most of his time at college, he also makes time for extra curricular activities such as sport and games.

Written by Christina

Weekly update: Week ending 14th October

Hello and welcome to the first of many weekly updates. After being placed into our respective groups we delegated roles within our group. Christina is the producer because she has very good organisation skills and good with keeping time. Cyprian is the camera man because he is quite handy with cameras. Gabrielle is the scriptwriter and blog adminstrator because of excellent english and writing skills. Michael is director because this is an area of film he is interested in. After getting to know each other a bit more we brainstormed ideas about what genre our horror teaser trailer could lie in. We managed to narrow down the choices to either a psychological, a slasher or a zombie movie and eventually came to the conclusion that psychological would be the best sub genre to pursue.

Michael

Horror and Society

"I recognize terror as the finest emotion and so I will try to terrorize the reader. But if I find that I cannot terrify, I will try to horrify, and if I find that I cannot horrify, I'll go for the gross-out. I'm not proud."
                                                                                                                                                       --Stephen King

Horror itself is a ancient form of art,  humans have been using long before cinema. Long before the 20th century, we as humans have tried to terrify others with  horrific tales which have been passed down from generation to generation to often act as a warning of the consequences of unmoral behaviour and a tool to reinforce the taboos in the respective society. For example, the werewolf. That is belief that when there is a full moon a man that has been bitten by a werewolf will transform into a werewolf and go on a massive killing spree. This myth has been passed down from generation to generation  arguably since the ancient Greeks. However many authors claim the myth at first was only told to people to explain the reasoning behind serial killing. The fact that wolves were the biggest threat to humans in Europe at the time may explain why storytellers may have used wolves to describe the fact that some serial killers of the past acted in a very malicious way. Others believed werewolves were an metamorphose of demons and the devil himself.

an 18th century drawing of a werewolf. 

Moving on to the 1800s, this was the time when horror was constructed into the form of novels which really helped push horror as a art form to more of the masses. However these novels broke away from superstitious horror and formed a new horror sub genre: Monster. Most notably out of this horror sub genre was the creation of Frankenstein by Mary Shelley in the novel Frankenstein or the modern Prometheus. However contrast to popular belief, Frankenstein was an name which was never associated with the monster itself but rather the main human protagonist. The monster itself was referred to as: "monster" , "fiend", "wretch", "daemon" and "it".

a 1831 adaption of Frankenstein

The 1931 adaption of Frankenstein

Another famous iconic novel from the 1800s was the novel 'Strange case of a Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde' which played around the theme of good and evil. The book itself is commonly associated with the mental disease condition called "split personality" or schizophrenia  which is when someone is believed to have two distinct personalities. In Dr Jekylls case, He is good and evil. Such was the impact of the novel, that the title has become a part of language because when people hear the term "Jekyll and Hyde", they are drawn to the image of someone who has a dark side about them in their brain.  Thus horror once again played a part in society because now instead of people passing down stories from generation to generation , people were able to purchase and read stories. However unlike passing down stories, Horror novels were considered to be for the wealthy and those who were educated as the poor were unlikely to afford these novels and and even more unlikely to have the ability to read.  Another notable novels from the 1800s were: The ring and the book, Through a Glass Darkly and Les Fluers du Mal (The Flowers of Evil)

Michael

Horror film research

The conventions of horror films

For horror films, it is important that they contain the most common 'rules' (which are known as conventions in the industry) and elements that make the film scary.

Examples of conventions used in horror

-"Do not take anything away from the dead"

-"If it appears you have killed a monster, never check if it's really dead"

Conventions like the ones above are usually seen in various horror films to achieve it's aim of getting it's viewers frightened.

Also, the most common elements of horror are ghosts, blood, zombies, curses, demons etc. Without these common conventions and elements, it would be highly unlikely that an audience of today will be scared. as this is usually what horror movie fans have come to expect from horror films.

A number of these conventions are visibly present in some sub-genres more so than others, for example blood and gore are more likely to make an appearance in splatter and slasher films rather than psychological, whereas cannibalism can almost certainly be expected in zombie films rather than paranormal.

Christina

The conventions of horror teaser trailers

Teaser trailers:

- Shorter than theatrical trailers,

- Don't give away too much information,

- Don't follow the narrative order (not chronological),

- Released long before the actual movie and are the first trailers to be released,

- May not have any footage from the film or of any characters,
- Usually use montage editing (although it is not mandatory).

Examples of horror teaser trailers:

Friday 13th teaser trailer

- Directed by Marcus Nispel,

- Released in 2009,

- 1 minute 34 seconds in length,
- Genre: Slasher,

- We do see glimpses of the kills in this teaser and discover that he wears a hockey mask and is heavily armed with chainsaws, axes, etc.

- This was a remake of the original 1980 Friday 13th movie,
- Set in 'Camp Crystal Lake'
- This teaser trailer uses continuity editing.

The Hills Have Eyes 2 trailer

- Directed by Martin Weisz,

- Released in 2007,

- 1 minute 05 seconds in length,
- Genre: Splatter,
- We see two well-built mutants dragging two bodies across the ground with rope and so we the audience are not fully aware of the mutants' weapons of choice.
- This movie is the sequel to 'The Hills Have Eyes' (2006), and a remake of the 1997 'Hills Have Eyes' movie.

- Set in a desert/secret area,

-  This teaser trailer uses continuity editing.

The Ring (American) Teaser Trailer
- Directed by Gore Verbinski,
- Released in 2002,

- 1 minute 33 seconds in length,

- Genre: Supernatural,
- We see a dark, disturbed young girl emerging from a well and her ominous nature gives the audience the impression that she is the antagonist in this horror film,

- This movie is a remake of the 1996 Japanese horror film, Ring.

- This teaser uses both montage and continuity editing.

Obsessed teaser trailer
- Directed by Steve Shill,
- Released in 2009,
- 23 seconds in length,
- Genre: Thriller,

- The only character present in this trailer is 'Ali Carter', a blonde female who appears to be the antagonist.

- This teaser trailer uses continuity editing.

Cyprian

Research of horror movies

Psycho (1960)

Psycho poster (1960)

‘Psycho’ is an American slasher film that was directed by Alfred Hitchcock in 1960.  The film ‘Psycho’ is based on a 1959 novel by the same name written by Joseph Bloch. The character Norman Bates is said to be very similar to real-life Wisconsin murderer Ed Gein, as both had; multi-personality disorders, deceased mothers, and the urge to dress in women’s clothing.

Executives at Paramount did not want to produce the film, which led to Hitchcock’s decision to film the movie quickly and inexpensively, although to date, the movie has made a domestic total gross of around $32,000,000. The murder scene that takes place in the shower is now become one of the most popular scenes in cinema history.

One of the main characters of this film, Janet Leigh is the mother of Jamie Lee Curtis who played the role of ‘Laurie’ in John Carpenter’s Halloween.

Although the film didn’t receive any Oscars, it was nominated for four, including Best Director (Alfred Hitchcock), and Best Actress in a Supporting Role (Janet Leigh).



28 Days Later poster (2002)

28 Days Later (2002)

28 Days Later is a British zombie horror movie directed by popular British director Danny Boyle (who also directed Slumdog Millionaire, 127 Hours). The plot for the film portrays the breakdown of society in London, after a contagious virus is unintentionally let loose on the public.

The film was Boyle’s fifth to be released, yet it was deemed a critical and commercial success at the box office. Most of the film was shot on digital video with a budget of £8 million but gained around $82.7 million worldwide. The film won 7 awards including Best British Film (Empire Award) and Best Horror Film (Saturn Award).

When the film was released on DVD, the DVD came three alternative endings, which all end with the main character, Jim, dying. Due to the success of this film, a sequel titled ‘28 Weeks Later’ was made, along with a graphic novel (2008) and a comic book series (2009).

Paranormal Activity (2009)

Paranormal Activity poster (2009)

Paranormal Activity is an American supernatural horror film, written and directed by Oren Peli. The film is based around a young couple (Katie and Micah) who are haunted by a supernatural presence. Paranormal Activity was originally an independent film before being acquired by Paramount pictures. The film earned nearly $194 million at the box office worldwide, making it one of the most successful movies ever made (based on return on investment).

The film was nominated for numerous awards including Best Horror (Empire Award), Best First Feature (Independent Spirit Awards) and Best Actress (Screamfest).

Paranormal Activity 2 was released on October 22^nd 2010, and Paranormal Activity 3 is set to be released on October 21st 2011.

Gabrielle

Research of horror movie director
Wes Craven

Wes Craven

Born: Cleveland, Ohio, 1939 .

Wes Craven is a horror film director and actor best known for writing the films A Nightmare on Elm Street and Wes Craven’s New Nightmare which features the iconic Freddy Kruger character - a horror character many horror fans easily recognize. He also wrote the hills have eyes series and subsequently wrote the remakes as well. Wes Craven is considered as one of the first film directors to blend horror sub genres and bring new innovative films to the cinema screens.  Wes Craven wrote, directed and edited his first feature film The Last House on the Left 1972, which grossed 3, 100,000 at the box office

Most of Wes Craven’s films tend to be based around the horror subgenre, Splatter. They also seem to involve the subgenre of psychological to an extent because most of the killers seem to have lost the plot in terms of the norm of society, except for Freddy Kruger who in the film Nightmare on Elm Street is dead throughout the film.  Wes Craven also wrote less successful films: Swamp Thing, Shocker, The last house on the left, deadly blessing, my soul to take, Wes Cravens New Nightmare, the people under the stairs and nightmare on Elm Street 3; Dream warriors.

 For his contribution to the horror genre and the film industry on a whole, Wes Craven has won many awards. His first award came in 1977 in the Sitges – Catalonian international film festival where he won the Prize of the International Critics Jury for his film The Hills Have Eyes. Since then he has won 9 awards and been nominated for 3 awards. Three of those awards he has won were lifetime achievement awards.


Michael