By watching the clip of Scream i am able to see that some of the stereotypes used in that film we will try and tie into our film.
Stereotyping is a negative thing - but tends to be conventional in genre and audiences respond to recognisable codes. We will aim to cancel out our negative stereotyping of female characters by including some stronger and more three-dimensional independent characters. This is something that lots of films aimed at teenage audiences tend to do.
In Scream we see a teenage girl home alone. This is a massive cliche. When we think of blonde girls the typical stereotype is dumb. This character in scream is a typical blonde. She is very naive as every single time the phone rings she picks it up, knowing that it is going to be that man calling back again. She then starts to have a conversation with him, she does not even know who it is. If you was home alone and you had one phone call and you didn't know who it was and it kept ringing and ringing you would not continue to answer it but obviously in a horror movie this is another cliche, things that you obviously do not do will appear i a horror movie. There is a part in the clip where we see her subvert the dumb blonde stereotype as she does something sensible. This is when she goes to all the doors and locks them after she realises that this phone call is not a normal person having a conversation. Women always tend to be the first victim in horror movies, this is because women are seen as less dominant and aggressive as men so cannot stick up for themselves that well.
Our film is a low budget thriller and for that reason we need to use camera in a really effective way to tell our story and to create tension. There are a few examples of use of camera that we think are really effective and we want to aim to recreate this style in our own work:
Luther
Luther was a BBC drama series which played on the conventions of thriller in the use of camera. There were often very tense moments with careful attention to the framing of shots, which were often extended in order to create tension. The timing of cuts in the series was very clever - often lingering on a point until the very moment the audience member felt uncomfortable before moving on. This creates a building of tension that we want to replicate. The example below shows this:
There are many effective shots used i this extract. One of the first ones is where he is walking to the crime scene. The camera uses rack focus, it only focuses on the back of Luther's head. This shows us that he is a very important person and is the main character of this TV drama. The second shot that i find very effective is when he has just entered the house and the camera is placed on the floor, off center and is low angle. The low angle shows us that Luther has power. Having the camera off center makes us feel uneasy and creates a bit of mystery. When Luther first walks into the house the editing pace slows down and so does Luther. We see his walk slow down and his facial expression shows us that he is shocked and a bit worried. Whilst this is going on there is use of non - diegetic sound. This music creates a lot of tension as the notes have been dragged out and is played quite quietly in the background.
Scream
Wes Craven is a very influential horror director and his opening scene for the film Scream has some very clever shots. The audience are wondering where the threat to the lead character is and Craven chooses to linger on certain things to force us to look, which makes us feel threatened.
In this extract there is no particular parts. As i said earlier the director likes to linger on certain things and it is clear in this clip what he lingers on , the girl on the phone. This creates tension as we want to see what she is looking at when she is on the phone. They show us what she is looking at when she looks out the window but other times we can see her eyes staring at something but it never shows us what. The camera shots are mainly all close ups and some medium shots. The use of close ups is really effective in this clip as we can tell that she is scared and when we think the camera is going to show us we are kept guessing as to what and why she is looking even more worried or even more scared than she was in the other shot. All the sound that we hear is natural. There is no tense music. Although there is no tense music, when the phone rings it is very high pitched and if you are the audience watching this film and you are so gripped to it the sound of the phone will be enough to make you jump.
For horror and thriller films the use of sound is integral for creating suspense and tension - so we have researched non-copyrighted sound to edit and use to create atmosphere. We need to have some high suspended notes - which are conventional as they inform the audience of impending danger. We also need some louder dramatic sounds for impact when the characters or audience become aware of the danger.
This video has a range of different sounds in it. I do not like the sound in the first minuter or so as it does not create any tension and its not very thrilling. It is quite boring and slow, there is nothing really that grips you to get you worried in the film. But when we get to 1 minute and 12 seconds this all changes. This is the part i would like top use as non - diegetic sound. This is because it creates a lot of suspense as it goes from a really high pitched note to a dramatic thud. This creates a lot of tension in the film.
Straight away i really liked this clip. This will definitely be a good sound to include in my film. This is because the music is quite spooky. This creates a lot of tension as it makes you feel as though something bad is going to happen. You hear this sound in a lot of horror movies so you could say it is a cliche. I would only intend on using the first 2 minutes of this soundtrack clip because after 2 minutes it goes onto a different sound that does not create any tension or suspense and is not the kind of sound we are looking for. It can also tie into the first clip as we can crop the sound and add the big thud in. This will make it sound like we have created out own soundtrack.
We created this questionnaire to get some inspiration/confirm final ideas for our film. This was very useful as we found out what the public like to be included in a horror/thriller film. As you can see we asked a question about what are peoples favourite cliches in a horror film and 90% of them said the feeling of being followed. This will definitely be a key feature that we will try to include in our film.
This will be the location we will be filming at. As you can see it is a school. We do not use many of these places in our film but these pictures have been taken at the same school we are filming at. We have chose this location because you would not expect a horror movie to be filmed here which creates mystery and tension. It had a lot of good places that we were able to shoot certain scenes which made them very effective. This is not the typical location for a horror movie, this subverts the typical stereotype.
These are typical horror movie props. The dark clothing represents the antagonist. By having the hood up we will create mystery and tension. We are going to have a character who wears all black clothing with a hood up to put our audience on the edge of their seats. Our target audience is teenagers and the dark clothing and hoods are things they will be familiar with.
The knife is used in a typical horror movie to scare the audience. They are usually used in the more gory type of films. This could also be a familiar with teenagers as this is something they fear. There is not a lot of gun crime in this country, its more associated with knifes. In our film we will not be using a knife but if we did need a weapon we would chose the knife.
The mask creates a lot of mystery and really gets you thinking who is the person underneath it. This could also be worn by the antagonist. These could be worn by the antagonist because they do not want anyone knowing their identity, this could be because they could end up in trouble if they do. this could be familiar with the teenage audience because its a classic convention of horror films.
In The first clip we listen to, the main sound that we hear is strings, this could either be a violin or an organ. This creates tension and suspense. This is effective because it makes you feel panicky as you do not know what is going to happen next. It keeps you on the edge of your seat from the anticipation of not knowing what is going to happen. It also has a slight sadness to the sound. This makes us feel sacred and sorry for the children that are being held in the van and especially the child who has got a knife being help up against his throat.
In the second clip the two main sounds that stand out are the heartbeat at the start and the piano notes that are being held. The heartbeat sound creates suspense as it makes us feel as though we are that character during that precise moment. It also starts our hearts to beat faster as you know something bad is going to happen as it is such a dramatic sound. The piano notes create tension as well. This is because they use a range of high and low ones. The high pitched notes are more effective that the low ones as it gives us an idea that we could be in for a shock. The low pitched notes sort of give us a sense that everything is going to be okay but then the high pitch notes start again.
