Final Film

This is our final film for our media A2 course.

Our title sequence is black and white which we thought emphasised the binary opposition in our film: good VS evil. We thought the transition of the title sequence should be slow to emphasise tension. Our establishing shot is a long shot of Livy walking along the car park to her car in a short white dress connoting her innocence and her femininity and attracting the male gaze. the wind creates an eery atmosphere and the darkness and shadows give an impression that something is amiss. Next we cut away to a voyeristic shot through the tree line to Livy walking along, this gives the feeling that Livy is being watched and we see this from our antagonists, Harriets, perspective. We then see a mid shot of Livy looking over her shoulder implying she is feeling uncomfortable like she knows someone is looking at her but she is trying to ignore that feeling (hence the caption on the poster).  We then have an extremem close up on Livy's phone of a text she is going to spend explaining that she needs to go home a different route. This shot is used to explain the narrative to our audiences and how the narrative unveils itself. Moving on to the mid shot of Livy shivering in her car, this could be that "hairs standing on end" universal feeling our audiences can empathise with when they feel scared or tense. This shot adds to the tension as by use of dramatic irony, we know she is being watched, and she is just starting to feel it herself. The next poignant shot is the shot of Livy's eyes in the rear view mirror where she is unaware Harriet is standing behind her. We blurred harriet out by use of depth of field showing Livy is unaware of her presence. Finally in this scene we see Livy pull away unaware of Harriets presence next to her car. We felt this shot was particularly creepy as dramatic irony has the audience feeling like screaming at Livy telling her to look behind her - Typical of a horror film. We chose not to have Harriets face shown as it creates more of an enigma as we know less abut her as we cannot see her facial expression and therefore we fear her more.

Our next scene is outside Escot House as we see another voyeristic shot through the window watching Livy's car suddenly stop in the road. This makes the audience assume Harriet is responsible.  Livy gets out of the car and checks the engine - not typical of a female protagonist. So there is an element of feminist attitudes in our film which will please the female audience. She tries to ring home but cannot because she hasn't any signal, we showed this through sound effects on iLife. We then zoom over to the house adding a sound effect to emphasis its forbidding nature. We used pathetic fallacy by the thunderclap and thunder roll sound effects to add to the forbidding element and the isolation of the house by the footsteps sound effect being so loud in amongst the silence. We also added the door squeaking with a defining thud which we felt connoted the "there is no escape" feel.

We next see Livy in the Library where we used the lighting to be quite dim which typical represents an old haunted house. The mise en scene of the library is all old pictures which has been used in horror films to connote its age and the deceased people who have lived within the house. Then we go to a shot of Livy looking at the books and then the piano is played eerily so Livy runs out of the room feeling quite creeped out.

Livy explores the basement after hearing some footsteps, the metal gate looks almost like jail bars which connotes the forbidding element and the age of the house. The basement is a typical setting for a horror film as it smothering and really connotes the "no escape" motif running throughout our film. She passes a mirror where she jumps at her own reflection and then notices an apple on the chair. The apple we thought could signify, through cultural experiences, evil. This is by references made to apples in films such as "Snow White" and in the bible the apple represents sin. Livy looks back up in the mirror and see's Harriet standing behind her and the sound effect makes it jumpy. She drops the apple and we shot a close up of it rolling on the floor. We then see Livy running back out of the basement and Harriet slowly walking behind her - almost mockingly teasing her like a cat and mouse. Harriet walks slowly through the gate and we added a sound effect where it emphasises her presence being evil. We cut away to Livy running into another room and slamming the door with a heart beat loudly pumping, which creates tension. We cut away to Livy and Harriet which adds to the chase scene being important and tense. Livy slowly opens the door with a close up on her hand, we then see a point of view looking out the door from left to right to left again where Harriet suddenly appears and then blackout. This leaves the ending as an enigma and the audience is left wondering why or how harriet got there unnoticeably.

Jono and I chose sound effects which we felt wither created tension or conveyed the forboding nature of our film. We used non-diegetic and diegetic sounds, contrasting them with total silence - which shown to work well in our audience feedback on facebook. We used cut aways and jump cuts throughout our film as we felt it made it more realistic, therefore gripping the audience more and built the tension up better. We edited our clip to have a reddish tinge throughout the scenes in the house which connotes the passion, danger and blood that horror films revolve around. We used dark lighting throughout as the shadows and darkness are instantaneously recognisable to the audience as frightening. We used short camera shots to build tension up effectively, many shots of Livy's expression so the audience empathise with her and sometimes shakey shots which are used lots in horror in films such as "The Blaire Witch Project".

The Woman In Black

The Woman In Black (TWIB) is a film that was recently released after Jono and I created our film, but the similarities are brilliant for comparison. The Mise En Scene of the isolated "haunted house" concept is paramount in both mine and Jono's film and TWIB. The idea of this is powerful as due to the cultural experiences in the western world our audiences infer this to be a frightening location. The Isolation plays up to the idea of "no escape" and "no-one can hear you scream" which is a key concept used in many horror films. Another key idea that is similar is the haunting ghost-like figure in both films. However the costume differs largely. TWIB chose to represent their antagonist in black to connote her evil, darkness and mystery. However Jono and I thought it would be more effective to dress our antagonist in a white shroud-like nightgown. This causes Barthes Enigma code to be prominant in our film. The audience is left questioning her dress. Did she die in her nightgown? Was she sick? Or perhaps was she murdered in her sleep? Is that the cause of her unrelenting cruelty? Or is she just pure evil? As these questions are swirling round our audiences heads our film becomes more intriguing. The cruelty of TWIB is explained, her son was taken away from her and killed in the marshes that surround the house. Our Antagonist's reasoning for her cruelty is never explained, we chose to do this so our audience can make their own decisions about this as it pleases them - Uses and Gratification Theory. We modernised our film, and set it in the present day so it had more of a universal feel that people could easily relate to.

Rough cut

I have uploaded the rough cut of our film to show the initial stages of our editing, we have not uploaded any sounds to the film, or completed editing our clips. I've done this to show the powerful effect soundtrack can have on a film, it builds the tension in our film and the diegetic sound effects are powerful against the silence in some of our clips, making the jumps - typical of a horror - even more effective. We've edited the lighting to give it a red tinge to connote the "danger" and "blood lust" of our antagonist.

Review

When creating my film review I used the poster I  created as a background image. By doing this I have achieved a rememberable image that will be forever associated with my film. When designing the layout of my review I based it upon the review i'd previously deconstructed "King Kong" by the use of snapshot images from the film, I will entice my audience by the enigmatic darkness and lack of awareness Livy has of Harriet in the image on the left and by the dark, old, abandoned cellar on the right gives a sense of entrapment and forbidding. This feeling given by my images connote the Horror genre entirely. The typical conventions of a review are used through the endorsements, page number and House Style is achieved through the logo in the bottom righthand corner. The mode of address used in the text is specifically aimed from my audience of 16+ by the use of colloquial and formal language. The images i've chosen are dark and enigmatic, and therefore will grab the audiences attention and make them want to watch it.

Pete's Media Blog

I explored Petes media blog and came across a powerpoint that was helpful and shaped my blog.

Presentation nov 4

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Preliminary task

I have drafted my preliminary task primarily, to create a film poster for our short film, so when it comes to the production of it, I will have an idea in mind and act accordingly. I have tried out a few ideas to see which I think would be the most effective and then I will make my decision based upon this for which film poster has the desired conventions and is the most attention grabbing for our desired audience. Jono and I created a film poster with a striking initial image of a girl in a night gown (as used in many previous films, eg The Ring). We used this typical costume convention as we felt it conveyed the correct messages of horror. The audience assume the antagonist is therefore young in age and also dead due to the bed clothes. She has her hair over her face to make her appear more enigmatic as she can't be seen. This is also emphasised by her silhouette being entirely dark all bar the light streaming through the night gown. There is also  a dramatic contrast in the two sides of the image. We felt this represented "good" and evil" and the antagonist is leaning more towards the evil with her head cocked to one side. This also could represent her not understanding the world she is trapped within. Her arms are held out slightly as though she's reaching forward towards the audience. This adds for the desired effect of her "coming to get you". The silhouette also adds to the possibility for her coming from the afterlife as she is walking away from the light and towards the audience. We chose not to show her face, by making this decision we felt it made the poster more striking as it was more enigmatic. The colour scheme is also very similar to that of "The Poltergeist", which we previously looked at and admired.

 

Initially I had the release date in the right top corner, but after asking my audience they agreed it spoilt the "clean look" of my poster. I was also comparing my film to a similar low budget film The Blair Witch Project. I decided to make the changes seen below, to blacken the bottom and add the necessary information in there. I used a white simple font to contrast with the background and stand out. White also has the connotations of purity and therefore contrasts with the protagonist seen behind. Finally I added my 18 certificate sticker to the bottom right corner as i felt it balanced the page out well. I followed the rule of 3rds in my poster, as the black, body, and white are vertical columns and the texts follows a horizontal rule. I edited the image on photoshop also as the background was previously not all black and you could see the stage's (where we took the photo) wings behind the person. I also upped the brightness and contrast to give it more illumination and stand out more. I chose universal studios in particular as this was a conglomerate commonly used to create horror films.

I then went out to our target audience and asked them for their thoughts and views on the poster. The overall response was positive. The audience admired our "appropriate use of font" saying it conveyed the correct messages and fitted the genre effectively. The "good use of colour" was described to be "cold, blue tinted" which was said to "add to the chilling horror effect". The image was strongly liked, saying the "glowing body was scary and ghost-like", "the tilted head really adds to the effect making it intrusive and chilling". The caption "is enigmatic and gripping. It makes me want to know more"
Throughout our audience research we found our poster well liked by all. The only criticism received was that the genre was not liked by all of the people I surveyed.

Film Review Deconstructions

In order to prepare for the preliminary tasks we deconstructed some existing film reviews and decided what  works and what we we intend to recreate in our own preliminary film review.