Film Brief

Film brief


The task set for us is to make the first 2 minutes of a horror movie; the purpose of this is to realise the organisation and prep that goes into film making.

We have decided to make our horror film in the sub-genre of psychological thriller, we chose to do this as the movie will be twisted and the aim is to make the audience think. The horror genre has evolved in the past few years. From 'slasher-flicks', where there is not really much of a story, apart from a succession of characters being picked off one by one, with a man and a woman surviving u0ntil the end, to a film like Saw(2004) which brought gore to a different level. Saw breaks many of the generic conventions of horror, demanding so much more from the audience in terms of their expectations. The audience of Saw will be shocked, surprised, challenged and have have an experience that may stay with them for time.

Our brief was to produce the first two minutes of a horror film.

We created a logo and a very short ident for our production company, as every film that we looked at had the institution before the opening or credits, giving the production its first sense of identity.

The opening of our film starts with a black screen for a second with a heartbeat sound fading up. This extra-diegetic sound will suggest the genre immediately, so that the audience has the opportunity to attune themselves to the genre. The sound of a heartbeat is one that is commonly associated with the horror genre. In a horror film, one of the aims is to raise the audience's heartbeat, to increase feelings of stress in what is perceived to be a safe environment.

The camera then pans across a wall/board covered in photos of Rachel, who the audience will assume to be the protagonist. These photos show Rachel in a variety of situations and we want this shot to show the audience that an antagonist has been stalking her. The way that we could show she is being stalked is through some obviously long-shot photos. we could symbolise this with a red crayon circle over a map, with an arrow pointing to a particular photograph. The wall/board is also covered in newspaper articles about vairous attacks on women.

Then there wil be a snap fade to blackout and the audience will see the male antagonist in a junkyard rummaging through scrap metal trying to find weapons.

Another snap blackout, and we see the male character either pouring acid on on a picture of Rachel or scribbling on her face.

Another snap blackout will resolve as we see Rachel sitting at a bus stop with her university books and bag. This is just a normal day for her. A bus or large vehicle then drives past and obstructs the camera. When we see Rachel sitting at the bus stop again, the male character is revealed to be standing behind her in his black hoodie. The heartbeat sound effect has been getting rapidly faster as the scenes switch from scene to scene.

Fade to: a heavy gasp disrupts the heartbeat and the camera looks out of Rachel's perspective (point of view shot). The sound of heavy, obviously, male footsteps and Rachel begins to scream and shout. She is asking who is there? and where is she? She is panicking, the camera then reveals that Rachel is tied to a chair and then quickly pans around the room, zooming onto a shadow, a broken chemical bottle and then back onto Rachel where it reveals her face and the audience can see she has suffered a horrific acid attack to her face. After Rachel screams, the footsteps fade away from her and you can hear a man laugh. Rachel screams again and asks who's there and what have they done to her? He laughs again and begins to tease her. The woman is frantic and crying while the man remains calm. While he continues to tease her in a flirty manner, Rachel begins to cry. The man then starts a guessing game with Rachel, making her guess what object he is going to kill her with and he laughs a slow evil laugh. The camera then pans onto Rachel's eyes she looks straight into the camera as she gasps, this is when the audience become aware of the damage of the acid attack to her eyes.
Then you hear and object drop and the screen goes blank and the film title appears.

Later in the film the audience become aware that after the attack Rachel starts having bad nightmares reliving the experience. Rachel doesn’t leave the house after having a number of these dreams as she becomes petrified of men in hoods. She feels trapped, venerable and unsafe.The very last shot in the film is off people from the mental asylum knocking on her door, so then the audience can tell she is being taken to be sectioned. We also discover that the man had attacked Rachel as a revenge plot on Rachel's fiance who he had worked with.

However, as time goes on, she comes to terms with her condition and vows to seek revenge on her attacker. Just as he stalked her for a long time, now the tables have turned. Even with her disabilities, she becomes a feisty, focused assassin who becomes obsessed and tranfixed with seeking revenge on men who committ senseless random, violent attacks on women.

Scream Remake

We created a re-make of the opening of the film Scream (1996), this gave us a chance to use the cameras and equipment and learn the different ways in which we could use them. We worked from a shot list and this helped us film different camera angles and for the correct amount of time. It also gave us the chance to use the editing software and practice putting different shots and transitions together. We think the piece helped us to experiement with the cameras and to film interesting shots and practice putting them together to get perfect continuity. A negative point about our re make is the tracking as something was wrong with the tripod and dolly therefore this part of the scene was very rocky, also with the room we used, because of the time of day and the lack of blinds the room was very bright creating the wrong emotion in the scene. We feel our strong parts are how the film all flows together, use of props to be as close to the film as possible.

Gantt chart

Gant Chart

History Of Horror

We have got our information on horror by doing research on ww.google.com . We have decided to research the history of horror so that we have an insight into what makes a conventional horror and what things horror films have in common, we think it will help us understand how horror has progressed through the decades and how we can develop our horror.

Horror films are designed to unsettle the viewers by causing fear and panic. They dwell on our fears to create terror, they focus on the darker side of life, the unknown, aliens/science fiction and death. There are many sub-genres of horror: slasher, teen terror, serial killers, satanic etc.

The first ever horror film is called: Le Manoir Du Diable (1896)
It was directed by Georges Méliès and it was only 2 minutes long.

The Plot:

A bat flies into an ancient castle and transforms itself into Mephistopheles himself. Producing a cauldron, Mephistopheles conjures up a young girl and various supernatural creatures, one of which brandishes a crucifix in an effort to force the devil-vampire to vanish.

Horror in the 1920's:
The horror genre became more popular in the 1920's and classics like Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde(1920), The hunchback of Notre Dame(1923) and The Phantom of the Opera(1925) became popular. Films were very gothic and most involved monsters.




Horror in the 1930's
Classics like Frankenstein(1931) and Dracula(1931) were released and this brought on very similar films which involved monsters, like The Mummy(1932)



Horror in the 1940's
Still predominatly about monsters and many sequels were made to earlier films The Ghost of Frankenstein(1942) and The son of Dracula(1943)

Horror in the 1950's
Films shifted from gothic to technology and science, Science fiction and horror was triggered by the Roswell Event.
The invasion of the body snatchers(1956) and The Blob(1958) Alfred Hitchcock's film Rear Window(1954) became a big hit.



Horror in the 1960's
The publics view on horror films shifted and soon they demanded films on reality and the world around them, people, social psycho traditions and stereotypes.
The most famous director of this era was Alfred Hitchcock and his famous Psycho(1960)and The Birds(1963)
The Hammer Film production and Hammer House of Horror became a popular show.



Horror in the 1970's
Horror films in this decade completely reflected the grim feel of the decade and big budget films returned that dealt with contempary issues and psychological issues, children and childbirth as well as killer animals.

The Exorsist(1973) was rated the scariest film of all time and was even banned from the UK and re-released in 1998. Cinemas had sick bags for the viewers and ambulences were called due to so many people fainting. During filming, a priest was brought to bless the set as it was rumoured that strange occurances were happening. Actor Jack MacGowran (Burke Dennings) died during filming.



Horror in the 1980's
Special effects like blood and gore were used and new effects were experimented with. Many films dealt with Evisceration(disembowlement). Friday the 13th(1980), Halloween II(1981) and Wes Craven's Nightmare on Elm Street(1984) all became big and were later led to be remade.



Horror in the 1990's
The films were mainly psychological thrillers and intelligent horrors.
The people under the stairs(1991) and Candyman(1992)



Horror in the 2000's
After 9/11 it was really hard for the horror industry and it hit recession. Horror films were nearly banned in the name of world peace.

Final Destination(2000) was made before the 9/11 attacks and is about a man who has a premonition of a plane crash. Many old classics were re-made and gore was taken to a new level with the Saw films.