Mood Board and early story ideas

This is the moodboard that I design for my group in phototshop to represent the feelings, ideas and moods that we want our film to include. We want our film to be very heavily linked, and take conventions from, the classic 1970's and 80's cult horror movies such as the exorcist, hellraiser, halloween and all the others show on the mood board. We have also decided that the horror of our film will come from the idea of dreams and real life overlapping, and nightmares become real. I believe that this is a good idea for a horror film, as everyone has dreams and nightmares, so eveyone would be able to realate to the events which are happening. The cast that the story will revolve around will almost entirely be teenagers, as they will be the easiest to cast. As well as this our early ideas for a target audience is teenagers, so again this will make them be able to relate to the events even more. At this time we don't really have a idea for a storyline beyond the idea of a group of teenagers having their worst nightmares come alive and kill them. However, this is not much of a problem, as with many horror trailers the storyline of the film is not really revealed beyond the idea of the horror being betrayed.

My view on the horror genre

Target Audience

My ideal target audience for my film would be teenagers, probably male, aged between 15 and 20. This is because, as I want my film to be a horror, I want to appeal to audience who would most appreciate, as well as watch my film. As horrors are traditionally watched mostly by these age and genre groups, it seemed the perfect, and most obvious route to go for. This could be said for almost all horror, such as Halloween which also included attracive teenage girls as the victims to make an even greater appeal to this audience. I am hopefully going to attract this type of audience myself by including suspense, and using actors of a similar age. This will mean that they are attracted by the mystery of not knowing what is going to happen next, as well as being able to sympathise with the characters.

As well as this, as I myself fall within the age and gendre bracket, I will hopefully find it easy to be able to understand and compensate for what this target audience need and expect from an effective horror. To add to this, as my peers also fall into this target audience I will be able to get their feedback on the product so I can see what's good about my film as well as where I'm going wrong.

Initial ideas

Early on in the development of our trailer, me and my group agreed that the best choice for film genre would be horror. This is because we believed that it would be the easiest to turn into a trailer on the very minimal budget, techniques, and special effects that would be available to us. We realised that within trailers for horror movies there is usually only very little in the way of special effects shown; but this is actually an effect that is used to raise suspense and a feeling of the unknown that makes potential viewers want to watch the movie. Therefore, within this genre the lack of funding and equipment can actually work in our favour. A good example of this is John Carpenters classic horror movie "Halloween", which has a very simple, yet very effective trailer :

Halloween

The director of this film has used very simplistic techniques to great effect. For example when we see through the eyes of the Michael Myers as a child, there has simply been a piece of card (or something similar) placed over the camera lense with eyes slits cut out, to make it look like we're seeing through a mask. This probably cost little to nothing to make, but to the audience it's very appealing, as it restricts our view of what's going on, therefore raising suspense. As well as this it really gets you into the mindset of the killer, as from this point onwards he always wears a mask. Within our film, a technique like this could ba avery strong possibility as it is completely within our ability to create, could make our trailer seem very professional and would coincide absolutely with the horror genre.

Colin

A film which could be a very good style model for our trailer is the British Made "Colin". This is a little known film that was never realeased at the cinema, and was made on a VERY low budget (estimated at only £45) however, it has done well at the film festival circuit, and could well become a dvd cult film. The film seems like a perfect example of what we hope to achieve; the special effects are very limited, but the way the camera is used makes up for this, as we see very little of the zombies themselves: they flash past or are moving with such vigour that its hard to make out any detail. A Guardian interview we found with the director shows this "DIY" ethic that the film encompasses, perfectly. The trailer for Colin is a very close representation of what we hope to achieve:-

It is very simplistic, as with the entire film, but it fulfills the horror genre. You don't get a full sense of what is going on, but enough is given away to gain interest. There are scenes which are quite frightening, when all the zombies flash past for example, but so much that it would scare a prospective audience off. I also like the use of bleak British weather within this trailer to help "set the mood", it could have been used to represent the post- apocalyptic feeling that the film encompasses. We could possibly use this, as well as other weather such as rain, to create a similar effect. As I've already brought to attention, this is a technique that is well within our "price range", as we simply need to film it outside at the right time of year.

Although these two films were made some thirty years appart, and with very different budgets, there are several similarities between them. For example both are grim and dark which sets up perfectly for the oncoming horror. As well as this both trailers show very little of the actual events that take place, and i'm sure that within both films this idea is continued to raise suspense and grab the audiences attention. It is often agreed that the likes of Carpenter set up the conventions for all horror after this, and in many ways this is true. There are many horror films that stick strictly to these conventions (eg scream, friday the 13th) and they are very popular cult classics. However, as of late, writers and directors have been trying to warp these conventions, or change them slightly to make a brand new era in the history of horror films. A good example of this is the recent film Paranormal activity, which puts a new twist on horror which first started with the 1990's cult film The Blair witch project. These film come from a completely new perspective; through handheld or security camera which capture the events "as they really happened", rather than from one person's perspective. This type of cinematography is very effecve in creating horror, as it adds a strong sense of realism. This added with the "realistic" acting, really plays with the audiences mind, as they can imagine it being themselves. Colin also breaks away from the usual conventions, as the film is entirely from the perspective of someone becoming a zombie. This brings a fresh idea to the horror board, and helps to draw in audiences board with the stereotypical idea. We hope to remain mostly the the usual conventions set up by John Carpenter, but we may add a new twist. As of yet we are not sure.

Theories on Narrative

Within the field of film narrative, there are many theologists with many varying theories about the nature of narrative itself. To fully understand how I should craft a successful plot for my film, I first need to understand how different variations of narrative work, and how these different theologists feel a good narrative should be structured. I have therefore looked into some of the better known thoughts on narrative, and this is what I have discovered:-




Tzvetan Todorov

Firstly I looked at the ideas of Tzvetan Todorov, a Franco-bulgarian philosopher, who has published many books and essays about literary theory, thought history and cultural history. Although the theory i'm interested in is supposed to be based upon fictional writings, it can be also be used when describing film narrative. The basic idea is this;

He believed that there is five stages to a narrative structure.
1.A state of Equilibrium. (All as is if it should be)
2. A disruption to that order (by an event)
3. A recognition that the disorder has occured.
4. An attempt to repair the damage.
5. A return or restoration to start a NEW equilibrium.


Although this can be true for many older films, and most films meant for children (such as the works of Disney) most modern films do not follow this, possibly so that the film does not become too obvious, instead they use twists, withheld information, or alternate time patterns (such as flashbacks) This makes films which are much more grabbing to the viewer, as they want to watch all the way to end to find out how it all "fits together". A good example of a film which does this very well is Memento which completely warps Todorovs ' theory, and in the process creating a very compelling, and somewhat confusing film.

Vladimir Propp

Another theory that goes hand in hand with Todorov's is Vladimir Propp's. He was a Russian and soviet formalist scholar who analyzed the basic plots of Russian folk tales. Again this was based on the narrative of fictional writing, but it can be transferred to film. His theory was about the roles of character with narrative, he surmised that there are 8 basic characters;

The villain — struggles against the hero.
The donor — prepares the hero or gives the hero some magical object.
The (magical) helper — helps the hero in the quest.
The princess or prize — the hero deserves her throughout the story but is unable to marry her because of an unfair evil, usually because of the villain. the hero's journey is often ended when he marries the princess, thereby beating the villain.
Her father — gives the task to the hero, identifies the false hero, marries the hero, often sought for during the narrative. Propp noted that functionally, the princess and the father cannot be clearly distinguished.
The dispatcher — character who makes the lack known and sends the hero off.
The hero or victim/seeker hero — reacts to the donor, weds the princess.
False hero — takes credit for the hero’s actions or tries to marry the princess.

within narrative, some characters can have more than one role, for example the princess' father can also be the doner, or the dispatcher. Again this thoery is true with many older films, and childrens movies, however, many modern films play around with people's roles. For example, within the film "Batman begins" made in 2005, the character Henri Ducard (played by Liam Neeson) starts off as the helper, training Bruce Wayne with an elite vigilante group. However, you later find out that he is the true villain of the story, not "the scarecrow" as you were originally led to believe.

Claude levi-Strauss

Claude levi-Strauss', a French anthropologist and ethnologist, believed that an effective narrative is made of many binary oppositions. These oppostions within media narratives are sets of conflicting values which reveal the structure of the text/film. These oppositions grab peoples interests, as usually we can identify with one of the values, whilst the other is alien. This combination is appealing, as we always want one value to conquer the other. The simplest opposition, and the most often used, is good vs evil. We all want to be seen as good, therefore we can relate to this. And most people want to be seen as against "evil" and therefore want to see good vanquish evil. Most films usually stick to this idea of opposites, however, some films play around with, and warp, your sense of these conflictions. For example in the film 1983 "Scarface" the character Tony Montana is a Cuban criminal, who eventually creates a huge drug based empire. However, the viewer is made to see Tony as the "good guy", and by the end of the film you want to see him succeed against the police (who are supposed to be good) and his competitors.

Roland Barthes

Barthes was a French literary theorist, philosopher, critic and semotician. His theory on narrative encompassed a broader sprectrum than the others, he looked at why items, characters, timings and information is used and described within films and text. His narrative theories are broken down into five set of rules or codes;

1. Action code which refers to the events taking place
2. Enigma code which refers to the questions raised and answered
3. Semantic code which refers to the characters and characterisation
4. Referential code which refers to the information and explanation
5. Symbolic code which refers to the connotations of signs

This is used in almost every film made, old and new; directors purposefully use the setting, events and characterisation to give the narrative a certain feel. A good example of this is Orson welles' epic Citizen Caine. The opening scene sets up the mood for the rest of the film very cleverly, through events, information given and signs:-

Advanced Portfolio Task

To produce a promotional package for film. To include a teaser trailer , a magazine front cover and a poster. The work must be presented on a blog format and edited to individual taste.