Video of test shots/experimenting

Backstage Photos

Checking to see if the shot is how we want it

Setting up shot of Swarica studying alone
One of our props, the book that Swarica is reading
Setting up another shot, Swarica inbetween the bookshelves
Thuy and Andy setting up the lights
Hayley adjusting and focusing the camera

First day of filming

We filmed in the LRC for an hour and a half, Hayley acted as the camera operator, Andy set up the lights and dimmed/brightened them where necessary, Swarica was the main actress, and I (Thuy) was the director and an extra with Andy.

Whilst filming we encountered a few difficulties and had to find our way around it. For example we had a problem with the lighting which is very dark in the LRC, therefore we had to use alot of lights to make the scene brighter, this was done mainly by Andy who had to carry the lights to different locations for our series of shots. Some of our shots had the light in it and so after watching it over we had to reshoot them, however this has given us a better perspective on how to do different shots and given us insight in how to solve common problems when filming.

Other problems we came across were simply practical errors where Andy's foot was caught in the shot of the door opening and closing by itself. My hand was also caught in the shot and so we had to reshoot the door a couple of times before we were happy with what we got.

During shooting however we did learn not to look at the camera (Swarica) until the director has said the shot is finished. We learnt about the importance of lighting and it's placement within a scene, and how to effectively light a shot to give it the right feel. We did shoot according to our shooting script which did help to speed up the process as we only had a limited amount of time in the LRC.

Supernatural and Psychological Horror Genre

Horror films are movies that aim to provoke the emotions of fear, disgust and horror from the audience, dealing with the audience's nightmares, hidden worst fears, revulsions and terror of the unknown. They also overlap with fantasy, science fiction, and thriller genres. Plots within the horror genre often involve the intrusion of an evil force, event or personage, commonly of supernatural origin.

A lot of horror films deal with the supernatural. The supernatural (translated: above nature) is anything above or beyond what is natural or exists outside of the law of nature. Supernatural horror has its roots in folklore, religious traditions on death, the after life, evil, and the demonic.

Some examples of successful supernatural horrors are:

The haunting - a 1999 remake of the 1963 horror film of the same name, based on the novel "The Haunting of Hill House" by Shirley Jackson, published in 1959. It was directed by Jan de Bont, starring Liam Neeson, Catherine Zeta Jones, Owen Wilson and Lili Taylor. It was distributed by Dreamworks and was released on July 23rd, 1999. The production budget was $80,000,000, but grossed $177,311,151.

The Omen - a remake of Richard Donner's "The Omen" of 1976, part of The Omen series. It was directed by John Moore, starring Liev Schreiber, Julia Stiles, Seamus Davey-Fitzpatrick and Mia Farrow. It was distibuted by 20th Century Fox, and was released (fittingly) on June 6th, 2006. The production budget was $25,000,000, and grossed $119,498,909.

Psychological horror is another sub-genre of horror which relies on character fears, guilt, beliefs, as well as spooky/eerie music to build tension. it is different from the type of horror found in traditional horror films, because instead of deriving effects from gore and violence or monstrous creatures, it focusses on a normal-looking human being, with an evil and/or horrific identity which isn't revealed until (or near) the end.

Psychological horror is subtle compared to traditional horror and normally contains less physical harm, as it focusses on factors affecting the audience's mentality. It creates discomfort in the audience by exploring common psychological fear,s or the shadowy areas within the human psyche which most people repress or deny.

Some argue that psychological horror isn't actually part of the horror genre, with it having similar characteristics to the thriller genre. However, the main purpose of psychological horror is to frighten the audience mentally, which is not the case with thrillers.

Some successful psychological horror films are:

Paranormal Activity - written and directed by Oren Peli, starring Katie Featherston and Micah Sloat. It was distributed by three companies: Paramount Pictures, DreamWorks, and Icon Film Distribution. It was released on September 25th, 2009, with a small production budget of $15,000. It grossed $193,355,800.

The Sixth Sense was written and directed by M. Night Shyamalan, and starred people such as Bruce Willis, Haley Joel Osment, Toni Collette, and Olivia Williams. The film was distributed by Hollywood Pictures, and was released on August 2nd, 1999. The production budget was $40,000,000 and grossed $672,806,292.

J Horror Genre

Japanese horror also known as J-Horror is a unique thematic and conventional treatment of the horror genre in light of western treatments. The focus is mainly on psychological horror and tension building particularly with ghosts and poltergeists. The themes mainly revolve around Yokai and precognition. As seen in the more popular J-Horror in the west, The Ring, The Grudge, and One missed call. Yokai translated literally means demon, spirit or monster. It is a class of preternatural, meaning supernatural but have rational explanations as yet unknown (such as the Loch Ness monster) who are creatures in Japanese folklore. The origins of these creatures and the inspiration for the movies can be traced back to ghost story classics, known as Kaidan, told in Japan during the Edo and Meiji period. Due to the success of The Ring in western theatres, it bought about the knowledge of Yurei, which had always existed in Japan for centuries. Yurei are Japanese ghosts bound to the physical world through strong emotions that do not allow them to pass on. This is displayed in The Ring, The Grudge, and One missed call, whereby the ghost is bound by desire for vengeance these are called Onryo. Onryo have a traditional appearance and follow a set of rules; they are often female, although there are male Onryo, and wear white clothing which is the traditional funeral garment, they have long black hair tied in with the tradition of growing it and keeping it pinned up only letting it down in death. All of these characteristics are found in The Ring’s Sadako and The Grudge’s Kayako. The Ring was directed by Hideo Nakata on a budget of $1.2 million, although it is unknown how much it made, the American remake directed by Gore Verbinski, made with a budget of $48 million, made a worldwide profit of $249,348,933. Ju-on The Grudge was directed by Takashi Shimizu made $3m worldwide, the American version directed by Takashi Shimizu again had a budget of $10m and made $187,281,115 worldwide. Due to the success of these movies, it seems that the western audience have fully embraced J-Horror.

Horror Genre

Horror films are made to frighten and awaken their hidden fears. There are different sub-genres within a horror film which could trigger their hidden fears for example; slasher, j-horror, supernatural, serial killers, satanic, Dracula, Frankenstein, etc. The sub genre I am going to go into detail about is Teen Horror. Teen horrors are made to scare teenage girls so the would want a hug from their boyfriend, they also have a predictable storyline, these storylines always out a teen in trouble that only a teenager would get into for example if a group of teens go on a road trip and their car brakes down, they would go and find help but they would come across an abandoned shelter which we then know something horrifying is going to happen but these teens have no clue as most of the teens in horror movies are jocks or the ‘cool’ kids (jocks are thought of as dumb and know nothing apart from sports). Furthermore parents would never understand never understand what kind of trouble the teenager has got into resulting in either them dying or the teen. The characters themselves are almost always in jeopardy because they did something stupid, irresponsible or wrong (broke curfew, smoked pot, used their parents' car without permission, explored the old mine shaft with warning signs posted, had sex).
Teen movies are about the action and thrills. Typical cast include a jock and his girl, a nerd and a misfit. The misfit often comes out as the hero or heroine who everyone always ignores. Teen horrors are often set in ordinary places where teens usually hang out like in a high school, also the events occur on special occasions like prom night for example. - Andy. Luc

Introduction to horror

This year for A2 Media Studies, we are going to be creating a teaser trailer of a horror movie. As well as a movie magazine cover and a movie poster. Our group consists of four members, all of which play a different role in making our trailer.



Pentagram - Goat of Mendes.

Horror Films are movies that provoke emotions such as fear from the audiences. Often they use scenes that deal with the human subconscience so that even if we appear not to be frightened it is always in your mind afterward.

Horror films are based around situations that make the viewers uncomfortable, mainly by how grotesque and taboo they appear. The majority of Horror films are based around the supernatural, something that is a unkown to us. Other genres and themes could/are based around serial killers, a disease/virus and/or the surrealism of the characters world.

Most plots within the horror genre involve the intrusion of an evil supernatural force, event, or personage, commonly of supernatural origin, into the everyday world.

Other conventional creatures for horror movies are:- ghosts (The Grudge), werewolves (Wolf Man), satanism (The Devil Rides Out), demons (Paranormal Activity), Vampires (Dracula, Nosferatu), cannibals(Silence of the Lambs), Mummy (... The Mummy), Zombies (Shuan of the Dead) and serial killers (Scream).

As we move from genereation to generation the definition of horror changes. From the man made montrosity to the supernatural plane of exsistance.

Make Up Design (Hand)

These are the firsts attempts we made at trying to create a hand that was terrifying but also very realistic. Like many of the disembodied limbs of a antagonist we have made it/them white, made sure that the hand had long fingernails and that the you could clearly see wrinkles

Posters

Below are some posters designed by Andy

(click to enlarge)

Poster Designs

Andy - Textual Analysis of The Strangers Trailer

The Strangers teaser trailer analysis
At the beginning of the teaser trailer we are shown a sideshow of houses and under each picture we see different sentences, these different sentences tell the audience the reason why people choose certain houses for example some people choose homes ‘For the neighbourhood’(Figure 1 and 2). As the trailer moves on the houses start to get more luxurious and then the quality of the pictures start to change, they seem to look like the photo was taken a long time ago as if the ‘strangers’ have already targeted the house and this is indicated by the red cross on the last few photos(Figure 3). Under the last few photos of the slideshow the sentences start to become more sinister as the following words are used ‘But some people choose a house for a completely different reason’ this tells you ‘the strangers’ are crazy psychotic people and that something horrifying is going to happen to some innocent people.

Figure 1
Figure 2

Figure 3
Once we are shown the last picture it cuts straight into an establishing shot of that house, which shows it in what appears to be the woods. It is set at night time. This very typical in horror films because it shows that the place is out in the open and if something bad were to happen no one would find out and also the darkness shows that the area is dangerous and evil. After the establishing shot it fades into a shot of a middle aged man who is well dressed and this indicates that he is quite successful. Then there are quick cuts between him and his girlfriend who is also well dressed, these shots show that the couple are in love and are very happy as if nothing has gone wrong, this gives the audience a nail biting situation because they know something horrible is going to happen but they don’t know when. While the couple are hugging and comforting each other they hear a knock on the door which startles them, the door is then shown in the next shot to create a mysterious atmosphere as the couple are oblivious of what or who is at the door and for what is about to happen to them. The next shot is a medium close up (Figure 5) of the women up close next to the door to show she is listening for something outside of it, when she says ‘hello’ she gets a reply from the other side and this voice says’ Your going to die’ and from this point on the trailer get more intense and frightening. From the medium close up there is a fade into a black screen and then cuts into a shot of a weapon. The weapon is introduced which adds to the horror of the film, as the shot quickly shows the axe knocking through the wood. This shocks the audience because after the black screen it comes when it is unexpected. It then cuts into a medium close up of the couple screaming and jumping, this shows that the couple are powerless towards the strangers (Figure 8). Then there are quick cuts of the terrifying events to come. Within the cuts we get to see the people who are terrorising the couple. These quick cuts give the audience too much too take in and this gets them baffled and scared at the same time.
Before we are given another black screen we see in the last image ‘the strangers’ (Figure 6) with the couple beneath them, this shows that the couple are powerless towards the strangers doing and they can only watch what will happen to them effortlessly. We are then shown the movie title followed by a shot we the following words ‘inspired by true events’, this gets the audience thinking how can people become so corrupt and want to mess with others lives, which gives them more reason to go and watch the film. Lastly there is a last slideshow showing the women clawing towards the camera (Figure 7) as if she is trying to escape after the countless assaults from the strangers. This tells the audience that they are not in for a happy ending.

Figure 4 Figure 5

Figure 6 Figure 7

Figure 8
SOUND
The song used at the beginning of the trailer is "If I didn't Care" written by The Four Inkspots. This was a classic in the 80s. With the combination of the recording quality back then and the situation in the teaser the trailer it creates a sinister and suspenseful atmosphere within it.
Non diegetic music is then played when we are introduced to the couple, this sound is suspenseful and creates tension giving audience a hint that something is about to happen. There is a loud knock on the door and the couple get startled, tension is then built quickly from this point on and we are introduced to a diegetic sound. At the end of each slide shows from figure 5 and onwards we hear a scream. This gives shock value to this part of the trailer.
From Figure 5 the woman gets a reply ‘Your going to die’. This gets the audience on the edge of their seats because if you heard someone say that to you, you would be rather scared and with this feeling the audience know what the character within the movie is going through.

Swarica - Textual Analysis of Stay Alive Trailer

Teaser Trailer Textual Analysis

Stay Alive

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZdWFRWtIOGY

Mise-en-Scene:

Anchorage: The trailer gives us a fact after showing a CGI character die saying ‘There are 100 million Gamers in America.’ After one of the characters expresses that he Is impatient to play the game, the trailer goes on to say ‘One in Four is addicted.’ It then continues on after showing more clips to say ‘but what happens…’ leaving ellipsis to draw out the suspense ‘When the game you play…..’ ‘Begins playing you.’ This is all used to build up the audiences anticipation, it also make they apprehensive when thinking about video games as a whole.

Lighting: The lighting in all the clips is very dark; this depicts the upcoming dark situations. The only exception is from the natural high key lighting that comes from when they are outside. The lights in the scene flicker every time that the villain (ghost) appears to kill another victim. As it fades out of each clip the screen is darkened to help the build suspense during transitions. The victims always appear in a high key lighting scene before they are killed, as well as when they have revelations come to light about the games purpose and their lives.

NVC: In the beginning of the trailer the first mans face is solemn as though he has seen something that has made him question what he has been doing. Putting an actor with such a face suggests to the audience that the upcoming events will be very serious. In the next clip we see To men and a girl looking down at a game that we are inclined to believe had something to do with the man prior to the clip. They all have questioning faces as they try to recall if they have ever heard of the game before. Later another clip shows these same three and another few with anticipation clear on their faces, this obviously makes the audience question what could the game they are about to play be like. A demonic creature walks into the scene, you can tell that the creature is demonic by the way it elongates it’s face and is able to move it’s mandible out of it’s sockets in order to scream. This is a common used technique in horror movies; it is also very cheap CGI.

Setting: The trailer is taken in a variety of places such as: An office building, a house and an apartment. In the apartment, you get a quick glance of some Japanese anime posters; this further supports the story by suggesting that gamers are interested in cartoons and imaginary characters and lands. All the buildings in the movie have sharp and harsh angles to them so already subconsciously you are aware that a house or place is bad.

Costume: All the people wear clothing that is appropriate to what they are seen to be doing in the trailer. In the beginning of the trailer the man that is seen playing the game first is in his Pyjamas, this is logical as it appears to be night time at the beginning of the clip.

Sound and editing: The trailer sound is based purely on Foley sound effects to make the audience jump from fright. They use a lot of the conventional sounds eg. Lightning, the door slamming, screams from the victims and the villain, swoops and slices from the actual murders. Other sounds such as dialogue is as always telling the audience the story but not revealing to much about it. The editor has used a lot of quick cuts and fade in fade out transitions. In the first half of the trailer when the deaths are being committed a white and the red light flash very quickly over the screen as if to suggest that there is a lot of blood, or that it was a very gory death.

Hayley - Textual Analysis of The Others Poster

Film Title: The Others


Year of Release: 2001


Director: Alejandro Amenabar


Producers: Fernando Bovaira, José Luis Cuerda


Production Company: StudioCanal


Starring: Nicole Kidman



This version of the poster is the Spanish version: Los Otros (Spanish for The Others). The background is black, connoting something that is unknown, yet dark and sinister. The composition of the poster is asymmetrical: the main image is to the right of the canvas, whilst there is lots of blank space for the text.

The main image is a close up of half of a woman's face, with an oil lamp in front but to the side. The face is sharp, but the focus of the lamp is soft. The woman's eye is a very strong, artificial shade of blue, which draws attention to the face. The oil lamp also connotes the time area: when electricity wasn't common. The colours used are strong and contrast against each other, which usually represents a dark and moody film.

The anchorage is all in capital letters as well as a serif font, connoting not only something that is traditional or old fashioned, but also a serious situation. The main actress's name is positioned above the title of the film, meaning that the studio wants the audience to know that Nicole Kidman is in it. Because she is a very well-known actress, lots of people will be more enticed to see it. The film title itself, is white - like the rest of the text - except that it appears to glow a slightly blue tinge. This connotes something eerie and ghostly. No release date has been revealed, neither are there any taglines or quotes from film critics, suggesting that this might be a teaser poster.

This is another version of the same poster

Hayley - Textual Analysis of The Others Trailer

Film Title: The Others (Los Otros - Spanish)
Director: Alejandro Amenabar
Producers: Fernando Bovaira, Jose Luis Cuerda
Production Company: StudioCanal
Starring: Nicole Kidman
Released: 2001
Running Time: 46 seconds

Synopsis

The Others is a psychological horror film by Spanish director, Alejandro Amenabar. It was the first English spoken film ever to receive the Best Film Award at the Goya's (Spain's national film awards), without a single word of Spanish spoken in it. I chose to analyse this teaser trailer because it relates to what our groups wants to create for our teaser trailer, involving ghosts.

The film is set in the British Crown Dependency of Jersey in the immediate aftermath of the Second World War. The main character (Nicole Kidman) is a woman called Grace Stewart, who lives in a remote country house with her two children, Anne and Nicholas, who have a very uncommon disease, resulting in them being very sensitive to light (aka. Photo sensitivity). Odd things start to happen and Grace suspects that there are ghosts living in their house. In the end, the truth is revealed to both Grace and the audience. She breaks down, remembering what had happened: Yearning for her missing husband and frustrated by her children, she went insane, suffocating them with a pillow. Once she had realised what she had done, she shot herself. It turned out that the supposed ghosts were the new family that had moved in, while Grace and her children were the actual ghosts.

The trailer starts with a tracking shot of the outside of the house. The outside scenery looks dark and foggy; the atmosphere gloomy. To the side of the shot is the silhouette of a bare, gnarled-looking tree, so that it looks as if we (the audience) are walking (or rather, gliding) beneath the tree and towards the house. Although this establishing shot doesn't show much more than the house and the tree, the audience subconsciously assumes that this house stands alone, in the middle of nowhere. A conventional setting for a horror movie. This shot alone is foreboding of something troubling to come.

Throughout the trailer, each shot fades to black, and then fades up from black. Up until about half-way through the trailer, every other shot is of the silhouette of a female figure climbing a dark staircase with a lit oil lamp in one hand. Each of these shots slowly progress from close ups, to medium shots, to long shots. The oil lamp connotes to time era, which could be either before electricity was invented, or when it wasn't as common as it is today. These shots also create tension, because the audience have no idea who the woman is.

Throughout other parts of the trailer, there are mid shots of the main characters faces and body language. They all look scared or suspicious, which suggests that they are aware of another presence within the house.

At one point, there is a shot of a young female who is dressed in what appears to be an old wedding dress, covered by a long, white veil. She turns towards the camera as if she had been caught red handed, which - in my opinion - suggests that she may be an intruder.

There is also a shot of the two children, going out into the night. The scene looks gloomy and misty, and the fact that we can see the mist, leads us to believe that the small amount of light may be coming from the moon. The children are holding hands, which connotes unity, although in their predicament, could be a connotation of fear and uncertainty.

I think that the main purpose of the teaser trailer is to show all of the unusual things that are happening in the house and the characters' reactions to them. For instance, one shot finds the main character, Grace, sitting bolt upright in an arm chair, looking up suspiciously at the chandelier that is rattling on the ceiling. This suggests that there is someone upstairs, and who are - judging by her expression - not her children. The shot is high angled, connoting that she is a victim and is essentially powerless to stop whatever is happening.

The pacing teaser trailer coincides with the tempo of the music, which is quite haunting. The tempo increases along with the pace, which builds up tension towards the climax. A blood-curdling scream.

At the end of the trailer, the screen goes black, and the name of the main actress appears. The words are white with a bluish tint, and are in capital letters, connoting that viewing this film is very important and that the opportunity is not to be missed. The words also look as if they are being stretched across the screen. This happens for all of the captions which appear, reveal the name of the director, the title of the film, and last but not least, the release date.

Thuy - Textual Analysis of The Haunting in Connecticut Trailer

The haunting in Connecticut was produced by Lionsgate whose first major box office success was American Psycho, which resulted in a trend of producing films that were too controversial for major American studios. Other horrors or thrillers that they have made are the SAW movies and their latest ones; The last exorcism, and Buried. This is the trailer for the movie The Haunting in Connecticut. It starts with and establishing shot from the air that gives the audience a clear view of a neighbourhood full of houses and cars, from this image the audience would be given the view that the neighbourhood looks quite nice because it is day time first of all and also because there is not scary music playing, or anything unusual. During this there is a voiceover, which we can only assume is the woman we are seeing, as she says; ‘why do bad things always happen to good people?’ This is a rhetorical question, and is also a saying that is quite common so the audience can relate to it, and are also more involved in the trailer because a question has been asked. It also tells us something about the character, she is thinking back on it, and her personal views of the situation come through. After the establishing shot there is a cut onto a black screen with white block capital writing on it that reads ‘NORTHERN CONNECTICUT’. The writing is positioned to the right to create a sense of unbalanced proportion implying to the audience that something is not quite right, it also helps to establish the setting too. As this frame finishes it cuts into another of rows of houses that are shown in a dolly shot which is meant to imply that the woman is driving past them in her car. To make it more realistic the camera then shows the woman in the car driving and looking outside as if to look at the houses, and then another show of the car itself moving with the woman in it as she pulls up outside a house for sale. Whilst she is driving the voiceover continues and says ‘We were just a regular family just like anybody else, we didn’t ask for this. And we didn’t deserve it.’ From this the audience will begin to wonder what it is that the woman is talking about and creates a sense of curiosity as well as encouraging them to continue watching. It is after this shot that the background music begins to play, a very eerie tune with a female voice singing, as it cuts to the black screen with writing on it again but this time it reads ‘BASED ON A TRUE STORY.’ Things based on a true story immediately make the audience much more interested because they can then decide for themselves whether they want to believe the extent of what they have seen. It also connects to the audience because it is in their world not made up fiction. The next shot is another establishing shot which is a wide one of the house that the movie is going to be based in. it is a very large old Victorian house with a nice looking front garden with trees and grass making it look harmless. The lighting has been quite high key from the start of the trailer to now because all the shots have been of outside in the sun. However the next shot is the woman in the house, and suddenly the lighting gets darker even though outside the windows you can still see the sun shining. The drastic change from light to dark makes a huge impact on the audience’s understanding of the trailer as it tells them in a non-obvious way that there is something wrong with the house. The next shots show the house and the new family entering it and exploring, the editing consists of quick fades into each image, to keep the audience interested in less scary parts of the trailer. When the issue of bedrooms arises the protagonist which we assume is the older boy of the family chooses the basement as his. Immediately the fact the he has chosen a dark, and what most people associate with being creepy and ‘old’, tell us that a lot will happen in his bedroom. Joined to his room is what appears to be a division made by stained glass with a door in the middle; however you cannot see through the glass and cannot open the door. This division stirs a mysterious atmosphere about the room and continues to contribute to the knowledge that scary things will happen down there. There is a shot of the boy looking through the glass trying to see what is on the other side, the camera is positioned on the other side of the door looking at the boy peering through. This shot allows the audience to again feel like they are involved by watching him. After this there is a long cut that is filled with a black screen initiating the transition from day to night, the black then fades out to the image of the house at night. The diegetic sound of cicadas and ‘old’ music playing from somewhere in the house can be heard whilst the boys sleep. It then goes to the protagonist who is watching television, when he turns it off there is a undistinguishable figure in the screen reflection standing by his door.
At this moment there is a loud high pitched squeak which is meant to frighten those watching because the music was so calm before. The transition from night to day happens in the same way and now slow piano music plays in the background throughout shots of the family discovering scary truths about their new home. It is from here that the pace of the trailer quickens which shows a development in the plot but also a sense of urgency and panic. Again when the boy is in the house looking in a room and the figure walks past him, the high pitched loud music plays again, which is meant to scare the audience. The cuts get faster and so does the music as the realisation comes through about what is going on in the house. Things get even faster paced and scarier when the boy is asleep with only a candle by his side for light, making the shot extremely dark, you can see the shadow of a boy leaning into him as he sleeps, and like other times something creepy happens the screech plays. As the family begin to understand what is happening in the house it gets worse, the young girl in the trailer eats a rotten apple, which is seen through a close up of the apple that has an entirely black rotten inside. She checks the fridge and everything inside has gone off, these are just a few of the cut aways shown to add detail resulting in it becoming more realistic. The anchorage returns after the shot of the boy sleeping and this time it tells us when the movie is out –‘THIS SPRING.’ The writing is still on the right but this time the font is a glowing white connoting change in the trailer. It cuts to the young girl in a library looking for information about the house and then her reading up on it. Whilst this shot continues she begins a voiceover explaining her findings, and a high pitch tone plays throughout this. There are then fast flashes of editing showing us old images of the house, and the people that used to live there, these are black and white images of old people dressed in Victorian clothing and the photographs are a yellowy brown. When these images flash past the screeches return because the people shown in the shots are vacantly staring at you which is quite eerie. The arrival of a priest starts a new shot, he is speaking to the mother of the boy and tells her ‘something evil is in your house and it wants your son.’ From here the tempo of the editing along with the sound become extremely fast, connoting urgency and fear as the music gets louder and harsher. The images gets scarier such as close ups of strange looking people’s faces, and a loud breath can be heard before everything comes to a halt at another black screen which this time reads ‘THE FEAR’ which then cuts back to the scenes of disturbing images where the boy has got writing cut into his skin all over his body and his mother begins to panic. It then returns to the black screen again which now reads ‘IS REAL.’ Completing the sentence of ‘THIS SPRING THE FEAR IS REAL.’ We then see shots of CGI where something is spreading through the house, and appears to look like mould.There is a point of view shot where the camera is whatever it is that is spreading and climbs up the stairs. Before it returns to the priest who is urgently telling someone on the phone that ‘you must get out now.’ Terror and action ensues when you see the girl getting attacked in the shower by an unknown entity, the boy holding an axe and a car scene which the priest is in, the music becoming louder, and the cuts even shorter so we only see a glimpse of the image. At the end of all this the piano music returns with the image of a window letting in white light, and the name of the movie appears in white on the right of the screen. The last shot is of the boy walking towards the separation in his room and seeing a distorted body on the other side, followed by the screech again. There is a lot in this trailer that is not explained such as why the ‘ghost’ is after the boy, why the family had to move, and why séances were held in the home. Because so much is thrown at you yet so much is unexplained it leaves the audience wanting to know more resulting in them watching the movie, thus the purpose of trailers. Also this trailer in particular was very jumpy and kept you on edge, it left a mark on me who has personally already seen the movie yet was still moved by the trailer, in this sense it is very effective.

Thuy - Textual Analysis of The Haunting in Connecticut Poster

This is the poster for the movie The Haunting in Connecticut. The story begins with a family moving to Connecticut in order to save money on the drive there for the family’s son to receive treatment for his cancer. However the young boy begins to see things and the family soon discover that their new home was formerly a funeral home where a young boy called Jonah was used as a demonic messenger allowing dark entities to cross over.

I believe the intended audience of this poster would have to be teenagers and older, because from the poster the film looks too scary for a young child to handle, and would not be in the best interests of those who are a lot older. The age group I would put this film in based on the poster would be those ranging from 13-50.

The poster shows a room with a view point that leads to a group of people sat at a table with a candle in the middle, holding hands. From this picture people would instantly have the word ‘séance’ spring to mind, as this is a horror movie poster and the position the people are in are typical of those who would perform a séance. At the top middle of the poster there is an image of a man, in relatively old fashioned looking clothes with his arms spread out, you cannot see his face however because his body is like that of somebody looking down upon the scene. The majority of the poster is just of the background to the photo because the photo has been taken from a distance of the people sitting at the table. It gives you the impression that you are a spectator watching the séance take place.

The poster for this film is mainly a dark coloured orangey brown with what look like scratches in it. This connotes to the audience the feel of a Victorian photo. This is appropriate as the movie has a lot of flash backs showing the audience that the time in which Jonah started crossing the dead into the living world, was in fact the Victorian times. There is a large white spot at the top of the poster with an image of a man with his arms spread out, this is there to make it stand out from the rest and also to make a clear cut between the rest of the poster, which is of a different scene. Most of the colour in this poster only appears where there are lighter areas such as around the candle. There are also shadows on the wall where the candle creates them; the shadows make the image look scarier and more eerie. The colours used in this poster are typical of horror movie posters, dark colours are usually used to create a scary depressing feel.

The people in the centre of the poster are not main characters in the film, but rather those that contribute to the back story of people coming to the house in Connecticut to perform séances to speak to the dead. The image of the man at the top of the poster however is of a main character, but you cannot see his face. His stance in the picture connotes power and freedom to me, and also makes him appear like Jesus on the cross, like he is being crucified, it connotes a religious tone.

This film had two taglines which are primarily the same. The first is ‘Some things cannot be explained’ and the second, seen on this poster, is ‘what if the only explanation for what you saw was unbelievable?’ The tagline works by asking you the audience a rhetorical question, in which the audience would want to know the answer to. Using a question brings people in because they want answers and in order to find them you have to watch the movie. In this case the audience would want to find out exactly what it is that is unbelievable. The tagline doesn’t reveal a lot about the film which has a huge plot and story line. It does however tell the audience that it has an unbelievable story behind it all. The fonts in which the tagline and film name are written are the same and are also both in white. However both of them look as though they have become dirty from their surroundings as some of the colour from the images around the writing has been smeared across the words. The tagline has been placed in between the two images and works as a divide to help the audience differentiate, and see that the two images are separate.

The most persuasive technique used in this poster would have to be that it is based on true events, luring people in to see if these events are real or not, and put their own judgement to the test. It would also scare the audience more knowing that it is not a work of fiction but can be part of our own world and therefore leaves a lasting effect on the audience so that they can carry on to spread word of how effective and good the movie was.

Thuy - Textual Analysis of Fangoria Magazine Cover

This is one of the front cover’s of Fangoria magazine, which is a U.S based horror movie magazine. On the front cover is the image of a man who is part of the cast of 28 weeks later. Those who are familiar with the film would know that he has been infected with the ‘rage’ virus hence the pun in the bottom right corner of the page – ‘it’s all the rage again!’
The man in the photo has been ‘bitten’ by another person who had the rage virus and has therefore transformed into one of the living dead. He is covered in blood, and is wearing red eye contacts to make it look like his eyes have been filled with blood, also his veins have been made to look like they are bulging from his face as you can see dark lines running through his cheeks. The NVC used here is effective because the man has his mouth open, connoting the fact that he is screaming even though we as the audience can’t hear him. However throughout the years a certain ‘zombie stereotype’ has been formed and therefore most people can instantly tell that this man on the front cover is now a zombie of some type.

The angle in which this photograph was taken has the man with his head facing the right. This is to enable the readers to see his side profile clearly without fully blocking out his entire face. The blood on his ear for example may want to be seen by those taking the picture to get the image of the film across in detail. It is also a medium close up of his face and shoulders. This level of proximity shows us the reader small details in his face which have purposely been put there.

The tone of this magazine is quite amusing in that it plays with words, and is quite colourful for a horror movie magazine. However this is effective because it makes the film seem less scary and more like something people can enjoy rather then something in the real world. It is also playful in the fact that on the left hand side, the cover stories have been placed on a film reel, and if you read each line under the cover stories they are genuinely jokes. Such as ‘Wind chill – death served cold’. The name of the film – 28 weeks later, is a sequel to 28 days later, and the symbolic hazordous symbol with the name of the film in it is quite big and made to stand out. The symbol has been outlined with white that looks like its glowing almost, to make it stand out. Also the entire symbol has been made to look like it has been worn down or scratched almost.

Location

We are shooting all of our trailer in the college grounds, however this is quite a conventional thing to do. A lot of horror movies are based in or around a college or school, with the victims being young students. Some of the horror movies I have looked into are Scream, Final Destination 1-3, The Locker, and Whispering Corridors. The first two movies I have named may be familiar, however the last two may not. This is because the last two are asian films, The Locker is Japanese, and Whispering Corridors is Korean. Our trailer itself as I have already mentioned is based a lot around asian cinema and their types of horror in comparison to Western Horrors.

A school is a great place to film a horror movie because not only does it have a large amount of places to film, to the audience it is almost as if there is no where to hide because the school is so big, and it is therefore scarier and makes the movie more suspenseful as the audience never know where the killer will be. Another reason why high school horrors are popular are because the actresses are usually very beautiful and young and are therefore more appealing. People want to watch attractive young actors and actresses.

In Scream, a bunch of high school friends become ravaged by a killer called 'ghostface', in Final Destination it follows a group of high schoolers who have 'cheated death' and therefore it is after them one by one. The Locker movie is about a group of young couples who play with a strange locker after hearing it can make their dreams come true, however instead they unleash an evil female spirit who wants to kill them one by one. Whispering Corridors is about an all girls school that is being haunted by the ghost of one of the girls who committed suicide there. All of these high school horrors have one thing in common, and that is that the characters are young and are being killed off slowly. The suspense and fear of knowing that someone else is going to die soon is enjoyable to watch and surprising when it comes as a shock. It is also frightening because the main audience that watch these films are people of similar ages to those in the movies, giving them a reason to relate.

Below are some photographs of the locations we shot in.