This slides will appear between scene as part of the iconography. Representing the companies that are responsible for the production of the film as well as title slides that describe the story.
Thursday, 17 November 2011
Wednesday, 16 November 2011
Malice Review (Editing)
This was the first draft of our Malice film review. We tried to copy typical conventions of a film review and looked at several contemporary broadsheet writers. We found that they are very opinionated aswell as having some information on the film so we tried to imitate this.
Wednesday, 5 October 2011
First Production Meeting
We held our first detailed production meeting today. We discussed some key points in making our production. Here are some things we discussed;
1) Genre
-We discussed the various sub genres of horror such as ghosts, torture, gore, santanism, serial killers and zombies. These sub genres can be seen in contemporary successful horror movies today. For example; Saw contains the sub genre of gore and torture on the other hand The Last Exorcism deals with satanism and paranormal activity. Our group has made a final decision that we are going to create a trailer within the sub genre of serial killer and satanism.
-We discussed the various sub genres of horror such as ghosts, torture, gore, santanism, serial killers and zombies. These sub genres can be seen in contemporary successful horror movies today. For example; Saw contains the sub genre of gore and torture on the other hand The Last Exorcism deals with satanism and paranormal activity. Our group has made a final decision that we are going to create a trailer within the sub genre of serial killer and satanism.
2) Plot Ideas
- We discussed a range of possible narratives within this sub genre and came to a conclusion after researching and brain storming ideas. Our plot contains an introverted child getting bullied at a high school by "the popular group". As times pass, the child who was once getting bullied see's a darker side to life and believes in satanism of which he is commanded to sin and seek revenge. We think the stereotypical representations will fit naturally within the horror genre containing typical conventions. This is only a microcosm of which would be a 90minute film, therefore we believe it gives us enough material to make a dramatic trailer.
3) Character Ideas
- As with many of the horror films we researched we will be using stereotypical character types. Using Vladimir Propp's character groupings we will create some of the following stock characters: The Villain, The hero and the princess.
The modern stereotypical Hollywood princess is of a white ethnicity, blonde or brunette, late teens, and physically attractive.
The modern stereotpical Hollywood hero is also of a white ethnicity, tall, athletic and strong of a similar age group.
Our villain will be an introvert character, very innocent at a young age. In our production we will challenge the stereotypical conventions of a villain.
4) Mise En Scene
- For the Mise En Scene we researched via looking at contemporary trailers of typical conventions and stereotypes. Stereotypes were elicited out of things such as location, gender, characters, props and lighting. Usual props we saw were props that helped the people get into the predicament such as broken mobile phones/cars and we also saw many props in terms of weapons.
- We discussed a range of possible narratives within this sub genre and came to a conclusion after researching and brain storming ideas. Our plot contains an introverted child getting bullied at a high school by "the popular group". As times pass, the child who was once getting bullied see's a darker side to life and believes in satanism of which he is commanded to sin and seek revenge. We think the stereotypical representations will fit naturally within the horror genre containing typical conventions. This is only a microcosm of which would be a 90minute film, therefore we believe it gives us enough material to make a dramatic trailer.
3) Character Ideas
- As with many of the horror films we researched we will be using stereotypical character types. Using Vladimir Propp's character groupings we will create some of the following stock characters: The Villain, The hero and the princess.
The modern stereotypical Hollywood princess is of a white ethnicity, blonde or brunette, late teens, and physically attractive.
The modern stereotpical Hollywood hero is also of a white ethnicity, tall, athletic and strong of a similar age group.
Our villain will be an introvert character, very innocent at a young age. In our production we will challenge the stereotypical conventions of a villain.
4) Mise En Scene
- For the Mise En Scene we researched via looking at contemporary trailers of typical conventions and stereotypes. Stereotypes were elicited out of things such as location, gender, characters, props and lighting. Usual props we saw were props that helped the people get into the predicament such as broken mobile phones/cars and we also saw many props in terms of weapons.
We decided to create a short movie of us creating a brainstorm of some things that we may include in our trailer...
5) Possible Locations
6) Interview of Target Audience
-We also hosted a short interview aimed at our target audience asking some key questions that will help us create a successful horror trailer. Here's how it went...
Tuesday, 27 September 2011
Conventions of Horror Trailers
Through exploring contemporary horror trailers i have noticed that many of them follow typical conventions of the horror genre. Each trailer uses the same editing techniques in terms of fast cuts, non-diegetic sounds, variety of camera shots and many of them follow contemporary stereotypes typically with social status, age and gender.
Here is just a short list of my findings:
- Horror trailers have a non diegetic backing track that add tension, pace and atmosphere the trailer. Non diegetic backing track is usually of an orchestral nature adding a sense of "creepiness" to the trailer. Diegetic is often a narration or some sort of screaming or whispering aiding an atmosphere.
- Each trailer starts off slow with a happy beginning then they get in to a predicament.
- Fast paced editing such as jump cutting, dissolves and fades are commonly used to merge scenes, add pace and atmosphere to the trailer.
- Females are commonly used as the vulnerable characters.
- Variety of representations of males, some are evil, some are good.
- Variety of camera shots used to get all perspectives in the predicament. Panning is a common camera angle used as well as camera shots of extreme close up, close ups and long shots.
- Gore and blood is a common theme.
- Horror films/trailer always follow media theories such as the Gratifications theory. For example offering entertainment and social interaction.
- Iconography is constantly used so that the audience know that they are watching the horror genre.
There are many more but these are the most obvious and most common features that are used in almost every horror trailer. I will be taking note of all of these aspects in order to help me create a successful horror trailer.
Audience Research
PLEASE CLICK ON AUDIENCE RESEARCH LINK BELOW. PREZZI FILE WILL NOT SHOW OTHERWISE.
Wednesday, 21 September 2011
Textual Analysis Of The Human Centipede
The human centipede is a story of a German doctor who kidnaps three tourists and joins them surgically, mouth to anus, forming a "human centipede". It stars Dieter Laser as the villain, Dr. Heiter, with Ashley C. Williams, Ashlynn Yennie, and Akihiro Kitamura as his victims. Six also stated that inspiration for the film came from Nazi medical experiments carried out during World War II, such as the actions of Josef Mengele at Auschwitz concentration camp.
MISE EN SCENE
The human centipede is very typical, not particulary in the storyline but in the props and location used to create the predicament that the three tourists get into. Firstly they use phones to firstly communicate to each other which represents contemporary society with the technological advancement of society. When they have met they travel by a car going through the woods, the car then recieves a punctured tyre and the girls are left stranded. The props used in the opening sequence are unlucky props of which is how the story begins and the girls fate is decided. By the terms "unlucky props" i mean the broken cars, broken telephones etc.
Due to being left stranded in the woods with no mobile phone or mode of transport they are unable to escape the predicament which by its self gives a sense of horror, everyone's worst nightmare is to be left stranded in the woods so the audience can relate to them. The woodland location that the girls are stranded in is very typical, the "woods" or "woodland" has connotations of darkness, evil, mysterious and unknown. The location that they end up is a dutch neighbourhood, this gives the sense that they are vulnerable as they are American tourists, do not know the area and can't even speak the language in order to seek assistance. In terms of costumes, everything is relatively stereotypical, the young American tourists are in dresses and heels ready to go out and the surgeon that they come across is wearing a shirt and trousers so everything is pretty regular.
Further on in the trailer, occupation costumes are also very stereotypical, as the man is a surgeon is dressed in a long white jacket that u would see many sergeons wear. The occupation of a "surgeon" is juxtaposed in this movie. Surgeons are commonly seen as heros and they perform operations that save peoples lives, but in this movie, he performs an operation that is more of a twisted experiment that puts each of their lives in jerperdy. In terms of the props used by the surgeon it is all very stereotypical to his professions, hospital and operative equipment such as knives, saws, saringes, hopsital beds etc.
There are iconic colours and props used throughout the trailer, when the girls first meet the surgeon, he is in a black shirt. The colour black has connotations of darkness and evil. One of the women is dressed in grey, this may appear to be slightly ambiguous. As white has connotations of heaven, purity and justice and on the other hand black has connotations of darkness and evil, grey may appear to represent something in between the both of those, almost an idea of pergatory and that her fate is undecided. There are also iconic props of horror movies such as knives that are present in this trailer.
CAMERA
The trailer is fairly long with it being over 3 minutes. The beggining of the trailer starts off with limited cuts but the pace increases with rapid close up cuts. During a period of 20seconds there is 13 cuts which alternates from close up to medium shots of the characters and props used in the trailer. The fast cuts seem to give the viewer an idea of the climax of the film, also as the cuts are very fast it builds suspense and tension to what is happening. There is a mixture of title slides throughout that almost tell the storyline.
CAMERA
The trailer is fairly long with it being over 3 minutes. The beggining of the trailer starts off with limited cuts but the pace increases with rapid close up cuts. During a period of 20seconds there is 13 cuts which alternates from close up to medium shots of the characters and props used in the trailer. The fast cuts seem to give the viewer an idea of the climax of the film, also as the cuts are very fast it builds suspense and tension to what is happening. There is a mixture of title slides throughout that almost tell the storyline.
There is a closeup of a man with his mouth tied which then turns to an extreme close up of his eyes, this is to show his facial expressions as he is extremely distressed and terrified. Throughout the trailer it alternates from long shots to medium shots to close ups of which gives us a sense of the location and the facial expressions, this is used to build an atmosphere and imagery.
There is a long shot of the car driving through the woods and then a close up of the punctured tyre, this has been put there so we fully understand the situation and what has happened. When the surgeon opens the door to the 2 helpless American tourists, there is an over the shoulder shot, this is very affective in enforcing the storyline. This camera angle may represent that he is now in control of the situation. When the surgeon is walking down the stairs there is a high angled pan of which is also a tilt. This has many connotations. As he is walking down it may represent that he is evil and going beneath ground level of which promotes religious ideologies of hell. A low angel medium shot is also very affective where the dimented sergeon is in his sergical outfit holding a saringe, the low angle gives him the representation of being powerful and fully in control.
ENCODING/DECODING
The preferred reading of the film will be influenced by the film creators to aid the emotions of shock and scariness. The shock element comes from the twisted story line on the other hand the scariness comes from the audience not knowing if the tourists will get out of the predicament that they are in. There is almost an element of reality too. As there were Nazi experiments during the war of which surgeons tried many delusional sickening things to jews using human bodies as test dummies.
ENCODING/DECODING
The preferred reading of the film will be influenced by the film creators to aid the emotions of shock and scariness. The shock element comes from the twisted story line on the other hand the scariness comes from the audience not knowing if the tourists will get out of the predicament that they are in. There is almost an element of reality too. As there were Nazi experiments during the war of which surgeons tried many delusional sickening things to jews using human bodies as test dummies.
There are many representations that we can elicit from the film. These predominately include gender, occupation and nationality. The representation of gender is through the stereotypes of male and female. The malevolent surgeon is the key male in the film and he has full control of the situation and all of the vulnerable peoples lives. On the other hand the female tourists are seen to be innocent, weak and vulnerable which may link to common contemporary stereotypes of the male figures being in control and strong and females being delicate and precious.
In terms of Nationality, this has many representations and may cause some ethical issues. The malevolent surgeon is German and the weak tourists are American. This may link to Nazi' ideologies influencing imagery that germans are bad. Nazi' ideologies of indoctrination are commonly linked, this may be shown in the film as he makes them think he is going to help them but then puts them in danger, very much sounds like Hitlerism.
Lastly, the representation of a surgeons occupation is played with as they are usually represented to be life savers and strong genuine people. But in this case the surgeon is demented and evil as he has a twisted experiment in mind.
The main gratifications offered are those of entertainment and social interaction. The entertainment is received by the target audience through the twisted, shocking storyline that they wouldn't usually receive in day-to-day life. It provides energy as it provokes the emotion of fear and shock. It also influences social interaction due to the ethical issues that the film may rise through representations and the storyline. People may talk about whether the film was good or not and whether somethings should have even been allowed to be filmed.
The main ideologies are shown mainly through gender but also nationality. It is shown through gender through the stereotypes of males and females but also it deals with the stereotypes of nationality influencing historic knowledge of countries.
Once again the film company that contributed in making the film is shown at the beginning of the trailer, this is used to promote the company but also so that the target audience will eventually recognise the brand and will watch other horror movies made by that brand.
EDITING
At the beginning of the trailer there aren't many cuts, this is to show the storyline aswell as it promoting ideas that everything is regular with a slow pace. This then dramatically increases to influence tension and atmosphere, the quick cuts create pace of which makes the audience feel on edge and its signifies the extent of where the climax happens.
There is no continuity as this will slow the trailer down, they want to create a fast pace with a scary atmosphere to draw the target audience in. The technique used in order to do this is called jump cutting. Cross dissolves are another technique that is used in the trailer to merge scenes together in order to create almost a short story to the trailer, although the events may not happen like that in the film, it is created in the trailer to add a more dramatic storyline.
Throughout the trailer it fades out from black. The colour black has many connotations in itself promoting ideologies of evil and darkness. The fade out from black shows how the story line is evolving. The fade out from black constantly goes to a screen of writing of which narrates the the storyline for example "the demented surgeon...to perform the unspeakable".
Throughout the trailer there is a mixture of diegetic and non-diegetic sound. The diegetic sound is offered through the voices of the characters which includes; conversations, screaming, whispering etc. The Non-diegetic sound is offered through the backing track, this also influences drama and tension as well as pace to the trailer.
All of this creates an atmosphere of fear.
GENRE
The genre is obviously horror as the film is all about provoking fear. It also fits into a slight sub-genre of sci-fi as it deals with subjects that have never been performed in today's society excluding the Nazi' era.
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