Stock characters.

Film Trailer Title.

The title for our film trailer is 'Final Deadline'.

The reason we chose this as our title is because it has two meanings to it.
One meaning is literally a final deadline for the students to hand in their media assignment. The title will relate to its target audience who will be teenagers, from the age 15 up.

The second meaning is the word 'Dead' being used within the title, since the majority of students are killed off by a fellow student. This also speaks to its target audience, who will be people who like horror films.

In our research we found that lots of Slasher/Horror movies related to a specific time on the calendar. Such as, Halloween, Friday the 13th, Black Christmas, Valentine's Massacre. Moreover, further research into the texts showed that these dates relate back to an event that causes the killer to be out for revenge. For example, Halloween is the exact time Michael Myers the 'psychotic killer' , gets insititutionalise and comes back 'for a mindless rampage'.

Synopsis

Synopsis for 'Final Deadline':

Four media students in their final year of sixth form, have to make a film production for media. The grade they receive from this production determines whether they go to university or not. The filming of the production is taken place in an abandoned mental institute.

The only person taking the project seriously, is grade 'A' student Jessica Woods.

She is a wonderer and goes to explore the mental institute to finish the project on her own.

Whilst Jessica is exploring, the 'Jock' of the group Dan Moorse decides to play tricks on his girlfriend Josephine Khemet, the popular girl.

The last of the four; Jacob Roper gives up on the media project and sits in one of the rooms in the institute, drinking a beer and smoking a cigarette.

All the characters slowly begin to get killed by one of their fellow possessed students. This killer has been possessed the lost souls of the mental patients. Jessica (the killer) returns to school with the footage of her fellow students deaths to receive her 'A' grade.

From our research on film synopsis's, we found that they must all include a antagonist, protagonist and stock characters. It also includes the plot of the film, showing the beginning, middle and ending. It is basically a short summary of who the characters starring in the film are and what the film will be about.

Setting:

We have researched abandoned buildings, to find a location for the filming of our trailer. We look into abandoned mental institutions, since the type of location is right for the plot of our trailer.

We found an abandoned mental institute in Surrey, which is shown in the link below.

Abandoned mental hospital:

http://www.abandoned-britain.com/PP/westpark/1.htm

On this site it show many images of what the mental intitution looks on both the outside and inside. It matches the type of setting we are looking for, so we have to see if we can have permission to enter the institute and if we are, then we will use this as our location for filming and photography.

Setting for trailer. on Prezi

Horror film Magazine front covers

The image on the front cover is of a woman covered in blood and with her lower jaw ripped off. This picture is very graphic and horrifying. This shows that it is advertising a film of the horror genre. It uses a mid-shot to give a full shown image of the woman.

The title is called 'Scars' which also has connotations to horror, it makes us think of the harm done to someone and the scars they are left with. The font is worn away, it looks as though it has been left to waste away like a dead corpse or an old grave stone. The colour of the font is white, to make the word stand out, but is outlined in red to combine with the blood and death.

The colours used throughout the front cover are white and red, which symbloise ghosts, blood, death and gore.

Horror Film Concepts:

Our group individually chose different concepts that are included in horror films and researched them. These concepts include props, locations/setting, mise en scene, characters/costumes, plot-lines/summary/narratives and themes/motifs/ideology.


Props:

In 'A nightmare on elm street' the protagonist; who is the killer is called freddie krueger and uses a murder weapon of clawed hands. The claws are not attached to him, but are worn on gloves.The claws look like razor sharp knifes and the gloves look like they would be used in a garden.

In the film 'Scream' the murder weapon is a sharp knife. This exact knife is the signature weapon for all the scream films. The protagonist (killer) is always seen with this knife, or it is found at the crime scene.

In the film 'Texas chain-saw massacre' the murder weapon is a chain-saw. The title of the film is based upon the weapon used by the protagonist (killer). The weapon of chain-saw is very much associated with this film.

Location/Setting:

The setting for 'hostel 2' is a dungeon type room. It looks very dim and dirty, with blood stains over the floors and walls.

The only thing in the room is a chair with straps on to tie people down onto it. It seems to have a very creepy atmosphere and looks like an area where murders would take place.





The film 'The Strangers' is set in a deserted location, surrounded by forest. There is only the one house that the victims live in. It is set at night time, which adds to the horror effect. Having the film set in a deserted location creates fear, because it shows that there is no one around for help.

Analysis of Horror Film Posters

The poster contains the title of the film, which is ’30 days of night’. The title is written in red, which is usually associated with death, blood and passion. The font looks like fingernails have scraped it, giving an intense, horrific atmosphere.
We are told when the film is going to be out in cinemas, which is in October. This is significant because Halloween is in October, so it adds to the film being of horror genre.

The image is of a man screaming, his body is shadowed, so that only the emotion on his face is shown. The man is screaming as if he is in great pain, this indicates that he might be getting attacked.
The main colours of the poster are black and red. These colours are associated with death, night, blood and fear. This meaning that the film might consist of these themes.






The title is written like you would see witchcraft written. This could be a link to the title being ‘The Blair witch project’. The letters are very spaced out from each other, representing isolation, which links to the image of the woods.There is then a short paragraph on what the film is going to be about, the word ‘disappeared’ makes the audience curious and adds to the effect of horror.

The image is of a wood, this gives an insight into where the film will be set, and also it is written in the small paragraph. The image looks like a negative Polaroid, which adds to the found footage. This makes the tree’s stand out and look ghostly and have a spirit feel to them. The colours black and white remind us of death.

The title that we can see on the poster is quite small but effective since it merges with the gruesome image. The title ‘Saw’ is in a white colour to make it stand out since it’s quite small. The font of the title looks as though they are the man’s teeth; this makes the title very effective.

In the poster we as the audience only see the image of a man’s mouth wide open and a bit of the bottom half of his face. Like many horror posters they try not to show a lot on the poster so that the audience are more intrigued (as this poster does).In the image it is very obvious to an audience that the man is in pain, we can tell this because most of his teeth have been pulled out and there is a hook in his mouth.Even though we can’t see most of his face we know that this character on the poster is being tortured. Like most of ‘Saw’s’ posters they always show someone being tortured so if a ‘Saw’ fan you can tell what is going on in the poster without giving away too much of the plot of the film. The tag line ‘ Opening wide this Halloween’ is very humorous and relates well to the image.

The font of the title ‘The Last Exorcism’ is quite gothic this relates to the time that the film is set and creates a spooky atmosphere to the poster. The colour of the font is black which contrasts with the bright off white background. The use of the bright background creates shadows from the image of the girl on the wall, this makes the poster more effectively scary and informs the audience of the genre of the film.

The image of the girl on the wall is very haunting and the position of her body makes her look unnatural or un-human; the positioning of her body is quite spider like. Since the image of the girl is in the corner of the wall it could be said that the photographer decided to position it this way so that it would look as if the girl is ready to pounce out of the picture. This makes the image more thrilling and makes it a must see.

The look of the film poster is important in telling the audience the genre. They use many conventions, which make the horror genre recognisable. All horror posters use capital letters for their titles, adding to the intensity. They use dramatic colours, such as red, white and black. The image’s used are usually quite horrific and show the setting, characters or props.

These elements help to promote the genre of the film, they let audiences know what the film is called, gives hints to what it is about and tells us when it will be out in cinemas.

The film poster markets the film effectively; it lets the audience know the main aspects of the film.