Notes on Kyle Cooper's interview

A good opening must grab the audience's first attention and make them to have expectations on the film they are watching. Kyle used a lot of close ups in his opening sequences as he thinks those shots show the the characters' obsession directly. The font even reflects characters' personalities or occupations.

Notes on True Blood

In the opening sequence of True Blood, we can see the things we usually see in wild areas, for example swamp, crocodile, snake; and hillbilly, houses in rural area, these images might link to the underclass of the society. The sequence also shows something religious which are church, religious people who are singing in a church, rituals and even the slogan "God Hates Fangs". Sex scenes, and dead bodies of rat, wolf are shown in the opening as well, these might reflect the primitive desire of human being and the nature of lifecycle.

Notes on Seven

when we watched Seven opening credits in class we saw that there werer overlapping of shots and it was very jumpy. It was made up of extreme close ups and focused on the fingers and what the hands were doing, creating mystery.

Gothika IMDb

The target audience of Gothika is Females under 18

Our target audience for our film should be female under 18 aswell.

Narrative ideas for our film

Characters:

Little girl as the ghost - 10 -13 years of age

Older teenage to play the victim that is getting haunted - 16 - 17 years old

Storyline ideas for our opening:

Boy victim wakes up in the middle of an apparently 'empty' playground and can't remember how he got there. As he gets up and looks around, different play equipment in the playground starts moving on its own. The swing starts swinging, the merry go round is moving round and the see-saw goes up and down on its own. The fog/mist starts forming at the feet of the boy victim and he can see a human shape through the fog. As it clears he sees a little girl and he calls out to her. The girl doesn't reply and instead sings a nursery rhyme in a slow, creepy voice. The victim keeps calling out to her and starts to walk towards her but as he does the girl disappears and moves to a different part of the park. The girl laughs at the boy as he becomes annoyed at her from moving and disappears again. The boy is glancing around and can’t see her. He sees something on the ground and goes to pick it up as he bends down the girl is stood behind him…

Costume:

The costume for our ghost will be dressed in a white, bloody, old fashioned dress and a long black matted wig which covers her face.

The make up on the ghost is a white pale face, with black tear lines down her face and red sore eyes.

The boy would be in his pyjamas so it gives the illusion that he has woken up and that it is happening at night time.

Setting:

The setting of our film is in a playground at night time. However, as members of my group said that it was difficult to film at night we will film in the day and add the dark effect when we edit it. Therefore, the lighting would be just natural daylight. Another effect that we will add is a grey/blue tint to the film as in The Ring, it gave a eerie effect to the opening and made it seem like something dark and dangerous was about to happen.

Emily Bland IMDB user ratings (The Ring)

 

From the user ratings of The Ring you can see that it appealed more to18-29 year olds therefore our target audience should be both males and females between 18 & 29.

User ratings of The Sixth Sense (Isabel Wong)

	Votes	Average
Males	199,059	8.2
Females	45,820	8.3
Aged under 18	3,282	8.4
Males under 18	2,358	8.4
Females under 18	908	8.4
Aged 18-29	135,633	8.2
Males Aged 18-29	108,382	8.2
Females Aged 18-29	26,462	8.3
Aged 30-44	87,223	8.2
Males Aged 30-44	72,236	8.2
Females Aged 30-44	14,010	8.3
Aged 45+	18,741	8.2
Males Aged 45+	14,530	8.2
Females Aged 45+	3,942	8.3
IMDb staff	54	8.0
Top 1000 voters	861	7.9
US users	81,965	8.2
Non-US users	154,362	8.2
IMDb users	301,831	8.2

Most of the audience of The Sixth Sense are both females and males under aged 18
So, the target audience of our film is most likely teenagers under aged 18
Just because most of the teenagers are obssessed with horror films,
and ususally it's hard for adults to find the horror films scary.

Emily Bland 'The Ring' wordle

I copied the plot of 'The Ring' from wikipedia to wordle amd it produced a word collage of the most common words that appeared in the plot. some key words which are relevant to our ghost genre are death, missing, mental, video and Samara who is the dead little girl. It is clear from this that we should use a young girl as our ghost.

Isabel Wong: Sixth Sense Wordle

The keywords of the wordle of Sixth Sense are 'videotape', 'dark',
'truth', 'ghost', 'alone'. Thses are popular elements in horror films.
These can possibly imply to our own film, with the victim staying alone in the dark
and he feels something spooky then he dicides find out the truth. Then he finds out some
old videotapes and meets the ghost.

Wordle - Gothika

The key words in this wordle (Excluding the characters names) are : 'ghost', 'body', 'girl'  and 'hospital'. We could use the words 'ghost','body' and 'girl' as they are easily achievable to do and fit the genre well but using a hospital as our location would be very difficult to accomodate so i don't think we'll use that in our horror film. However, we could use the medical idea instead.

Laurie Dyche and Title Research

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nqNd_qlT2ls


Dark Water

The information we are given in the opening titles of ‘Dark Water’ is quite short. We only find out who is starring in the film;Tim Roth John C. Reilly, Dougray Scott and Jennifer Connelly. We also find out what company produced it (touchstone) and who directed it which was Walter Salles.

The font is presented to look like it is written on the bottom of the bath and there is a ripple effect added to link in with the title of the film. When the title of the film is shown, it is just written in black with a plain cream background so that catches the audiences’ attention as it is the only thing that they can see so they don’t get distracted by other things on the screen.

The visuals we see during the titles are taps, water, bath, legs and plug hole. This relates to the film because it relates to the title and the plot of the film.

This has made me think that for my horror film title sequence we could relate the visuals to our title like in this.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tn_DjzN8410
Nightmare on Elm street

The information we are given in the opening titles of ‘Nightmare on Elm street'. We find out who stars in it, who the casting director of photography is, Production designer, mechanical special effects, associate producer, film editor, music, executive co producer, producers ad who wrote and directed it. 

The font is just plain font, similar to this but a little bolder. When doing our film, i think we should make the titles a bit more interesting and eye-catching.

The visuals we see give us a little introduction to hint what the film is about and show a victim and the killer. It is set in some sort of factory at night-time as the victim is in her pyjamas and the lighting isn’t very bright.

This has made me think that for my horror film title sequence we could continue the story and show a little bit of the background of our main character like in this film.

Emily Bland Title sequence analysis (The ring & The Messengers)

The Ring

1) The opening titles tell us the: Film company, Name of the film, cast, casting and music director, production design, photography director, producers, writers and director

2) The titles are presented in a child like font, showing that the film is about a child.

3)- repeated images of a circle (ring) are used to symbolise the opening to the well where the child died

   - images of an empty chair and bare branched trees in desolate places, show emptiness as if there used to be things/people there.

4) I think that the idea of using a jewellery box song to show that our film is about a child would be effective and to have the titles in a scruffy, handwritten font.

The Messengers(title sequence from 3.28-5.46mins)

1) The opening titles tell us the: Name of the film, cast, casting and music director, production design, photography director, producers, writer, screenplay and director

2) The font style is fairly basic and clear, it generally appears next to an object that gives us information about the story.

3) We see many farming tools and old childrens toys which give away the location on where the film is set (a farm). Childrens toys are often used in ghost films and especially dolls and jewellery boxes are seen as spooky items.

4) I think that a good aspect of this title sequence to use in our own work would be images of the location and props to give an audience an insight to what the film is about.

Isabel Wong and Title Research

1. What institutional information are we given in the opening title?
Throughout the whole opening sequence of se7en, the actions of fliping through some books,
highlighting some keywords, soaking the teabag into a cup of hot water, writing journal, dealing with
photographs, doing copy and paste work etc. give the evidence that the main character of the film is
a researcher. When we observe those actions in detail, we will find out more about the film or the
main character. For instance, keywords that are being highlighted contain some negative words like
"capricious" and "offensive", which indirectly give the clue that the film isn't about something postitive. There are even photographs of dead bodies in the sequence which provide further information to the audience that the film maybe about crime. Nearly at the end of the sequence, the word "GOD" is being clipped out in which the film maybe related to religion as well.

2. How is presented (fonts/style)?
The font used by the opening sequence is kind of handwriting type.
But the font it uses creates the impression that the words are written by
a sentimental man or devil. The style throughtout the whole sequence is quite
old-fashioned because there is continuous frame jitter as if the video clip is from an old tape.

3. What visuals do we see? How does this relate to the genre?
There are continous flashes and different couloured tone filters in the opening.
Such effects create a sort of fear or wonder to the audience especially the red filter,
when it matches with the black coloured background of the sequence, audience may easily
relate the film to death or crime. The sudden flashes and the overlap effect of pictures and words put a mysterious impression to the film as well.

4. What can you learn from this title sequence for your own?
The most fabulous thing that can be learnt from the sequence is the close up of the actions and objects. Even without a shot of the main character, the audience have already had a minor picture of the character and his personality in their mind.

Character based title sequence storyboard

Here are some of our ideas for a title sequence which would relate to the character
This is actually inspired by the title sequence of the film Se7en.
Here we tend to use close ups of different single props which are related to our plot.
Since our film is going to be children-based, we will have a shot with a little girl running at the start.
Then we will put close ups like the girl's house, unhappy eerie family framed photo, stranger opening door, newspaper clips which tell the murder of the little girl etc.

The title sequence will end with a shot showing a hanging rope which means there will be another character being killed in our film due to the little girl's death.

Image based title sequence storyboard

These are our ideas for using images for a title sequence which relate to the genre of Ghost
Here we tend to have different single shots to show the surroundings of our film's location,
for example mirror, television, corridor, vintage clock in the location; and misty garden, gloomy sky with heavy clouds to make our audience to have a feeling that they are already surrounded by a mysterious atmosphere.

At the end of the title sequence, we will have a blurry shot with a stranger walking towards the camera but never make it clear that who the person is, this is also a strategy to arouse audience's interest in watching the whole film.

Isabel Wong Textual Analysis

Film Name: The Sixth Sense
Sub Genre: Ghost

  Throughout the whole film, there are various types of camera shots to illustrate the threats ahead and make the audience thrilled. For example, there are a lot of close ups of Cole's footstep in a dark area, this makes me wonder what is in front of Cole and what will happen next and such shots can create the fear of the audience directly because unknown makes people anxious. There are also many low angle shots, long shots and POV shots in the film, for instance, the film tends to show Cole's eyesight when he is walking towards where the spooky objects are. POV shot is commonly used in horror film since it makes the whole scene seems real to the audience, the audience may feel like experiencing the whole thing with the character or they may assume they are the characters themselves. Besides POV shot, the film contains quite a lot of long shots, like when Cole is walking through the long corridor in the dark, the long shots create the vulnerable image of Cole because the use of long shots particularly shows the relatively small body of Cole which makes him looks weak.
  There is one part that Cole meets the sick girl in his own tent, right before he goes back to his tent and tries to communicate with the girl, the film made use of various kinds of camer shot to create the thrilling atmosphere, there is canted angle-long shot which is showing the dark corridor, then there is a POV shot whiching pretending the eyesight of Cole on the dark living room, then it comes to a close up of Cole's fear face, the combination of these camera shots creates the fear of the audience accurately.
 
  The film made use of dim light and dark lighting to portray the mysterious and scary atmosphere. When Cole meets the sick lighting in front of his tent, it is almost entirely dark in the background whilst there is only some red light from the tent reflects on Cole's fear face, such lighting makes the audience feel scary.

  Similar to most horror film, the film has tense and horrifying background music in the opening with violins creating some screeching sound which makes the audience chill. When Cole meets the suicide woman, silence in the scene creates an extreme fear to the audience, when the woman walks pass Cole, there is suddenly a "Bang" sound which makes people jump.

  The scary parts of the film are usually located at corridors, stairs where something can hide at an invisible dark corner. At the beginning of the film, Anna is at the dark liquor cabinet picking red wine, since it is located at the bottom of the house, and seems it's hard to grab enough light, such environment creates the fear of the audience and makes them wondering if there will be anything coming out at the next moment. Since there are plenty dark corners in the liquor cabinet, it leaves enough rooms for something to hide so it further makes the audience fear of something is going to come out.

  The film focuses on a lot of props to create fear, it gives many close up shots on the things that sharpen the personalities of the characters. For example, there are close up shots on a dim light bulb, candles to illustrate the mysterious atmosphere by emphasizing the dim light. The tiny statues of Jesus, Maria give to evidence of Cole can connect with the paranormal objects.

  The film has followed several conventions of my sub-genre, including thing moving on its own where we can find the example in the part Cole meets the sick girl in his tent. The haunted house is even implied to this film as there are quite a lot paranormal encounters of Cole happen in his own house. Also, the film made use of horrible make up to show how the ghosts are killed by showing their bleeding head, pale face etc.

  I think the scariest part of the film is Cole meets the sick girl in his tent. Because at the very beginning of the part, Cole is hiding inside the "safety zone" he assumed, but suddenly the clips on the tent remove automatically and the tense background music gives evidence that something is going to show up which makes my heart beats faster and faster. Then, Cole runs out of the tent and walks pass the dark corridor, the combination of various camera shots creates the fear that makes the audience can hardly breath, there are close up of Cole's fear face, canted angle-long shot of the dark corridor and even POV shot of Cole, these camera shots trap the audience to watch what is going to happen next and unable them to escape from the scene even if they're terrified.
   

Laurie Dyche Founation Portfolio Research: Textual Analysis

Foundation Portfolio Research

My sub-genre is ‘Ghost’ so in order to get some ideas for my own horror film, I watched Gothika. Even though I have seen this film before it never fails to make me jump and the first time I watched it it gave me nightmares so I thought it would be a good film to watch and pick up some ideas.

The camera shots varied to portray the victim and threat in the film. At the very start of the film there is a close up of Chloe’s face when she is speaking about what happened to her; this is so that the audience only focus is on her and you aren’t distracted by the surroundings so you can listen to what she is saying. It is also so that we can see the emotion on her face clearly and feel sympathy for the character because she looks distressed and upset. Later on in the film, when Miranda is in the shower, the camera illustrates what Miranda can see when she sees distorted faces of the people in the shower. This is so the audience can see what she sees which is effective because the images are frightening and confusing as you don’t know if what you are seeing is just her imagination, the ghost taking over her mind or her eyes playing tricks due to the drugs she’s been given by the hospital. The camera frames the victim by doing close ups of the girl ghost under the bridge because it showed that she was shaking, hurt and you could see that she was crying which engages the audience because you want to find out what is wrong with the girl and find out what happened to her. However, in contrast to this, the girl ghost is also conveyed as the threat because when Miranda is in the shower the camera shows another close up of her face which looked angry and evil which is again engaging to the audience because you become scared of the character as you don’t know what the girl will do next and you want to know why she is so angry and violent towards Miranda.

All through the film there isn’t much light as whenever the film is outside it is at night time. Inside the hospital there is artificial lighting which is always flashing, this makes the scene seem jumpy because you are always afraid of what you can’t see so when the light goes to darkness you don’t know what is there. Due to the little light in this film, you cannot see the actors/actresses face as it casts shadows over their faces which makes all the characters seem suspicious and eerie because you can’t see them clearly.

At the very beginning there is not any music only Chloe talking about what happened to her. This is used because it is very dramatic and also highlights what Chloe is saying as there is no back ground noise to distract. After Miranda and Chloe have a conversation, Chloe suddenly shouts which makes the audience jump because it was so unexpected. When she is carried away by the guards she is screaming and shouting after Miranda which links with the choice of instruments which is then played as Miranda walks away. These are violins and pianos which are used because those instruments typically are related to emotion and sadness.

Gothika is set in a mental asylum which was used to great effect because it creates fear as you a typically afraid of people who have been branded ‘crazy’. The mental asylum is dull and grey with huge gates, locks and lots of security. This again links to fear because it portrays that the people inside have either killed someone or who are mentally unstable.

In the opening scene there aren’t many key props. However, throughout the film there are other props which we see such as the murder weapon (axe), the newspaper article (which is where we find out what happened to her husband), a computer (where Miranda finds the information about the tattoo and what happened to the ghost called Rachel), the cameras in the hospital and the TV screens they appear on, Medical equipment (drugs). All of these things are crucial props because without them the plot wouldn’t be as gripping and wouldn’t flow.

There are conventions of my sub-genre in this film such as flashing lights, the lightening outside, shadows, ghost writing and things moving on their own which i think we should take in consideration when deciding what conventions to put in our film.

The scariest part of the film was when Miranda is in a cell and she bends down to pick something up the ghost is stood right behind her. What makes it so scary is because you don’t expect to see her stood behind her which made me jump. I think I’ll use something similar to this in our film.

Emily Bland Textual Analysis: The ring (certificate 15)

Mind Map

These are the type of things we know that we have to include in our film.
In order to fit the conventions of our sub-genre (ghost), we might have things moving on their own in the film because this is a very popular conventions in ghost films.
We would also like to make our horror film children-based, because children in horror films can always
enhance eerie feeling and even appeal a wider range of audience including adults and teenagers.
So location we are probably using will be somewhere with children, for example nursery, orphanage, playground etc. Kid's evil laughter will be put in the film to create a scary atmosphere.

Since mirrors are commonly used in horror films, we might make use of reflection to portray a sense of mystery before the film reaches its climax. This is to drag audience into the mood of the film, and further enhance the mutual threat since the audience are like exploring what will happen next with victims in the film. It would be a good idea to have some shots of the shadows of props or the victims to create the loneliness and emptiness of the location, thus increase the vulnerability of the victim.

We prefer having dark eyes as make up of the ghost in our film to make it scary.

Final coursework group Emily Bland, Laurie Dyche, Isabel Wong

We have now gone into our groups for our horror film and have decided on the genre of Ghost.