Treatment

Darkness falls on a dance studio. Five friends, dancers: Buffy, Kirby, Tatum, Nina and her boyfriend Thomas, come to the end of their rehearsal and prepare to leave. One of them decides to stay behind to perfect her pirouettes. As the friends leave, and the door begins to close, Buffy will soon realize that she’s not alone. Whilst practicing her routine, she looks into the mirror and screams as she thinks she has seen someone. In a state of frenzy, she turns around to find no one behind her. Paranoid and frightened, she believes the hallucination was due to lack of sleep and stress. She is unsettled therefore decides to leave. She picks up her belongings and makes her way to the exit when the lights go out. Overpowered by darkness, she calls out to see who’s there. The lights begin to flicker and she sees a masked figure running towards her.

Oblivious to the brutal murder of her friend, Kirby is on her way home and takes her usual route through the park. Engrossed in reading, she is unaware of the presence of the masked villain coming towards her. She bumps into him and briefly apologizes but dismisses it and continues reading. Recalling the brief encounter, she stops to think about the strange appearance of the person. She turns around to reassure herself that she was worrying over nothing and finds the masked person standing facing her ready to attack with a deadly knife. In a state of fear, she screams and begins to run. Unable to hear his footsteps behind her, she turns around hoping that she has lost him and falls in the process. Vulnerable and frightened, she looks up and sees him standing over her.

The next day, Nina is flicking through the channels when she comes across the breaking news of the death of her friends. The reporter emphasizes the similarity of the previous years events on the same date where the victim was from the same college. Whilst watching the LIVE broadcast, she notices a masked figure lingering in the far distance. She pauses the screen and edges closer to examine further. Certain that the masked person is truly there, she gasps and has a flashback of her involvement in last years accidental killing. Fearing Tatum’s safety, she calls to inform her, Tatum doesn’t pick up as she’s having a bath, so she leaves a panicked voicemail ordering her to keep safe. The masked villain answers the call and say’s “It’s all your fault” and then hangs up. Upstairs, an oblivious Tatum is having a bath, unaware that the masked villain has entered her bathroom. The cheerful song juxtaposes the brutal intentions of the villain.  While laying there with her eyes closed, the villain is shown entering the bathroom.  Whilst washing her hair, she dips her head under the water and then rubs her eyes to clear her vision. At opening her eyes, she sees the masked villain standing over her; who blocks her scream by drowning her.

Nina arrives at Tatum’s house to see that the front door is open. She rushes yelling Tatum’s name through the house, finally finding Tatum’s body in the bathroom. Crying and terrified, she collapses onto the ground and begins wailing in utter disbelief. She calls Thomas and explains what she has seen and he replies he will be there shortly; suddenly she hears the front door slam shut. Is Nina destined to have the same fate as her friends?

Plot ideas for horror film trailer

1.     Four girls, in a dance studio practising a dance, a boy emerges wearing a ‘V for Vendetta’ mask, then starts attacking/killing each of the girls one by one. One dies in the studio, one on the way home, one in the shower. One final girl, going to be shown running away from the villain.

2.     A group of teens maybe 4 or 5, go out to the woods, have a couple of drinks, maybe do drugs, one of them have a psychological breakdown, and “turns” evil. He then starts killing them off one by one. Final girl.

3.     A boy in school gets severely bullied, to a point where he can’t take it anymore; he then gets revenge on all the bullies.

As a group we had a discussion, and came to a conclusion that plot 1 will be our final plot, due to the fact that it hasn’t been done yet. Also we feel that out of the 3 plots, this one would work better, and might be a more interesting option.

Questionnaire Analysis

Questionnaire

 

We created a questionnaire to hand out so we could do some research into our target audience and what they think makes a good horror trailer. We used the answers from this questionnaire to help us make decisions on what to include in our trailer.

Pitch and Analysis

Preliminary Task: Bussing Sequence

Bussing Sequence Evaluation

For our preliminary task we shot a bussing sequence in which the victim gets a false shock before the real scare. The victim (Ellie) is alone in a school and goes to play an old piano. She sees the curtain move and the piano lid shuts closed as she begins to walk away. The villain (myself) appears from behind a curtain and goes to attack the victim. We encountered a range of problems due to the circumstances we were filming in, but we managed to overcome them and learn from them.

The main problem that we faced was due to the mise-en-scene and continuity. We had a problem with Ellie’s costume as we had to film over two days, so the clothes are different in the first and second parts of the sequence. Another problem we faced was that we used the piano music as non-diegetic sound as well as diegetic so it was jerky when we edited it. A way in which we could fix this is to record the piano music as a track and then add it in during the editing process so it is smooth. Also, as we weren’t alone in the school, there is some unwanted sound of doors and speech, in the beginning of the sequence thus defeating the notion that it is an isolated setting. Another problem was that we were shooting in the daytime and so we couldn’t really control the lighting, however, we tried to make it darker by pulling the blinds down over the windows and turning lights off.

The continuity editing of a long shot followed by a close up of Ellie peeking around the door was done well however, we needed more close ups in order for the audience to be able to sympathise and identify with the victim. We started our sequence with a long shot of Ellie in the corridor; when we received feedback we learned that it would have been better if we had an establishing shot at the beginning and a shot of Ellie walking up the stairs to establish the setting.

The editing process after we shot our bussing sequence went well because we followed conventions of horror films and added eerie non diegetic sound in the background, to make it scarier. We also cut some clips so that the cuts were quicker and built tension like in most horror films. The diegetic sound of the piano fit in well with the horror genre as the song Ellie played sounds eerie.

However, after receiving feedback, we learnt that less of the diegetic sound would allow for more non diegetic sound to be used, such as ghostly noises. Another suggestion was that Ellie could have played some eerie notes on the piano when she strokes it to create a more sinister atmosphere. Also, the high angle shot from behind me makes people think there s someone behind me thus the effect is not the same. Feedback suggested a shot reverse-shot of Ellie’s reaction my appearance, would have been better. Also, the point of view shot of me walking towards could have been done better and from a higher angle, thus making me look superior and allowing the audience to identify with the victim better. Additionally, in this part of the sequence, after watching it over and with feedback, we realised that there was too much distance between myself and Ellie, so it doesn’t make sense that to be a point of view shot. Also, that Ellie’s fall was not very convincing so we could either eliminate it from our real trailer, or somehow make it more realistic. Feedback also said that the fades in the sequence did not convey time passing properly (when Ellie strokes the piano, then is playing it). Additionally, though the fade at the end of the sequence was too quick, the link to Psycho was good. Another suggestion from feedback was that a false shock would have built up the real scare, thus creating a better effect for the audience.

From this experience I learnt that continuity is extremely important in order for something to make sense and so, in our actual trailer we should be prepared for any problems we could face involving costume and other mise-en-scene. Also, by experimenting with types of shots, I have learnt which shots work best for the horror genre and to create the correct atmosphere for the audience and that with more time, planning and preparation we could improve a lot more.