music ideas

Being a horror film to fit conventions we would need to have to have some scary or creepy music. The music should be slow at first but build up and become increasingly fast paced leading to a climax at the end of the trailer. This will give the audience a heightened sense of excitement towards the film and when pairing this excitement with increasing scary, fast paced clips the audience should be excited to watch the film, if this is not the case the trailer is not a very good one.

Institution research

Our film is going to be very similar to the films in the paranormal activity franchise, so it makes sense to look at the institutions used for these films. all of the paranormal activity films have been distributed by Paramount pictures. It is not common for a film with such a low budget to be distributed by such a massive company. Paramount have produced and distributed huge films including Justin Bieber: Never Say Never, Transformers: Dark of the Moon, Thor and Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol. These films have a budget range from $13m all the way up to $195m, this is very different to the $15,000 budget of the first paranormal activity film, for this reason it is unlikely that we use paramount. Blumhouse Productions is the production company behind the franchise and is much smaller than mega companies like paramount, this makes it a good choice to produce our film. Blumhouse Productions has produced other horror films such as Sinister, a film that falls into the same sub-genre as paranormal activity and uses the same methods to make the film scary, this makes Blumhouse Productions perfect for our film. BrainDamage Films (BDF) is a good option for us to have as a distribution company as it specialises in Horror films, and is low budget. This isn't a company that pumps money into big blockbuster films that will gross well over $100m but invests into low budget films.

Font analysis

 The font of the title stands out massively compared to the rest of the writing on the poster. The title font is red which sticks out on the black background, this is effective as it draws the attention to the name of the film, doing this is a great way of drawing attention to the trailer and to the name of the film. In our film we plan on having a font similar to this, although when used in our trailer it will not bne constant title in one place, it will appear and will possibly have some effects to go with it.

Horror films

In a good horror movie we expect to see it set in a scary location (usualy in the middle of nowhere) and loads of silly mistakes that dump the characters in trouble, but their are many more cliches used in horror films, some are obvious whereas some are a little more subtle. I used the opening couple of minutes of  'jeepers creepers' and straight away the most obvious cliche is used, the main characters are in the middle of nowhere, and to make things worse the characters themselves are cliched, they are both defenseless teenagers. People love watching teenagers get into these situations mainly because a large proportion of the horror market is teenagers, it is much more effective for a teenager to watch someone they can relate to getinto these situations than watching an old lady get into the same ones. 'Did i just see that?' moments make the viewer extremely nervous and scared for the character, a good example would be a zombie darting across an aisle in an abandoned super market, they make us want to shout out to the charcater in a pantomime fashion they're behinf you but we just cant and we know that the character is totally oblivious and will proabably die as a result. In the opening of jeepres creepers we see the camper van turn off the road through the cars back window they do not notice however and we as an audience are wondering what they know that we don't. After seeing the caper van turn off we see a truck in the distance speeding toward the car but it takes a while to reach and every second that goes by without a reaction, suspense is building and then finally the protagonists notice the truck. This is a good example of a climax/anti-climax. In alot of horror movies we expect to see lots blood and gore, films like saw show massive amounts if this and this helps us get involved in the film as we are now feeling a bit ill and scared of the people responsible. One of the biggest cliches in horror is the lonely situations, like when your car breaks down in the middle of a spooky woods adn nowhere but a creepy house you could find help, these really make the film scary as all of us have been to a woods we find spooky and the thought of being stuck there at night al alone is a freaky prospect. With our film being similar to paranormal activity and following some of the same conventions we need to make sure that our film is full of jumpy seens that will really freak out the audience. We will also have to ensure that our trailer reassures the audience that our film will be packed with these type of scenes, but we must be careful that we don't ruin it and that we keep the audience guessing.

Title analysis - Resident Evil Afterlife

The title of this film gives us a lot of information and suggests a lot:

• The use of the colon tells us there is more than one film in the resident evil franchise.
• The E in evil is much bigger and more pronounced than any other E on the poster which draws attention to the type of film it will be and also makes it obvious that 'evil' will be one of the themes.
•  The fact the title is in a different, much more interesting font than the information about the release takes you away a little from the fact the film in fiction, and tells us the film is not just ordinary.
• The fact the character on the poster is leaning on the title and it is slanted gives us the idea that she can combat the resident evil in the film, and that she is potentially the protagonist.
• The backdrop is dark and it is raining which gives us the idea the film is not set in a nice place.

Dark Knight poster analysis

Although 'The Dark Knight' is not a horror film, this poster is a great example to follow for our poster. There is a little bit of writing at the top which says ' Welcome to a world without rules' on it's own it doesn't really mean anything, combine it with the sky filled with smoke and the decaying building, it adds a huge amount of connotation. Giving clues but no answers like this poster does is very effective, it makes the posters audience question what is going to happen, and whats gone wrong, even people that aren't particularly fans of batman will still be interested to see if batman can handle his next challenge. The poster doesn't just get the current audience excited, it gets others that have not seen the films interested (which is a great way to increase sales). The flaming bat on the collapsing building makes the audience think maybe batman is responsible for the destrucion, this again is very effective as it gets the audience asking questions and therefore interested. The main attraction to the batman franchise is the hero himself, so having him standing strong, infront of a collapsing building with his fists clenched adds a huge amount of buzz to the film as people essentially want to see how strong he is. Although 'The Dark Knight' is not a horror film

Questionnaire results

Q1) 6/8 people said yes.

Q2)  3/8 people said supernatural
2/8 people said Comedy
1/8 people said Teen
2/8 people said Monster/zombie

Q3) 5/8 people said Paranormal Activity

1/8 people said Texas Chainsaw Massacre

2/8 people said Dawn Of The Dead

Q4) 3/8people said 26-50

3/8 people said 51-75

2/6 people said 76-100

Q5) 5/8 people said up to £10
1/8 people said £8
2/8 people said 'between £12 and £15'

Q6) 5/8 people said 1
2/8 people said 2
1/8 people said 3

With our questionnaire we found that only 6 of the 8 people we asked were fans of the Horror genre, this was not suprising as the nature of Horror films is often too intense for some people. Despite this we found that most are fans which made the questionnaire results more reliable as 6/8 of the people are likely to have experience with the genre and be able to make comparisons.All the favourite films mentioned are huge as far horror goes, all of the three movies grossed more than $100m in the worldwide box office, but luckily they did not all have huge budgets. 2/3 of the favorite films had $millions at their disposal, which isn't great for us as our budget is tiny in comparison, but despite this the most succesful film of the three was Paranormal Activity grossing over $193m at the box office globally, but interestingly had an astonishingly low budget of $15,000. Our budget still comes nowhere near to that but it shows with a low budget you can still create a very successful and profitable peice.Only 3/8 (37.5%) of our sample group stated the supernatural subgenre of horror to be their favorite which is quite low, however we are not concerned as 5/8 (62.5%) said that Paranormal Activity is their favorite horror movie, and considering our film is going to be quite similar to Paranaormal Activity it is a reassuring statistic.

Questionanaire

Media Questionnaire 

Are you a fan of Horror films?   YES/NO

What is your favourite sort of Horror film? 

• Supernatural
• comedy
• teen
• monster/zombie

     

What is your favourite horror film?____________________________________________________

How many dvd’s do you own?

·       1-25

·       26-50

·       51-75

·       76-100+

How much are you prepared to pay when you buy a DVD? £_______

How often do you visit the cinema a month? ___________________

                                                                      

Analysis of trailers

From my research into movie trailers I have realized they exhibit similar qualities to the opening couple of minutes of films, they both give a taste of what is to come in the rest of the film e.g. an action sequence or comical situation. Another feature they share is the questions; in trailers it is very important to get the audience asking questions as the urge to find the answers will convince them to go and watch the film, similarly if questions pop up in the opening couple of minutes the audience is immersed into the film and the experience of watching that film is likely to be enhanced.

Movie trailers can have a big part to play in a films success therefore producing a good, interesting advert and broadcasting it correctly is very important. To make a good advert you should give a taster of the scenes to come, with an action movie trailer you expect to see a bit of a punch up, someone in distress and a few explosions, as well as this there needs to be suggestions into the plot of the film but its important to make sure too much isn’t given away. With the previously mentioned the audience should be interested in the film but may not be convinced they have to go and see it, this is where questions become effective (especially if the film is a sequel or prequel) as they take it from a film trailer to a film from which you can learn the answers to the questions you as an audience member have asked yourself; a perfect example of an advert like this is The Dark Knight Rises, the advert featured clips of action and gave us an idea into the plot, although many of these ideas we were questioning as there were no answers at all. Broadcasting a trailer correctly is extremely important and many factors should effect when and where the trailers should be broadcast, the two main factors are budget, and target market. There is very little point in broadcasting a trailer for An 18 cert movie on a kids channel; the audience of the trailer would not be able to see the movie if they wanted to but its likely they would not understand concepts of the trailer, equally if you advertise a kids film at 11 o’clock at night the chances are kids (the target market) aren’t going to see the trailer. Budget effects how your trailer is broadcast also, if you have made a film with your mates on a budget of 10 pounds then it is pointless in putting an advert out on prime-time tv for the film, but if your film has a huge budget and is projected to gross millions worldwide then advertising in a small town newspaper probably wont cut it. Avenger Assemble nailed this by broadcasting the trailer for the first time during the superbowl, which over 100m people where watching, the thirty second slot reportedly cost $6m, which is a huge amount of money but not a lot to invest when the film grossed over $1.5bn worldwide.

Certificate analysis

texas chainsaw massacre- 18
paranormal activity - 15
paranormal activity 2 - 15
paranormal activity3 -15
28 days later - 18

we're almost 100% certain that we are going to do a peranormal activity style trailer, although we may do a zombie style horror. Finding out the certificates for films similar to the one we wish to create has helped us decide a rating. If we do the paranormal activity style trailer the rating will be 15 as it is not too violent or explicit and being 15 leaves us with a wider audience. If we do a zombie style horror the rating will have to be an 18 as it will be violent and explicit, with blood and gore.

texas chainsaw 3d trailer - analysis

The trailer starts off introducing the cast, they are a group of late teen or early 20's people, and are all situated in a horror favourite, in a vehicle that looks like it could give up at any moment. The young Adults also conform to other conventions as they are portrayed as stupid and idiotic, when asked if she knows anything about the place they are going the girl says "just the address" This is perfect for horror fans as they want to see a female get killed, especially one that is prepared to go on a trip without any idea on where they are visiting. Now that the setting and the cast has been introduced they start showing the action and horror that entails throughout the film. The girl that doesn't know anything about where shes going is soon shown to be at the mercy of the chainsaw massacre. Tied to a tree and duct tape over her mouth she is unable to scream, shout or break free, the chainsaw massacre is toying with her and connoting he is going to cut off her arm. This is exactly what the audience wants to to see, a horrified teenager being terrorised by a nutcase who is likely to caus e huge amount of blood, gore and terror.

Film idea 1

Our third idea is another horror, we plan to make a trailer for a zombie apocalypse film. The film will be set in a post apocolyptic world with either no other people or very few other people in the trailer and will follow just one person, however there will be glimpses of beings but it will be quick and due to this we are not sure whether or not to make the fact there is zombies obvious from their costume and make-up, trough action titles that explain the plot, or both. The plan is to have a trailer like that of '28 days later' although this could be very difficult due to lack of budget and equipment.

Pros

• We have both seen the film and the trailer and are aware of the conventions and cliches expected of this type of film.
• The trailer could be filmed with only two of us which keeps things simple and saves us from having to find numerous people to act for us.

• We are both familiar with the genre and sub genre and we have a clear idea of the things we want adn don't want in the trailer.
• Some shots will be simple and easy tro film but will be effective.

Cons

• With the equipment we have, it will be extremely difficult to make some shots clear, scenes when it's going to be dark, the character will be hard to see clearly as the cameras are not of high enough resolution and we dont have access to powerful lights.
• Filming in public will be tedious as we will have a limited time period in which we can film due to lighting and during this time there will have to be no-one around so they don't compromise the shots.
• 
  

Film idea 2

The second idea for our film is a horror film similar to Paranormal Activity. The advert to Paranormal Activity is composed of quick and simple shots which we could recreate fairly simply. The only shots in the advert that we would not realisticly be able to do is the shots showing the audiences reaction as we dont have access to a cinema or screening room, and the more complex 'happpenings' such as the sheets floating. Both of us have seen the Paranormal Activity films and are interested, this is partly the reason for us considering this idea. Making similar shots to the film is well within our capability as we will need to purchase little equipment or props, considering the first Paranormal Activity only cost a reported $15,000 to make we should be able to make our trailer for a few pounds.

Pros 

• We are both interested in the Paranormal activity franchise
• We can create shots that fit in with the genre and look good with the equipment we have.
• A huge budget is not required in order to make the trailer

Cons

•  Creating the shots may be tedious as methods of making the paranormal happen may be noticable in the shots.
• Lots of takes of most shots will need to be taken as we may not be able to see the errors on the camera screen.

Film idea 3

The third idea for our film is an Action, the reasoning for this is that we both enjoy action/adventure films and would enjoy filming, directing and editing an action trailer, also we felt that the conventions you would expect from an action trailer would be fairly easy to conform to and represent them clearly and effectively.



The plot to this film idea is along the lines of a man with a military background who's brother gets murdered, the film would be following his mission to exact revenge on the men that did it.

Pros

• Easy to conform to cliche and conventions
• We are both interested in the action genre
• We have access to props and costumes
• We are both aware of the cliches and conventions

Cons

• Very small budget may make it difficult to produce a quality trialer
• Some of the ideas we have would require private land which we may not have access to
• probably the hardest to film out of our 3 ideas

genre analysis

Age of heroes

'Age of heroes' is a film based on a true story, in world war 2, and this information is given to the audience at the start of the trailer. Showing this information is effective at interesting the older male audience as it's historic and based on true events, this makes it more interesting to the older audience as it makes the film seem more relevant and real almost. The film also appeals to the younger male population aswell as it is a war film, the younger audience from about 16-25, are attracted to the shooting and explosions shown in the clip as it is showing the things thye love about other action films.The pace of the trailer is slow at first but it becomes quciker and quicker, this hypes the audiecne up and they are left at the end of the trailer wanting more. The pacing of the clip is effective at attracting the whole of the action audience, but having well known actors that appeal to the different audiences targets the older and younger audiences individually, Sean Bean has been in numerous well known films and in particular films that th eolder audience will have watched, similarly Danny Dyer is well known with the younger audience and having them both in the same film is effective at attracting both age groups' attention. The use of costume in this film is effective as it c,learly shows the time period it i set in.

    

500 days of summer trailer analysis

The target audience for rom coms is prodominantly female and consists of mainly young women and teenagers, the majority of the mlae audience is likely to be fom taking their girlfriends or watching it witrh female friends. The trailer kicks off with an awkward moment with 'the perfect girl' in a suspected confined space with no exit at that time. Having the perfect girl in the film leaves the female audience aspiring to be like her, similarly having the male protagonist as a well known actor who women love engages the mlae audience also as they now have a rival or a character to aspire to. The awkward moment almost always happens in rom coms and it is always betweeen the protagonist and the person they are destined to fall head over heels for. To add to the awkward moment it always end with the protagonist looking like an idiot. Showing this scene at the start of the trailer is effective as it introduces the comedy right away which is half the reason the audience are watching, although the other half is shattered by the narration about 10 seconds later when it says "this sik not a love story". Despite this, the scenes of them having fun  and the male protagonist stating he wants to get her back, give us the idea they may get back together and therfore a love story is born, With this we have to question. The question is probably the most effective way of getting th eaudience interested in the film as it engages them. Now that the audience are asking themselves if they will they are thinking more and more about the film and become increasingly likely to watch it, We start to se quick clips of footage of their time together (in which they look very close and suggests the romance could take place again) and we see a clip of them runnning through a shop, scenes like this are not uncommon in films but never actually take place in the real world, this isn't only fitting the comnvention of rom coms perfectly but it also excites the audience as they want a relationship like that, it has the same affect on the audience as a hulking, hard nut hero in an action film interests the young men, who want to be just like them.

The ring trailer - analysis of conventions and cliches

The ring (2002) is remake of the hit asian horror by Hideo Nakata (1998), one of the differences is the adaption from Asian horror into a mainstream horror. Things like linen closets are very popular in Asian horrors but just arent seen as scary to the mainstream audience, but the adaptions in the mainstream version made it a whole lot scarier to the mainstream audience, which is why the remake grossed over $249m worldwide (box office mojo) and Hideo Nakata's grossed just over $13m (wikipedia). The trailer starts off with us hearing a creepy voice telling us the plot behind the video tape, the context of the monologue in itself gets the audience interested as they now know a summary of what the movie is about and that strange deaths occur, from this th eaudience is re-assured that this film will include themes that are hits in mainstream horror. At first we cant see who is talking just quick glimpses of different things one of which appears to be a photo that is brushing its hair. very trippy. When we do see who is talking we see a gothic looking girl with straight black hair telling the story, with a smile on her face, to another girl who has fair hair and looks shocked. The two girls fit the horror cliches perfectly, the girl telling the story is our creepy teen synonomous with hit horror films like 'The Omen' and 'The Exorcist', adding this into the trailer is very effective as it shows the audience that they will get the things that scare them in the film. The innocent looking fair haired girl who looks shocked as shes being told the story fits the bill as the victim. The girl is obviously  victim and that is the thing the audience want to see the most, who wants to watch a horror with no victims? Throughout the trailer eary music is playing in the background but as the trailer goes on the musci intesifies and gets faster paced, accompanying  the faster music is clips of more and more supernatual going on until a climax at the end of the trailer where the music finishes with a scream. The only thing to follow this is the Poster image you cans ee at the top, after the climax is the best time to add the image as the audience is concentrating on the trailer more than at any other time.

The Sweeney - target audience

'The Sweeney'is an action film based on a police duo, who are part of the flying quad called the sweeney. This is a modern adaptation of the hit 70's television show, therfore appealing to the older audience of the televison show. The action audience is primarily male and the aggression and presence of Ray Winstone's character is an aspect of the trailer that attracts the male audience. The car driving through walls and smashing into others is the sort of destruction we expect from an action film and the excitement of these scenes excite and attract the younger male audience of about 16+, the 15 cert is perfect as a large number of 15-17 will want to watch it and would not be able to if it was an 18 cert.

The dictator trailer analysis

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

This trailer gives its audience a glimpse at what the film will be like, the clips they put into the trailer tells the target audience that the film will include the things they are looking for. The things the comedy audience will be looking for is a protagonist who is funny, in this case the protagonist is a tyrant and leader of a country, with this we see politically incorrect and illegal acts being committed by the tyrant but a joke is being made out of it. The style of comedy portrayed in the trailer is synonymous with Sacha Baron Cohen which is very effective at attracting the viewers of his other films that helped achieve the total box office gross of over $400m from his three films. The trailer shows funny clips, stereotypes being made fun of and well known actors and even has star kameos.

Dark knight rises trailer

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g8evyE9TuYk

The trailer starts off with some eary music and a female narrating, this makes us ask the questions who is she? why is she narrating? and why is it eary? Getting the audience asking questions is effecive at getting them interested in aspects of the film and eager to watch it. The content of the narration informs us of a 'storm', storms are synonimous with danger and destruction which gets us excited as to what this 'storm' is. Almost immediately after the storm is spoken of  we see a sack being taken off of someones head, which reveals a man with a large mask/aparatus across his mouth, it almost looks like a muzzle, the fact that he has soldiers around him and he had a sack on his head has the connotation that he is dangerous and possibly the villain. Seeing the villain excites the audience as they can now see who Batman will have to face but it also excites Batman fans as they know about this villain and what he is capable of so they are even more excited. After the sack is taken of his head destruction follows the rest of the trailer, but when we see Bruce Wayne at the mercy of the villain who tells him "your punishment must be more severe" we get the idea that this villain is above the rest as far as an immediate danger to batman. This is effective in a trailer as anyone who has seen anything batman related now wants to see what happens to him.

The trailer shows lots of action sequences and leaves us with lots of unaswered questions. Showing tasters of the action to come in the trailer is effective in an action films trailer as that is ultimatley what the audience want to see, and shows them the quality of that action. The narration and dialogue of the clip leaves us as the audience with lots of questions which will influence us to watch the film in the hope of finding aswers, similar to the techniques used in the opening couple of minutes to a film, however it is more important to leave the audience interested after a trailer than it is the opening scenes as they are unlikely to walk out of the movie but would easily just not bother seeing it.

This is my year 12 blog, here is a link for you.
 http://sidratcliffg321.blogspot.co.uk/