storyboards for the deluge

actors used for the filming of 'the deluge'

As our opening 2 minutes of footage has a focus on isolation and a 1 vs 1 between the killer and the victim, only 2 actors have been used. Obviously, one is the victim marie played by Holly Gowler, the other is the killer, played by Elliot Wright.

'the deluge' film overview

Overview of the rest of the film: 
Because we decided on a broad opening that could lead into any type of sub-genre the rest of the film is going to be a psychological slasher based around water, the killer will have a signifier to do with water on each death. The final girl will actually be insane and will have witnessed a death as a child this is what leads her to be in the hospital. To establish that she is in a insane asylum after or whilst each killing is happening an item is in the background which is significant of a hospital e.g. a hospital band, hand sanitiser, medical certificate, room number or a doctors plaque because of this new idea of a item being in the background. The first death in the opening will have to have an item left Jonjo put the idea forward that we should have a room number on the bathroom so this is Stacey’s number in the hospital. 

After first killing a series of deaths happen all witnessed by Stacey and all having an element of hospital and water. She tries to find the killer this gives a factor of thriller. 
The opening has blood left in the bath and a signifier of the room number on the bathroom door. 
The killer will carve a number into each 4 of his victims these eventually add up to the room number that was the same on the bathroom and is the number of the room that stacey is staying in. 
The film will end with stacey reading a newspaper of the killings, showing her the numbers carved into the bodies to create her room number, making her realize that the world she inhabits is all in her head. This is followed by a shot Stacey in a mental hospital flashbacking to the clues e.g. the plaque, the hospital band etc. this allows the audience to piece together previous evidence to understand why the killings took place and how she came to be in a mental hospital.

shooting schedule day 1

The Deluge, Group 2
Date 3/2/2011	Weather Partly Cloudy	Shots Storyboard * of * (Varies)	Time 16:00 Duration 1 hour 30 mins
Equipment Camera Steady Camera Tripod Batteries Tapes/ SD card Props + Costumes Laptop Causual clothing	Contacts Holly Gowler- 078******** Elliot Wright- 078******** Jonjo Sharp- 078********	Special Arrangements Transport-  Walk Lunch-  N/A Arrival Time- 16:00 Location- Holly’s House

shooting schedule day 2

The Deluge, Group 2
Date 10/2/2011	Weather Partly Cloudy	Shots Final shots that we need to do after reviewing raw footage	Time 18.00 Duration 2 hours
Equipment Camera Steady Camera Tripod Batteries Tapes/ SD card Props + Costumes  Laptop Causual clothing Cloaks Knife bag	Contacts Holly Gowler- 078******** Elliot Wright- 078******** Jonjo Sharp- 078********	Special Arrangements  Transport-  Walk Lunch-  N/A Arrival Time- 18.00 Location- Holly’s House

Paranormal activity, what makes it scary?

Paranormal activity, what makes it scary?

Alongside the Blair witch project, paranormal activity is proof that quality horror films can be made on an incredibly small budget. Both have a small cast, a shaky cam style of filming and are able to genuinely scare audiences by showing very little of the threat that’s pursuing them. But what really makes paranormal activity scary?

I believe that one of the scariest aspects to the film is the location in which the film takes place, a regular home. When people think of places in which they are safest and most comfortable, the place where they live is generally near the top. With the demon that haunts the main character Katie, it always has haunted her in her house. When she is speaking with Dr Friedrichs, (the psychic) she talks about being haunted as young as 8, with her house burning down under mysterious circumstances. It is made clear during this conversation that she has always been haunted while in her bed, at night. This happens to her periodically over the course of her life, and recently has come back. This is the second thing that makes paranormal activity a frightening experience. Katie is haunted, not the houses she resides in. she can’t run or escape from the demon that obsessively haunts her, as it will always follow her. Hiding under her bed covers ultimately becomes fruitless, as the bumps in the night become far more malevolent as events unfold.   The film plays heavily on loud noises in the night as well as a fear of the dark, something that the large majority of the audience can relate to. The fear of not knowing what could be hiding in the shadows is an aspect that both the characters (Katie and Micah) and the audience share. This makes the film a lot more personal to the viewer, making the films events even more terrifying.

Initially, the events which happen during the night are minor. The first occurrence isn't even caught on camera, down in the kitchen Katie’s car keys have been thrown on the floor. A few nights later, Katie's and Micah's bedroom door closes slightly before returning to its original position. Micah doesn’t take the events as seriously as Katie, taunting the demon, making matters worse. Not long after at around 2 am, Katie rises from bed and stands up staring at Micah for several hours before leaving the house and sleeping outside. These events violate the sanctity of their bedroom, an area of the house that they spend most of their time sleeping in. and where they are most vulnerable.

Door opening and closing
 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZL10HzYG9F0&feature=related

The malevolence of the demons actions become increasingly more serious, gradually building up the tension. The film uses banging doors and crashing noises in the night to great effect. Unlike other modern horrors which resort to false scares and cheap jumps, paranormal activity successfully combines a creepy and foreboding atmosphere, as well as the usual uses banging doors and crashing noises in the night to great effect.

The paranormal events continue to escalate as the film progresses. Gradually it seems like the demon is slowly getting closer to the bedroom. This is made apparent after Micah has put powder on the floor and the demon has left footprints that lead to Katie's side of the bed.

The films events escalate and the demons attacks begin to happen during the day, with Katie claiming she can feel it breathing on her. The most significant action the demons does is smash a photo of Micah and Katie, with the crack in the glass over his face and claw marks down his side of the photo. This acts as foreshadowing, pointing at Micah's demise later on in the film. The viewer knows that he will die, but the way in which he does is made even more horrifying due the audiences’ anticipation of his death, not if he will die or not.

1 night after the demon leaves footprints, the bed sheets are moved while they sleep, showing the audience that the demon can get to Katie physically, and foreshadows that it will. The next night Katie is dragged from her down the stairs. It is now more than apparent that the demon is now capable of interacting with her. The next morning they discover a bite mark on her back. This bite signifies the beginning of being controlled by the demon, as she becomes possessed soon after this. The possession is complete when Micah finds Katie lying on the floor a few days after gripping a crucifix so tightly that her hand is bleeding. This blood due to the gripping of the crucifix represents the death of Katie's soul, and the complete possession of her body by the demon.

Bed sheets are disturbed while Katie sleeps

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wdv0J0vpSSo&feature=related

Katie is dragged from bed http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AG8dvfbl0Xk&feature=related

Evidence to back this up is when Micah tells her that he's ready to go to a hotel for a few nights like she wanted, and she replies while in a trance, refusing to leave. Micah storms out, and after he’s gone, Katie speaks to the camera is a strange voice and says “I think we’ll be ok now”. She has given up trying to fight the demon, as the demon has possessed her.

On night 21, Katie once again gets up and stares at Micah sleeping, this time when standing on his side of the bed, foreshadowing his imminent death. She proceeds downstairs before letting out a blood curdling scream, far longer and louder than any other scream in the film. Micah awakens and rushes to help her. Then there is silence, hinting at the demise of one of them. Footsteps are heard on the stairs, followed by more drawn out silence. This adds significant tension to the scene, leaving the viewer in great anticipation. Suddenly Micah's body gets launched at the camera, which until now had remained stationary upon its tripod. Katie walks in, covered in blood. She crawls over Micah's body, allowing the demon possessing her to show its superiority over him, the only one protecting Katie. She stops at the camera that is on the floor, which is in a tilted position, adding to the confusion. She smiles, before lunging at the camera as her face takes on a demonic appearance. By doing this, the fourth wall is broken and the audience, who up until now were spectators, are as much of a part of the films events as the characters.

Ending scenehttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KdPd4iGzGEs

blair witch project analysis

The Blair witch project analysis

The 1999 horror hit the Blair witch project has a very strong emphasis on foreshadowing throughout the film, right from the beginning. Good foreshadowing would work very well in our horror, as it would let us vaguely show what will happen to our character without being explicit enough to take away from the shock value of later events.

The first piece of foreshadowing occurs when the 3 college students (heather, josh and mike) are interviewing residents of the town of burkittsville about the Blair witch. One man talks of rustin Parr, who claimed the Blair witch forced him to kill 7 young children in 1940’s. He would take them to his house in the woods, take 2 down to the basement and make one of them face the corner of the room while he killed the other. These events foreshadow multiple events later in the film. The largest is the fact that heather and mike end up going to a house in the woods during the films thrilling climax, where heather enters the basement after mike and finds him standing in the corner of the room. She is then presumably killed. The deaths of the 7 children are represented during the students second day in the woods, where they uncover a cemetery with 7 cairns in it. Each cairn represents one of the dead children. One of the cairns is knocked over by josh, which heather rebuilds as a sign of respect. Josh’s reckless actions foreshadow later events, as when the student’s tent is attacked in the night; and on return only josh’s items have been covered in a blue slime. Everybody else’s has strangely been untouched. This has effectively marked him as the first of the three to go missing, and presumably die.

After the students camp for the second night in the woods after failing to locate their car and hear strange cracking noises coming from all around there tent. They wake up the next day to find 3 cairns built around there campsite which weren’t present when the camp was built. There is cairn for each of them, and they represent there impending deaths. Later on, the students discover an area of woods filled with dozens of wooden stick figures hanging from the trees, which scares them considerably. A larger variant of these figures can be seen towards the end of the film, on the outside of the abandoned house. The stick figures in the forest symbolize danger or death, and as they appear between the students and the house near the films climax, they are a warning to not progress any more. The large stick figure on the house near the end of the film foreshadows the death of those who enter it, in this case heather and mike. To add evidence to this theory, as heather enters the house, what appears to be a hangman’s noose can be seen hanging from the wall next to the doorway. This too can be a foreshadow of death. It can also be interpreted as symbolizing that this is the house of Rustin Parr, the child killer who was hanged, and who claimed he was possessed by the witch.

Blair witch ending
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cMQQpmm5u3w

(stick figure sign can be seen at 0:14 and 0:40)
(noose on wall can be seen at 1:00 to 1:04)

  One morning heather finds a bundle of sticks outside of her tent. It is wrapped with josh’s bandana and contains lots of blood and what appears to be teeth and a tongue, presumably josh’s. This symbolizes the presence of the witch. I've concluded this due to the information the students gather near the beginning of the film where they’re told “In 1825, eleven eye witnesses claimed a pale woman's hand dragged a little girl into a creek. For thirteen days after the drowning, the creek is clogged with oily bundles of sticks. The bundle heather finds is similar to the ones in the story. The oily substance is the blue slime that was put on josh’s items. These 2 things point to the witches presence, and ultimately to their demise.

representation of women in james camerons 'aliens'

Representation of women in James Cameron's ‘aliens’As a sort of director trademark, James Cameron always seems to have physically and emotionally strong female characters present in his films. Examples of this are films such as terminator 1 and 2, titanic and abyss, but none more so than aliens. Sigourney weaver depicts Ellen Ripley, a warrant officer who must once again confront her fears of the menacing alien threat.

One of the more probable reasons that Ripley goes against most stereotyped female leads in horror films is the fact that her character was written as unisex, allowing a male or female actor to be cast without needing the script to be altered. Despite her first name being Ellen, she is almost always referred to as Ripley. This dissociates her with being female, which makes the audience perceive her as stronger and less vulnerable. Even when entering and exiting hypersleep (which must be done in underwear) she wears a tank top, covering her body up considerably. Her appearance is often simple; she does little with her hair and is often wearing overalls or a jumpsuit, a unisex item of clothing.

 

As Ripley has been in hyper sleep for 57 years, she has lost her daughter to old age, leaving a void in her life. Initially this void is filled with Jones, the cat from the ship nostromo. This theme is included to show Ripley's vulnerabilities, and the fact that she is female. Dogs are considered a man’s best friend, for Ripley it is a cat, showing the other end of the spectrum. This is Ripley's weakness, she has to have something to care about to take her mind off of events. This void is later filled by the young girl newt, which Ripley cares for like she is her own. Newt and Ripley form a maternal bond, and the void in Ripley's life is filled.

Despite Ripley's fear of the antagonists of the film, the aliens, she puts her maternal bond with newt first, not only risking her own life, but the lives of the remaining crew as well. This portrays Ripley as someone who will stand and confront their fears, but also makes irrational choices, something that is stereotypically associated with women. An example of this is at the films climax, where she opens an airlock to space in order to eliminate the alien queen. Doing so not only puts he own life at risk, it also endangers newt’s safety, as she too almost gets sucked into the void of space.

Another strong female character is the marine Vasquez. She is a strong willed soldier, complete with very short hair and an untypical muscular physique. In her first scenes she is seen doing pull ups alongside the other male marines, showing that she is equal in strength, breaking the stereotype of physically weak inferior women. While she is doing pull-ups, the male marine Hudson quips “hey Vasquez, have you ever been mistaken for a man?” her response “no, have you?” not only shows she is of equal intelligence, but is a subtle foreshadow to later events. This is because Hudson shows the female stereotype of mental weakness and hysteria when he gets injured. He is clearly scared, evidence of this with dialogue such as:
   Hudson: Seventeen days? Hey man, I don't wanna rain on your parade, but we're not gonna last seventeen hours! Those things are gonna come in here just like they did before. And they're gonna come in here...
Ripley: Hudson! 
Hudson: ...and they're gonna come in here AND THEY'RE GONNA GET US!
And other lines such as: Hudson: That's it man, game over man, game over! What the fuck are we gonna do now? What are we gonna do? 
Furthermore, Vasquez shows that she is intelligent when Hudson says “Maybe it's like an ant hive?” she quickly corrects him with “Bees, man. Bees have hives!”Vasquez outsmarting Hudsonhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eycDq4NW88o&feature=related

 

Another representation of a strong ‘female’ character is the alien queen. She is very powerful, dominating creature, represented by her huge size in comparison to the regular aliens. The alien queen’s role is similar to that of a queen bee, as both produce eggs in a hive and have many lesser types of her species under her control. The queen then removes herself from her egg laying sac (ovipositor) in order to chase Ripley and newt. This represents the queen dissociating itself from the female gender, as without it, the queen is not much different from a regular alien. In the resulting chase the queen shows signs of intelligence when it uses a switch to call an elevator, which goes against the stereotypical viewpoint for females.
The queen removing its ovipositor ( from 9.42 onwards)http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H649RmR-3Gg&feature=related

In the films climax, Ripley and the alien queen fight, signifying a battle between two maternal figures. Despite Ripley being a strong willed and powerful woman, she is no match for the queen on her own and must utilize a ‘power loader’ exosuit in order to defeat it. This shows her stereotypical female weakness, despite all of her unconventional strengths.

Ripley vs. the queenhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zqzHdKqZAmo

horror film font analysis

Horror film font analysis

To find out what makes a good font design for a horror film, I decided to look at some of the most critically acclaimed horrors of all time, and analyse there design.

Psycho

The design for the font in psycho is relatively simple, but holds a lot more value once the film has been witnessed.  The crack that runs through signifies the mental damage of the films killer, the infamous Norman bates. But after watching the film, it also can be interpreted in another, deeper way. As revealed by the films plot twist, Norman bates houses 2 personalities inside one person, him and his mother. As the crack in the font goes right through all the letters, it can signify 2 personalities, 2 sides of the same person.

Alien

The font used for Ridley Scotts alien film is very plain and very stark. It is simple white text of ‘alien’ on a black background. The pitch black background could be a visual representation of space, where the film is essentially set. It relies on its contrasting colours and plain, basic visual design to evoke mystery, giving the film added appeal

The shining

the shining, much like ‘alien’, has a very basic, yet distinct font style. Solid black letters sit upon white nothingness, giving a stark contrast to the word. The word ‘shining’ could also signify the dark and evil things that happen inside the overlook hotel during the events of the film. The white surrounding it could represent the snow that barricades the residents in, and leaves them vulnerable to the sinister happenings that take place.

References to other horror films

References to other horror films

DVD covers: we planned to have a horror film laying in one of our shots in our horror opening. We decided to use the film ‘mirrors’. Unfortunately the shot in which the DVD was in got cut from our footage, as it proved to be unnecessary.

Costumes: as the killer in our footage has his identity kept secret, we decided that he would wear a cloak. Not only does this add mystery to our footage, it also allows us to reference the film ‘scream’, where the killer also wore a cloak similar to ours.

Props: In our original ideas, the killer would take a knife from the main characters (Marie) kitchen and use it to kill her later on. This would be a reference to scream, which also features a knife block that is interacted with by characters in the opening scene. It is only a minor reference to scream, as ghostface doesn’t kill Casey with her own kitchen knife.

laptop wallpaper: we originally planned to have a horror film as the background of maries laptop. The image we were going to have was of Casey from scream encountering ghosface.

However, we chose to go against this, as used an image of a waterfall instead. We used this to foreshadow later events which would happen to Marie.
 Name references: we have named our character Marie. We have done this as it is similar to Marion crane, one of the characters in the film ‘psycho’ who also gets killed of relatively early.

script for the deluge

Script for the deluge

For the 2 minute opening of our horror film, we have decided to not have any dialogue, so we don’t have a script. This was decided upon for various reasons. The main reason was the fact that our opening only has 2 characters, the killer and the victim. The only interaction between them is the murder towards the end of the footage, where no dialogue is spoken, just screams. Secondly, due to having broad Norfolk accents, dialogue would take some of the fear out of the scene, as Norfolk accents are very comical.

Originally we intended for the main character, Marie to have a brief phone call to her boyfriend saying “hey, I'm just getting ready, okay see you then bye”. We then changed this to a text message to avoid unnecessary dialogue.