CODES AND CONVENTIONS OF

HORROR

conventions

BLOOD

DEATH

KILLING

VILLAIN

VICTIM

HAUNTED HOUSES/ ISOLATDED SETTINGS

Characters

THE VICTIMS…

Mainly a young

female victim,

who attempts to

save herself, but

in the wrong way.

Liz Hunter, for example goes back to the antagonist to find a car, but ends up being brutally killed by the killer.

Ben Mitchell was the one to escape as he did not catch the attention of the killer, by returning back to him.

The females are the ones that get killed in both their situations, this is because they didn’t tend to try and escape from the killer, they either tried to get help from one another by screaming at the top of their lungs.

Which isn’t going to help either of them, they seem to be oblivious to the fact that they’re going to be killed either way.

These female stereotypes are used thoroughly in popular horror movies, showing that the male characters are more confident and acknowledging to the fact that they’ve got to escape so they do not die.

characters

The killer…

The psychopathic killer, Mick Taylor who secretly lives in Australia in an abandoned mining site, tortures all 3 of the victims. Also among one of the victim’s discoveries, she finds he has done this to several other groups/families. The unknown Mick Taylor has never been found by the police (it is said in the movie to also have been based on true events) This makes the fact of it seem scarier to the audience, also finding the setting of Australia as weird, unusual place…

SETTINGSLarge, vast, spacious settings to allow the

characters to explore

Isolated and abandoned settings, such as Mick Taylor’s abandoned mine shack in Australia

Deserted places such as Wolf Creek (an actual Creek in Australia)

ACTIONS (CONVENTIONS)• characters don’t fully engage the threat ~

they know people have gone missing in that area (wolf creek) but still decide to camp there.

• The car battery and their watches/phones break ~ they think nothing is unusual so decide to stay in their car till dark where the stranger Mick Taylor takes them.

• Character runs upstairs or returns back to the killer’s area instead of running out the house or far away.

• Victim falls over (mainly female) while the antagonist is chasing them.

iconography

Symbols of death• Darkness• Skull• Blood• Gravestones• Weapons

Audience are confronted with horrific images that are disturbing and uncomforting.

Blood and body parts