Horror Film Opening Evaluation

By Harriet Nash & Taylor Wright

The questions that we will answer..

•In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products? (i.e. film openings)

•How does your media product represent particular social groups?

•What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?

•Who would be the audience for your media product?

•How did you attract/address your audience?

•What have you learnt about technologies from the process of •constructing this product?

•Looking back on your preliminary task (the continuity task), what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to full product?

In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products? (i.e. film openings)

In our horror film opening ‘Unlocked’ we used a number of typical horror conventions. We decided to add these typical conventions as we thought that it would persuade more people to watch the film as they would be familiar with the genre.

In order to give us an idea of what the typical horror film conventions are, we watched ‘The Wrong Turn’, ‘See No Evil’ and ‘Jeepers Creepers’. As these are all horror films and have the same target audience we managed to familiarise ourselves with some horror film conventions.

The typical conventions we used in our horror film opening were; a teenage girl as our protagonist, our actor alone, extreme close ups and close ups, a radio station which is popular with teenagers and young adults, a mobile phone as a prop and tense music. Without any of these conventions our opening wouldn’t come across as a horror.

How does your media product represent particular social groups?

In our horror film opening, we believe we represented a particular social group, teenagers. Our opening features and focuses on a teenage girl coming home early morning from a night out. Our actress wore her own clothes as she is around the age group that our target audience is, her costume included jeans, boots, a small handbag and a flower in her hair. This is something which is expected of teenagers therefore meaning we have successfully portrayed and represented a particular social group.

These are pictures of actors/actresses from various teenage horror films. All 3 of these pictures represent a particular social group.

These are pictures of our actress, Chloe, in our horror film opening. She also represents a particular social group, teenage. Like the actresses below, Chloe is wearing female clothes and make up.

What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?

Our production and distribution companies for our horror film opening were; Euphemia Entertainment and BROHATTAY. The production company is the company that supports and produces the film. The distribution company financially supports the film and helps promote it.

I think any production and distribution company that focuses on horror films might distribute our media product because our horror film opening is a 15 certificate and contains many typical horror film conventions. For example BrainDamagedFilms is a distribution that targets horror films.

In our horror film opening we added many credits and we thought it looked more professional. The first credit that came onto the screen was the production and distribution companies as these are the most important things for the audience to see. The names of actors and actresses followed the production and distribution companies. We also added credits for the costume designers, executive producers, screenplay, music by and the name of the film.

Who would be the audience for your media product?

As our groups media product represents a teenage social group, our target audience will be for teenagers and young adults. The age certificate for our horror film opening is a 15. The 15 certificate means that no body under the age of 15 is allowed to view, rent or buy the film. The film must not endorse discriminatory language or behaviour, strong threat and menace are permitted unless sadistic or sexualised, sexual activity may be portrayed without strong detail, nudity may be allowed in a sexual context but without strong detail, there may be frequent use of strong language , dangerous behaviour (for example, hanging, suicide and self-harming) should not dwell on detail which could be copied. All of these guidelines have been set up by the bbfc (British board film classification) In our horror film opening we have followed these guidelines.

Like most female teenage/young adults I would expect that the girls below shop in places like; Topshop. New Look, River Island and Primark. Whereas the boys below might shop in places like Topman, Burtons and Officer’s Club.

I believe that most teenage people would listen to music by various artists and bands like; Bruno Mars, Snoop Dogg, Katy Perry, Beyonce, Rihanna Black eyed Peas and Arctic Monkeys

I believe that most teenage people would watch programmes like; Eastenders, The Only Way Is Essex, Skins, Shameless and Misfits.

How did you attract/address your audience?

Our target audience for our horror film opening was teenagers and young adults. We spent around 2 hours thinking and discussing different ideas for our openings. We thought about previous teen horror films such as; Scream, Prom Night, Jeepers Creepers and The Wrong Turn and came to a decision that we wanted to have an opening where somebody is being followed. By looking and watching the films mentioned above we were able to take ideas from them films and make them our own. Like Scream, our opening starts with a teenage girl by herself. In a similar way, Prom Night also starts with a girl by herself and that girl is later followed.

Our opening also uses many typical horror film conventions which allows the audience to be attracted to the film and want to watch the whole thing as it is similar to other horror movies that have been released and been a success.

What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?

When we first started this project, we were very unfamiliar with using the Macs, the software on the Macs and any of the cameras and tripods. From doing this project we are now familiar and able to use the Macs, Final Cut Express, Live Type, Garage Band, QuickTime, Slideshare, Blogger iDVD, iMovies, the video cameras and the tripods.

We are now also familiar with using different and more sophisticated angles, movements and shots such as; the crane, panning, point of view, establishing shot and so on. We are now familiar with the rule of three which is a guide of how to position the props and main subject on the screen.

Above – This picture demonstrates Harriet using live type. Below – This picture shows Taylor using Final Cut Express.

To the left – Taylor setting up a tripod ready to use for our filming. Above – Harriet using iDVD to burn our footage onto a disc.

Looking back on your preliminary task (the continuity task), what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to full product?

During the process of making our preliminary task and overall project we believe we have learnt a tremendous amount of knowledge that we can take away with us and use in the future.

We are now experienced with using the programme Final Cut Express and how to function the cameras. At first we found both of these things difficult however we overcame our issues and are now experienced and enjoy using them. We also believed that we were a great success with using and adding sound in on our overall task, we were pleased with this because when we did our preliminary task we weren’t able to do anything with the sound.

However we are still lacking experience and knowledge in Garage Band but with a little more practise and work with it we will be able to use it more frequently.

Establishing shotWe first learnt how to use this shot during our preliminary

Mid shot

Shot Reverse shot