1. TITLE - The title of our film is 'the paranormal' and we
feel this fits the conventions of a horror film, especially our sub-genre. The
film has a similar theme to the 'paranormal Activity' films and so it is
fitting to have a similar name, it suggests the films have common themes and
factors, for this reason we decided to conform to the conventions. We spent a
fairly long time trying to think of a title for our film but most either had
little relevance to our film or sounded like a really cheesy, low-budget horror
flick which you would watch for a laugh. We wanted to avoid this so we looked
for inspiration and found it in the paranormal activity films which are
extremely popular and grossed huge amounts at the box office, this is the type
of film we wanted to be associated with, the most important thing to put in a
trailer is the title, so we needed it to sound like the sort of film we would
want to go and watch.
2. SETTING - Our film is set in an abandoned, haunted house
which is overgrown and in the middle of no-where. The untidy bush, faded window
frames, door with a torn up sign on it and smashed window all give this
impression and the establishing shot of the house shows what a great setting
for a horror movie it is. The house has a lot in common with the setting of
other popular horror movies such as the Amytiville horror and the shining.
Although we conformed to many of the conventions and clichés of horror
location, the establishing shot of the house could have been more effective in
a different light. If the shot was darker, it is likely that the connotations
of the house would be too. We had problems with trying to get a clear shot of
the house later at night because the camera we had at our disposal was not
suited to dark lights, and we did not have access to lighting sufficient to
create the perfect degree of light. Our setting fits the the conventions of the
horror genre, some of the most successful and famous horror films have been set
in an isolated, spooky building.
3. CAMERA WORK AND EDITING
- Typically in horror films and
trailers you would see low angle shots of the antagonist to make them look big,
scary and powerful. You would also expect to see high angle shots of the
victims to make them look weak and defenceless. We conformed to the high angle
shots, although we only had one character, there is multiple high angle shots
of him which often make him look vulnerable. Making the antagonist look
powerful with angle of shots was difficult because we cannot see it, although
we developed our own technique. The shot of the character getting pulled up the
stairs is a steep low angle shot which shows the protagonist clearly having no
control which gives the idea of power to the invisible force which is pulling
him; this makes it carries the connotation that the invisible force is too
powerful for the Human victim. Scenes which show the antagonist clearly
overpowering its victims are common in horror films and are often the most
memorable scenes; the end scene of paranormal activity 3 is very memorable when
the possessed woman tosses another across the room. In almost every trailer the
audience will witness a change of pace, in action and horror movies the pace
often starts off slow and calm but gets faster and faster, and often louder as
the trailer progresses. This is something we have conformed to in our trailer,
at the start of the trailer the shots are long and some have slow fades, this
sets the pace and keeps the audience calm, although later on in the trailer the
shots are lasting less than a second and are shown in quick succession of one
another. This gets the audience’s hearts going as the pace builds as does their
attention, then the climax hits them and the title is shown which is very
effective as the audience’s interest and concentration is at its peak during
the action, so showing the title afterwards makes it much more likely the
audience will take notice of it and
increases the chance of them remembering the name of the film. The increased
excitement that the audience experiences at the end of the trailer makes it
much more likely they will go and see it. We have conformed to the conventions
of horror trailers with our camera work and editing although in most horror
trailers there would most likely be a wider variety of camera shots and angles.
4. COSTUME - Unlike the opening 2 minutes of films, trailers
are rarely set in chronological order, this meant that you can expect to see a
character in numerous costumes. In our trailer the character wears several
costumes which suggests to the audience the time frame of the trailer. Having
the character wear more than one outfit conforms to the norm of trailers as you
very rarely see a trailer where the characters are dressed in same outfit all
the way through, this is probably due to the fact that the huge majority of
films are set over an extended period of time. The costume generally fits the
setting in the trailer which is common but not necessarily a cliche. In the
first shot of the character and the house he is dressed in black jeans and a
grey jacket; dark, dull colours which have the connotations of horror and match
the state of the house well. Similarly the shot of the character in the kitchen
he is dressed in bright colours which matches the brightness of the shot. The
more dominant costume cliches and conventions in horror films are based on the
antagonist, this makes it more difficult to show conforming or subversion as
our antagonist is not visible, although the costumes of our protagonist fits
the conventions. We set the costume for the character to look like a normal
guy, dressed as many would daily. We did this in order to enable the audience
to relate more effectively and gives them the idea that no matter what you're
doing the evil can still get you.
5.GENRE AND HOW THE TRAILER SUGGESTS IT - The genre of the
film is obvious form the start of the film, Blumhouse Productions is synonymous
with horror films, and the font of the Brain Damage films title further
suggests this. The gothic red font with a black background fits the horror
conventions and stereotypes perfectly. Once the clips start going we see a slow
pan of an obviously run-down house and later on we see shots of some very
spooky things happening but the lighting and camera angles also suggest the
genre. The run-down house with smashed windows is a favourite location in
horror films as seen in films like Amytiville horror. dark places are very
common in horror films so the shots we have in a dark room are effective at
suggesting the genre. The slamming doors and characters being dragged about are
things you see in the paranormal activity films, these films are extremely
popular especially with the current horror target audience, this means that
seeing clips like this show the audience this film is a horror. Many horror
trailers feature an establishing shot of where the film is set, this is a
convention that we conformed to during our trailer but, those trailer also
likely to show more footage from the film especially of the scariest bits
happening. In our trailer we didn't show as much footage from the trailer so
this was a subversion of the conventions.
6. HOW CHARACTERS ARE INTRODUCED - Many film trailers show
and introduce multiple characters, ours only introduces the protagonist, this
is because he is the only character that has any significant role in the film
and as we only needed to show him in our trailer for it to come together as we
had hoped, there was no point in introducing anyone else. The establishing shot
of the trailer is a pan on the house where the film is set, the character is
first introduced walking towards that house. Having the character walking
towards the established point of importance suggests that the character has a
main role in the film. In the next clip we see the character talking about
noises in the house and we see him going to the source, this shows him to be a
mixture of brave and extremely stupid which i what the audience love. there is
always a character that looks in the closet, opens the door or goes into the
dark room in search of the bad guy, these are the characters that get the
audience saying the famously cliche "don't go in there" Although
these character generally have a very short lifespan, they are responsible for
a large amount of the action. The character is shown to be in the middle of the
action as well as in a large risk of danger especially in the scene with him
being dragged up the stairs. The way the character is introduced is similar to
how 'Katie' is introduced in the paranormal activity trailer, they are both
shown to be targeted by the evil. This shows the conforming to the genre's
conventions.
7.SPECIAL EFFECTS – Special effects are used in the huge
majority of films and you will see these in their trailers and it is often huge
very effective scenes that cost huge amounts of money to make, especially in
action films. Being a horror film there will still be special effects and
although they are often nothing compared to the special effects seen in a film
like Avatar, they will be expensive. We didn’t have access to a big budget
allowing us the luxury of amazing special effects so we had to work with what
we had. Getting the shots that conform to the horror genre would not have been
possible in our case without special effects, a great example of this is the
scene with the character being pulled up the stairs backwards. Using ropes or
stings to pull the actor could be painful as well as very difficult to edit out
on our budget and/or skill level but we used easy cheap methods. For that shot
the actor went down the stairs on his stomach and then we reversed the clip in
Adobe Premiere Elements. This was easy and extremely effective as it looks like
something you would see in a big budget movie. In other shots where spooky
things happened such as doors slamming and blankets being ripped off were done
by us ourselves, to do this we just placed people in the right spots so they
weren’t seen but could execute the job. We decided against ropes or wires as we
thought it would look more realistic doing it with our hands. Although we
didn’t have any blood or gore which you see in a lot of horror movies in would
not really fit into our sub-genre very well so in all we conformed to most of
the conventions and clichés of horror trailers as far as special effects is
concerned.
8. STORY AND HOW THE TRAILER SETS IT UP - Looking back at
our trailer this is one of the things we should have concentrated on more,
being a teaser trailer we should have had more of an in depth introduction not
the story, using a vice over or more dialogue/monologue we could have achieved
this fairly easily. From the trailer you get a good idea of what the story
could be but you are not told about it too much. From the order of the clips
the audience knows that there is a derelict house which the character ends up
spending time in and that strange things happen to him, but with a voice over
or dialogue/monologue we could tell the audience that the character had bought
the house and these things started happening, letting the audience know this
would make the film make more sense to them. Having uncertainty could be
effective at peaking audience interest as they will leave the trailer wondering
what the story is behind it but it is a very risky tactic. Starting the trailer
of slow and without spooky events helps give the connotations that everything
was fine until he entered the house. The numerous things that happen such as
doors slamming and the character being dragged up the stairs gives the audience
a taste of the horror that will be in the film.
9. TITLE FONT AND STYLE - We used 'Garamond' font for all
titles except for the film title, we chose this font because it's not too fancy
and it is the perfect thickness. Having a really intricate font can distract
the audience from what the title says as they are concentrating on the font
itself, another reason for having a fairly basic looking font is brings the
audience back to reality much less, it preserves the audiences engrossment in
the trailer as they aren't being reminded that it s a film, not reality. The
thickness of the font added appeal to it as it made it more predominant
compared to similar fonts like times new roman. We used a red font with black
fade as red is synonymous with the horror genre but the black fade made it
blend in with the background, much like the antagonist. The font for 'The
Paranormal' is completely different from the others, it is white, not red and
has a glowing effect, this adds a ghostly feel to it which fits in well with
our film. Although all sorts of fonts are used in horror trailers they are
often more fancy and intricate compared to the ones we used, but equally there
is films that use even more basic fonts than us as well. Having red font is an
extremely popular cliché in the horror genre to which we have conformed. As
there is such a massive range of fonts used in horror trailers its hard to say
whether or not we have conformed.
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