Composition

To frame my picture I made sure I followed the rule of thirds and considered head room and nose room.
To make sure I followed the rule of thirds I divided my camera screen into nine equal parts by two equally-spaced horizontal lines and two equally-spaced vertical lines. Important elements should be placed along the lines of intersection which is why I made sure the eyes were around the top left point of the four points of intersection.
I considered head room by making sure there was an appropriate amount of room between the top of the subjects head and the top of the picture.In my picture I also considered nose room. There is more room to the right of the picture as this is the direction the subject is facing.

Initial Shooting Script

SCENE 1 - EXTERIOR - OUTSIDE A HOUSE - NIGHT
Establishing shot of the back of the house.

SOUND - Howling wind. Sound of rain on the windows.



SCENE 2 - INTERIOR - BEDROOM - NIGHT

Scene begins with a camera gliding along a bedroom wall. On the wall is a variety of pictures. These pictures include pictures of the victims, suitable locations for murder, weapons and mutilated bodies. The camera then zooms away from the walls. In the middle of the room is a girl rocking back and forth. The girl has obviously been attacked as her shirt is ripped, her hair is messed up and she has blood on her face. Pictures of each victim then flash up on screen. In between each picture the camera flashes back to the girl, who in between each picture is rocking back and forth more frantically.

SOUND - Eerie music throughout. Girl gasps in a panicked state in between each picture that flashes up.

The Opening of Revenge - Initial Ideas

Opening #1

Eerie music begins to play. Red lighting. The camera tracks along the walls of Jake Crofts bedroom. Along the walls are gory pictures, pictures of weapons, mutilated bodies and school pictures of his victims. The names of the actors come up as pictures on the wall.The camera continues to track along the walls for roughly a minute. Then the camera zooms away from the walls. In the middle of the room is Jake Croft rocking back and forth, pulling at his hair. Then a sound of a school bell rings and the title of the film flashes up and then trickles away like blood.

Opening #2

Dramatic music is playing and the lighting is quite dark and shady. The camera is following a girl walking from behind. The camera picks up pace and within 10 seconds is right behind the girl. The girl senses someone behind her and turns round. Her face shows ultimate fear and then she screams. Then a plain black background comes up with the title of the film across it. It then flashes to the present day, where Jake Croft is at school being bullied. One of the girls bullying him is the girl we saw at the very beginning being followed.

Pitching Our Idea

Treetown Productions
Working Title : Revenge

Synopsis
Set in a small town in central England, Revenge is about a teenage boy Jake Croft* who is repeatedly bullied by the local school bullies. One day the bullies go too far causing Jake to seek his revenge.

*To be changed at a later date

Pre-production & Post Production

Making a big budget Hollywood film costs a tremendous amount of money and involves many months of hard work from a variety of people. This hard work can be split up into 'Pre-production' and 'Post Production'. Here is a step by step guide (split up into pre-production and post production)showing how a Hollywood film is generally made.

Pre-Production
A source material is found or an idea is pitched.

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Rights to the source material then have to be obtained.

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A screenplay is then written by professional screenwriters.

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Screenplay then has to be approved by backers of the film(the money). The screenplay may have to be re-writed at this stage if necessary.

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Essential personnel is hired such as the director, casting director, cinematographer, assistant producers, editor and musical director

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These professionals then hire their own assistants and crews.

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Auditions are then held or there are negotiations with an actor's agent if a specific actor is wanted.

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Contracts are then signed.

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Then a location is either found or built.

Post Production
Once filming has finished the director works with editors to edit the footage.

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Musical directors then create a score to accompany the film. This means either securing the rights to a certain song or hiring an orchestra.

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Special effects are then added.

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Dialogue then may have to be re-recorded if necessary.

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Sound effects are then added by 'foley artists'- professional sound recordists. These people can generate noises such as footsteps aswell as enhancing natural sounds.

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The film is promoted. This is done by methods such as the actors making personal appearances around the world, on numerous television talk shows and at arranged press conferences. Posters and preview clips must also be produced to help promote the film.

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Then finally the film is released.

Conventions of Horror Films Found in 'I Still Know What You Did Last Summer'

Some of the conventions which featured in "I Still Know What You Did Last Summer" included :

1)Dream Sequence (1:20 - 3:36)
The main character Julie is confessing to a man about a man she killed and the aftermath. The person she is confessing too then turns out to be the killer and his hooked hand comes through the window as if to kill her. However Julie then wakes up and we realise she was dreaming in her lesson.

2)Fake Scare (8:14-10:03)
Julie gets woken up by her door slamming. She thinks someone is in her flat as she hears noises and keeps seeing shadows of a person on the walls. However it turns out to just be her friend.


3)Blood Splatters (41:14 - 41:16)
One of the hotel workers gets murdered by the killer and his blood is shown splattering on the surface.

4)No-one Believes Witness (48:41 - 49:11)
When Julie tells everyone that there was a dead body in her closet which means there is a killer on the island no-one believes her.

5)Phone Lines Cut (49:43 - 49:52)
Julie realises there is something wrong with the island and trys to ring for a boat to come take them off the island. However it turns out the phone lines are down.

6)Dark and Stormy Night (50:22)
A shot of the hotel shows the night is very dark and stormy.

7)Power Cut (1:06:07)
When the group decided to go look for the killer all of a sudden the power goes down.

8)Horror Film Showing On Tv. (1:08:22 - 1:08:26)
Ray goes to see a man about a boat. The man he goes to see is watching something on TV which appears to show a dead body with a monster reaching out to take it.

9)Secluded location (1:10:31 - 1:10:34)
Karla reminds Julie that the boats are down and theres no way off the island.

10)Someone Runs Upstairs Instead Of Going Out A Door (1:15:03 - 1:15:10)
When the killer starts to chase the girls they decided to run up flights of stairs instead of going outside.

Dawn Of The Dead (1978)

Dawn of The Dead was written and directed by George A. Romero.

The cast features David Emge, Ken Foree, Scott H. Reiniger and Gaylen Ross.

Dawn of the Dead is about an unknown plague which brings back the dead who prey on human flesh. This consequently causes mass hysteria. David Emge, Ken Foree, Scott H. Reiniger and Gaylen Ross play survivors of the outbreak who barricade themselves inside a shopping centre.

History of The Horror Film

Horror films are movies that aim to achieve the emotions of fear, horror and terror from viewers. The main themes include slasher, vampires, zombies, evil childre, cannabalism, haunted houses etc. Many horror movies also include a central villain.

The genre of horror is nearly as old as film itself. "Monster movies" were amongst the first horror themed moviess. These were silent shorts created by Georges Melies in the late 1890's. Films created by German filmmakers in the early 1900's were the earliest horror-themed feature films. Nosferatu (1922) was the first vampire themed film. The Hunchback of Notre Dame(1923) and The Monster(1925) were some of the early Hollywood dramas which dabbled in the horror theme. Both starred Lon Chaney who was the first American horror-film movie star.

In the early 1930's American movie studio's such as Universal Studios created the modern horror film genre. This bought to screen gothic themed films such as Dracula, Frankenstein (1931) and The Mummy(1932). These films were designed to thrill but also to bring in some more serious elements and were influenced by the Freudian concept. Actors such as Boris Karloff begain to build careers around the genre.

In the 1950's the tone of horror films shifted away from gothic to more modern. A lot of low-budget productions featured humanity overcmong threats from outside such as alien invasion and deadly mutations. During this time the horror and sci-fi genres were often the same. These films provided opportunity to wow audiences with gimmicks such as 3D and "percepto" which was the electric shock technique used for 1957's The Tingler. This drawed audiences in week after week for bigger and better scares. Some of the good horror films of this period included The Thing From Another World(1951) and Invasion of the Body Snatchers. These films managed to channel the paranoia of the Cold War into a creepy atmosphere without resorting to exploitation.

In the late 1950's/early 1960's there was a rise of studios centered specifically around horror such as the British production company Hammer Films which specialised in bloody remakes of horror stories. These sometimes controversial films started a trend for more explicit violence in both horror and mainstream films.

In the late 1960's the genre moved towards non-supernatural psychological horror. Psycho (1960) by Alfred Hitchcock used all too human monsters rather than supernatural ones to scare the audience. Peeping Tom by Michael Powell was an example of this genre.

In the late 1970's mainstream films started to focus on disaster films such as The Towering Inferno and thrillers such as Jaws. Independent filmmakers upped the ante with disturbing gore-fest such as The Texas Chainsaw Massacre(1974) by Tobe Hoope. In 1978 the original slasher mobie Halloween debuted with great success. Halloween introduced the teens threatened by superhuman evil theme which was copied by increasingly violent movies throughtout the 1980's such as Friday the 13th.

In the 1990's horror movies turned to self-mocking irony and outright parody. Scream movies featured teenagers who were fully aware and made references to horror movies. It also mixed ironic humour with shocks. Only 1999's The Blair Witch Project attempted straight ahead scares. This was done in the ironic context of a mock documentary.

In the 2000's there has been a mix of teen horror with films such as The Final Destination and more serious attempts such as Night Shyamalan andThe Ring.