Narrative theory- Applying theory

Vladimir propp suggested that the characters took on the role of narrative 'spheres of action' (which allows the story to move along) or functions. From a study of folk stories he came up with the following different character types:

• The hero, usually male, is the agent who restores the narrative equilibrium 

often by embarking upon a quest (or search). Propp distinguishes between 

the victim hero, who is the centre of the villain's attentions, and the seeker 

hero who aids others who are the villains victims. The hero is invariably the 

texts central character.

• The villain who usually creates the narrative disruption.

• The  donor gives the hero something, it may be an object, information or 

advice, which helps in resolution of the narrative.

• The helper aids the hero in the task of restoring equilibrium.

• The  princess (the victim) is usually the character most threatened by the 

villain and has to be saved, at the climax, by the hero. The father's (who in 

fairy tales was often the king) role is usually to give the princess away to the 

hero at the narrative's conclusion. He may also despatch the hero.

• The dispatcher sends the hero on her or his task (who can typically be the 

princess father) 

• The false hero appears to be good but is revealed, at the narrative's end, to 

have been bad 

Characters can fulfil more than one sphere character type, for example; a princes

Applying the theory to trailers:

Camera controls

Today in class we learnt about the different camera controls and lens functions to create various different effects such as deep focus, shallow focus ect.

The F Stop is a measure of the size in the opening in the lens, which affects the amount of light that can pass through. The smaller the F stop the larger the lens opening- large f numbers relate to small openings/apertures in the lens. Below is a diagram of the f stop function:

We also learnt how to pull focus, pulling focus means shifting the lens to keep a subject sharp. You do this by using the focusing ring at the front of the camera lens which moves the lens elements inside the lens. pulling means shifting the lens to keep a subject sharp. To pull focus a the camera needs to be on manual focus (m) rather then auto focus (af) to engage the focusing ring. 

Below are the examples of our groups practice of using the camera, we have included shots using the f stop to create deep and shallow focus and a short clip in which we pull focus over the duration of it

 SHALLOW FOCUS

 PULL FOCUS

Levi strauss- Binary opposition

Good vs Evil
Light vs Dark
Love vs Hate
Stillness vs Movement
Quiet vs Loud

Levi Strauss suggested many narratives can be understood by considering conflict created between two opposite forces. One example of a binary opposition is the relationship between the protagonists and antagonist.
In the horror genre Good vs Evil is the concept that applies (the killer vs the victims), this can be linked in terms of our horror trailer as we are going to have the killer against the stock characters therefore it reinforces good vs evil.

Plot Synopsis

Local journalist Cameron James Castle is brought in by the poilce to help aid their investigation of the disappearances of 19 year old Alice Clarke, but as the evidence begins to unravel so does Cameron. While the tally of killings increase, Cameron becomes increasingly obsessive about attention to detail, while those close to him begin to question his mental state. Cameron's greatest fear becomes a reality; with his wife in the clutches of the suspected killer, it becomes a race against time to protect everything he cares for.

Permission letter

We have sent a letter to the owners of the song Mad world by Gary Jules requesting permission to use the song in our trailer for non commercial purposes.

Planning: Storyboard updated

put  pictures of story board up

Initial ideas for synopsis

We have developed a basic plot line that we are looking to use within our trailer, it is as follows:

• A Man who works in a journalist agency, who is reporting on kidnappings of children coincidently wakes up each morning to find to find himself feeling an overwhelming feeling of guilt and abhorence following the events of the night before which he cannot recolect. The motivation for these events are caused by his alter ego or other side of his personality, which he is not aware of.

General ideas include:

• Night vision cameras showing recordings of the protagonist lashing out, 
• Him having flashbacks- recollections of what he did last night as well as memories from his childhood (stock footage of children)
• Children's toys found in his room
• Bites or scratch marks (evidence of nights events) 
• A shot of him looking in the mirror while getting a haircut and seeing himself moving (something that he isn't doing in real life) but is visible in his reflection
• Camera edits: rewinding of footage (him crawling) to make the shot look distorted (similar to the Grudge)

Character Development:

• Double barrel name (helps illustrate the plot line of having a split personality)

Planning: Target Audience

Film's Cool- Session 2

As I said last week, we had the privilege of being able to work with professional scriptwriter Jesse O'Mahoney, who's written scripts for successful television programs such as Sky 1's 'Dream Team', who gave us a tremendous amount of help in creating a idea for our film and without his contribution I feel we might not have advanced to such a stage in our planing right now.

However, we were once again blessed as this past week we not only had Jesse O'Mahoney back to help us, we also had professional scriptwriter/ producer Ben Harris and also the head of media and film studies at LaSwap Kate. They were here this week to give us some help on creating our storyboards and helping us transfer our synopsis into a storyboard, as well as giving us a oppurtunity to ask them questions at the end of the session.

Again my group worked closely with Jesse O'Mahoney who gave us some very important tips on what we should do before creating the actual storyboard. He said that although we already had the synopsis written out we should make sure we knew exactly what was going to be in the film like settings, props, portrayal of the killing scenes etc. As with that knowledge it will become much easier to then draw out the storyboard, He also stressed the importance on imputing Todorov's narrative, that we recently learned about, into our trailer as it will give a nice structure that audiences can recognize to our trailer. These are all tips that we though deeply about and made sure we imputed in to our work when creating our storyboard the day after. So not only did this help with the creation of the storyboard, it also helped us gain a further grasp on what our film is actually about, and what specific details we are planning to include in it.

Afterwards, towards the end of the session we were lucky enough to have a Q&A session with Jesse O'Mahoney and Ben Harris who answered any queries we had about how we are going to go about our work, and also about the film industry itself. This was beneficial in allowing us gain more of a insight into the film industry, as well as helping with the advancement of our work.

Killers in Horror Films

Stock characters in Horror

Stock characters in Horror from Da_Bhoy

Conventions of horror posters

Conventions of Horror Posters on Prezi

Film's Cool: Christine Blundell Makeup tutorial

As part of our introduction to Film's Cool, BAFTA Award winning make-up artist Christine Blundell (of Christine Blundell's Makeup Academy for TV and Film) who has worked with the likes of Daniel Craig, Robert Downey Jnr came into to share some wise words of advice and give us a few tutorials to show us how to create effective horror make-up.













Although Christine has access to some of the most expensive and best equipment in the industry, we are working on a smaller budget for our trailers which means we will have limited amounts of money to spend on hair and make up  However, Christine showed us that you don't need tonnes of money to create realistic and dramatic horror make up and all the products used by the professionals can be created at home using normal products from the supermarket. For example food colouring and golden syrup can be mixed together to make great fake blood, or using blue or yellow food colouring and a dark eye shadow can be used to highlight and contour certain areas of the face to make them look bruised or darkened.

Below are some of the pictures from our groups experimentation with our own home made horror make up.

Trailer Analysis

Testing Burtons Theory

Burton's theory from Da_Bhoy

 In class we looked at commenalities found within film genres and the various elements used which defines and helps us identifies specific genres. To help us with this we looked at Burton's genre theory, which sets out five key elements that make up the horror genre:
 1) The protaganists in the film (main characters)
 2) The stock characters
 3) The plot and stock characters (how the stock characters all fit into the pliot/story line)
 4) Iconography- icons we associate with the horror genre e.g. An isolated, old house.
 5) The setting of the film and how it used to suggest a certain theme or genre.

Does Burton's Theory work?

 In looking at conventional elements there are a number of commonalities for the horror genre. This proves te theory of repetition and variation as well as genres having specific features. A balance of repetitiona nd variation is vital to the sucsess of a movie. From looking at 5 different movies I have concluded the following; all five horror movies focus greatly on the appearance of the protaganist (mainly disfigurements such as Freddy's burns or claws)which highlights their derangement and seperation from society as they are considered monsters and outcasts among normal people.
All protaganists have a back story also, e.g. Esther from 'Orphan' is actually a 33 year old woman named Leena Klammer who has a condition called hypopituitarism.
This therefore gives the protaganists motives to do what they do, almost as if they are getting revenge on soceity for their misfortune, this theme is common in many other horror movies (Saw, Nightmare on Elm Street ect.)

 Secondly, Stock characters are generally used as a representation of society as a whole, for example typical characters can be noted such as the The popular girl, the jock and the final girl (the Scream films provide a good example of this- the popular girl is the ditzy, big boobed blonde , a character for males to admire(Mulvey's male gaze) who's time in the movie is short lived as she is often caught out by Ghostface at the beggining of the movie. The wanderer in these movies shares a similar fate to the Popular Girl in that they try to take on the killer but go in the most dangerous of places (in the woods, upstairs ect) and end up getting slaughtered. The icons used in the horror genre, are generally tools that are used to disguise or mask an individual's (the protaganist's) identity. For example Ghostface's famous scream mask is used a key part of the movie as it has the role of hiding the killer and therefore creating fear of the killer and getting the audience questioning and thinking about who the killer is.

Although the movie has the same plot each time, the main thing that changes is the fact the killer is different each time- the stock characters are very much the same and aid the killer in getting what they want. The fact the killer is behind a mask provides a fear of the unknown. The settings used in horror films are normally a danger in themselves, although somewhat different from each other e.g. a normal high school with average teenage kid's is used in Scream 4 whereas films like Saw focus predominantly in isolated chambers or cabins which are full of dangerous objects and very isolated in a place where no help can be recieved (the chamber's are isolated in Jigsaw's lair)

Distribution