Research and Planning: Planning the Film

I have discussed the plan with my partner and have come up with this unique idea and film title:

Our film will be called "Decorus Nex", this is Latin for Beautiful Death.
As our film genre is horror/supernatural/haunting, we have decided that our main character is going to be a helpless female, and then later on in the opening, another character comes on who will be a creepy figure. We will be using a lot of close up shots to allow the audience to really connect with the female character.

At the moment we have a potential female lead that hopefully we could cast but we are still looking into it.

We have found a suitable location. We want the set to look fairly new. The character has just moved into the house so we will want everything that is involved in a house move such as boxes, objects being unpacked, and cheap plates that are breakable.

The film starts when our female character has just moved into her new house, the location is right next to a grave yard. She is still unpacking when she feels as if something was watching her and hears a light tapping on the window. She then looks out of her window and something swiftly shoots passed the window. As she lives on her own, she becomes scared. As she moves closer to the window to see if there is anything outside, her phone suddenly rings, adding tension to the atmosphere. The phone call is from her father. The atmosphere then calms down until there is an unusual soft banging at the door. This brings the tension back. She walks slowly towards the door, opens it and walks outside to see if there is anybody there. The door suddenly slams shut behind her and she cannot get it open. She then runs to her back garden to try and open her back door, to no avail. She looks through her kitchen window and sees objects such as furniture, crockery, utensils, slowly moving and smashing on the floor and  moving around the kitchen. She sees the lights flickering and then notices a scary figure staring at her in her hallway. It scares her so she runs back round only to find that her front door creeks open. She walks back into her house, the door slams shut behind her, flickering lights come back and then the title comes up.

Research: Target Audience.

The target audience I would imagine would be between 15/16 to 25. As it's a horror supernatural it wouldn't be something a young audience would be allowed to see. For this type of film opening the audience would probably be mostly male but as our main character is female, it could be seen as female dominance so it could appeal to a female audience as well.

Genre Mood Board

Research and Planning: Narrative Theory

                                                    Roland Barthes, Narrative Codes.

What Rolad Barthes means by narrative codes is the combinations of technical features that are meant to have a specific meaning. In this theory there are three types of codes, these are The Hermeneutic Code, The Proairetic Code and the Semantic Code.

The Hermeneutic Code is also known as the Enigma Code. This refers to any elements of the story that are not fully explained, this is how it becomes a mystery to the reader. This is used to keep the audience guessing until the last few final scenes when they realise what's happening.

The Proairetic Code which is the Action Code. It builds up tension, refering to any actions or event that indicates something else is going to happen, getting the reader to guess what will happen next.

The Semantic Code refers basically to the way images or music mght be used to mean something in addition to the thing it shows.

Linking to Dexter, TV Series.

The opening sequence really is based on a Hermeneutic Code. Because its full of mystery. The audience never get to see a full image until the very end of the opening. The opening is based on loads of close ups of Dexters morning routine. But we only get close up images. This leaves the audience thinking why its in this particular lay out.

There is also some Proairetic Code aswell, for example the dripping blood, the unusal shaped knife cutting through the blood orange that looks like its cutting through something human, him tieing his shoe laces that looks like hes also strangling someone. These examples would also fit in with the Semantic Code.

Levis-Strauss and Binary Oppositions.

Levi-Strauss introduced the idea of binary oppositions as a useful way to consider the production of meaning within narratives, this means stories driven by paired opposits.

Title Sequence analysis: Thirteen Ghosts

As i could not get the proper opening scene from the film, I'm having to use the first part from the movie.
The title sequence finishes after 1 minute 20 seconds.

As my coursework's genre is supernatural horror i felt like i should study an opening with a similar genre. So i chose Thirteen Ghosts.
At the beginning of the opening there's the advertisement of the entertainment company's who have helped create this film - Columbia Picture entertainment, which was presented in black and white with an eery backing sound of a whistling wind. Which then leads on to the next entertainment company, Dark Castle Entertainment, which is ironic seeing how the way their advertisement is a scary gargoyle roaring that's on a dark scary castle will give the audience straight away feeling of a supernatural horror.
This then leads on the this opening scene:

This scene opens with the backing sound of thunder and straight away the audience see's this image. The fact that this scene is dark, foggy, lighting that emphasis's the atmosphere really gives the feel that something is going to happen that will make the viewers jump.

At the same time that the sound and the mise-en-scene is giving off this feel of something bad will happen, cinematography takes over with a jurky hand-held feel as the image moves slowly towards the car suspended in the air by the crane.

As soon the camera has crept closer to the car, the start of the title sequence begins with this lettering appearing with it looking like it's on fire.

The mise-en-scene is one of the bigger aspects used in this opening that shows the genre of this film. Even though it is difficult to see, prop's such as dead cars piled on top of each other really gives an 'off' feeling. Making the audience feel the realism. This is also due to the cinematography, how the camera still moves in a jurky way as if its hand held. To add to the effect wind is blowing. Old bits of torn ragged fabric have been used to emphasis this, and is high lighted above.

Also at this point, more sound's become more effective at this point with sound's of sounds like a gate either being opened and creaking or the wind blowing it. Again with added thunder sound effects.

After more camera movement the main title appears with editing it gives the audience the feel of certainty that it is going to be something along the lines of a supernatural horror. Along with the title appearing, the backing sound for it almost sounds like people but its distorted.

And then the title sequence ends with some action of a lorry driving through a pair of large gates.

In this opening sequence there is no music when there normally is but the opening to this film really sets the scene so creepy background sounds are used.The sounds that are used really show off the genre for this film. Sound's of strong winds blowing, gates creeking open and closed, thunder are used to open the scene, then the sound goes into a weird sounding wind that give's the feel that something is there or is about to happen. This strange sound is used with the cinematograpghy to create a strong atmosphere.

The use of mise-en-scene is very strong. Even though in the opening there are no characters, just the location of the first scene really gives the audience the idea of something 'eery'. Lighting is obviously important as this scene is set at night, so the use of flood lighting in the corners of this car junk yard really shows off how creepy the setting is. The prop's mainly used are these crushed or broken cars, along side the fog adds to the effect.

One of the most obvious techniques used to show off the genre is the cinematography. When the camera goes 'all over the place', as if it's following someone. Sort of a jurky hand held movement, along with the strange sound effects really give the audience the feel of realism.

Main Coursework Introduction

The main aim or task to this coursework is to produce a opening title sequence and the first 2 minutes of a film created by myself and my partner. My partner, Georgia Haldane are going to create an opening for our own supernatural horror.

Preliminary Production Final Outcome