The First Cut

For our opening scene, we wanted to establish a supernatural element to introduce our film. We decided that we wanted to incorporate a cult-feel to our scenes, which follows the horror genre, this also helped to establish how the main character got his powers. We used a lot of imagery and abstract pieces of film in this opening, such as the chess pieces, we did this to symbolise good and evil and how the innocent can be broken and changed to evil.
I showed this to some of mine and Harvey's friendship group and a lot of them thought that it was quite bad and needed a lot of work doing to it, this motivated me to improve the editing, as I don't think that this first cut was up to the standard of editing that Harvey and I can actually do. I feel like we can really do well and make our film look quite professional.


Miss Spencer told us to improve on the following:

• Make the opening shot so it's not halfway through a zoom
• Tighten up on some edits
• Add titles with a suitable font
• Add a vignette
• Add a cinematic feel
• Add transitions
• Add sound effects

The Art of the Titles

Role Allocation

Director - Cathy Maddox
Writers - Cathy Maddox & Harvey Perry
Editor - Harvey Perry
Starring - Harvey Perry
Camera Man - Cathy Maddox

Casting

For our film opening, there is only one role, the demon who cursed the protagonist with his supernatural abilities. We thought that we should have this as a man, as men generally seem stronger and more capable than women, especially in the film industry, and so we had Harvey be the main role. I personally thought that by having Harvey instead of someone else play the role, it would save a lot of time getting another actor to get into character or understand what drives the character.

Recce

Filming Schedule

Target Audience Research

Horror

Horror and the BBFC

[ information taken from the BBFC's website]

Historically, the BBFC has treated horror as a special case, so much so that in the late 1930's they introduced a 'H' sign to show (or warn) an audience that the film would have horror features and content. Horror films were also banned from distribution during the second world war in case they damaged public morale, often not released until afterwards when they could have the desired disturbing effect on an audience. This shows that horror films have always been made to disturb or shock the general public, even from the beginning of horror during the middle of the last century.
Throughout the years, horror has been marketed at almost all ages. From films such as 'Nightmare on Elm Street' and 'Dawn of the Dead'




Our target audience for our film is preferably 15-20 year olds, as most young people around these ages are willing to a watch a horror film with friends. Most horror films such as Paranormal Activity are rated 18/R, due to their nature, however I don't think this prevents younger people from actually seeing the films marketed or made for over eighteen year olds.

In films such as Paranormal Activity and Cloverfield, a handheld camera is used. I feel like this is an effective way of attracting an audience to a film because the handheld camera adds realism to the film. This makes the scare factor a lot more prominent for the audience and would encourage them to see the film and recommend it to their peers. In our opening scene, we used a mix of handheld camera and a camera on a tripod, which not only reflected how the characters mental state could fluctuate between stable and unstable, it also reflects how easily people can change sides between good and bad, which also links with the story of the film, as the protagonist switches sides and turns out to be evil. This attracts audience as it happens in a lot of Hollywood films such as Transformers, Olympus Has Fallen, and Iron Man 3.

In other films such as X-Men, chess pieces are used. This attracts audiences to the film because it shows the underlying game playing that the protagonist and antagonist participate in. This is effective because it foreshadows plot lines, such as conflict or a character falling. In films such as X-Men, we are shown Magneto's plans to overthrow Xavier and get his way, this was a clever way into looking at a character's plans and hidden thoughts. We decided that for our film, this would be useful to use as it shows us what's happened or what's going to happen. We also decided to put this in the opening, as like in Se7en, we used our opening to give hints at future or past events, and to confuse yet intrigue the audience and captivate them into watching more.

Moreover, our use of candles and cult-like symbolism shows that