Changes to - Filming Date

Filming was originally suppose to take place on Sunday 30th January, however due to complications with various factors such as unavailable actors and unsuitable weather, it has now been postponed to Thursday 3rd February. Have checked this with all invloved.

Group Meeting - General

Below are a few notes I wrote down to help initiate and prompt me on the points I wished to bring up in the discussion.

Opening Sequence Analysis - 'The Shining'

'Stanley Kubrick's epic nightmare of horror'

The Shining (1980)
Genres: Drama, Horror, Mystery
Certificate: 15
Directors: Stanley Kubrick
Writers: Steven King, Stanley Kubrick
Cast: Jack Nicholson, Shelley Duvall, Danny Lloyd
Production Company: Warner Bros. Pictures

A family heads to an isolated hotel for the winter where an evil and spiritual presence influences the father into violence, while his psychic son sees horrific forebodings from the past and of the future.
SOURCE - IMDb

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MY NOTES;
A man, his son and wife become the winter caretakers of an isolated hotel where Danny, the son, sees disturbing visions of the hotel's past using a telepathic gift known as "The Shining". The father, Jack Torrance, is underway in a writing project when he slowly slips into insanity as a result of cabin fever and former guests of the hotel's ghosts. After being convinced by a waiter's ghost to "correct" the family, Jack goes completely insane. The only thing that can save Danny and his mother is "The Shining".


old (1980) investigating differences from old horrors to moder,

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Opening Conventions

Narrative Function-

Characters/ Stars-

Film Lang- MES, Cinematography, ( light and colour)-  

Film Lang- Movement , Framing, Editing and sound- 

Opening Sequence Analysis - 'Ernest Scared Stupid'

Ernest Scared Stupid (1991)

Genres: Comedy, Family, Fantasy, Horror

Certificate: PG

Directors: John R. Cherry III

Writers: John R. Cherry III, Coke Sams

Cast: Jim Varney, Eartha Kitt, Austin Nagler

Production company: Touchstone pictures

After a misunderstanding, Ernest P. Worrell unleashes an evil troll on Halloween.

SOURCE  - IMDb

The film begins silently, the first credits show the production company, ‘Touchstone Pictures’. This slide and the next 3 are like this, displaying bright red font with what seems to be blood dripping from them. A shot of dark, spooky looking building is then shown, with unusual shaped clouds in the background, and then a lightning bolt comes down showing the building is in fact a castle, credits also fall down with the weather. The clip is in black and white further adding to the scary effect. This is where the sound begins, which is typically horror music, but at the same time quite funny because it is so over dramatic. The next shot is of the main character gradually moving up into the frame situated in what I presume is a woods, with a terrified expression on his face. It is immediately obvious he has a mental issue of some sort because of his body language but also his costume. He is a middle aged man in a baseball cap and has what I would perceive as a school rucksack. He then notices the lightning bolts and looks in that direction, the camera then follows his eyes to a shot of the sky with the main title showing on it in orange and white coloured font which when put on the screen splashes back. It is clear that the film was made in the 1990’s because the quality of the footage is not as clear as it is today although I think there are purposely edited clips to make it appear like old fashioned. The text does then not move for the next clip of a crowd of people gathering in a bunch and backing away from something, (men generally laughing or not showing too much emotion, woman looking scared). This is again in black and white. From this point the cuts are much faster to match the bouncier music. The clips display incidents of horror such as a man being forced to fall over, the hand of what is considered to be a monster, the primary character looking from left to right, shadows of non-human beings in attacking positions, knifes with blood squirting from them, which turn into credits and much more. The red credits continue throughout these clips, a vulnerable, trapped woman is shown chained up with skeletons in the background however this is not viewed as horrible and twisted but funny because of the contrapuntal sound generating humour. Ernest is then briefly shown in between the following clips of fictional miss-happenings acting goofy, helpless and running away. To add to the comedy, there is a clip of a man’s head poking out from a toilet (hiding) and blown up trees with arms and mouth with sharp teeth fighting what I can only describe as being a spud... As well as giant rock monsters, brains attacking people, wolfs attacking people which are puppets that they haven’t attempted to hide. Demon moon walkers, possessed princesses, cobwebs, vampires, giant spiders and anything else you can think of that is associated with horror! Whenever Ernest is shown he is in colour on a black background, the rest remains black and white and whilst all these dreadful things are occurring Ernest is acting foolish. One transition of credits I found particularly effective is when credits appear gradually from a woman’s screaming mouth.

 The sequence ends with Ernest showing he has had his limit of horrifying things and falls over.

The closing shot is of the moon as the soundtrack comes to a stop. The film is a comedy on a scary subject therefore irony is a main theme. I chose to analyse this film to ensure my opening sequence didn't end up being comedic or convey slapstick comedy in a cheesy way as this opening sequence did.

Showcase

Today each group presented their current copy (working or finished) of their opening sequences to the rest of the class in order to gain relevant feedback to better our O.S'. Agreed compliments from our audience consisted of our variety of camera angles, believeable acting and steady shooting, although I  more so looking for criticism as I thought this would be immensely useful. Below are some of the points and suggestions critques highlighted along with what I plan to do to improve if not rid of these;

• Credit font did not match the main Title and was too girly therefore looked odd - change font of credits, to suit genre of film and create more tension and texture
• Following footsteps scene was too short - lengthen amount of time feet are shown for and how many times it flashes from one character back to the other, cleaner cuts
• Black out was random - show a close up shot of the light switch and a black gloved hand switching it off to make more sense
• Whimpers Shauna makes are weird and not needed - mute sound for this clip or cut it out
• Ending shot of screaming face kind of ruins it, makes it cheesy type horrow instead of scary type horror - delete this and have scream in blackout as ending instead, also creeping more towards a trailer with this clip
• Few bad cuts/ jumps spotted - not obvious on mac but are when blown up on big screen so must correct this
• Follows Shauna in house for too long - not sure I agree with this, I think it enables the audience to build a relationship up with her and feel for her when they sense something is going to happen to her
• Couldnt' understand what 'boyfriend' was saying in second phone call - perhaps re-shoot

Testing Fonts

My initial thoughts when trying to decide which Font to use for our opening credits were size and colour but actually there is much more theory behind the final product. Possibles are previewed below stating my opinion beside them.

Opening Sequence Analysis - 'Panic Room'

'It was supposed to be the safest room in the house.'

Panic Room (2002)
Genres: Thriller, Drama
Certificate: 15
Directors: David Fincher
Writers: David Koepp
Cast: Jodie Foster, Kristen Stewart, Forest Whitaker
Production company: Columbia pictures corporation

A woman and her teenage daughter become imprisoned in the panic room of their own house by 3 criminals. SOURCE - IMDb

I chose to analyse the opening of Panic Room because it is similar in how it seeks to scare its audience (as I learnt watching the whole film), and its genre is similar to that of the film I would want to produce. Before the film begins the production company is shown, in this case Columbia. As the screen then fades to black sounds generally found in a busy street are heard along with an eerie piece of music. We then see an establishing shot of a city in the U.S.A which is evident by the shape of the buildings where Columbia is again shown. It then flicks to the next shot which is of a building closer to the distance in the previous shot as an actor’s name is present. This is continued in a cohesive manner, occasionally moving from one shot to the next in a more exciting transition. The buildings shadows are included, likely to be to make the city appear darker to set the scene. The camera movement I found interesting because the camera is always slightly edging forward it is never completely stationary. The range of different angles used are also interesting.  Behind the credits showing on buildings there is traffic and pedestrians present in the background just to clarify that the film is not set in a ghost town. The music that had remained throughout all of the previous clips mentioned then changes suddenly when the title of the film is shown to highlight the name and from this point forward the music is of a different nature, louder, more dominant and fast paced with a slight ticking sound joining it. The amount of time between each new shot speeds up also. After a short time the music then returns to the soundtrack from the beginning of the sequence only with added sounds. The credits them self appear 3D and don’t stand out against the buildings because they are grey. Just over 2 minutes in, the background changes to a park in daylight with a reasonable amount of people spread out, this is when the dialogue begins but it is off-screen. The main character is then established, walking towards the camera in a street, the music is still faintly present.