Pre-Production Planning: Location Scouting

In order to prepare for our filming and planning, Jess and I took pictures of the area in which we will be using to set our film opening. We felt that the mise en scene of the locations were very suited to a conventional thriller film, due to the eerie vastness of the countryside area. Hopefully on the day we shoot the film, the weather will be dull and grey, as this will introduce a natural pathetic fallacy.  

Conventionally, the beginning of a thriller genre, sub-genre phycological film, includes still shots of the location where the film is set with the intention of engaging the audience and creating suspense within the first few seconds. Therefore, we will be using the roundabout in the park, the long road in the field and the old abandoned lorries to shoot, with different camera angles such as low and camera shots such as establishing. This will help the audience have a better understanding of the setting of the film and how eerie it is, implying that something is about to happen - slowly introducing the enigma. 

The tree we shall be using to hang the dolls on will be this one, as there are many thick branches and without leaves in the winter, it looks scary.

Just opposite this tree is the lake which we shall be using for when the lady finds the floating shoe and doll. It's quite a marsh-y lake, which can be easily associated with tragic drowning deaths, which is also featured in the classic thriller film The Woman In Black.

Preliminary Film Evaluation

Jess Fisher and I filmed our own preliminary film together, as we will be working together in order to produce our final film opening. Filming this preliminary film gave us an opportunity to develop our understanding of camera angles and shots and how to use them effectively within practicals. 

The genre of our final task will be a psychological thriller, therefore, we tried to incorporate as many typical conventions that thrillers behold, which we've found out via previous research. We specifically chose a location with a low-key lighting in order to make the audience feel unease and tense, furthermore building an eerie suspense. It has negative connotations, suggesting that something bad or scary is about to happen to the protagonist. The darkness blocks the audience's vision, therefore obstructing their understanding of what is happening, enticing them further. Using technical equipment during editing (iMovie), we were able to develop on this conventional lighting by adding a filtered special effect onto the film footage called Bleach Bypass. It exaggerates the darker lit areas, presenting a scary atmosphere. We also used the X-Ray special effect whilst Jess' character washed her hands, quickly flicking it from normal to X-Ray to create the creepy psychological effect. Whilst my character walks into the toilet cubicle, we shot from a high angle, which is a conventional thriller genre shot as it symbolises the belittlement of the antagonist, as if being watched. 

An institution is a company that  issues a media product (in this sense, a film) for audience consumption. Institutions such as Warner Brothers Entertainment Inc, 20th Century Fox and Universal are incredibly large film institutions, producing high budget films, some making profits within the opening weekend. Lionsgate is a large institution with the majority of their films being of the genres Drama, Action and Thriller. If my product were to be distributed by a large film institution it would most likely be by Lionsgate. However, because I am making this film independently, with a small budget, filming crew and cast, my film would most likely have to be distributed by an independent institution, therefore making my film an "Indie film". Institutions such as BBC Films are the forefront in producing British independent films and produce many feature films. Vertigo Films also distribute commercially driven independent cinema. Both institution take care and pay attention to their budgets. For my film I would contemplate advancing towards one of these independent film institutions because they would help cover my budget issues. 

We have decided that the audience for this preliminary film would be 12A on the BBFC due to the genre being psychological thriller. The BBFC website claims that "moderate psychological threat is permitted at 12 or 12A as long as horror sequences are not too frequent or sustained and the overall tone is not disturbing". Although some of the psychological aspects of this preliminary may be seen as disturbing for some people, it is fairly moderate in comparison to most. The scary notion that there is a mysterious killer out to get the girl in the bathroom may be an unsettling concept for children under the age of 12 as this connotes with murder and disturbing death scenes, however, there is not enough particularly strong violence shown or use of strong language to BBFC rate this preliminary film as a 15. 

From filming this preliminary task, we were able to experiment practically with camera angles and styles of editing. Whilst filming, Jess decided it would be effective if we drastically changed the camera angle for one shot, enticing the audience. She did this by raising the camera above the toilet cubicle, so that it was filming down into the cubicle my character was walking into. This was very successful as it gave the sense that my character was being secretly watched, which only the audience knew, incorporating dramatic irony. This helps to build up more of an understandable storyline to the film. We also learnt how to edit as a team, agreeing on what special effects, sound effects and titles to use. In order to incorporate continuity editing into this film, we had to carefully edit the film to allow the shots to flow seamlessly from one to the other, showing the linear sequence of the narrative. At the sink shot, we tried to make the special effects of the footage flicker, to create tension that thriller films portray. However, I feel we need more practise with this as it did not look legitimate enough, and you could clearly tell that it was badly edited in, which ruins the effect. We were also able to experiment with shot-reverse-shot and jump cuts which are conventional shots within thriller films. 

Creating our own preliminary task will help us to learn from our mistakes in order not to make them again in our final product.

Preliminary Task feedback

Our teacher, Mr Osbourne, gave us a feedback sheet after he watched our preliminary film. His comments were that we incorporated a "strong sense of tension and suspense".

Preliminary Film 2