This is my final cut for my slasher film the "The Trees Have Eyes".
The soundtrack features a cover of "Killer Queen", and the main title is downloaded from dafont.com in the style "Nightside". The film was produced by L48 Films and Skyscraper Productions, and presented by New Heights Films, with help from the BFI and Film4.
EVALUATION Q1: How does your product use or challenge conventions and how does it represent social groups or issues?
I saw / I did:
Interviews are an important part of promoting your film to a wider audience. To present this question in a creative way looked at a promotional WIRED Autocomplete interview with Penn Badgley for the new season of the psychological thriller YOU:
Transcript:
We also looked at sound. So conventionally it's a combination of diegetic and non-diegetic sounds.
Horror films use instrumental strings, with a mixture of long or short drawn-out notes. This makes the audience hold their breath as it mimics the heartbeat, and increases the tension. The diegetic music heard within the film is typically related to the killings. Classical examples of this is the use of theme songs in Psycho and Halloween and Friday the 13th, so we used the notes from the iconic Friday the 13th music for our film.
There are usually sounds of slashing, stabbing, and the allusions through sound allow for less graphic deaths, as the audience's imagination is often more gruesome and effective than a films visuals. That is why we have the sound of the slashing carry over to our title as well as sounds of water drips and splatters of blood.
The first shot, the establishing shot is very important so we looked at many film examples and we found that it was most commonly a an els for exposition but we went against this convention. It was inspired by the opening of Cherry falls, we wanted to create a sense of a small town. We started by creating a shot for shot copy of the sequence. We used the hand of technique from the 1960 film psycho by Alfred Hitchhock to highlight that this story can happen to anyone and create verisimiltude of a small town through the mise-en-scene. The two most common shot types are
Dutch angles are commonly used in horror to create discomfort and connote that something is wrong with the audience, so we use that or the shot of the school.
Often, a blue tint is added to shots, denoting coldness and discomfort, and are often seen in horror, like in Bride Of Chucky. We used a combination oft he Day to Night effect as well adding a blue tint.
Another use of lighting is the lack of it, as many killings or events typically take place at night. The darkness and little lighting allows for more cryptic shots and adds to the mystery of The Killer.
So we started by looking at different fonts in horror films. For the names and titles we wanted to use relevant industry examples from recently made horror films. So we chose to collaborate with the British film institute and Film 4 since it’s a common convention for an indie company to receive funding from them. It is unconventional to see a double directing credit in the same line so we opted for one. But I looked at a few hybrid horror and rom-coms films to really get the font right and I saw that they opted for a white or sometimes even pink font like in Jennifers body rather than a bright red bloody ones.
My Conventions Vodcast from earlier in year:
My post on sound creation is here.
I saw / I did:
male gaze is the act of depicting women and the world in the visual arts and in literature from a masculine, heterosexual perspective that presents and represents women as sexual objects for the pleasure of the heterosexual male viewer.
Gender performativity posits that gender is made up of the acts that mark a person as “man” or “woman” (dress, mannerisms, ect) and it is through the repetition of those gendered acts that the illusion of a stable gender identity is created.
When there is total opposition between two characters or forces used in order to further
the plot.
In my film:
-Binary opposition of male and female characters.
-Opposition of studious and shy Laurie with promiscuous and confident Mandy
when the audience personally identifies with the characters on-screen they feel gratified and fulfilled from the product
John Berger’s "Ways of Seeing"
stated that "men act and women appear", with women being aware of their obligation of performance towards the male viewer.
Created by Allison Bechdel, a measure of female representation in films. The rules are that there are
1) two women
2) that are named
3) and talk about something other than a man.
In my film:
-Three named female characters, Marion, Laurie and Mandy
-Mandy and Laurie talk to each other about Marion missing and what Laurie is doing at the locker
Transcript:
Hello, in this video we will be covering who would be the audience for the film The Trees Have Eyes, how they engaged with their audience and how it will be distributed?
Well before we could decide on that we have to look at some active audience theories to see how different audiences would respond to our text.
Dennis McQuail’s Uses And Gratifications Theory is an active audience theory which comes from a passive audience theory Hypodermic Syringe Model. The hypodermic syringe model believes that the media can have a direct and immediate effect on the audience. This model sees the audience as a ‘homogeneous mass’ (all the same), as passive and believing what they see in the media without questioning the content. The five needs from the original classification – cognitive needs, affective needs, the need for personal identity, integration and social interaction and escapism.
So if you look at the film opening primary audience of the film its targeted towards age 15-24+ so this would link to personal identification for the audience since the characters fall in that age range. The creators conducted an audience survey, which found women to be less interested in horror, and the slasher genre, but found female targeted horror films appealing .The primary audiences of horror are males 15-24+ and they will find this film appealable cause of the gore and male gaze . The female protagonists in this film opening are highly sexualized for the male audience, short skirt and bright makeup. Laura Mulvey, a feminist critic, argued that audiences are typically positioned as male; the camera lingering on a female body positions us as a male, heterosexual viewer.
People often watch horror for escapism as it provides them the gore and scare factor that make them forget about their personal problems. The psychology behind horror providing escapism is that it triggers the fight-or-flight response, which comes with a boost in adrenaline, endorphins, and dopamine.
Katz & Blumler’s variation of the theory
Users take an active part in the communication process and are goal oriented in their media use.According to their research for media use can be grouped into five uses.
The audience wants to:
1. be informed or educated
2. identify with characters of the situation in the media environment
3. simple entertainment
4. enhance social interaction
5. escape from the stresses of daily life
Stuart Hall’s Audience Readings Theory
Another active audience theory
preferred reading is how creators want someone to respond,
negotiated/contested reading where some part of preferred reading is rejected or not recognized
oppositional reading consciously rejecting or mostly not recognizing preferred reading
To follow the preffered reading in the film opening the viewer would need to have a very good understanding of horror as there are references to cult classics and more modern teen horrors.
So the preffered reading of the film opening would be that the all layers of audiences would pick up on the intertextual details in the film. A negotiated reading would be an older audience not picking up the Jennifers body references and a younger audience not picking up on the psycho references. An oppositional reading would be someone who wouldn’t understand any of the intertextual details.
As mentioned before the primary target audiences age os an indie filmmaker making a slasher film with a primary target audience of 15-24+ and the secondary target audience is 25-45+ since the intertextual references would appeal to them.
It was aiming for the 15 BBFC classification. An 18 rating would
commercial prospects and theatrical distribution.
The film generally follows all the rules for it to be a 15 rated film. The teen rom-com hybridity of the film is also highlighted with the at times cringy humour like your mom and maybe you should stop trying to find x and start trying to find a boyfriend, but it is what ultimately anchors it as a teen slasher.
Publicity wise the film had some flaws and some successes as a self distributing film.
But first we need to know what is distribution?
Distribution is in the middle of the production, distribution, exhibition film cycle and it is basically the process of making the film available for audience viewings.
If this film had an over 100 million it would be part of the tent pole model, also known as the Blockbuster theory by Anita Elberse. It basically is investing a lot of money in a few movies or shows in hope for a hit rather than many low budget films.
In her book Blockbuster Elberse explains the entertainment industry's blockbuster strategy '' a as risky approach that involves large resource allocation to acquire, develop, and market concepts with strong “hit” potential to offset average returns from other holdings.’’
But the film is lacking the key characteristics of a tentpole film like a star cast
Richard Dyer argues they are the dominant factor in marketing, and therefore production decisions and how the public consume/choose films. It also lacking CGI/SFX, IP or Franchise.
Since this is a low budget film so it would have entirely different distribution.
If we look at what distribution companies films Studio Canal distributed warp x film Tyrannosaur. Studio Canal previously known as Optimum releasing also releasing warp films such as Submarine and This is England.
This is the distribution company which is most likely to distribute this indie horror film in the UK. The release date should be set to the winter holiday for counter-programming. The market is dominated by PG U family comedies and blockbusters and a horror film would really stand out. Another option would be to do what the distributors of Paranormal activity did. It was given a limited US only release on September 25, 2009, and then a nationwide release on October 16, 2009. The film earned nearly $108 million at the U.S. box office and a further $85 million internationally for a worldwide total of $194 million.
But today Digitisation has made it easier for creators to use innovative methods to cheaply promote their film. So their options are our options:
• Straight to stream: already doing this. We uploaded it to Youtube. But it would be better to have a simultaneous Video on Demand/digital release
• Straight to DVD, a likely option since theatrical release is unavailable
• Film festivals to have critical acclaim, all part of the marketing campaign
• Or Making deals with arthouse cinemas
Horror films tend to attract a slightly younger audience, predominantly under 25s. As our main characters are 16 years old, through the use of representations and stereotypes we will make our characters more easier to associate with to a wider audience. The age of the main character directly reflects the age of your primary audience. Our teenage cast would therefore attract a teenage audience. Our scream queen, is a stereotypical rebellious teenager, this makes her more relatable to our teenage audience. We modelled her after the Scream opening sequence, where Casey gets murdered as punishment for her somewhat immoral behaviour. Our final girl, while being presented as the stereotypical virgin-pure nerd, is a countertype as she is the counter type since she turns out to be the killer. We also used the clique idea which is a stereotype seen in many teen horrors.
Our secondary audience is adults 24+. Our BFFC rating is 15 so the movie wouldn't be accessible to the audience younger than that. To appeal to this age group, our full film would include older actors in the roles of parents, teachers, or police.
GENDER:
Our primary target is females, specifically due to the female protagonists of the film, and our inspiration from Jennifer's Body (2009) and Heathers (1998).
It is said that roughly 42% of horror audiences are women, with 58% being men. After our audience survey, we found women to be less interested in horror, and the slasher genre, but found female targeted horror films appealing. The main reason women found slasher unappealing, was due to the negative portrayal of female characters in the film, something we are attempting to avoid by blurring character tropes. The character archetypes we used in our film: the scream queen and the final girl, which are binary opposites and are simplified representations of women. There is also frequent nudity or women wearing revealing clothing in the genre, and the female characters are objectified for male pleasure. According to Mulvey's male gaze, this attracts male audiences to see a slasher film which is way we dressed our characters in very male-gazey clothing.
Stuart Hall active audience theory that readings and meanings lie in audience and text, while older passive audience theories assume meaning is only in text. Meaning is found in the text and then interpreted by the audience, compared to passive audience theories such as the hypodermic needle, assuming meaning is conveyed directly from a media text.
preferred reading is how creators want someone to respond,
negotiated/contested reading where some part of preferred reading is rejected or not recognized
oppositional reading consciously rejecting or mostly not recognizing preferred reading
Uses and gratifications theory:
Four quadrant theory:
A four quadrant film refers to a film that appeals to all four major demographics or “quadrants”: male, female, young (under 25), and old (over 25).
How would your product be distributed?
Distribution is in the middle of the production, distribution, exhibition film cycle. Production is the making of the movie and exhibition is the public screening of the movie. To get exhibition, a production company will need their movie to be distributed by a distribution company. Theatrical, television and self distribution are all types of distribution. Theatrical distribution is when the movie is screened in cinemas, television distribution is when the movie is screened on TV, personal home viewing distribution is when the movie is on DVD or Blu-ray, and self-distribution is when the production company takes distribution into their own hands, through social media for example.
Digitisation, Disruption and Convergence:
Digitisation is the process of change that is moving away from analogue to digital, the broadcasting media market shifting to online streaming services. A good example of this is older media being cassette tapes and new media is steaming. Disruption is the consequence of digitisation and the impact of it on media industries. The commercial aspect of theatre. distribution is a lot more complicated now as a lot of movies are now on streaming sites such as Netflix and Amazon Prime, having a large impact on the film industry. Convergence is the barrier between things disappearing, for example, a phone is no longer something just to call people on, we can now watch movies through Netflix or other streaming sites on here, making it less necessary to go to the cinema, which is an example of disruption.
Indies:
Indie companies have a much lower chance at getting distributors than a Big 5 production company. The Big 5 conglomerate NBC Universal has a first-look deal meaning that if Working Title, the junior production company, produces a film, the NBC Universal distribution company will have the first look at the movie to decide if they want to distribute it. If they decide they don't want to, they will have to find another distributor. Indies rarely have the chance to be theatrically distributed unless it is in an arthouse cinema. The main reason an Indie movie will have a much smaller release is because their budget is much smaller than a commercial movie. Another thing that stops Indies getting a wide release is that Indies usually cover more sensitive topic, like the social realist movie Tyrannosaur (2011) directed by Paddy Considine, with the protagonist kicking his dog to death. They also show much less commonly shown representations and both of these factors appeal to a niche audience.
