question 1

1. QUESTION 1 - IN WHAT WAYS
DOES YOUR MEDIA PRODUCT
USE, DEVELOP OR CHALLENGE
FORMS AND CONVENTIONS OF
REAL MEDIA PRODUCTS?

2. GENRE AND SUBGENRE CONVENTIONS
 Based on dominant social issues
 Visceral pleasures
 Providing a sense of mystery
 Relatable locations
 Be selective with shot types in order to present
the correct connotations
 Realism
 Creates discomfort by exposing common fears
 Female victim
 A disturbed, tormented individual
 An ordinary person who ends up exerting the
horror onto the other characters
 Lack of weapons
 Low key lighting

3. DID YOU MEET THESE CONVENTIONS? COULD YOU HAVE DONE
BETTER AT MEETING CONVENTIONS?
I believe we met -
 Based on dominant social issues – Underlying mental illness (schizophrenia)
however this was aimed more towards our sophisticated audience and created
enigma and a mystery for them to solve.
 Visceral pleasure – The drowning scene would give the audience adrenaline and
increase their heart rate.
 Sense of mystery and enigma (an unanswered question) – We put across there
may be a supernatural threat but also the question “did the protagonist kill her
friends due to mental illness?” We never fully clarify this leaving the audience
with enigma.
 Relatable locations – As we used a forest and a school, this will apply the
gratification of personal identity to our audience.
 Discomfort – By exposing the common psychological fears such as drowning.
 We used a female protagonist.
 We used a disturbed and tormented victim.

4.  We used an ordinary person however it is never clarified in
the film whether she killed her friends or if it was a
supernatural threat.
 Low key lighting – We included low key lighting briefly in the
bedroom scene to connote the fear and stress felt by the
protagonist when she wakes from a nightmare. However we
also included lots of ambient lighting to keep realism involved
and encourage fear as it makes the audience think that this
could happen to them. The ambient high key lights also work
better to establish the uncanny (the ordinary becoming
extraordinary and therefore unsettling)
 Realism – People really do have mental illness which includes
realism in our production.
 Linking to realism, we ensured that our characters sustained
an everyday appearance concerning costumes as it
reinforced personal identity within the audience. This included
connotations of vulnerability as the characters were innocent
and did not do anything to deserve to die. This also increases
the horror genre in our production as innocent people die
which makes the possible antagonist daunting and a lot more
threatening as it victimized the blameless teenagers.
 The lack of weapons used introduced psychological torment
instead of physical harm. The death of our characters at the
beginning is ambiguous as no blood or gore is shown. This
gives the audience enigma as they have something unknown
to solve. We included iconography of the subgenre with the
dead teenager’s ‘ghosts’ however I do not think we included
enough horror iconography, we could have improved in this
area.

5. MENTAL ILLNESS
It was extremely important that we met
and explained the dominant social
issues as this was a important part in
our production. Throughout the
production we wanted to suggest that
the protagonist is suffering from a
mental illness called schizophrenia. We
did not make this largely obvious as it is
an option for the solution of enigma
which we included for our secondary
audience as they are more
sophisticated and enjoy solving
problems within the narrative. We felt
that mental illness is often pushed aside
in todays society, especially by young
people, so we wanted to find a way to
include it in our production. This also
left the option for a possible antagonist
open, allowing us to keep the horror
genre included.

6. DETAILS OF THE DROWNED CHARACTERS
 It was very important that we made our drowned characters
look as realistic as possible in order to increase realism and
enhance the horror side of our production.
 We wanted to achieve a cold and lifeless look. We used cool
tones of blue around the lips, collar bones, cheeks and
temples and we put red and orange around the eyes.
 I believe we achieved the look we were going for.

7. DID WE CHALLENGE ANY OF THESE
CONVENTIONS?
 Whilst planning, we considered challenging the convention of
line of action/180 degree rule as it would provide the audience
with disorientation and visceral pleasure and create an
disturbing feeling for them. But we decided, after a few tries,
that it just looked confusing so we decided not to go ahead
with this.

8. I believe that we could have improved
the unrealism of our production. This is
because psychologist Dr. Glenn D.
Walters stated that one of the three
primary factors is including unrealism
so that the audience knows that at
some point what they are watching is
not real. This is so they can continue to
watch it and not become too disturbed.
Our production seemed very real which
could lead to some of our audience
becoming too afraid to continue
watching it. If we were to do this
opening sequence again I would
suggest including more elements of
unrealism to create a sense of safety
for our audience, but still give them the
thrill of being scared. We would have
added more unrealism by possibly
including a shot showing the victims
struggling to swim to the top. This
would be unrealistic as you can see in
the shot that the pool is not very deep,
therefore you would think the
teenagers would be able to save
themselves. Also it would have been
unrealistic to expect the killer to have
drowned all 4 of the victims at the
same time as this would take more
than one person.

9. FORM CONVENTIONS
 Attention to detail
 Engaging
 Flashback
 Production logos and credits
 Foreshadowing
An opening sequence is supposed to introduce some sort
of background to the narrative and provide the audience
with some information so that they can make sense of
what is going on, but also leave questions that will only be
answered if they watch the whole film.

10. DID YOU MEET THESE CONVENTIONS? COULD YOU
HAVE DONE BETTER AT MEETING CONVENTIONS?
 We made our opening sequence engaging by
including a enigma and excitement. Our
protagonist is seen running away; this will engage
the audience and make them question what she is
running from.
 We also paid close attention to detail as we
wanted our opening sequence to look as
professional as possible. We did this by asking all
of our actors and actresses to take their role as
serious as possible and to make the right facial
expressions and gesture at the right time to create
more realistic scenes.
 If we were to do this again I think we could have
included some more obvious foreshadowing. Our
protagonist commits suicide at the end of the film
so we could have hinted at this by including a shot
of a rope or a bottle of pills to connote the suicidal
thoughts of the protagonist. However this may be
too obvious for both our audiences so we could
also consider something more subtle included in
the opening sequence like having the bottle of pills
in the background but still in view.

11. CREDITS
We presented our production logos
and credits in order for our genre:
o Production company
o Distributor
o Actors names
o Casting director
o Writer
o Producer
o Director

12. INSTITUTION CONVENTIONS
 Below the line marketing
 No A-list actors
 Sophisticated narrative
 Co-funding/ co-produce
 Sub-genre – psychological – less special effects
and CGI helps low budget
 Film festivals
 Cheap locations

13. DID YOU MEET THESE CONVENTIONS? COULD YOU
HAVE DONE BETTER AT MEETING CONVENTIONS?
 We used below the line marketing by creating a Facebook page.
 We chose not to use A-list actors or actresses to stick to our low budget.
 We chose a sophisticated narrative to engage our audience by including enigma as
we could not include CGI or special effects in our opening sequence due to our low
budget. Although there are cheap CGI programmes available for independents, we
decided it would not fit with the narrative of a psychological horror.
 We co-produced with film4 as it allowed us to receive funding that we could use to
add things to our production to make it better. As film4 is a British independent film
company owned by channel 4 it allowed us to advertise our film on another media
platform. (TV)
 We used a subgenre of psychological horror as it focuses on the minds horrors
instead of lots of blood and gore. This helped us to save money as it was not
necessary to include special effects of blood which is normally needed in a normal
horror film.
 We marketed our film at “Bel air film festival”. We marketed it here because we
wanted to secure distribution from overseas.
 We used a school, house and school forest to film. This meant that the locations we
chose were free to use which helped us save money for our low budget.
 I think we followed our institution conventions well.

14. TECHNICAL CONVENTIONS
 Orchestral score
 Dark, creepy location
 Low key lighting
 Close ups
 Contrapuntal sounds
 Short takes
 Long takes

15. DID YOU MEET THESE CONVENTIONS? COULD YOU
HAVE DONE BETTER AT MEETING CONVENTIONS?
 We used a woodland area which is a gloomy and chilling
location which helps connote the isolation our protagonist is
feeling. This location also created realism as it is a place
where most of our audience would have been before which
creates an eerie sense of fear as it portrays that the situation
occurring could happen to anyone.
 Low key lighting was used in our production during the
bedroom scene.
 We used a flashback within the protagonists dream.
 We used close-ups to connote the pain and confusion the
protagonist is in.
 We could have improved the amount of low key lighting used
to represent the protagonist’s severe isolation and create a
foreboding sense of mystery. If we were to do this production
again I think including more low key lighting would have been
a good improvement to make.

16. ORCHESTRAL SCORE
 We used an orchestral score that contained a
collection of instruments. We found that this could
connote the torment the protagonist is going through in
her head and in reality. We found this score to fit
parallel with the movement of our opening sequence.
As the sound and tempo of the score increased so did
the intensity of the opening sequence.

17. LONG AND SHORT TAKES
 We included lots of short takes during the shots of the dead
teenagers. This connotes the ambiguity of their deaths and
highlights how little we actually know about it. It also connotes their
short lives and how quickly life was taken away from them. The
close up connotes their helplessness.
This long take of the protagonist running
further connoting her isolation as she is
the only person seen in the shot for a
long time. She can only run from the
possible threat chasing her.

18. DID YOU PURPOSEFULLY CHALLENGE ANY
CONVENTIONS? WHY?
 We purposefully broke the convention of using contrapuntal
sound. It is normally used it contradict what is taking place on
screen to confuse the audience, however our audience said
they wanted to hear parallel sound like the breaking of a twig.
We used this as we believed it would increase realism and
make the experience for the audience visceral.
 We also decided to break the convention of using any
voiceovers or dialogue to create a more remote atmosphere
for our protagonist and for the audience.

19. LOOK BACK AT YOUR THEORETICAL RESEARCH
AND APPLY TO YOUR PRODUCTION.
 We applied ‘genre theory’ to our production. This is because we believed it
was vital to include ‘repetition and difference’ as without this we would not be
able to attract a large audience. As Steve Neale said “Difference is absolutely
essential to the economy of the genre”. He also stated that conforming and
subverting the conventions of the genre was necessary in order to create a
unique selling point. We have stuck to many conventions to stick to the genre
however we subverted a few. We have included difference due to having our
production take place in a stereotypical location instead of having a few
scenes in it. In addition, we included difference by challenging other
conventions such as the contrapuntal sound. We also had a USP which was
seeing the characters drown; this is unusual to be seen in a psychological
horror film.

20. AUTEUR THEORY
 From our research we discovered that it was
important for the director to “impose a personal
vision on their films”. We had planned for the
protagonist and other characters to be of a
similar age to us which enabled us to include as
much realism as possible as we could implant
some of our knowledge into the production. As a
group, we researched and are now aware of the
rising dangers of mental illness in today's society.
It has even been scientifically proved that
females are more likely to develop a mental
illness so we felt that having a female protagonist
helped us develop her mental state further to
make it as real as possible.
 However, our group agreed that we got carried
away with the social realism part of our
production and did not include as much horror
iconography as we possibly should have. We
could argue that due to our company being
independent that a social realism film is more
stereotypical, but we do use a cross over appeal
including the horror genre so we should have
kept this in mind during the planning and
production stage.

21. ANTAGONIST
We have also included suggestions of a
supernatural threat or even a regular man
(antagonist) being the murderer or the four
teenagers and chasing our protagonist. This
conforms to conventional antagonists.
However our subversion of this is that we
have not clarified who/what the antagonist
is, as well as suggesting it is in fact the
protagonist and a mental illness. I believe
that we put across the suggestions about
the antagonist being a physical being very
clearly as there is the low angle shot with
the dark figure above the water. But I do not
think the mental illness being the antagonist
is clear enough as it also looks like the
protagonist is just troubled.

22. COMPARE YOUR PRODUCTION WITH A SIMILAR
PRODUCTION – WHERE ARE THE SIMILARITIES AND
DIFFERENCES?
 Kill List is a 2011 British crime-thriller psychological horror film directed by Ben Wheatley,
co-written and co-edited with Amy Jump, and starring Neil Maskell, Michael Smiley, and
MyAnna Buring. The plot consists of a British soldier returning home from Kiev and he joins
an old friend as contract killers. His disturbed past surfaces as he spins out of control during
jobs and ominous employers raise the stakes.
 Similarities include: “Apparition” is also a psychological horror film like “Kill List”. Both films
are independently produced. Total Film rated the film 5/5 stars and said that as well as
being a horror film it was "also a mystery movie”. “Apparition” also has enigma included as
we never fully clarify whether the female protagonist is being haunted by her conscious or
by an unknown supernatural threat.
 Differences include: Although both films are produced by Warp Films, “Kill List” was also
produced by “Rook Films”, “Film4 Productions”, “UK Film Council “ “WarpX” and “Screen
Yorkshire”. Both films are distributed by different companies. “Apparition” is distributed by
“StudiocanalUK” and “Kill List” is distributed by “Optimum Releasing” (UK) and
 “IFC Midnight” (US). Another difference between these two films is the gender of the main
protagonist, “Apparition” has a female protagonist and “Kill List” has a male protagonist.

23. MORE SIMILARITIES
The setting in both ’Apparition’ and ‘Kill List’ follow the stereotypical
conventions of a psychological horror. Both characters look isolated
and disorientated. The woodland area also creates realism for the
audience as it is an everyday location.

24. IT FOLLOWS (2011) SIMILARITIES AND
DIFFERENCES
 Difference - The female character
in ‘It Follows’ is seen wearing
very little clothing putting her in
Mulvey’s male gaze. She is
sexualized by the mass amount
of skin she is showing. However
in our production, you can see
that our character fits Butlers
Gender Performance as she is
wearing a trouser suit which is
stereotypically a masculine thing
to wear and she is in control of
her sexuality. Despite all this, she
is still targeted by the possible
antagonist which presents her as
vulnerable.

25.  Similarity - Both girls in ‘It Follows’ and ‘Apparition’ are
running away from a suggested threat. The track
connotes that there is something following both females
and they are both trying to escape.

26. TEEN HORROR CONVENTIONS
 ‘It Follows’ plays with teen horror
conventions as it keeps the female
who has sex, alive. It is conventional
for this character to die in some way
in teen horror movies, however in ‘It
Follows’ the female must have sex in
order to pass on the curse and
become safe until it comes back for
her. So, this film is made postmodern
as it does not accept to traditional
ideologies about women and their
sexuality.
 We also play with teen horror
conventions as ‘Apparition’ is made
post modern by the unknown
antagonist. This rejects the
conventions of having a clear and
simplistic representation of our
antagonist. This provides the
audience with intellectual pleasure
and enigma to solve what or who the
antagonist is.

27. IS OUR PRODUCTION MORE SUCCESSFUL
THAN KILL LIST OR IT FOLLOWS?
 I believe that you could argue our production is as
successful as these two as in ‘Apparition’ we have
included enough to make the audience uncomfortable
and leave them with questions. However, ‘It Follows’
has stuck more closely to the conventions of a horror
genre and ‘Kill List’ has stuck more towards the social
realism side. Due to our group getting carried away
with including a mental illness, our film did not include
as much horror iconography as ‘It Follows’. Overall, I
believe our production was a success, however we
could have improved on including more horror
iconography.