1. REFERENCE FILMS
There are many films I have taken
inspiration from for my trailer, and here
are the few that inspired me the most.

2. High School Musical:
This is a clichéd high school film
portraying the many stereotypes we
have in teenage society. From the
jocks to the drama queens to the nerds,
they are all shown here, with special
emphasis on the main stars of the
movie, Gabriella (the studious, nerdy,
smart one) and Troy (the athletic jock
with a lot of expectations on his
shoulders). They both meet at a fateful
new year‟s party, sing together, and
like each other a lot. When school
starts, they find themselves to be in the
same homeroom. They also give
auditions for the school‟s musical.

3. When their friends and family find out,
they have a lot of reservations. These
were not the people they thought they
were, and they thought they needed to
take some form of action to bring them
back to the right path.
Interspersed with songs at short intervals,
this modern adaptation of Romeo &
Juliet, as critics have compared it to,
gives us a lot of melodies signifying and
aiding the plot going on in the movie. For
example, Stick To The Status-quo is a
song in which it is discouraged to try and
grow and become anything other than
what your status-quo defines you as.

4. Gabriella, being a smart student who excels in science
and math, and Troy (on left) who needs to take his team
to victory in the basketball championships, find that
they must find a way to overcome this hurdle if they
truly want to sing together in the school‟s musical.
They are shortlisted in the competitive singing
competition, but the only problem is that Sharpe Adams,
who thinks it is her birth right to be the singing and
performance arts queen, sabotages Troy and Gabriella‟s
chances of auditioning by making the date of the call
back auditions coincide with those of the basketball
championships, and the decathlon competition, which
Gabriella is part of.

5. With the help of their friends, they work out a plan where they cause
a mishap in the schools computers so the big game and the
decathlon are postponed. When that happens, they run to give the
auditions. They get the parts, making Sharpay and Ryan
understudies, and they win their respective competitions as well.

6. In this film, the conflict that has arisen is
the fact that Gabriella (picture on left) and
Troy, two people who come from opposite
sides of the stereotypical high school
society, want to do a school musical
together, which is not what they usually
do, and society won‟t let them become the
people they want to become. Society is
forcing them, using instruments of social
control (such as disapproval from friends,
family) to succumb to what the society
thinks is better for them, as it also furthers
their motives (i.eThe basketball team wins
the championship, and the decathlon win
the competition too).

7. In the case of my film, the male protagonist and the female
protagonist both come from similar structures such as the ones Troy
and Gabriella come from: Shaheer is the football athlete, and Noor
is the studious girl. They both revolve in different circles, and have
a chance meeting at the school canteen when Noor runs out of
money and Shaheer pays for her drink. That is similar to Troy and
Gabriella meeting at the New Year‟s Eve party. Similar to the plot
of High School Musical, when Troy‟s friends trick him into saying
that Gabriella is not important, and she find out and stops talking to
Troy, over here Noor realizes that Shaheer is one of the most
relaxed, unconcerned people on the planet. That is affecting her
negatively because she is an extremely motivated, driven person
with the need to overachieve at everything. Another incident
happens when she is out with a friend and Shaheer is there with his
friends. He says hi to her, and they talk a few minutes.

8. When Noor goes back to her friend, she snidely asks if she is
„friends‟ with that guy? The tone, coupled with the expression and
obvious distaste of her friend makes it known to Noor that it is
socially unacceptable for her to have friends such as Shaheer. This
pushes her to stop talking to him altogether, aggravating Shaheer to
such an extent that he starts studying to prove to Noor that he is
worth it.

9. Being a high school
drama film, High School
Musical is set with a lot
of preppy music, mostly
happy and cheerful.
There is only one sad
song. This shows that it
is a light drama, not
something overly
serious, and appropriate
for a preteen to teenage
audience.
High School Musical is the inspiration for my film in terms of the
main leads as well as the social barriers need to be broken in order
to transform into your true potential.

10. Slap Her…She’s French
This is a slightly more mature fillm, and it
inspires me in the aspects of how Starla is
denied being a cheerleader (amongst other
things) due to the sabatoging efforts of the
french exchange student who, in seeking
revenge, destroys Starlas life. Starla,
failing in French, needs to pass in order to
be allowed to remain cheerleading captain.
The exchange student fakes in helping her
and she ends up landing in worse trouble
than she was in before, also being kicked
off the team in the process. As in my film,
Noor after spending an extensive amount
of time with Shaheer ends u not being able
to study often and gets a C ona test — the
lowest grade she has ever gotten in her
academic career.

11. Legally Blonde
Legally Blonde starts off by showing us
a girl who lives in a sorority, and is
very well off. They play off on the
stereotype of Elle being a stupid blonde
who only is concerned about the latest
gossip, what shade of lip-gloss she
should wear and what the perfect dress
would be when her boyfriend Warner
proposes. When she is out shopping for
said dress, the salesperson tries to sell
her a dress double the price than it
actually is.

12. But at this very important point she
proves that she is actually pretty
smart because she catches the
salesperson in the lie and
reprimands her about stereotyping
her for a stupid blonde. This shows
the audience that just because she
dresses up differently and takes an
interest in her appearance does not
mean she is stupid. It also shows us
that she might not be a math genius,
but she is a genius in something that
the math genius would be very bad
at.

13. They go on to choose the dress, get ready, and Elle goes for her date,
expecting an engagement ring. Instead, Warner, her boyfriend, dumps
her. This comes as a shock for her as she was madly in love with him.
But Warner was going to law school and wanted someone more „serious‟
for her image. More stereotyping, especially in reference to her
image.She decided to become more „serious‟ for him. She works really
hard and gets into Harvard Law School. But of course the story of her life
follows her everywhere and she is looked at from snarky mean eyes that
term her as “Malibu Barbie” and other things that show how much she is
judged on her appearance. After some initial hurdles, she gets serious
when Warner tells her to her face that she‟s not smart enough. She starts
studying, readying extensively and working really hard to prove herself.
When she gets chosen for a very special project in which only a couple of
law students got to work on a very important case, she is ecstatic.

14. Eventually she proves
herself even more
through her work, and
even though she faces
more problems through
friends, through her
mentor hitting on her
and seeing her as
nothing more than a
pretty girl, and almost
giving up and going
back home, she sticks
through it and wins a
case! Not only that, but she becomes best friends with Warners now ex-
fiance, as they both understand and realize that he was a slimeball. Aside
from that, she starts dating a very nice guy, graduates top in her class, and
has a happy ending.