2. Supernatural
Supernatural movies are ones which tend to feature a type of
ghost/spirit which antagonises and haunts its victims
throughout the film. They depict events beyond normal
perceptions (such as paranormal activity).
Conventions include:
- The horror film’s stock location to be the protagonist’s
house/set at a place which is close to the main character
Other conventional locations which feature in a supernatural
can be woodland/forest areas (The surroundings of the house
in The Amityville Horror is full of trees and appears to be
isolated)
- Female main character who is ‘normal’
- Creaking of doors, gusts of wind, unexplained
shadows, unknown noises (in The Amityville Horror, we see
shadows when nobody is there during the scene when the
family view the house)
- The use of orchestral music in the soundtrack
- Jumpy moments
- Interaction with the spirit/world of the ghost (i.e. A ouiji
board/seance, psychic/medium) (in Paranormal Activity, a
ouiji board is carried out)
3. Slasher
Slasher movies are movies which involve a psychopathic killer, who
kills his victims in a graphic manner, involving lots of blood and
gore being shown.
Conventions include:
- An unknown masked male killer with a signature weapon (i.e.
Jason Voorhees from Friday the 13th always has a machete in
hand, Leatherface from The Texas Chainsaw Massacre has a
chainsaw as his weapon, Freddy Kruger from A Nightmare on Elm
Street uses his bladed hands)
- The victims/characters predominantly being teenagers, who are
sexually active and quite attractive (Lynda from Halloween)
- A final girl being left at the end; she is usually a virgin who is more
masculine than the killers victims (Laurie Strode in Halloween,
Sidney Prescott in Scream)
- The stock location of the film being a suburb/small town
- A chase scene between the killer and the final girl towards the end
of the movie
- The use of a ‘sacrificial lamb’ who is usually a blonde, sexually
attractive girl (Casey Becker in Scream)
Slasher movies were extremely popular in the 80’s and 90’s.
4. Possession
Possession horror movies are horror movies which feature a
female who is possessed by a spirit or demon. They usually
feature exorcism scenes, and have some sort of religious
aspect to the narrative.
Conventions include:
- The female who is possessed being a child/young girl
- Religion playing a big role within the whole film (In The
Rite, we see a priest training to be an exorcist)
- The possessed character
levitating, vomiting, swearing, performing bodily contortions
- The narrative being based on a ‘true story/inspired by true
events’ (this is because exorcisms occur in real life; The
Exorcism of Emily Rose is based on the exorcism of Anneliese
Michel)
- The possessed child’s costume to be an old-looking
dress, with a visual indication that they are possessed; usually
plain white eyes or cuts on their face and body (In The
Exorcist, we see the possessed girl covered in cuts on her
face)
5. Psychological
A psychological horror movie is a horror movie which uses the
characters fears and their emotional insecurity in order to build
tension for the audience. Psychological horrors tend to focus more
on what is going on in the main characters mind to scare viewers
rather than showing gore or a ghostly presence.
Conventions include:
Weapons being more subtle (i.e. The killers mind is the weapon – this
is demonstrated perfectly in The Silence of The Lambs with Hannibal
Lecter)
Indoor, realistic settings such as an isolated house or hotel room
(Both 1408 and The Shining are set in a hotel)
Flashbacks and nightmares (In The Uninvited we see Anna have
frequent nightmares about the night her mother died in a fire)
Children being featured
Making normal everyday props scary and sinister (Danny’s tricycle
in The Shining becomes somewhat of a symbol of scariness within
the film as whenever we see him ride it around the corridors of the
hotel we usually come across something scary. Therefore whenever
we see him on the tricycle we have a feeling something scary will
happen.)
6. Gothic
Gothic horror movies are movies which tend to feature
monsters and mythical creatures such as vampires aswell
as a mythical, mystical setting (i.e. A castle in a far away
land). They were extremely popular in the early 20’s and
30’s.
Conventions include:
- An atmosphere of doom and gloom
- Medieval castles with rooms such as dungeons and
torture chambers (Dracula is based in Transylvania , and
is in a castle for a lot of the film)
- Low key lighting (The Woman In Black uses low key
lighting throughout the film; it is extremely dark)
- Untamed landscapes which are empty
- Old architecture
- The heroine/hero being in danger
- Graveyards/holy relics
- Beast transformations/creations (In Frankenstein we see
Frankenstein being created by the professor)
7. Our sub-genre...
For the trailer, my group has chosen psychological horror as the sub-genre. There are many
reasons as to why we collectively decided to focus on this sub-genre; we feel it has less
restrictions and therefore our work is likely to look much more professional. For
example, with sub-genres like slasher and gothic horror, there are many strict conventions
to follow in order for the movie to be of that genre. However, from watching various
different horror movies, I discovered that psychological horrors can differ extremely when
it comes to elements such as mise-en-scene and location – for example, The Ring and
The Shining are both psychological horrors; The Ring is based on a video tape which, if a
person watches it, they will die seven days later whereas The Shining is based on a man
who is driven to the brink of insanity and ends up trying to kill his family. They are both of
the same sub-genre yet have extremely different plots – slasher movies for example, tend
to have similar plots for every film (teenagers are chased by a masked killer and are killed
in a graphic manner). For example, Halloween and Scream are both slasher and feature
similar storylines (Michael Myers chases Laurie Strode in Halloween, whilst Ghostface
chases Sidney Prescott throughout Scream). Therefore my group and I felt if we chose for
psychological to be our sub-genre, we would be able to be more creative and original
when it came to our storyline. We also chose psychological as there is not many
psychological horrors out today – Possession and Supernatural movies tend to be more
common, therefore we wanted to create a trailer which is refreshing and different; as
shown by The Silence of the Lambs and American Psycho, when a psychological horror is
executed properly, it becomes a cinematic classic. We wanted ours to do so too, and
believe we will be able to create a fresh, original and intellectual idea for a horror movie
which, in time, would become a cinematic classic.
