1. ‘In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms
of real media products?’
Before starting my media product I made sure to educated myself on the
key aspects of the horror genre, alongside much research onto what horror
conventions work the best for successful trailers. This research of both
horror films and horror trailers allowed me to have a clear understanding
of what does and doesn’t work well within our particular medium. Our
media product has a strong use of contrapuntal music to build up the
tension and create a dramatic feel. Music became vital for our trailer due to
the fact when we were looking at our style models the music was the
aspect that withheld the most tension and provoked the feeling of panic
more than anything else in the trailers. This was partly inspired by the
music in the insidious trailer, it was very creepy and the pace gradually got
faster.

2. Our horror trailer was mostly a psychological thriller (a sub-genre of
horror) with only a few aspects of gore added in to connote danger and
death. I was influenced into this particular part of horror due to the fact I
have studied the auteur Alfred Hitchcock after analyzing his use of shots
in PSYCHO (1960). I believe his talent for building suspense within his
films works significantly well, and this is no doubt why he is nicknamed
“The Master of Suspense.” I tried to mimic this in my own work so that the
buildup of tension contrasted with startling moments of violence or action
would shock our audience. We can see an aspect of this when Frankie is
slowly crawling along the floor and then she suddenly gets pulled back.
This represents the hope of her escaping against the entrapment that she is
forced to be surrounded by.

3. I also took on board Thomas Schatz “Genre Theory” set out in his book
Hollywood Genres (1981). I understood how important genre was for the
development of my trailer, and therefore researched into who my
stereotypical fan was and what they would conventions they would be
looking for if watching our trailer. We understood that by using a few aspects
of gore we were eligible to appeal to a wider audience (both psychological
and gore fans) we were able to do this by using makeup and then editing the
look of the makeup and costumes. These helped us to signify a personality of
each person, for the normal everyday characters we had basic everyday
clothes. However while the teenagers were affects by the cold, damp weather
(pathetic fallacy for sadness), we were able to automatically make our
psychological killer stand out as she was dressed in a long white gown which
any other person would be frozen in. The gown was originally a pure white,
however had been destroyed by black and red that connote danger and
darkness.

4. We researched that many horror trailers like to indicate a series of generic
horror features to show to the audience that their generic expectations will
be met. We used low-key lighting and parallel music that both
automatically suggest to the audience that it is within the horror genre and
therefore automatically starts the trailer off with a memorable starting
point. This suspense allows us to start the beginning of a terrifying
sequence of events that are about to occur.

5. Our trailer also followed the traditional structure of horror trailers. We started
by making our trailer have a disrupted beginning forming into a broken down
suspense and emphasizing the equilibrium being destroyed and normality no
longer being a security. This follows the Classical Hollywood Narrative by
(Tzvetan Todorov and Vladimir Propp.) As this suggests that the equilibrium
gets destroyed and they have to find a new equilibrium. The thought of the
four teenagers being lost in the woods and getting further and further away
from home helps convey a very uncertain and sinister mood. As a group we
wanted this mise-en-scene to be dark and mysterious and therefore did our
best to edit the setting to make it look eerie yet anonymous.

6. Our beginning plot allows us to emphasize the work of Hitchcock
from his film ‘PSYCHO’(1960). Hitchcock also begins by using an
unnerving setting of a young girl travelling alone and a feeling of
disorientation being forced upon us from the lack of normality from
Norman and his mother. Loneliness is a key horror convention that
many auteurs use to relate to a feeling that many people have
experienced and therefore creates a sympathy with a wider
audience. This is ideal for the more mainstream psychological
thriller/horror genre, which can also be seen in films such as ‘THE
WOMAN IN BLACK’

7. For my personal research, I did an in depth analysis from the INSIDIOUS
trailer, and therefore some of my inspiration from my own trailer comes from
this. Within the INSIDIOUS trailer I liked how it started off with a basic story
line, and then something occurred that disturbed the equilibrium. I thought
that by using this method it automatically draws the audience in and makes
them curious as to what is going to happen in the actual film. The INSIDIOUS
trailer worked very well at building up tension due to the fact it starts of slow
and gradually builds pace. The music is also a key contribution to why it’s so
affective. The strong use of contrapuntal music at the beginning of the trailer
immediately gives the impression that something isn’t right, and it is
distinctive for horror fans to notice.

8. Ending with a jump scare is most typically found is psychological thriller
trailers and we conventionally decided to use one in our own trailer. The jump
scare is used to leave the audience wanting more and has to be explicit but also
affective. The trick is to cut to black before we find out what has happened to
the character. This part of our trailer also shows me realizing that the
antagonist has taken Frankie’s place and therefore leads us to be more on edge
and unnerved about what is happening. This inconclusive last shot leaves us
on a cliffhanger, and makes the audience desperate to know what has
happened. As a media student it is important to be aware of not only the part
of media we are studying into but also the influences that help to promote it on
social media, and therefore we added in an intertitle of a hashtag
(#GOCRAZY).

9. Due to the fact we had a female dominated group it made us
unconsciously challenge some of the media genres. Normally males
are a very active role throughout and the females are normally
relatively passive (apart from the ‘final girl’) and due to the fact we
only had one male in our group it made it easier for us to challenge
this genre convention. We emphasized this feminism by showing
that no ‘male was present ( because the male character Ryan was
seemingly killed off) and in fact three blonde haired girls were
representing a different depiction of the stereotypical ‘bimbos’. We
also researched that the final girl normally has dark hair that is tied
back or short so we decided to keep a part of this convention and
make the blonde girls have their hair tied back throughout the
majority of the trailer. Our psychological killer is also a female
character.

10. When researching into the horror history, statistics show that the majority of
psychological horror killers are normally male, yet we also challenged this
aspect of horror. Our killer was a female and was still able to bring fear to the
audience. I believe that due to the fact we were a female dominated group it
made it easy to reveal our key female protagonists that embrace the strength of
the role of a female and are not afraid to challenge gender stereotypes.

11. I am a keen leader and understand the importance of organization, and
this particular aspect contributed well to the scheduling and making of my
trailer. Alongside this skill I also have an ability to recognize if shots work
well or if they needed to be edited/reshot. The shot with the blood on the
wall was shot many times to get the full gore affect. Andrew Sarris’
“Auteur Theory” (notes on the auteur theory in 1962) suggests that
directors put “their soul” into the producing of their films. I believe that
despite the fact I am only a student it still doesn’t prevent me from putting
everything I have into making the trailer to the level of success that I have
in mind. I was able to recreate styles from existing auteurs alongside
adding in our own individual female driven narrative. There are only a
few female horror directors, Kathryn Bigalow is an example of one with
her film “near dark” but mainly they are dominated by male directors.
As a group we opted to create a psychological horror dominated by a
feminist viewpoint and therefore I believe that we were successful in our
aim to challenge the stereotypical gender roles within horror.