This is our pitch for our A2 media studies coursework on horror films.

1. Our Pitch
by Kirsty and Stephanie

2. Our Target Audience
● For our horror movie, we have chosen our target
audience to be teenagers/young adults (15-25). This
is because they would be more likely to relate to the
movie, and because they’re the main movie-goers in
this society.
● We are going to target both males and females,
although it will be predominantly female; this is
because our main character is a female, so girls
would find it more relatable, increasing the horror for
them.
● Our film is going to be a 15, because of references to
drug and alcohol abuse, along with suicide and strong
language.
● We will target this audience through the use of social
media, film posters, magazine articles and trailers.

3. Sub-Genre
Our sub-genre for our horror film is Psychological. A
psychological horror is one which relies on the character’s
fears and emotional instability to build suspense; the main
character is usually a regular person who creates the horror
through their mental vulnerability.
We chose this sub-genre because the audience can relate to it
as the antagonist is a human so it ties in with reality,
increasing the fear factor.
A psychological horror film could feature flashbacks as the
antagonist thinks on past events that may have caused
them to behave erratically.

4. Narrative
Our film’s storyline starts with our protagonist, Marie being abused by her parents
when she was a young child. This continues into her adolescence and we begin
to see how it is affecting her mental capacity. She begins to have nightmares of
herself being attacked or her attacking others. These nightmares have caused
her to turn to drugs and alcohol as a release from her torment and she becomes
addicted to them. Her addiction causes her to have hallucinations such as her
taking a bath and it slowly filling with blood even though it is only in her mind. Her
boyfriend attempts to help her through her struggles; but she ends up killing him
in an unprecedented rage. This leads into her being mentally unstable; hearing
voices in her head and smashing a mirror because she sees that her reflection is
of her dead boyfriend. In the end, it becomes too overwhelming and she commits
suicide by hanging.

5. Locations
Bathroom → In the bathroom, this is where the girl’s
bath turns into a bloodbath, although this is only a
hallucination; this makes it scarier for the audience
because it’s a regular place turning bad, and it’s
unexpected.
Train Station Platform → We chose to use a train station
because it’s a lonely place; here she thinks she sees
her boyfriend and ‘follows’ him. This helps link our film
to the theme of suicide because she would question
committing suicide by jumping in front of a train.
Cemetery → In the cemetery, she visits her boyfriend’s
grave, and the audience find out that her boyfriend is
watching her.

6. Inspirations for our horror movie
‘Girl, Interrupted’ is a psychological film with
running themes of drugs and suicide. In our
film, the protagonist commits suicide by
hanging herself at the end of the movie; this
idea came from a scene in ‘Girl, Interrupted’.
1:40 → 2:12
● The reason behind our protagonist’s troubles is
because of her past abuse at the hand of her
parents; this idea came from a scene from ‘Case 39’
- a psychological horror in which her parents try to
burn her to death. (stop at 1:10)
In ‘Black Swan’, Nina pushes Lily into a mirror causing it to smash in
an attempt to kill her. This inspired us to include a scene in our
movie of our protagonist smashing a mirror; this will signify her
losing her mind, trying to kill herself and what she sees.

7. Early Ideas for the Promotional Package
● An early idea for the poster in our promotional
package is the image of our protagonist with her back
to the camera facing a broken mirror with the
reflection being the image of her dead boyfriend. The
poster will feature our masthead and our tagline along
with institutional information.
● Another idea for our poster is having a noose hanging
from the tree where our protagonist hangs herself.
● For our magazine front cover in our promotional
package our idea is to have the main image of our
protagonist Marie giving the reader direct address
whilst standing alone in front of a brick wall to
represent her loneliness.

8. Early Ideas for the Promotional Package
● An early idea for our trailer would for it to
be a montage filled with quick cuts
showing our audience what has happened
to lead up to our protagonist becoming
insane.
● The trailer will include white writing on a
black background fading into view to give
our audience clues to what the narrative
will include.