The document discusses how the opening of a student horror film uses various conventions common to the genre. It introduces the killer through newspaper clippings and mentions of suspicious deaths, creating suspense. Dark lighting and handheld filming techniques increase tension and atmosphere. The characters include traditional archetypes like the heroic male and damsel in distress, though one female challenges conventions by being brave. Like many horror films, the main characters are a group of friends who will be targeted by the killer.

1. The monster/killer
Our film opening uses many of the common forms and conventions usually found in
horror films. All horror films have a main killer/monster killing off the characters
throughout the film in specific ways, such as the killer in ‘Scream’, and our film
opening also has this. Even though the killer is not seen during our opening they
are introduced through the shots of newspapers declaring the killings and the
character Will's mention on the "suspicious deaths".
Picture of will by CCTV and
newspapers.
The killer from scream.

2. Suspense and tension
We showed a group of people from our target audience the opening of our film and
asked them to give us feedback. Many of the replies we received said that our
opening had lots of suspense and made them want to watch the rest on the film.
This is another convention of horror films that we have used in our opening as
many horror films create tension and suspense to keep their audience and edge
and make them want to continue watching the rest of the film.
Pictures of feedback sheets and maybe
group of people.

3. Lighting
Many horror films will use dark lighting to add to the atmosphere of suspense and
fear created throughout their story lines and our film opening also does this. Our
opening is set in a forest meaning it will be naturally dark but it is also meant to be
late at night as this makes it more interesting for our audience as well as creating
tension. We used this convention in our opening as well but as we filmed during
the early evening this meant that many of our clips were too bright. To overcome
this we darkened our clips while editing to increase the atmosphere of fear in our
opening. Darkness increases the audiences fear and confusion as they not have a
clear picture of what is happening which is why many films use this convention.
Pictures of clips before and after
post production darkening.
A clip from The Descent

4. Traditional Characters
Horror films usually have very traditional characters such as a male hero and a
female damsel in distress and we have chosen to use this convention in our
opening. Both of our male characters are represented in traditional ways and the
character Will is the hero of our film. He is shown to be strong and brave where he
dismisses the stories of the previous deaths in the park and many horror film
heroes are also portrayed in this manner. Our character Serena is the damsel in
our film as she is represented in a traditional manner and shown to be scared and
constantly looking for reassurance. However we also challenge this convention as
our other female character, Maria, is brave and represented in a modern manner
as she is not scared of anything supernatural and does not mind being in the woods
at night.
Pictures of all characters.

5. Filming Techniques
Some horror films, such as ‘Cloverfield’ and ‘The Blair Witch Project’ will use hand
held filming as their method of filming and we also chose to do this to match
conventions of low budget horrors. Many low budget horror films will use hand
held filming as it means that their filming costs will remain low as they only need
one or two cameras and the acting can be more ‘natural’ to give the audience the
impression that the events they are watching are real. We thought this style of
filming would be best for us as it means our film opening would be more like that
of others in this genre.
A shot from ‘Cloverfield’ A shot from ‘The Blair Witch Project’

6. Characters involved
Mainly in horror films the main characters will be a group of friends who are killed
off one by one until the hero is left alone or they are all killed. Our film opening
uses this convention as our main characters are a group of four friends. None of
our characters are killed in the first two minutes of opening but later in the film
they will be killed off one by one by the killer in the woods.
Picture of group.
Group of friends from ‘Wrong
Turn’