The document discusses the slasher film subgenre that the author has chosen for their promotional package and film trailer. Slasher films involve a psychopath stalking and murdering people with bladed weapons. The author identifies with the relatable teen characters typically seen in slashers. They also have access to a suitable wooded filming location and teen actors. The author was drawn to slashers because they remain popular and reflect real human fears. They analyzed inspirational slasher films like Cabin in the Woods and Scream to incorporate classic tropes into their own trailer.

1. Subgenre Explanation

2. The sub-genre that we have chosen is the slasher sub-genre.
Slasher films are a subgenre of horror films, typically
involving a violent psychopath stalking and murdering
several people, usually with bladed tools. We decided to
base our promotional package content on the sub-genre of
slasher, because by being the same age as the characters
typically seen in slashers we can relate more to the narrative
and the characters themselves. Due to the characters being
relatable teenagers to ourselves we identify more with the
characters in terms of similar behaviour that the sub-genre
reflects us more. Additionally, as we are students ourselves,
we have a wide selection of actors to choose from within this
‘teen’ age bracket. The Slasher sub-genre of horror is deeply
embedded in the classics, like Halloween and A Nightmare
on Elm Street to name a few, and thus we wanted to carry
through the traditional horror tropes into our own trailer,
but at the same time keeping it relevant to our young
demographic.

3. Slashers are notoriously known for their strong tropes
and stereotypical horror conventions, thus we chose
this subgenre in order to convey a very distinct scare
factor that is most likely to carry through this well-
known codes and conventions for our audience. The
80s were the decade where Slashers reached their
apex, and these films are where the well-known
tropes seen in today’s Slashers were born. The
stereotypical characters like the first girl, final girl,
jock, nerd, etc were bred in films like A Nightmare on
Elm Street; Nancy Thompson is the typical Slasher
heroine, the Final Girl, whilst Glen Lantz is the
nerd/Boyfriend; Rod Lane is the jock Boyfriend; Tina
Gray the First Girl/slut. Freddy Krueger is obviously,
the Killer, the main antagonist. Cabin in the Wood
strongly conveys these tropes also, another reason
why we used this for our primary inspirational text.

4. We were initially enticed to choose Slasher as the subgenre for our
trailer and ancillary pieces, because Slasher films have always been
the horrors that have remained relevant and popular over decades
of evolution; horrors reflect the fears and anxieties of the time, and
the very real and constant fear that humans hold for each other
always rings true- the fear of an unknown killer hunting us down; the
human killer which is all too real reflected in the news and televised
in the media. Slashers, although sometimes over exaggerated and
made comical in their plots and characters, always manage to retain
a level of realism, and thus we knew that it would be much easier to
work within this subgenre than any other (like sci-fi or supernatural),
which require superhuman elements and SFX.Working with all
human characters, acting realistically in a easily accessible location
like a forest; creating our slasher trailer would need very little extra
elements, and the fear could mainly be created in the editing stage. I
have a suitable wooded area that would be perfect and easily
accessible for filming, as well as a teenage cast in my classmates who
I could easily used to play my teen slasher victims.

5. I had recently watched a couple of Slashers that I saw
as inspirational texts for my own film trailer; Cabin in
the Woods was a contemporary slasher I had seen that
interested me because of the keen focus on the
characters and their individual yet stereotypical
personalities. I have also recently viewed two of the
films in the Scream franchise; Wes Craven’s characters
and their self-aware nature when it comes to horror
tropes is echoed in many of the modern Slashers of
today; it was an aspect that interested me and added a
new layer to the horror narrative. Thus, in my own
trailer, I wanted to incorporate some of these
exaggerated aspects of conventional Slashers, by
placing emphasis on these like the mask, the bladed
weapon and use of sfx blood.

6. When developing the ideas for the antagonist for my trailer, I
looked to my inspirational texts Friday the 13th and the Scream
franchise, looking closely at the stereotypes of iconic Slasher
killers like Ghostface and Jason Voorhees . What is commonly
seen in their costume is the prevalence of the mask, which is a
huge part of these characters’ as it hides their true personalities
and identities; acting as an enigma code to create mystery and
tension for the audience. As well, the costume is usually dark and
ambiguous, shrouding the characters body and form as to create
another layer of mystery surrounding the killer’s true identity. The
use of sfx blood here over the killer’s clothing is used to
emphasise the antagonists’ bloodthirsty nature and savagery
when killing. A bladed weapon of some sort is always included in
Slasher horrors, wielded by the antagonist; Jason is Friday the
13th has a machete, whilst ghostface has the more traditional
kitchen/hunting knife- yet I am choosing to use an axe as my
antagonist’s weapon as it both fits into the use of the bladed
weapon in Slashers and goes along with the wooded setting and
‘woodcutter’ killer.