Planning: Possible Film Openings

As a group we have come up with two possible film openings. The reason we have done this is so that we can see what type of opening our target audience will enjoy the most. The aim is to present a group of people with these opening and get their opinion on which they prefer. When this has been done we will have a better idea of what will make our film opening a success. The possible openings are as follows;

Film Opening One

• Who: The Psychiatrist that will appear in the film as the main character and villain, and one patient that he choses as one of his victims.
• When: At the middle of the day, in a meeting between the two characters. The victim is a patient of the Psychiatrist so visits him often.
• Where: The two characters are sitting in the Psychiatrists office having one of their regular meetings, the patient is sitting on a sofa with his/her back facing the door with the Psychiatrist sat opposite.
• What: The Psychiatrist is asking the patient questions and recording the answers. After a while, the Psychiatrist excuses himself and walks out of the room. When he goes outside, he picks up a blunt object and takes his shows off at the door to avoid being heard. The Psychiatrist then walks back into the room, stands behind the patient and lifts the weapon - as he brings down the weapon and just before it makes contact with patient the scene cuts to titles.

Film Opening Two

• Who: The Psychiatrist will briefly appear in the opening, but just the character writing in a book or notepad, so the face of the character may not be included due to a lack of importance of any story.
• When: There is no time or date for this opening as it is an opening with no story, but based on the opening titles, like in Se7en.
• Where: Again, there is no story line in this opening so there is no location for the opening, however when the psychiatrist is briefly shown, it will imply that he is in his office even if the filming doesn't take place there.
• What: Like in the opening to Se7en, the opening will be wholly based on the opening titles. The structure of the opening will be a selection of clips of the psychiatrist writing, blood splatters across a page, glimpses of the psychiatrists head collection etc.

Target Audience Feedback

We got some feedback from our target audience about our potential openings. We showed two potential film openings to three people who we believed fitted our target audience and asked them for which opening they preferred and why. The feedback we got from these people was very important in helping us to decide which film opening was better to use.

Research: The Importance of Sound in Horror Films

Sound in horror films plays a massive part in making the film scary, making the film a horror. There is wide range of music used in horror films from your slow, high pitched music to create eeriness to your fast paced, low pitched music to create an immediate sense of danger and threat. Sound in horror has the ability and power to create a sense of danger and vulnerability just from an every day activity such as opening a door to a room. During a horror film, there are many different factors which affect the type of sound that is used. For example, in a blood and guts film such as jaws you would expect to hear a faster paced, low pitch sound accompanying the visual while with a film such as children of the corn you would expect a slower paced, high pitched sound to be used to create the tension.

The purpose of sound in horror films is to create a certain atmosphere which allows the audience to connect with the film more deeply and emotionally. It also enhances the overall quality of the film. For example, I watched a horror film trailer without any sound in it and it completely took alll the horror film feel away from it and lost the films sense of purpose.

Doing some research I found that the sound used in the majority of horror films, no matter how disimilar they may sound, plays on the instinctive fears of people. This means no matter of how fearless the audience may be, deep down there will be a sense of anxiety from each and every person watching the film. The class of noises used have been labelled as 'non-linear' sounds.

Psycho, arguably the most iconic horror film of all time, uses sounds extremely affectively and the sound used in the film is almost as big as the film itself. The sound in psycho became so iconic by how it amazingly ties in with the story of the film. An example of how effective sound is in this film is the use of the famous shrieking, staccato violin in the shower scene. This sound massively enhances the scene with the stabbing violin in compliment to the assailant's attack with a knife.

Here below in the video are examples of the sound used in some of the most iconic horror films of all time.

The Importance Of Opening Titles

The information you may be given during the opening titles of a film;

• The title of the film
• Cast in the film
• The production company
• The distributor company
• Director, producer, make-up, costume design, music

What is the difference between opening titles and closing credits?

 

The difference between opening titles and closing titles is the following; the opening titles are there to inform the audience of the people who played the more important roles in the film. This will include those such as the director, producer and the production company. On the other hand, the closing credits list everyone who was involved in the film making; from the director and cast to the costume design and music department. During the opening titles it displays the theme including font, colour and style. These have all a correlation with the genre of the film.

What is the importance of opening titles?

The opening titles of a film are very important in giving the audience a lot of information. For example, it states the most important people in the film to give the audience that information. The names are usually given in the order of importance with the most important coming first. An example of this is from the film 'Se7en' where Brad Pitt's name is the first one stated out of all the actors. This is because he is the most well known actor in the film and the star actor therefore coming first in the titles. Also, he would be first in the titles as he of the biggest actors in the world and a huge star in Hollywood, therefore by putting him first this will attract viewers to the film. There are other crew members mentioned in the opening titles too. These include the director, producer and executive producer, music and the distributors. It is also important to include these members for the same reason that they are capable of attracting possible viewers. For example, the director of the 'Se7en', David Fincher, is a very successful and well known and respected director. This means people who have previously recognised his stuff and enjoyed it are likely to watch 'Se7en' due to the fact he is involved heavily in the making of the film. Opening titles aren't only just useful for giving the audience information, it has symbolic coding which the audience can recognise. For example, in 'Se7en', the font and style of the credits, along with the the music and image used all contribute to the genre. It is easy to make out from the titles that the genre of 'Se7en' is thriller.