Final Cut Focus Group

Evaluation Part 4

Evaluation Part 3

Evaluation Part 2

Evaluation Part 1

My Finished Movie Poster & Magazine Cover Compared To Real Life Examples

To show where I got my inspiration for my ancillary products, I have put the two together to make the similarities clearer.

This is my movie poster for our trailer 'Revenge' compared to a real life contemporary horror movie poster 'The Possession'.
 

As you can see the colour scheme has been kept very similar and the main images are both of young possessed girls.The tag line 'based on a true story' is the same on both posters to add to the psychological theme and writing has been kept very minimalist. The title has been kept the main written focus. Both pictures are linked to my Flick analysis.

This is my magazine cover for 'Total Film' compared to a real life 'Total Film' magazine cover.

Like my movie posters, the colour scheme has been kept the same as the real life version apart from the main image. I included the element of a free gift to make it seem more realistic and kept the date and issue number for the same reason. As we were doing psychological horror, our research confirmed that a female would appeal more to our target audience. Both pictures are linked to my Flickr analysis.

Flickr Analysis (Real Life Movie Poster)

Flickr Analysis (Real Life Magazine Cover)

Flickr Analysis (My Movie Poster)

Flickr Analysis (My Magazine Cover)

Final Cut Of Trailer (Revenge)

Rough Cut Of Trailer (Revenge)

Original Images For Poster And Magazine

These were my two original un-edited photos for my movie poster and magazine cover.

Evil Dead Trailer Review (At Home)

The Possession Trailer Review (At Home)

Mama Trailer Review (At Home)

The Wicked Trailer Review (At Home)

The Toxic Avenger Review (In Class)

Dawn of the Dead Trailer Review (In Class)

30 Days of Night Trailer Review (In Class)

Cloverfield Trailer Review (In Class)

Choice of Trailer

We are choosing to do a ‘highlights trailer’ and at of the end of the trailer there will be a miniature ‘scene trailer’. We are choosing to do both because we want to get across the narrative of the trailer but this enables us to build up suspense for a jump at the end. We are doing a ‘redband’ trailer as we have an all-girl group and would like to include a little gore however in a ‘greenband’ trailer you are not allowed violence towards women.

Moodboard

 

 

The main character for our horror trailer will be a young girl so we collected images fom recent films that have young, either possessed or scary girls. Stereotypically they have long hair and the more innocent they are the more it seems to freak out the audience as it is uncomfortable. One of the techniques we hope to recreate in our film is a different action in the mirror to what the person looking in the mirror is doing e.g the bottom right hand image from Paranormal Activity and the 2nd from top image on the left from Black Swan. There will not be too much blood and gore but little things such as the image of the skin on the finger on the left hand side, are quite realistic so hopefully we can recreate something alone the same lines.

Shot List

Prop List

Health and Safety

Audience Research: Initial Class Poster

Plot Details for Your Idea:

 A young girl’s sister has been murdered yet the identity of the murderer is unknown. As the plot progresses, the audience discover that the young girl is possesed by her sister who seeks revenge and communicates through mirrors and photos. As the sisters learn a group of people had commited the murder together, the young girl hunts each individual down. The audience realise that the group were formed by a serial killer and the individual are in fact ordinary people that have made bad life choices. Therefore, the girl gives them a choice by allowing them to fight for their lives. However, if they don’t fight hard enough and gain a new appreciation for the life they have, they are faced with the prospect of a gruesome, horrific death.

Positive Responses From Other Class Members:

The main positive aspect of positive responses related to the amount of contextual background we planned to convey to the audience. For example, the storyline behind the narrative would be made very obvious so that the audience would be able to follow and understand what’s happening; this would be instead of leaving everything very mysterious. Other responses also suggested that certain aspects of our plot would be interesting; for example, one class member said they liked the idea of a serial killer having other recruits to do his dirty work. Similarly, other class members liked the idea that the motive behind the killings is simplistic which makes the idea have a better sense of realism. Overall, the incorporation of paranormal occurrences seemed to be the strongest feature of our idea as most responses from the class said this is an aspect of the film they would find appealing due to its creepy and eerie nature.

Negative Responses From Other Class Members:

The main criticism regarding our idea was the complexity of the plot. For example, some class members suggested that if the plot was very involved then the audience may lose interest or not be able to follow along. In addition to this, people also suggested that the recruits would need to be less unruly in order to feel sympathetic for these characters when put into gory and unsettling situations. Therefore, it was suggested that homeless people could be used.

How Many Voted That They Would Watch The Film?

After a class vote, 7½ people said that they would watch our film based on the description of our idea and plot outline; this resulted in our idea coming 5^th out of the five groups in class. This suggested that the negative responses needed to be taken into consideration in order to improve the appeal of our idea.

Are You Happy With The Score Overall? Do You Think This Idea Is Worth Making For Your Real Trailer?

Overall, the score our film idea received was reasonably low which was disappointing because the figures demonstrated that the majority of people would not be interested in seeing our film. Therefore it became evident that aspects of the plot would need to be developed in order for our idea to attract a wider audience. For example, using the negative responses and adapting our ideas would give us a better chance of creating a more appealing trailer. Overall, our plot needed to become much more simplistic and well structured so that it would follow the typical Hollywood Narrative allowing it to be realistic and plausible. As a result, our actual trailer will hopefully entice more people and appear more professional and conventional of the Psychological horror genre.

A Stereotypical Psychological/Gory Horror Fan and Class Poll

Description of a stereotypical fan:

The target audience for our horror trailer will be teenage, working class, mainstream females. Their ‘mainstream’ nature influences their likes and interests; for example, our target audience of young females are likely to have trendy clothes with a darker, grungier take on fashion. Their interest in fashion may also suggest they maintain a blog and are involved with social networking and like to keep up to date with what everyone else is discussing in the mainstream media world. As the ‘hipster’ lifestyle has become more popular, mainstreamers are likely to explore alternative ways of life. This has resulted in things that aren’t initially considered ‘cool’ becoming more widely admired as being ‘different’ is the new mainstream thing to do. This has allowed things like horror films, heavy metal, gothic clothes and eccentric makeup/hair to become much more popular.

Demographic profile:

Our target audience of mainstream females are likely to be considered as social class D. This means they will be working class and are likely to be employed at high-street franchises such as New look, River Island or even Topshop. The age range of 16-24 year olds may also suggest the target audience have other part time occupations such as waitressing or cleaning; all of which are low level unskilled jobs. This suggests that people of this social class are more likely to watch the less pretentious genres of film; this could include horror as it avoids conveying conceited, posh lifestyles which makes it more relatable.

Psychographic profile:

The title of  'mainstreamer' can incorporate sub categories of stereotypical groups of people. For example, mainstream incorporates groups such as ‘hipsters’, ‘trendies’, ‘casuals’, or even ‘townies’. However, currently the more dominant of the mainstream groups is hipster which suggests our target audience will consider themselves as alternative and original even though being this has become the new mainstream. As a mainstreamer, our target audience are likely to portray a very cool façade demonstrated by their love for partying, unknown bands, fashion and celebrities, festivals, tumblr and controversial films.  To ensure they maintain their reputation, they are likely to rely heavily on social networking to show their interests to the people around them. Therefore, websites such as Twitter, Tumblr and Facebook provide a platform for advertising the horror genre of films; particularly a psychological, gory horror like ours. In addition to this, the incorporation of a young girl as the main character can make the film trailer more relatable for our target audience. Similarly, incorporating mainstream interests such as partying, unique costumes or original music into the film will contribute towards catching the audience’s attention.

Favourite films might include:

Known for their unique and original plots, films such as ‘The Woman in Black’, ‘Paranormal Activity’, ‘Saw’ and ‘The Blair Witch Project’ are likely to be admired by our target audience. For example, ‘The Woman in Black’ is a favourite film for mainstreamers as it includes a psychologically thrilling plot. Similarly, ‘Saw’ is considered to be a mainstream film for its ability to interest the audience by the gruesome, horrific killings they wouldn’t usually be able to witness. As ‘Saw’ is regarded one of the goriest films, it becomes appealing to the mainstream audience because it’s different from the majority of what they’ve seen. Also, a well-established brand suggests that a lot of people are engrossed by the film and its sequels. Therefore, creating a trailer that represents already well known aspects and features of existing popular films will help to grab the attention of our target audience. 

Below is the class horror poll that we conducted in October, 2012. It was carried out with 8 males and 9 females, and confirmed that females generally prefer psychological and action horrors, while males prefer gory horrors. The results were close, however, which suggests horror can appeal to both genders.