Sound Effects/Music

- This sound would be perfect for when we show the clips of children in christmas plays, old photos etc. This links with the fact that the killer is punishing the parents of his old childhood friends, by killing them. The screeching sound chills the audiences spine and makes their heartbeats race. Mix this sound and photos of young children and juxtaposition is created and makes the audience ask a lot of questions.


- This sound could be used whenever the victim is on screen. Her heartbeat could be heard and the weird synthesised sound also makes the audience nervous, wanting to learn more. The sound changes half way to a sort of cricket bug sound, this shows the character is in a place they don't want to be in.


- This would be a good backing track that can be played quietly throughout the opening sequence. The underlying sound mixed with whatever musical score we pick would create a sinister evil feel that would make the audience worried about what is going to happen.

Peer Assessment

Shot List

The following images are tester shots of what we will use in our opening sequence.

This ECU (Extreme Close Up) will be used in our opening sequence as we want to hide identities and not give anything away. This will create mystery and build in tension at the same time. This will be our victim and they are tied down looking around, so her eyes will be moving.

This is a mid-shot of the killers feet, it will show him tapping his feet, waiting for a moment in time. This again creates mystery and hides identity which is what we want to achieve in our opening sequence. We also don't know what he is waiting for, could it be sinister or just a simple idea?

This is mid-shot of the victims feet that will be tied up. We learn from this shot that she is tied down and can't escape, supplying the audience with a new piece of information. We don't know where she is or even who she is. I think seeing parts of the surrounding asks the audience more questions, making this composition well laid out. 

This close up will be of the killers hand tapping away, looking at the victim form afar. This will create tension and mystery for the audience as well as to make them ask questions. The sinister tapping sound is a typical convention of a thriller, the slower the tap the faster the audiences heartbeat as it is really creepy and eerie.

This mid-close up (similar to the earlier photo of the legs tied up) will explain further that the girl has been tied up. It will also show the characters confusion as she doesn't know where she is. This helps the audience understand more about the scene but also makes them ask more questions like 'Who is she?' 'Where is she?' etc.

This close up will show the killer pinning up pictures of his victims that he has already killed. These pictures will be on a pin board and will have big red crosses through them to show the killer is murdering them one by one. This creates an eerie atmosphere for the audience and makes us worried for the victim who is tied up.

This POV (Point of View) shot will show the killer looking at his hands and thinking about what he has done. The fact that the killer has something psychologically wrong him might mean he has a split personality and one side of him regrets what he has done, whereas the other side doesn't feel guilty. This helps the audience understand the character more and also puts them in the shoes of the killer and lets them feel what the killer feels.

This close up shot of the victims hand shows her personality without even showing her face. The coloured nail varnish could show that she is a quirky character who stands out from the crowd. This makes the audience question 'Why is she there?' 'What did she do?', creating mystery and tension. It could also show she is quite young an the audience instantly side with her as from her nail varnish she looks innocent and we want her to escape.

Film Synopsis 'A Child's Nightmare'

The Film Synopsis on Prezi

Audience Research

From the answers of this question our group now know that our main target audience is maybe the age range of 16-30 as they are both the most popular responses from this question. Now that we know this we can research into what genres this age group mainly go and see in the cinema and can maybe ask future questions just to this age range.

 As the majority of people who answered this question like Thriller/Horror the most it means that all of the following answers would be more accurate then a person who prefers comedy, meaning that their answers can really effect our opening sequence and gives us very important information.

This helps us define what musical score to use in our opening sequence. From the responses our audience would prefer a high pitched musical score, an example of this would be Jaws, that sort of screeching sound that chills your spines.

These responses have/will greatly help my group and I with our opening sequence. It has given us defined detail into what our audience wants to see and what they don't. We now know what type of music our audience will prefer to hear, this will change the concept of our opening sequence. We were going to create a hybrid thriller/sci-fi genre opening sequence, but from this questionnaire we now have decided to just create a thriller opening sequence, changing the entire concept of our opening sequence. This research really has helped us in as many ways possible and we now will begin to develop a more in depth opening sequence to what our audience want to see.

Initial Ideas

Questionnaire

This is my groups Questionnaire.

Location Research

Conventions of a Thriller/Sci-Fi

This type of scream is a typical convention of a thriller as the majority of victims in thriller films are female. When we create our opening sequence we won't have any dialogue, and this could break the stereotypical convention of the thriller genre.



This ambient sound is used to underlies the musical score. The majority of thriller films always have this, making it a convention of this genre. This type of ambient sound is heard in films such as:
- Taken (2008, Morel, UK)
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0936501/
- Disturbia (2007, Caruso, UK) 
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0486822/
- Phone Booth (2002, Schumacher, UK) 
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0183649/

Se7en (Fincher, 1995, US)

These are the first four shots of the opening sequence. They consist of extreme close ups of items that could be seen as creep or deadly. The use of editing is montage as it jumps from one shot to another without a fade in or transition. The titles look like they are literally scratched into the film, showing that this film will be violent. It could also be psychological as the stereotypes of people with schizophrenia carve things into walls or their own body.

The title 'Se7en' appears in a very interesting way. It looks like an old fashioned film reel is rolling and displaying the titles, we can see scratches (linking with the earlier images), it also jumps from corner to corner of the screen - appearing in different sizes, fonts and colours. This could represent that the thoughts inside the main character head are all scrambled and they are psychologically disturbed. The final 'Se7en' that appears link us into another shot of the film.

In the next few shots the editing has been used to a high standard. Subliminal messages appear for a fraction of a second every so often, these messages can be words or images of dead/injured people, this shows that the killer does in fact have a psychological problem. The character goes over and over memories or what he wants to do to someone in his head constantly, meaning this opening sequence is in the perspective of the killer.

The images in this opening sequence are violent, gritty and can be scary, instantly making the audience tense and leaving them to expect that something will happen in the near future. The musical score literally sounds like it has been scratched on the disk, leaving this horrid screeching noise that sometimes appears, this again links with the mental issues that this killer may have. The image of the razor blade and scissors also feed this portrayal of the character by showing that they may have a fascination of knives.

 

28 Days Later... (Boyle, 2002, UK)

Conventions of an Opening Sequence

Titles in an opening sequence

Hollywood Pictures: This is the first distribution company.

Spyglass Pictures: This is the second distribution company.

These two appear again but just in text form - 'Hollywood Pictures and Spyglass Pictures Present'

Production Company:  'A Kennedy/Marshall/Barry Mendel production'

The main actors name now appears: 'Bruce Willis'

Title of the film: 'The Sixth Sense'

Now the secondary actors/actresses names appear: 

'Toni Collette'

'Olivia Williams'

'Haley Joel Osment'

'Donnie Walburgh'

The supporting (least important of the main characters) appear:

'Glenn Fitzgerald

Mischa Borton'

'Trevor Morgan

Bruce Norris'

After the actors comes the post-production team

'Casting by Avy Kaufman'

'Costume Design Joanna Johnston'

'Music by James Newton Howard'

'Edited by Andrew Mondshein' This person edits the entire film.

'Production Designer Larry Fulton' This person makes the sets/props/lighting basically they design how the film looks.

'Director of Photography Tak Fujimoto, A.S.C.' This person chooses the camera/lens/filter and the position of the camera, they manage the camera for the director.

'Executive Producer Sam Mercer' This person invests in the film.

'Produced by Frank Marshall, Kathleen Kennedy and Barry Mendel' These people are the boss of the film, they ensure it makes money.

'Written and Directed by M.Night Shyamalan' This person is the most important person in the film production, they control the set and people on it.

The Spiderwick Chronicles (Waters, 2008, US)

Copy and paste the link for the Opening Sequence of The Spiderwick Chronicles - http://youtu.be/9o-KoV_P0vo

Bridget Jones' Diary (Maguire, 2001, UK, Ireland, France)

This is the opening shot of the titles, before this we heard a voiceover, relating to the diary theme. It's like Bridget is telling the story to us as she has it all written down in her diary. From the size of the title it show the audience that the actor is important in this film. This is also the establishing shot as it is a mid-long shot and shows the audience the setting.

This is an eye-line match as in the previous shot we see her looking at something. She is lonely and bored and this makes the audience feel sorrow for her, allowing the audience to easily connect with the character.  

The titles are an orange like colour, representing fun and happiness, however she is depressed and unhappy, making this scene very juxtaposition. This makes it quite funny to the audience (through her acting) and this is the funny part of the 'rom-com' genre, but there is a serious side as she is depressed.

These three shots show a time pass through fade in and fade out. The audience see the fade and fill in the blanks and we realise that she has done nothing during this session of time. This is very effective as the film doesn't have to show everything she done during that time and allows the audience to think about what she has done during this time period, getting the audience more involved.

At this point the character is at her lowest point of depression and we as an audience feel sorry for her but she does it in a comical way (romantic-comedy). Their is a popular song playing at its highest at this point to, only rom-coms have popular songs as their musical score and not an orchestral score like most other genres.

This is the point of uplifting as she tries to cheer herself up. However, the titles linger on and this could represent that her depression will come back later on in the film. The titles are also written in a scribble font, like handwriting, and this links with the idea of a diary. 

In the shot to the left it looks like she is pointing towards the title, like she is welcoming us to the film, this makes the audience feel even more attached to her. The fade out into the title of 'Bridget Jones's Diary' could show that she is fading out of depression and into a new 'her'.

The Sixth Sense (Shyamalan, 1999, US)

http://youtu.be/eb5bmX9P1zs - Copy and past the link for the Opening Sequence of The Sixth Sense

Wallander (Firewall, 7/12/08, BBC1)

The opening shot, after 8 seconds of a black screen, is of an ocean. The dark blue colour could represent that the audience are supposed to feel sorrow, this is further emphasised by the dramatic orchestral score, making the audience feel even more sorrow.

The camera slowly tilts up at a countryside. At this shot you can hear the hyperbolic wind, and its almost like the wind blows away the sorrowful music to create a nice mood with the nice scenery. This shot is the establishing shot of the opening sequence and shows the audience where the characters are. They are in an isolated location, this makes the audience ask 'why are they there?' We see a car and two characters walking away from it, this makes the audience ask even more questions. A sound is then heard, a sort of rushing wind sound, it increases in volume and tells the audience that something is about to be shown.

The rushing sound cuts us into this shot. We learn that both the characters are female. The one on the left looks like the more 'rebellious' character and maybe even the leader of the one on the right. At this point we still haven't seen what the characters look like and we don't know why they are walking away from the car.  The two characters don't talk, telling the audience that they are either in shock or know what they are doing and there is no need for small talk.

This shot immediately tells the audience that they have done something bad, that either involves murdering or just violence. We see the two characters walking away from the car, but we know they have probably done this as they are in an isolated area and it is unlikely that someone else has done this. We also learn that the dead/injured man is a taxi driver, meaning that this could have been planned. The radio is still on in the taxi, meaning that the two characters ran away in a rush.

We finally see the two characters in this shot. The rebellious character in the foreground is in focus and isn't really displaying an emotion, the character in the background is out of focus and looks more effected by what has happened, this could show that the rebellious character is the leader and drags the other character around with her.

This extreme close up (ECU) of the character in the taxi's face shows that he has been brutally beaten up, he is still breathing so he isn't dead yet. The man looks reasonably old and makes the audience ask 'why him?' You don't fully see his face, this is done so you don't know who he is.

The two characters are heavily breathing and both are covered in blood (the rebellious character has more on her), this could show that the man in the taxi attacked them and they struggled to get away or the adrenaline has kicked in after what they have done. The character on the left is wearing a razor blade on a chain, this could symbolise that she is a violent character.

We now learn that the man is the taxi driver and most probably has a son, shown by the image on his keyring. This could show that he is a family man and is responsible, he doesn't look very violent, meaning that this attack could have been planned.

From this final shot we learn that the two girls have done the crime to the taxi driver. The way her fist is clenched on the knife it could show that she is still angry or is hiding her fear from the second character but is showing her fear through her clenched fist. She then drops the knife, this could show that she wants to forget about what has happened and remove all the evidence.