Group Narrative (Synopsis)

This is our group narrative for our trailer, highlighting the key events:

Choice of Production Company Name and Logo

Production logo decisions from Maleeha17

Findings/ Analysis of Results

Research Into Horror Trailers

Research Into Horror Magazine Covers

Magazine Deconstruction 1:

Magazine Deconstruction 2:

Research Into Horror Posters

Contemporary Horror Advertising Campaign Analysis

Research Rationale - Audience Reactions

This is a video on reactions on some of the audiences from my target audience. The first film trailer shown was of 'The Suffering', which is a mystery/thriller and the second one was 'The Devil Inside', which was a paranormal/exorcism. This research was carried out in order to find out which horror sub-genre, they reacted to the most. The results showed that the scenes which evoked the most reactions were jump scares, as seen in the video above. Also, another factor which created discomfort among the audience were scenes in which there was absolute silence. In my opinion, these scenes were quite effective as the silence added suspense and caused the viewers to feel uneasy, as they were aware that something is about to happen. Therefore, taking these aspects into consideration, we decided to choose exorcism/paranormal as our sub-genre and  include these features in our own trailer, in order to make it more professional and mostly, to scare our viewers. 

Here are the participants with their consent forms:

Research Rationale - Market Research

(http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3287222/How-scary-films-make-feel-alive-Psychologist-claims-driven-watch-horror-movies-lives-boring.html) 

As an additional part of my research rationale, I decided to look online for news articles which showed, why people chose to watch horror films, aspects of horror which were effective and also, people's comments regarding which horror films they liked and what they thought about horror in general. 

The article above suggested that younger people were more likely to watch a modern horror than the older generation, as they were more "visually literate". By this it meant that younger audiences were able to better process the quick changes between scenes, as they had the understanding that the film was artifice. According to Dr. Lewis, who is a psychologist, he thinks that "scary films have become so popular because we feel the need to return to our cavemen-like state when we experienced genuine fear, which releases 'feel-good hormones' like dopamine and adrenaline. Our modern lives are so dull that we have to look for an artificial re-placement". This implies that the production of horror films can serve several purposes to the public as they provoke startling responses which cause the essential hormones to be released, in addition to their main function, which is to simply entertain. Also, it has been mentioned in the article that film makers use psychological tricks to provoke these responses, which could be done through the sound, mise-en-scene, camera work and angles. This results in creating feelings of terror and can stimulate both psychological and physical reactions, for example, loss of sleep and feeling sick. 

The article also consisted of comments given by random people, in regards to what they thought of the article and how they feel about horror films. This is very useful as I was able to gain responses of anonymous people, which meant that could give their opinions freely and without being influenced by others. Some examples of the views of others were:

By analysing some of these comments, I was able to figure out the type of films that most viewers enjoyed watching. I feel that the comments were helpful as they helped me understand the type of sub-genre I would want my production work to be based on, as well as giving me an idea of what type of setting. props, characters and monster I would want to include. 

Research Rationale - Questionnaire

Audience Theories

Audience Theories from Maleeha17

Barthes' Enigma Code Theory

Wells' Research and Cohen's Moral Panics