Main Task planning: 60 second pitch (the video)

Click the picture below to watch our 60 second pitch:                                    

please skip to 4:45 on the video and continue watching until 5:45 

                                                                                                         

Main Task research: sharing our pitch with our target audience

We interviewed 10 people, gave them the synopsis for "Murder Studies" and asked them what they think the opening should be. We can't show you all 10 but here are 3 we thought were very good. Credit to Mateusz Zbielski for making the video.

Main task planning: the synopsis

This is the synopsis for "Murder Studies":

Fred, Jase, Mike and Tom are 4 average sixth form lads who are assigned the task of planning and creating a teen horror movie. After indulging themselves in lots of research by watching horror movies, they have their plan; A psychopathic killer who kidnaps teenagers and tortures them in new and inventive ways...
While filming for their horror movie they get carried away with their roles and begin actually killing and torturing victims in the style of the murderers from the films they have researched. The style of their killings are loosely based on the Saw films along with hints of other horror classics such as halloween and Friday the 13th.

Main Task planning: 60-second pitch

Here is the script for the 60 second pitch for the idea of "Murder Studies":

John:  I'm John Power
George: I'm George Hopkins
Mateusz: I'm Mateusz Zbielski
All : We are twin pine films
John: Our fourth member Jamie Oliver could not be here today, our idea for our film is "Murder studies" which is wordplay on "Media Studies"
George: It follows four sixth form media studies students Fred, Jase, Mike and Tom. They are given the assignment of making a horror film in lesson.
Mateusz: While filming they go on a murderous rampage, inspired by the horror films they watched for research.
John: The film is shot using the Point-of-view technique which is seen in The Blair Witch Project and Diary Of The Dead.The target age certificate for "Murder Studies" is aged 15. That was our 60-second pitch for "Murder Studies" I hope you all see it in cinemas thank you for listening good day, good night we love you.

Main Task planning: Plot for main task

The plot line for "Murder Studies" (A Twin Pine films film and A Twin Pine films production) follows four sixth form media studies students Fred, Jase, Mike and Tom who are given the assignment to film a horror film in lesson. During research they watch horror films and inspired by the murderous violence, during filming for their task they film themselves going on a very REAL murderous rampage! The character names have been adapted from horror villains Freddie Kreuger, Jason Voorhees, Michael Myers and Thomas Hewitt (Leatherface's real name in The Texas Chainsaw Massacre). The film at first is shot from the character's point-of-view and then during the murdering spree the POV switches to the character camera. POV filming can be seen in such films as The Blair Witch Project  (1999), Cloverfield (2008) and Diary Of The Dead (2007).

Main Task planning: Brainstorming

During lesson in our group we brainstormed possible movie ideas we could use for our main task. Here is a picture of Twin Pine films with our brainstorm: 

Main Task Research: British Board of Film Classification (BBFC)

The British board of film classification is the company that decides age certificates of films that are proposed for release in Britain, they decide what gets cut out of a film. The BBFC was first established in 1912 by the film industry (who wouldn't rather have the government controlling censorship).

Here are all of the age certificates the BBFC use for cinematic and video release purposes:

The R-18 certifictate is only used in licensed cinemas that show"adult" films.

Media ID card

This is a Media ID card that I made in class, this is not relevant to main task research or horror work. We were assigned this task as part of our photography based class.

Main Task research: Audience perceptions and expectations of a horror film

This is my evaluation of the qualitative questions in my survey on horror films:

In this question most of the people who answered said that they had watched their first horror movie long before their teen years. I watched my first horror movie at the age of 7. This is probably why people don't scare easy at horror films in later years as they have gotten use to watching horror films and it doesn't bother them as much. 

 In this question nearly everyone stated a favourite horror movie that was released in the 70's or 80's. The horror films that are seen as major classics today were released in the 70's and 80's  (the teen slasher era) and still loved by many people, even people who were born long after that era; that's how influential films such as "Halloween" and "A Nightmare on Elm Street" are and still are.

Main Task Research: audience perceptions and expectations of a horror film

25 people completed my survey on horror films on Survey monkey and here are the results from my quantitative questions:

   

 

3. This tells me that people (mostly female) watch a horror film for the suspense alone, not knowing what will happen next although in most films these days anyone can have a pretty good guess on what will happen. 68% of people said that they want a plot in a horror film to get them to the cinema or DVD outlet, a good plot twist makes a good film. Terror on the viewers' mind seems to get over half of the surveyees to the cinema too. I felt pretty mentally tortured watching "A Serbian Film" and "The Human Centipede 2".

4. Over 3 quarters of surveyees expect a scare when watching a horror film (after all it's what horror films were made for). When I was 7 I watched the 2003 remake of the texas chainsaw massacre and felt scared that leatherface would come and kill me in my sleep with a chainsaw! To be honest Horror films do not scare as much as they used to (in my opinion), I like a horror film that leaves me feeling disgusted and scared.

5. The fact that most people would rather watch a horror with others around shows me that they are easily scared and terrified by horror movies. To some people watching a horror film alone if they're easily scared (especially with the lights off) gives them an adrenaline rush that is like heroin, it is so addictive and feels good.

6. This shows me that even though horror films are intended to scare people they don't give them a "real" scare by preying on their phobias, an example of this would be arachnophobia in which a tarantula is used in filming to prey on people's fear of spiders.

7. This shows me that watching a horror film in the dark gives people that adrenaline rush, dark is associated with fear and death and sets a mood when watching a horror film, a lot of people like that.