Similar Films

Similar Films


A film that is similar to ours is Wes Craven's A Nightmare on Elm Street. The plot revolves around a group of teenagers in the 1980's being attacked by a mysterious figure in their dreams, causing death in real life to anyone he kills in the dreams. 

This film is very similar to our own as the plot follows a young teenager as they are chased and attacked by a dark and evil monster in their dreams, with the victim becoming very confused and scared as the film goes on as the attacks continue. Both villains, Freddy Krueger and El Cucuy, act in a similar way, hunting and killing their pray through dreams, instilling fear in to them while they are awake. Additionally, both antagonists have a demonic and menacing look, adding to the fear and intimidation they instill in the characters and audience, as well as the inhuman image they project.

However, in contrast to A Nightmare on Elm Street, our film follows a much heavier emphasis on the ideas of psychological horror, with El Cucuy mentally scarring the characters as they try to escape him, with very disturbing images and a distorted voice to induce a large amount of fright. 

Another similar film to ours would be Christopher Nolan's 2010's box office hit Inception. This film follows the same themes of dreams and the illusion of reality as ours, with its plot revolving around a group of people who enter peoples dreams in search of information. While in a dream, it is often that the world they are in becomes distorted and warped, coursing them to question if the world is real or a dream. This idea is seen in our film, as the main character Jamie wakes up thinking he has escaped the monster, only to find that he is in fact still in a dream.

In  both films, the characters involved in dreams are often confused and delirious when it comes to what is real or not, as they both have to fight some form of enemy while in a dream. This in turn has the effect of disorienting the audience, as the shock of Jamie still being in a dream at the end of the film is not expected by the audience, emphasizing the power of El Cucuy and his influence on Jamie.

History of Horror

History of Horror

The concept of a horror film is to make it's audience fearful or on edge of the events that are to follow, either through sharp jump scares or physiologically distressing scenes. This idea has been around from almost the beginning of cinema it's self, with early film makers creating the genre as a new form of cinema all together.

The first documented example of a horror films is 1896's Le Manoir du Diable by Georges Melies, which was a comedic horror depicting a encounter with the devil. While not being made for any fear factor, opting for a more comedic approach through pantomime, the themes of the devil and hell shadows the horror genre with its dark concepts and imagery

One of the first true depictions of a horror film was 1910's Frankenstein by Edison Studios. While not mainly being made for the purpose of scaring or distressing it's audience like more conventional horror films, It did share similar themes and traits to a classic horror film, making it a film of that genre overall. The concept of monsters and scary creatures was seen prominently in this film, being one of the earliest examples of a monster appearing in a film.

Proceeding this point, the next major development in the horror genre would be 1922's Nosferatu, the first true depiction of a vampire film. Now becoming a cult classic, the film originally became popular for its impressive use of prosthetic and makeup that would genuinely scare audiences, due to its pioneering presentation of fear and horror in film, with audiences never seeing anything like it before. This film helped to develop and advertise the horror genre as a whole, as more and more people began to learn about it from this iconic picture.

The word horror would not be created until the 1930's, however themes of horror had been used for years before, creating the horror genre before its actual naming. Some notable examples are The Phantom of the Opera and The Hunchback of Notre Dame, examples of American productions cashing in on the growing popularity of monster films. These early films also relied heavily on emotional plots and heavy us of distressing storylines to evoke sadness.

After the official creation of the horror genre itself, companies began creating films for it much more frequently, with much higher critical acclaim. Some of these films are 1931's Dracula by Tod Browning, which followed the success of its predecessor for vampire films. Additionally, 1931's Doctor Jekyll and Mr Hyde was acclaimed for its innovative use of cinematography to present Jekyll's transformation in to Hyde on camera.

The genre as a whole exploded in the 1960's following films such as Godzilla, House of Wax and Night of the Living Dead,  all well known and acclaimed movies following the success of the genre. Popular films as a whole, irrelevant of the genre also came out in this time period, such as Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho in 1960 as well as many performances by Christopher Lee as Dracula. At this point in time the horror genre had been pushed in to the mainstream for film watchers, with many becoming household names.

After the release of many low budget gore horror films, company's began investing higher budgets in to the horror genre. This lead to films such as The Exorcist, Alien, A Nightmare on Elm Street and Friday the 13th all becoming not only the horror classics, but also all-round classic they are seen to be today. Additionally, many other mainstream medians were adapted in to film for this genre, such as Stephen King's The Shining. 
Moving in to the late 1990's and 21st century, critically acclaimed successes such as Silence of the Lambs and Blair Witch Project were released, once again redefining the genre with stellar performances and memorable charterers. In the modern day horror films are a common sight in cinemas, with franchises such as Saw and Scream  becoming little more than a cash grab to make money. However, newer, more original horror films are still being released, such as Cloverfield and 28 Days Later, two very different takes on the now ever popular genre       

 



      

Short film analysis

Under the stairs

The film begins with a shot of the ceiling, that then tilts down to show a large corridor that is lit by lights on the ceiling, with doors on each side of the corridor. This cuts to a close up of a women typing on a laptop, cutting again to a wide shot of her lying on her bed while working on the laptop. In all shots, the diegetic sound of someone crying can be heard through the walls, muffled slightly in each shot.

The shot continues with the character noticing the sound of crying and getting up to listen, calling out, asking if they are ok. This then cuts back and forth between a close up shot of her face pressed upon the wall listening to the crying person, again asking how they are. This flickers back to the original wide shot of her on the bed in a empty room, and then back to the close up. After this it jump cuts to a close up of a  kettle boiling, with a load piercing sound going with it, startling the viewer. This is then proceeded by close up shot of her pouring the water in to a mug, then a wide shot of her in the kitchen, where her cat jumps on to the kitchen counter, emphasising the cat as it plays an important role later in the film.

This then cuts to a head shot of the women looking across the room again, listening to the crying once more. Following this, a wide panning shot plays, with her walking from the kitchen back in to the bedroom, placing her head on the wall again. The same close up of this is used again, were she asks if the crying person wants some tea. The camera then goes back to the wide shot of the room from before, having her pick up her laptop, which is the only source of light in the room, walking back in to the kitchen with it. While she walks past an open door way, an ominous non diegetic sound plays, a common technique used in horror films, while the light highlights a figure in the doorway, watching her, which only the audience notices.

The wide shot continues to pan around the room, following her back in to the kitchen, were she opens a cabinet to look inside. The unsettling silence of the scene is then broken by the loud diegetic bangs on the front door next to her, startling both her and the audience. The scene continues, panning around once again as she opens the door, only to find none is stood there.

The camera then has a close up head shot of her looking outside the door, pocking her head around the frame. This is followed by a point of view shot of her looking down the corridor, panning from left to right, showing nothing but an empty room. This moment of tense quietness is then again broken by a sharp sound, this time the thud of her cat running out the open door and down the hallway. This cuts back to the women at a close up shot of her faces, showing the small shock she felt from this, which then zooms outwards to show more of the corridor, were she walks out and shuts the door. The scene then cuts to a wide shot of the cat sitting, staring at her from the top of the stairs.

Moving on from this, the camera show a low angle shot of the women, looking up at her from the bottom of the stairs as she peers down them. This then cuts to a point of view shot of her looking down the stairs, which quickly cuts back to the low angle shot of her again. The camera then has a wide shot of the stair case going down, which slowly pans across revealing the cat sitting by a door, meowing. This cuts to a long show od the women walking down the stairs, tilting down as she does, revealing the same figure as before standing bellow the staircase, with the same non diegetic sound playing again. All the time this is happening the sound of the person crying can be heard once again.

The camera then cuts to a low level shot of the cat by the door, with the characters hand appearing and picking up the cat, tilting the camera with it to show a medium shot of her holding the cat. At this happens, load non diegetic music begins, with a gradually increasing volume and pitch, presenting a feeling of panic and fear. The camera then pans around to her walking up the stairs, with the figures from before much closer now, clearly in shot as she walks up the stairs. There is then a quick cut to a low level close up shot of her legs as she walks up the stairs, which slowly cranes up with her as she ascends. A hand comes out from under the stairs and grabs her leg tightly. The camera then cuts sharply to a close up of her face, as she pulls her head backwards and creams in pain. The camera cuts to a long shot of the cat running down the stairs, which is then followed by a birds eye view shot, showing the whole staircase, with the women then being pulled under the stairs by the hand as she continues to scream, all while the loud non diegetic music is ear piercingly load at this point.

The scene lingers on that shot for a few seconds, until finally cutting to a close up shot of a step on the staircase, which cranes down the steps to show the mysterious and evil figure that dragged the women underneath staring directly at the camera, clearly showing the demonic look of her character. The camera then continues to crane past until finally fading to black, showing the title of the film.   



Preliminary - Elliptical Version

Preliminary - Full Version

Film Idea

Comedy

Untitled Project

One night a man is having a dream about watching his favourite cartoon show while eating a bowel of cereal when suddenly he's dropped onto the side of a busy road. Still eating his cereal (because who'd waist cereal) he just stands there for a moment a watches, suddenly a man walks out into the road assuming its safe to cross but is suddenly struck down by a car. We hear a siren going off and as we see the man running to help, the siren becomes his clock alarm and he wakes up.

Having woken up he thinks nothing of it and goes down to get some cereal, while eating he decides to watch some TV, flicking the TV on it happens to be playing the exact same episode of his favourite cartoon show that he saw in his dream. He thinks is weird but might just be a happy coincident and continues to sing along with the theme tune.

10 Minutes Later; He gets up, put the bowel in the wash, turns the TV off and walks down the street. As he walks down he begins to look around as if the street today looks exactly the same as in his dream but never the less he carries on. Then he stops and see's a man about to cross the road but unknown to the mas crossing there is a car heading straight towards him.

As our hero pulls back the unsuspecting man we hear a screech on wheels, a loud bang and loads of screams as a man further up is struck by the oncoming car. We see that he isn't in the right place and looks over to see the man on the floor as he think to himself 'Why do I bother helping people! He wasn't even in the right place!'

Horror

Sweet Dreams

Its night time on a cold, suburban street, the street lamps flicker as we then see a young man running down the street shouting for help. He continues to run shouting for help, claiming someone is after him before cutting to him suddenly jumping up in bed. The warm light from his bedroom lamp shines across the room as his clock reads 3:00am, he decides to try and go back to sleep.

Suddenly his bedroom light begins to flicker off and on, a wind begins to whip up in his room as we hear a creepy voice from another room, he gets up to investigate and opens his bedroom door but suddenly he's within a college which is completely empty. He continues to hear the creepy laugh as he walks down the corridor.

Suddenly he hears circus music playing from one of the class rooms, as he opens the door and walks through he notices a clown stood with what seems to be a pig person, the face of a pig but with the body of a man, he begins to back away but they both advance on him. He darts out of the room followed by them both and as he runs down the corridor he stumbles and falls to the floor.

As he hits the floor we realise that he's now in a field somewhere but the clown and pig man are no where to be seen. He continues to walk through the field, the creepy voice appears again saying 'You'll never be able to escape me' and as he's saying this two bright light are racing towards him, we hear the sound of a car engine getting louder and louder before the hitting him we cut back to him waking up in his class.

The teacher walks over and says 'Maybe if you didn't stay up all night then you wouldn't fall asleep in my class!', the student apologises and begins to start his work again when we hear the creepy laugh one last time, the room goes dark apart from a spot light on him as the clown and pig man pop up either side of him and pull him to the floor. Before cutting to black we see a dark figure wearing all back, he faces is covered in make-up just like the Joker. He looks directly towards the camera and says 'Nightmares aren't just for night time, Sleep Tight' Screams and cries for help can be heard in the background as he stares directly into the camera laughing as both the picture and sound becomes distorted.

Film Idea

Film Idea: Hostage

A man walking on a street accidentally drops but after looking up he is then chloroformed by two masked men and is taken to an undisclosed location.

One man holds the tied up man on chair at gunpoint while the other one starts gently stroking a knife, but after some threatening complaints made by the intruders, the hostage recognises their voices and room to realise they are his friends, so they both take their masks off clueless as they thought their disguise was perfect.

The hostage asks to be released but Friend #1 starts threatening with blunt objects and goes all aggressive on him, but the hostage keeps a straight face and declines his offer, making Friend #1 gutted. Friend #2 tries the nice guy approach but Friend #1 shoves him out of the way and decides to just kill him.

Both friends start to fight giving time for the hostage to escape the ropes, but Friend #1 gets upper hand an plans to shoot, but finds it's out of bullets and goes out of his room to get them.

Friend #1 finds some in his mother's drawer and hears noises in the room nearby and finds Friend #2 reading one of his mother's magazine's, but then asks who is watching the hostage, and finds he has escaped.

The hostage runs out of the house and runs into the street but finds his friends threatening him again, the hostage asks what they want from him, and they say he owes them £2.50 from an old Xbox game they bought him from the pawn shop, as he run out of money.

The hostage gets his wallet out and starts to have a rant about them but then gets hit by a car. The friends get his wallet and find his money, saying its a job well done.

Film Idea

Film Idea - Copy-cat Murderer

 

 

A guy is down on his luck, just living at home all the time, watching TV all day. On the news, there are reports about a mass serial killer around the area, showing all the people he has killed and the panic it's creating.
 

After a couple weeks, he becomes obsessed with the killer, starts idolizing, with lots of shots of him watching all his news reports. Eventually he decides to he wants to become a killer to, through some sick point of view that the killer is his hero.

A montage of him training and hyping himself up to become a killer starts, with lots of physical humour in it. Such as googling murder techniques, stabbing a teddy bear, and practising a 'menacing' voice.

Eventually he goes to kill his first victim, a random person walking in a park. He gets ready to kill them, and runs up. The person turns around to the sound of him running over and calmly asks what he wants. The killer stands and stares in silence where he panics and runs away.  

About a week later, we see him just sat at home, like before, watching TV, living his boring life again, re-creating the original scenes.