Horror Movie Research - Shrooms (2007)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1L-pJyGZhRM

This film is about 3 couples that go to Ireland woods to collect magic mushrooms on a trip out. On their way they meet some strange inhabitants of the woods and it doesn't take long until a creepy story is being told at the campfire which might be more than just a story. So strange things happen, people start disappearing, silhouettes move through the woods and the creepy story starts to melt into reality. The horror kicks in along with the effect of the mushrooms.

 

This film opens with the credits and a low rumbling sound repetidly getting louder and quieter like a drum. Ontop of this a violin is playing in a minor scale slowly, creating a sad, slow atmosphere.

The opening credits fade in and out quickly.

Fast, breathing is played as a black screen is shown. The sound of the breathing suggests that it's a female, which is sterotypical for a horror movie as females are seen as vunerable and weak.

The breathing gradually becomes louder and follows with a tracking shot of legs running quickly through a wooded area giving the impression that they're far away from safe houses and help.

The scene is shot at dusk and the person running is surrounded by fog. This shot contradicts the music being played as the sound and movement is tense and fast pace while the sound is sad and mysterious like.

This can make the audience worried as it gives the effect that the person doesn't know where they're running to and can make them question why they're running in the first place.

A straight edit to a shot looking up at a gloomy, big, old looking building is shown, setting the scene.
 Ambient sound builds up which sounds twisted creating a spooky affect.
The trees move in time with the music making a more spooky atmosphere.

A straight edit is shown of what appears to be either blood, goo or something of the sort, emerging slowly from a bucket creating a twisted feel to the film.

Splattered blood on the walls is shown which can make viewers feel uneven and question how the blood got there.

The shots in this openeing are discoloured and appear in a cool blue tone making the picture unclear and mysterious, linking in with the ambient sound. Also the screen picture is faded in a circle shape, perhaps suggesting that the viewer is looking through someone's eye.  The shots are put together at a fast pace as they are put together with straight edits, increasing the intensity from the viewers perspective. 

Rustling, ambient sounds are also played which creates more suspense.

A shot is shown at floor level of blood trailing towards the camera.

The next shot is showing the person's feet running again through leaves, not showing the face of the person.

A dark, gloomy corridoor is shown, suggesting that it's inside the building that was shown before. As this shot is shown, a screaching, unpleasant sound adds to the twisted, tense affect. Unclear objects at the other end of the corridoor are shown making also add to the tense atmosphere.

The next show it of a hand that is vigourusly shaking and covered with blood. This is offputting and can make the viewer question what is happening as nothing has been revealed.

A low, abnormal breathing sound is played as a blurry, dark figure moves oddly, also adding to the twisted feel to the film.

The fast breathing of the female is repeated again as the shot is showing her running another time, linking the different shots together, yet leaving lots of unanswered questions for the viewer to think about.

Some odd shots (shown above) of what looks like rope that's being moved slowly and a straight edit to another shot that is unclear to what it is showing builds the mysterious factor of this film.

A mid-shot of someone with their hands possibly tied behind their back and a mesh bag over their head is quickly shown suggesting that they've been taken hostage. 

This shot (above) quickly changes back to two different camera angles of the female running. Viewers still don't know why she's running which builds up more tention every time the camera is showing her running.

An extreme close up of a nose and mouth with a hand infront holding something is shown in a grey scale tone, keeping to a dull lighting throughout the opening of this film. The face and hand is shaking extremely quickly for an unknown reason. A squeaking sound is played when this shot is shown.

A straight edit is used to show maggots squirming grossly on mud or something unknown. This can make the viewer feel uncomfortable as what is shown is unpleasent.

The next shot looks like the camera looking through a keyhole at the shilloette standing on the other side. The dark shilloette is blurry and unclear of the gender but is clearly shown holding either a long knife, pole, bat or something of the sort.

Yet another shot is shown of the paniced girl running through the leaves. The repetativeness of this shot can make viewer think that she doesn't know where she's going and she may be lost. This shot carries on and she looks around as if something was chasing her. The camera follows her glance but the shot quickly changes.

A hooded figure (to the left) turns smoothly around to face the camera and a few creaking sounds to add to it. This changes to a straight edit to zooming in of what looks like the end of a log (below)

An extreme close up of an eye looking into the camera is shown sideways on the screen. The fact that it's shot sideways adds to the oddness of the film. The close up looks like it's a man older than 40 as he has deep set wrinckles. Around the eye is covered in blood making the viewers unsure if the blood is his or if he's the murderer and it's someone elses blood. The shot zooms into his eye and then fades out to darkness with an odd sound like whispering and creaking.

The blackness is carried out for a few seconds and the sounds fade away too. Maybe suggesting death? As the film so far has created lots of tension and suspense by using short, fast shots, joining them with straight edits and the fact that viewers don't know anything about what's happening in the plot, the suspense is built up even more so now that everything has gone quiet, making the viewers feel that something dreadful is going to happen.

Producer credits are shown in the same font and size as the start of the film.

An overhead *ding* sound is played like one from a plane and a straight edit of a sign telling passengers to fasten their seatbelts as the next straight edit is of somone putting their seatbelt on.

A slow tracking shot down the walkway in a plane is shown as passengers are seated. The shot is at night time so passengers on the plane are quiet as they may be tired and want sleep. The tracking shot stops at a two women.

 A close up of these women is shown in a two shot. To emphasis that the scene is at night, one of them has a sleeping mask on and pulls it off, squinting at the light.

A shot of a book is shown which looks like a journal and zooms into the picture in the book.

An over the shoulder shot is used of them quietly talking and another shot of closing the journal. On the front of the book it says, 'CATHOLIC UNIVERSITY DIARY'. This can suggest that her university has been on a trip or is going on a trip and this Catholic woman is recording what she does.

Shot reverse shots are used as they speak to one another about what was in the journal.

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A straight edit to a black sceen suddenly appears and a screeching sound which sounds like a plane landing is played as the title 'SHROOMS' appears on the screen. This fades out into the blackness as an instrument gently starts to play.

Group Discussion - 19/12/12

Today we disscused what sort of horror film we would be creating. We have thought about doing a thriller, crime, mystery etc. type of horror.
We liked the idea of doing a crime horror and have thought about filming a murder for our openeing to introde the film as a murder mystery type film.

Our idea that we came up with was that two girls in a two shot (Chelsea and I) who are either sisters or friends go outside to feed the chickens at the end of a normal, casual day; so it would be dark outside. They hear some odd noises coming from inside the woods next to their house. A silhouette of a human like figure is shown and a scream is heard echoing into the distance by one of the girls. A torch is shown, in slow motion, falling to the ground. A first person shot of the other girls running towards the house as you can hear her terrified, heavy breathing.
At this point we had three ideas. One of these was her tripping over and being pulled into the shadows, screaming that fades.
Another idea was for the girl to carry on running but she hit her head on something as she trips over. When she wakes she's dazed and in a horrible looking room.
The last thought we had was that she carried on running to the house. When she was inside we liked the idea of shooting the next shot from the outside of the window looking in at her explaining to her parents. The shot of the parents comforting her becomes unfocused and in the foreground a hand is placed on the window for a brief moment and slides off, leaving a mark on the window.

Horror Movie Research - Let Me In (2010)

Let Me In, directed by Matt Reeves, is about a bullied young boy that befriends a young female vampire who lives in secrecy with her guardian.
I chose this film because the soundtrack to the opening of this film drew me in and stood out as a good exaple of a horror movie. I thought that the sounds used were quite threatening and the shots used were interesting as they leave the viewer guessing and making up stories in their heads as to what's happening in the film.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yjL7VEFvOxM

While the producer credits are shown on the screen by fading in at the very beginning, an echoing choir is singing in one tone that gradually becomes clearer and louder. Ontop of this, a harp is very slowly playing in a minor tone making the atmosphere sad. The plucks of the harp strings echo so that they end up combining into the sound of the chior singing. The sound drifts off into a minor scale which makes the chior sound haunting almost as it comes across as harsh and drifting out of tone. The sounds put together enhance a scary surrounding making the viewer feel tense and adds to the scary affect making it seem like something is wrong but they don't know what yet so it keeps the viewers guessing the worst.

A black screen is shown and the chior becomes quieter and a fade in of each word of the title is shown in big, bold letters, written in red. The colour red is often reffered to blood and death as it is written infront of a black screen. This may give the viewer an image that death may occur in the film. After the title has fully appeared, the chior fades out into nothing aswell as the title which fades out into blackness once again.

A loud booming drum breaks the silence which repeats while a place and date appears on the screen (Los Alamos, New Mexico, March 1983) which can scare the viewer as this relates more to real life.
The sound of wind builds up before a picture is shown on the screen. The wind gets louder and a low brass instrument accompanies the drum, playing the same haunting note over and over.

A small, orange light is show in the middle of the screen is zoomed into it to see that it's an establishing shot of an ambulance and a few police cars going round a winding road surrounded by some trees. Sirens fade in and become louder as the camera nears closer to re-enforce the audience that they are police cars. This shot can make the viewer interested in what's happening but nervous at the same time as the sirens are on so something must have happened and they're surrounded by trees on a winding road so they could be far away from a safe place.
A factor of mise-en-scene is that this scene is filmed at night as it's pitch black which can scare people as some people are afraid of the dark and most bad things happen at night. I can also be quite threatening as you can't see whats lurking in the dark, if there is anything there or not.

A traking shot of the police cars and an ambulance is shown from in the trees and the sound of the veichles is emphasised to show that they are driving quickly, building suspense to show that they need to get to the desitnation quickly.

A shot shown from the inside the police car is of the front of the window showing that it's snowing heavily as the window-wipers are moving quickly.

 A straight edit to a shot of the radio which has a radio transmission of a man asking for them to reply in code. The voise is stereotypically a man's voice as he must be a police man and this role is stereotypically carried out by a man as they are known to be the braver and stronger gender.

The next straight edit is blurry and isn't very clear as to what it's showing. It seems to show a trolley bed as the camera moves to show the bottom of  the foot of a person that is laying down on the bed. The camera is quite shaky so suggest that it's shot inside of the ambulance. To add to the fact that they're moving quickly, creaking and shaking of the bed and things in the abulance are cluttering noisily.

Scissors are shown cutting the material, supposedly belonging to the person's on the bed showing that he must be injured, leaving the viewers with no idea of what's going on making them wonder how they got there? Who he/ she is with? What's wrong with them? etc.

The hand of the person reaches up and grabs one of the uniformed men who tries to stop him/her. The uniformed man is stereotypically male as it seems they're dealing with something majour and women aren't seen to be able to handle too much pressure and blood.

Another straight edit changes to show the radio again and the voice replying, inside the ambulance describes the 'male' that is injured in the ambulance. This is typical for the person lying on the bed to be a male as they tend to get up to no good and misbehave more than women.

Different shots are shown to be helping the man on the bed  but faces haven't been shown yet so this also adds to the curiosity of the viewers as it leaves things unkown.

Sounds of the patient being sick and making strange noises may freak the viewers out, still not fully understanding whay's happening. The report on the radio said that he had swallowed acid so this could link in which can gross the viewers out and feel his pain almost.

All the while, the brass instrument and drum had been playing quietly in the background, unoticably yet still haunting like.

All sounds come to a sharp, high pitched sound and all is quiet. A straight edit is shown of the back of a man in what looks like a hospital.