Response to Brief

The first scene from a horror movie I remember seeing was The Classroom Trap from Saw III (2006).

        

 I was age 6, which is insane to think about since the Saw movies are some of the most grotesque and twisted films in more modern horror. I remember I was at a sports leisure centre going to my daily karate and trampolining clubs when I ran over to my stepdad who was watching the movie on his laptop. Although I didn't understand the plot and what Troy had to do to escape, I was aware of the torture device and didn't really get freaked out too much; if anything I thought it was very different and interesting! 

And that is how my love for gore began. My parents didn't allow me to watch horror movies at such a young age, but as I got older I started to watch films that weren't extreme such as the Paranormal Activity (2007-2015) movies where the base of the film was a very basic idea e.g. the Paranormal Activity movies (are all recorded on handheld camera and through security cameras in the houses the films are set in) show normal people living everyday lives until a couple of jumpscares occur and things get more insane to the end.

Watching the Classroom Trap (Troy's death) scene again more than a decade after I first saw it, it did make me wince more, but gore is my favourite sub-genre in horror movies and the cringe I feel from positioning myself in the characters' shoes when they die or are put in insane contraptions such as in the Saw movies is disturbingly thrilling.

One of my favorite parts of a horror movie are unique deaths and as a person whose favourite genre of film is horror its very hard to find death ideas that haven't already been shown, which is why I love the Saw movies since they always think of new bizarrely creative torture devices as well as making you really wonder if they will survive, and if it involves more than one person, who will survive. 

One of the smartest horror movies that I've seen recently has to be Unfriended (2014); the fact that the movie is shot from the perspective of one of the characters as well as a laptop screen (since the film uses social media as the way to tell the story) really immerses you and the deaths very incredibly intriguing to me. DISCLAIMER: some of the death scenes below are extremely grotesque and not for the faint-hearted.

As more characters died, I realized that their deaths were foreshadowed earlier in the movie: Ken Smith, the character who dies by the blender (02:20 in the clip) raised it up and was talking about it in the skype call earlier:

Ken: "Now to try some of my famous brew of salsa!"

[brandishes mixed up blender of food and drink to group]

Blaire: "Ken that is so disgusting!"

[laughing] 

Jess Felton, a character who was seen to either be playing with her hair or nails throughout the movie dies by being internally burnt by the same hair straighteners she is seen using at the beginning of the movie (04:30 in the clip) when all of the friends begin their group call:

Jess: "[sarcastically whilst straightening her hair] Blaire you're a dirty girl,..."

Though I like extreme gore it does freak me out as it would anybody else, I had to look away at Jess's death scene because I had never seen it before, and most of the deaths in the Saw films still make me flinch and quiver.

Another horror movie that I'll never forget is Hush (2016) which has an incredible twist unlike any other horror film: the protagonist is deaf. Madison Young, the protagonist, is left alone in her isolated home in the woods as a masked killer teases and attempts to kill her. Because Madison is deaf, it opened doors to some incredible concepts in the film such as the viewer knowing more than Madison because we can hear the sounds around her and how close the killer is to her at times where she has no idea; the death of her friend and neighbor Sarah shows this.

Another scene in Hush that was so emotional to me was the scene where Madison is left feeling helpless after trying to fight off the masked murderer and accepts her fate of death as she types a description of the killer on her laptop to leave behind for the police when they find her; the shot where we can see both Madison typing and the killer breaking the glass on the door is so effective since we can see how close she is to death (01:08:10 in clip below).

I think that Hush will really inspire my final of a horror trailer and poster because of the psychological aspect to it; as a lover of gore and physical danger I find the idea of exposure to danger on a mental level very fascinating, I think it leaves a huge impact on the viewer since it plays with their mind also (unlike with physical danger since the viewer cannot get hurt). I would also like my movie's plot to be modern because it would be a lot more relatable since it will be set in the same time period as us. Movies such as Unfriended that has a focus on social media and everyday technology and It Follows (2014) which is about gaining a supernatural entity after having a sexual encounter can really scare people since they are very realistic settings in the sense that people use technology and have sexual encounters usually.

I am very excited to explore the film side to the project. As an aspiring film director this will be my first time producing a project that focuses entirely on movies. I can't wait to learn more about the use of shots, editing, sound, etc as it will show me a clearer understanding of the industry I will work in in the future.