Evaluation Question- 1) In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

Different genre films have different codes and conventions which make them identify themselves from other film genres. This goes for slasher films as well as any others. Slasher films convey their conventions in an appropriate way to the genre and in our trailer we used and challenged them in many different ways. For instance, every slasher film has a final girl, which is the quiet virginal girl of the group that ultimately survives until the end and confronts the monster. We have used this convention in out trailer as we didn't feel appropriate challenging those conventions as it is quite iconic of the horror genre. As well as that it was an integral part of our slasher story line.


Our final girl is Nora and we tried to portray her in a typical 'final girl' way. The term 'final girl' originally comes from a film theorist Carol Clover who wrote a book 'Men, women and chainsaw's' which talked about the difference between gender representations in horror. She claimed that the final girl in many horror films is represented as a social outcast and not a rebel in any way. However she does have a sense of appeal about her and Clover claims that she is the person that drives the narrative forward and appears masculine at the end due to the weapon choice to confront the monster with. These are usually knifes, chainsaws, hangers etc. and are used as phallic symbols to be used against the monster in a penetrative method. In our trailer we see Nora being quite quiet and wearing cardigans and plain coloured clothing as opposed to the other girl, who is the sexually promiscuous friend. We wanted to represent our final girl in this conventional way as lovers of the genre could then identify with our storyline as they could see the familiarity it has to other horror films in that aspect. It was important to us to make Nora be easily identified with.

Another convention of horror that we have followed is to have the sexually promiscuous teenage girl. This is usually a character that is friends with the final girl, is a part of the group but is the total opposite of what the final girl is. She is usually represented in a sexual way, wearing short skirts or short and tight fitted clothing in general. It is also conventional of that character to die first. In our trailer that character is represented through Crystal Lake. We decided for her name to come from the popular slasher film 'Friday the 13th' as it provides the audience with a textual reference between that and our film. That is not however the only thing in our trailer that has a textual reference. Eve's red coat and the shot of the splash of water is reminiscent of the 1973 film 'Don't look now' which shows a little girl drowning in water and follows her parents coming to terms with her death. In that film, the little girl wears a red jacket so we used that in our trailer to create reference between the two.

As well as using mise en scene in her clothing to represent her promiscuity, we also used montage editing and shots in line with the male gaze. With the matched action of the running scene we see Crystal running in a loose fitting top which creates a sense of voyeurism and goes in line with Laura Mulvey's male gaze theory as Crystal is shot in a sexually appealing way. As well as using that shot to represent Crystal’s character, it also shows aspects of German Expressionism with the use of the twigs and branches which is reminiscent of the use of shadows to create effect in the German expressionism era.  

We based our synopsis on Todorov's narrative theory as our trailer does have a beginning, middle and an end. The audience can see that in our trailer as at the beginning we can see the group of friends walking down the street which represents their equilibrium, the start of their story. It is also quite formulaic as from that shot the audience can identify that this is a teen based horror film and in that way the horror genre is conveyed. The equilibrium is soon disturbed when the friends find themselves in the woods and start getting attacked one by one and with Nora's get away, the equilibrium is again restored. This basic structure of film is often used therefore we used it in our trailer as well to give the audience more to identify with. 

  At the beginning of our trailer it is not obvious who the killer is as we first see Eve playing in the park on the swing. The nursery rhyme she is singing together with the setting around her represents her as quite innocent and unthreatening. With the black and white shot of her face dissolving to the empty swing and the use of that montage editing represent her disappearance. This is then echoed in the dissolve from a fence to a face of the man warning the kids of the woods. Through this use of editing and making the shots black and white, the man becomes a suspect linked with her death to the audience and as well as that becomes a red hearing that keeps them questioning what happened to the little girl. In those shots, we used montage editing and visual language to lead the audience through the storyline.

It could also be said that the shadows of the branches in the swing shot also represent aspects of German Expressionism and create a psychological landscape of the film as the broken and dark shadows of the branches represent the broken and fractured narrative of what happened to the little girl.

We broke the convention of having the monster wear a mask as we wanted to create more tension and
keep the audience guessing as to who the monster in the film is. It is not clear at times as at the beginning of the trailer we see Eve behind a tree, looking down, hidden and unhappy, which shows her as the victim of the monster. The makeup we applied to her eyes also give out a sullen and corpse like effect, so the audience can see through that and the shot of the empty swing that this girl is dead. The use of the little girl creates anxiety as it is unsettling to the audience to think of the little girl as a victim and see her dead. The way she looks up, like she is looking at the group of friends, and then down reflects that the things
happening to the group are going to be sad just like the things that happened to her. The shot helps maintain the tone of the film as it creates suspense, which is conventional for horror trailers/films, as the audience are not yet told directly who the killer is.

This shot is repeated when we see the characters Tony and Keith discussing their escape from the woods. They are shot the same was that Eve was shot before, behind the tree, and this technique of parallel shots is very popular in classic cinema as they help convey narrative. The similarity of the shots make people have no doubt about the fact that they are now being chased by the little girl.

The first clue the audience is given to show them that Eve is the monster in the trailer is when the title first appears on screen. With the title, we used Levi Strauss' binary opposites theory as although the title is written in a quite a childish handwriting, which ultimately suggests innocence, the red mirror reflection of it creeping towards the audience represent her evil side. That one shot sums up the whole narrative as the audience now know that this innocent young girl was once good but something happened to her to make her evil. This is again highlighted later on in our trailer with the shot of Eve smiling behind a tree. The montage of the group of friends dying paired up with her laughing and smiling behind the tree shows her as evil. The meaning at that point is set in concrete and the audience don’t have to question the fact that she is now evil.

As well as using lots of montage editing, matched action etc. we used semantic codes to tell the story. This happens with the shot of someone watching the group of friends from behind a car which gets the audience asking from whose point of view the story is told. It is originally the teens but that shot changes perspective and shifts that as the story is told from Eve's point of view. 

Among all these conventions of horror films, we also constructed out trailer using common conventions of typical trailers. We added the logos of other film companies that were involved with the making and producing of our film at the beginning which is the convention of trailers so that the audience know who was involved in the film. We also added the name of our film in the middle which was not in our original story boards as we didn't think it was necessary but soon realised that adding it would create a better effect and the audience could get a chance to familiarise themselves better with the film. Another convention we followed was having the end card at the end with the name of our film on it again and the names of the cast and crew which again is conventional for trailers. Of course we followed the typical structure of trailers having it start of slowly, telling the story and then building up the tension through the montage sequence at the end with fast paced short shots and added a voiceover which works with conjunction with the captions to explain aspects of the narrative that are not obvious through editing.

 
My film poster, as well as my trailer, is very conventional of other film posters. The conventional of any film poster is to have the image representing the name of the film, the name of the film, age certificate, principle cast and crew etc. The image on my final poster is one of Eve standing in the
woods which gives the audience an idea of what the narrative is but doesn't automatically makes people think that she is evil. She looks confused in the poster and that is due to the fact that it was important for us to have the audience wonder who the killer is and what the overall story is actually about. We used the same typography from out trailer for our poster to distinguish the brand identity between the trailer and ancillary products. I also included the date of release on the poster which is conventional to have on posters and lets the audience know when the film can be watched. Overall, the poster I created is very conventional of other film posters.



The magazine I created is also quite conventional for horror magazines. Because the film we are
creating is an independent film and is made on a low budget, I was afraid that if I was to do something out of the ordinary and break conventions it may have backfired and made the film not desirable to watch. Hence why I used popular conventions and coded them in a way in which the audience could easily identify with the film. That's the main reasons why i chose to make a magazine cover for the 'Fangoria' magazine. 'Fangoria' is a magazine aimed at teenagers and young adults and is primarily based on horror films, reviews, competitions etc. This magazine however, is the only product that breaks my film's brand identity and that is due to the fact that 'Fangoria' has established their own image and their own identity so I had to follow that of the magazine rather than that of my trailer and poster. That's why I didn't use the same typography for the name of my film as i did on the poster and trailer. I did, however, put a picture of Eve on the front cover which again shows her standing in the woods. For the rest of the magazine I used typical conventions and structure of magazines like including a banner, main story, in this case my own film Eve, the feature stories to attract attention, mentions of competitions etc. I also added a Facebook and Twitter logo so that the audience can use social media to get in touch with the magazine which would ultimately create a wider audience as social media is now a very popular form and source of information.