Remember the unnameable class movie we decided to make last year? Yup, we decided to try it again and see if this time it would work!  After an intense Horror Unit, which involved reviewing horror in film, and literature, we came to the conclusion that horror is ultimately a mirror for our own internal struggle.

By coming to this conclusion we were to create a short film in the horror genre that responds to the project’s driving question:

How does horror reflect and comment on our society?

This Horror film was supposed to be engaging, entertaining, of high quality, and it must demonstrate our deep knowledge of the horror genre by including Elizabeth Barrette’s “Elements of Aversion: What Makes Horror Horrifying?” in to our story. This project came with very high expectations that were very soon excited to get started on. After last year’s project we realized our mistakes and we were sure we could learn from them and make this project a much better one, or so we thought.

The project started with an application for different positions. Our Executive Producers; Petra Willemse, and Bryan Hughes,(Our Teachers) would be in charge of picking these positions. I applied for the position of Producer, but my teachers saw me more fit to be part of the Production Design team. This team included our DRI Michael Fourie, and Stanfield Chui. This position involved creating a series of storyboards that serve as the film’s first draft. Creating these storyboards also ensures the visual continuity of the film throughout.

Why do we need Production Designers?

Being part of the production designing team does not only mean you create storyboards. The most important part of our job was ensuring we maintained the scriptwriter’s vision, and didn’t create our own. This was possible by communicating with them and making sure that what we produced and created represented their idea of the movie. We were also vital to the production of this film as we serve as the director’s visual guide throughout the filming process and the storyboards also help the editor throughout the editing process.

Learning from the process:

My first storyboard is one that I wouldn’t be very proud of. It was very rushed and I didn’t understand how important it was to include notes about, setting, character positions, and camera angles. After storyboarding for 18 scenes I was soon a “pro” at storyboarding. I became familiar with new camera angles, and understood how to successfully use them to spook the audience.

 

Feeling Unnecessary :

Story boarding is very time consuming, and it requires detailed work. One day I was curious to see how filming was going so I decided to go and see the process for myself. I was very disappointed to see that the storyboards Michael, Stanfield and I had spent so much time on were being forgotten and weren’t used or followed during filming. The directors, cinematographers, and actors were almost “winging” it and did not refer to out work. This made me feel like my position was almost unnecessary and was not important to the project.

The Learning:

All horror is ultimately a mirror for our own internal struggle, and causes a sense of relief.

Elements of Aversion: all horror have common motifs

Elements of Absence: Takes away our comfort

• The unknown: primal fear, anything can happen
• The unexpected: reversal of expectation, confuses
• The  unseen: something we never see, therefore it grabs our attention, curiosity
• The unbelievable – beyond belief,
• The unconscious: fear of what you may not be able to control within yourself
• The unstoppable: what we can’t do anything about, not in our hands to control, ie: the supernatural

Elements of Presence: adds an intrusion on our comfort

• Helplessness: Lack of control, relate to the feeling of helplessness
• Urgency: The feeling that something has to be done, variables place pressure on the action
• Pressure: Build of tension adding to the resolution
• Intensity: Senses heighten, increased emotion, enhances emotion. Ao powerful it can drown out common sense
• Rhythm: Initial, climax, and resolution of tension. Pattern of intensity/events. The lack of pattern to be disruptive
• Release: The end, lets us let the story go, you made it, you can forget about it

The viewing of the Film “Locked In”:

Watching what we had produced was a time of realization. I came to understand that we got very side tracked with the making of the movie and getting it done, that we forgot to make sure we answered the driving question.

While the movie does address some aspects of Horror; such as the character tropes ,  the final production does not reflect a personal struggle of mine and does not have a deep hidden meaning. After deeply analyzing horror films such as “Halloween“, and “The Exorcist” we come to realize that everything is put there for a reason and everything has an underlying purpose such as using the certain fears to comment on our society. Unfortunately the film did not have those secret hidden ideologies put into it. I feel so bad saying this but I feel like it needs to be said that this movie turned out being more comedic than serious and was very close to being a parody.

While viewing the finalized product I was able to take notes on the highlights and the negatives of the film. Although our movie had some highlights, it would still need a lot of retakes, editing, and major script adjustments to be the finalized product we would’ve wanted. To address and respond to the driving question, I feel like we should’ve used a more realistic plot that ultimately would’ve been more relatable. The  truth is I couldn’t relate to the plot even though I am a student and could potentially be put in a situation very similar to the one portrayed in “Locked In”.

http://https://m.youtube.com/watch?feature=youtu.be&v=KwD8aCgTo30

https://m.youtube.com/watch?feature=youtu.be&v=KwD8aCgTo30