The document discusses plans for an original vampire film that challenges some Gothic horror conventions. It will show the protagonist vampire feeding to survive, rather than for pleasure, and struggling to hide his true nature from others. The opening title sequence will create mystery through symbolic shots and a nonlinear structure. It will be inspired by Dexter, Zombieland, and Twilight in its portrayal of a vampire attempting to live an ordinary life. The film aims to attract a male audience aged 15-21 by emphasizing the gore and complex plot over typical vampire romance elements.
2. The subgenre
The horror subgenre that we have chosen is Gothic Horror
Under this we have chosen to focus on vampires
3. Researching Gothic Horror
From research we learned:
There are many conventions with Gothic horrors, such as a limited
pallet of black and white
They are based on gothic fiction novels
Most gothic horrors were made in the early 20th century such as
Dracula made in 1931.
4. Conventions of Gothic horrors –
Mise en scene
Mise en scene is not very important in creating the horror due to
most being made before better technology was available.
Limited pallets are used of black and whites to highlight the rich red
colour of blood
There is a high emphasis on lighting to create mood
5. Conventions –Narrative structure
The narrative structure is usually in the form of a story or a tale of the
“monsters” who make up the antagonist role in the story
The structure is conventionally linear as follows the protagonist in
their battle against the monster
6. Conventions- Plot
The plot involves a monster or non-human antagonist whom
dominates the main plot to the story
The main plot also has a sub plot of a romance, usually involving the
protagonist
7. Conventions- Camera
Low angle shots are used to show the dominance and control of the
monsters
Zoom ins of thought to be empty rooms building tension
Two shots to show tension between two characters
8. Conventions- Editing
Fade to black shots are used to conclude many scenes or films
Sound bridges used to continue the tension from one scene to the
next
Quick cuts (fast paced editing) used to show the characters danger
9. Conventions- Sound
Non- diegetic music used throughout
Dramatic changes in volume used to emphasise danger, for
example dead silence with a sudden break into scream
Fast paced music when characters are scared mimicking their
emotions
10. The plot
Protagonist is an ordinary blood specialist doctor
Protagonist has recurring nightmares of something chasing him until
one night he is bitten
He wakes up with a bite mark
Turns into a vampire and has a lust for blood
He starts by eating animals and people get suspicious
He moves on to eating people
People don’t realise that he is a vampire
He tries to go about an everyday life while eating people in his
spare time to fulfil his lust
His neighbour is always suspicious of him
He has to bite him to stop him from telling anyone
11. Conventions in our film
We will reinforce conventions of a vampire who has to hide himself
from everyday people. This makes the plot more relatable to an
audience as not many people would accept a vampire into their
community.
We will then challenge conventions as vampires are usually shown
to kill for fun, we will show our vampire to eat in order to survive. This
makes the protagonist more relatable to the audience as they can
understand why he has to do what he does and therefore they can
sympathise with him.
12. We will create enigmas by….
This will be achieved by not introducing the character or exactly
what he is in the OTS.
We will show symbols of what he does but not be clear
We will then not show the protagonist's face in the OTS
13. Type of OTS
The OTS will be a mixture between a non-linear and symbolic
This will leave us able to show cuts of what he does without giving
too much away
This will also allow us to create enigmas through the use of symbols
14. Character representation
The protagonist will be represented as someone not in control
He will be someone that is simply fulfilling his need to feed allowing
him to relate to an audience as we will see everything from his
perspective
This will also create sympathy for the character himself
15. Character representation
The antagonist, the neighbour, will be the only person who sees
through the protagonist for the vampire that he is
He will be represented as moody and always cautious towards the
protagonist
As the audience sees all events in the protagonists eyes, this will
create the neighbour to be perceived as frustrating and to be wary
of.
16. Inspirational film 1
Dexter
This also shows a person who is hiding his true personality as feels will
not be accepted by anyone
We see his struggle for human connection and also has a work
colleague, Sargent Dokes who sees him for how he really is
17. Dexter This cut from the OTS of Dexter highlights the
protagonist’s love for blood
This also shows how the
charcter does what he
does behind the image
of an ordinary life. This is
shown through blood
and gore being shown
in a morning routine
We will use this
idea of hidden
symbolism in our
OTS to create a
similar idea of
hiding
18. Inspirational film 2
Zombieland
This is mainly due to the effect use of blood and gore shown in the
OTS
The use of slow motion and effective mise en scene really highlights
the gore in a light hearted way
19. Zombieland
The collection of
slow motion non
linear shots work
really well to
highlight events
rather than
establish any
characters. This will
help us when we
are trying to create
enigmas.
20. Inspirational film 3
Twilight
This non-conventional, modern twist to a vampire film is similar to
what we are trying to achieve
The use of having to hide is shown in twilight as well as showing how
normal people do not accept vampires
The conventional traits are also there, such as the lust for blood,
which we can look at and use in our film
22. Our unique selling point
There are not many, if any, modern vampire films that show them
feeding for lust rather than just for pleasure
The idea of having a single character that is relatable but a killer at
the same time is not very common
23. Target audience
We will not be targeting the stereotypical audience of vampire films
due to our lack of romance and increased level of gore
Due to this we will be targeting males of around the age of 15-21
The increased amount of gore and a lifestyle focused more around
killing and the struggles which follow will relate more to this group of
people.
24. We will attract our audience by…
This will be achieved by highlighting and advertising the gore and
plot to the story rather than the vampire side to the story
This will attract this audience as vampires are associated as more a
female genre with the biting being more sexual
Focusing on the gore and complex structure to the plot will hook
more people and allow the audience to feel empathy for the
characters.