2. IN WHAT WAYS DOES YOUR MEDIA PRODUCT
USE, DEVELOP OR CHALLENGE FORMS AND
CONVENTIONS OF REAL MEDIA PRODUCTS?
As a group we researched film openings to identify the convections of our media product, which is
horror with a sub genre of slasher. We looked into films, the main ones being Scream, Unborn
and Chucky, and did further research into the conventions of horror films through the internet
and various books. We invested the most time analyzing Chucky as the plot of our film,
Scarlett, was inspired by that film.
The conventions we found from Chucky:
• Haunted house, an isolated setting
• Pathetic fallacy of stormy weather
• Dark lighting
• Vulnerable child as a victim
• Weak females
• Chucky is in the colour red which has conations of blood and death
• Non-diegetic music to establish the genre
We tried to make our film, Scarlett, to conform to these conventions and challenge them slightly
making our film opening realistic and be successful in the film industry.

3. THE LOCATION
We originally wanted to film in a wood, as this an isolated place is a convention of
horror films. To slightly challenge this we decided to film in a park, the contrast of
a park being an innocent place for children to play added to the creepy element
of Scarlett and also fitted with the plot of the film. The inspiration from the film
Chucky is seen with the use of children and youth. The large tree’s surrounding
the park gave the feeling of isolation which is a convention we wanted to conform
with. The shapes of the trees give our film, Scarlett, a creepy and spooky effect.

4. SOUND
For the non-diegetic sound, we have used royalty free music called ‘Evening of chaos’,
we chose this music as it is disturbing and creates an enigma. For our diegetic
sound we used all three conventions of laughing, screaming and heavy breathing.
The horror conventions of sound is kept with screeching noises, playful child
laughs and nursery rhymes. This is seen in many horror film openings, so will
instantly establish the genre of our film.

5. NARRATIVE
We used ‘Todorov’ and ‘Propp’ in our narrative.
Todorovs theory
• The equilibrium begins with the group of teenagers laughing, drinking and relaxing in the
park.
• The disequilibrium is flash forward to show the survivor being threatened by a possessed doll
and is shown to be scared and frightened. This will be revealed later in the film.
• The new equilibrium will be shown towards the end of our film which will show the survivor
getting on with her life.
Propps theory
This is a convention in slasher horrors, some examples are.
• Protagonist survivor, which we have created as ‘Riley’.
• Villain or killer and in our film opening we have created a doll who is a killer called ‘Scarlett’.
Friday the 13th and Nightmare on elm street use this.

6. LIGHTING
Dark lighting is a convention in horror films as it gives the connotation of mystery. We
tried to film from angles which made the park, which is the area of action, look
scary and dark, so we planned to start filming around four o’clock when it was
beginning to get dark. The sky is dull and you can see the shapes of the trees
towering over them creating a spooky effect. We also used night vision on the
digital video camera, this helps show the flash forward and the dark lighting with
a hint of green/yellow gives a disorientating and scary style to our film. The
lighting helped us, as the directors and producers, to show the evil and negative
atmosphere, which relates to the genre.

7. THE CHARACTERS
We created each character to be individual to show the different stereotypes of
teenagers. Although this isn’t a convention of horror films, we challenged this as
females are usually shown to be weak and black people are usually the first to be
killed. Our main character of the villain, Scarlett, is a female and also the
protagonist, Riley, is also a female and black. This made our horror film-opening
stand out from other horror openings created. Scarlett, our main character in the
film was based on the main character of Chucky, they are both children's toys and
have an innocence about them. Scarlett outfit is very innocent which is a dress
with high knee socks and her hair in two bunchies, we then contrasted this with
her make up of big bold scary eyes and scars, to show threat and establish her as
the villain. We also made her to be very mysterious and making her actions and
laugh to be very haunting.

8. PATHETIC FALLACY
This is a convention in horror films where the weather acts as a human emotion for
example raining and storms occur. This will establish the setting to create the
atmosphere, we therefore used rainy and windy weather for our film. The rain and
wind helps to establish the genre of our film and also keeps our film in the main
conventions of horror films. Many films use the weather to set the eerie
atmosphere as we saw from our research into other film openings for horror films,
for example, Chucky.

9. THEMES
Theme
• good v evil
We showed this through the characters as the teenagers showed the good in their
vulnerability and the evil was shown through Scarlett as she is threatening and
intimidating. This challenges the convention of females being the victim as here in
our film they are shown as strong and intimidating. Chucky, the main idea behind our
film, had this theme as well as they had the young girl as the good and the Chucky as
the evil.