Media evaluation question 1.

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

2. Conventions of a horror.
The forms and conventions of real media products (horror genre and the sub genre of slashers)
are used frequently in our production as we feel that to create a successful slasher/horror, the
basic components of forms and conventions are essential to create the final denouement
towards the audience. A very common convention of a horror movie even more common in a
slasher sub-genre) is setting, the use of small communities and isolated places. We have used
an urban environment (the home) which is one of the most used settings for an opening of the
movie e.g. scream, Halloween and insidious. These movies are very similar through the setting,
especially Halloween where it is once again a female alone being murdered by a boy with a
mask. These locations are emphasises through the use of setting the time at night, connoting
loneliness and foreboding. Isolating being that she is home alone, which foreshadows the
outcome in a horror as we know a basic convention to a woman being alone is that she will be
murdered (femicide). use of darkness creates the vision of the unknown, a fear which everyone
once has experienced in their childhood. This is emphasised through the use of the scene of the
boyfriend parking in the driveway so the audiences notices the darkness and rain, connoting a
pathetic fallacy by attributing human emotion of sadness through the setting. The whole
narrative of the production is a typical convention to a horror sub genre slasher, relating
extremely well to the movie ‘You're next’ where we see a scene in a modern house involving a
woman as the main character, where the villain is also masked. We believe that we have
mostly used the forms and convention of real media products than challenging them. However
we believe that many conventional horror movies are set in very old possibly abandoned
houses, whereas our setting is much more modern and typical for the audience. We believe
that this setting is better as realism is much more apparent, with the juxtaposition of such evil
presence with the gratification of every day life.

3. TITLE.
The title of our production is also an example of following conventions
of a horror movie. We believe the more simplistic and short titles create
the most recognisable and memorable names, ‘Redemption’ is defined
as the action of saving or being saved from sin, error, or evil. "God's
plans for the redemption of his world“ which is a biblical reference,
connoting to the audience that his demonic and murderous nature will
be insidious and cruel, acting quite traditionally and intelligently. As we
can see from existing products, the length of the titles are all one
worded, defining quite dangerous and scary connotations which is
needed for t a good effect towards the audience. They also have a mix
of embellishments, either sans serif font or serif font, where ours is serif
font but with little embellishments.

4. At the opening of the movie we wanted to demonstrate explicitly
the narrative of the production. We attempted this through our
title sequence from the transition through the dark hallway to the
murderers lair. In this short clip, we notice the use of placing the
villainous typical murderous weapon; the knife. This incorporates
the generic convention of a weapon of a horror slasher sub genre
from previous genres e.g. A nightmare on elm street, Halloween
and You're next. By using this weapon the audience realises what
genre it will be and reveals the plot and narrative involving murder.
The use of a close up panning shot allows us to focus on intricate
parts of the mise-end-scene, similar to the murderers persona and
characteristics, being set in a dark bedroom conveys the typical
uses of camera work with slasher sub-genres, the viewer is also
captured and engaged, only being able to see part of the bigger
picture, as this shot really defines the movie as a whole from the
use of the reflection from the cracked mirror, which is a over the
shoulder shot. The use of the P.O.V shot recreates the idea of the
audience being in the room and finding the murderer in his lair,
using uses of gratification theory where the audience can feel apart
of the action and gets an inside look to the narrative, making the
movie much more interesting and understandable.

5. SOUND.
We have used the effect of the ambient highlighted sound of pouring of the
drink in our production which we feel is a use of conventions of real media
products. We have seen such happenings in the movie ‘You're next’ which we
feel is a very influential modern slasher movie which we love. We believe that
we have taken a modern approach to the slasher movies, using younger
actresses and modern and more replicable houses/setting. However, we have
stuck to the traditional conventional sounds of a slasher. We have used and
layered many conventional sounds for our opening which has definitely related
back to the originals. Highlighting sounds on specific scenes such as pouring of
the red drink, where the murderer is in the kitchen and the scene of the
murder. We believe that using these sounds it has amplified the mix of modern
and classical existing products, trying to use the best of two conventions. We
also used the sound of the music box whenever death is approaching, we
notice it in the opening scene, the credits and the needing. We believe that this
is extremely effective as it connotes innocents. We had a few issues with sound
due to our computer which we edited on malfunctioning, where the sound of
the white noise led through to a scene which was not supposed to be present,
although we believe that this is quite effective as it can connote a sense of
confusion and a decline in mentality (comparison to the murderers state of
mind.)

6. LIGHTING.
We decided to use the convention o setting the production
at night which is a widely used convention to a horror
movie, viewed ad used in many other existing products., for
example Halloween where the establishing shot was set
outside looking into the suburban house whilst looking into
the house which had artificial lighting. The use of pathetic
fallacy is a brilliant way to connote the mood of the scene,
for example when the boyfriend drives into the drive of the
victim and it is raining reflects the atmosphere and
foreshadows the events which will occur (crying, sadness). In
the background of the shot to the left, we notice that
lighting is a huge factor to the connotations of the movie.
The antagonist is positioned in the foreground which is pitch
black connoting danger and insidiousness, whereas the
victim is in the centre of the room covered with bright light,
connoting heaven and innocence.

7. CHARACTERS.
To introduce or main character, we have a medium shot of her where she
is opening a cupboard (camera on the inside) looking for something in a
dark area, we have intentionally placed her in the centre of the frame to
show her importance as the leading role. The low key lighting helps to
signify that the ‘darkness’ (death) is approaching her, the juxtaposition of
the lighting represents how she is suddenly falling into death,
foreshadowing the narrative from the opening of her appearance .she
changes into dark clothing which suggests to the audience that she has a
darker side to her, a reason to possibly why she is going to be murdered.
We have used and developed this idea of redemption of sins from the
movie ‘Seven’. The narrative are quite similar, yet we have portrayed them
from the murderers and victims perspective which is more conventional
than the uses that ‘Seven’ uses which is from the perspective of the police.
The first character that we see is the antagonist of the murderer, who is
also dressed in dark clothing with a mask. This is used to keep his identity
at a low key with the use of the mask. He also wears dark coloured
clothing with a black hoodie, signifying the idea that he is enveloped in
darkness which is in his nature resides in dark dwellings. in order to
remain "unseen“, We are only able to see parts of his face e.g. his hair,
which again signifies how he is in hiding to keep himself away from the
persecution of the police.

8. SUSPENSE.
This final scene depicts how suspense has been created in our opening
sequence, as after all the tension has been built up from the quick editing style.
One example of the tension being built is through he noises which appear through
the scenes, how the victim hears the opening of the back door when we know that
she is on her own, that she goes to see what has happened to find the back door
open. This is a very common convention to a slasher genre, where the victim
investigates the strange happenings and ends up being murdered because of
humans instinctive curious nature. At around the half way point of the opening
scene, we see the murderer appear in full lighting too see him behind her with his
mask on and knife in his hand. As we know that he is now in the house, the
audience now knows that she has no chance to escape, building tension to find
out how he plans on murdering her, that she is now in immediate danger. Before
she drinks her red wine (connoting blood, death and seduction.) the conventional
creepy soundtrack starts to play. We have decided to develop this from the movie
‘Insidious’, which is famous for its ‘creepy’ soundtrack. We believe that using older
diegetic music is very effective as it creates the idea of death. The victim then
investigates what the sound is coming from, where we then layer in ambient
suspense non diegetic sounds as we see the villain creeping before her, where he
then raises his knife and the screen goes blank but as a viewer we are certain that
his life takes an abrupt turn and so the end of the opening sequences leaves us
with a cliff-hanger and an action code.