Genre Research Activity: Horror Films

 One of the largest film genres in the world are horror films. After some research on the genre, here are some of the facts about horror. 

Intended audience: The typical target audience for most horror movies would be primarily young adults and teenagers, often with an affinity for thrills, suspense and the macabre. As a side-note, the genre has been broadening to appeal to include a wider range of demographics , including older audiences how enjoy phycological horror and suspenseful thrillers.

 Content: 

-Supernatural Elements: Involves ghosts, demons, or otherworldly entities.

-Psychological Horror: Explores the dark side of the human psyche, often delving into themes of fear, paranoia, and madness.

-Body Horror: Focuses on physical transformations, mutations, and grotesque imagery.

-Slasher: Features a masked killer who stalks and murders a group of unsuspecting victims.

-Monster Movies: Involves creatures, often gigantic or monstrous, that threaten humanity.

Institutional Conventions

Narrative Image:

-The Final Girl: A recurring trope in slasher films where a lone female survivor outwits the killer.

-The Monster: A terrifying creature or force that threatens the protagonist(s).

-The Haunted House: A classic setting for supernatural horror, often filled with dark secrets and malevolent spirits.

Marketing:

-Disturbing Imagery: Uses shocking and provocative visuals to attract attention.

-Intense Trailers: Creates suspense and anticipation through suspenseful trailers.

-Social Media Campaigns: Engages fans through social media platforms, sharing behind-the-scenes content and interacting with the audience.

-Merchandising: Creates a range of merchandise, such as masks, collectibles, and clothing.

Additional Notes:

-The horror genre is constantly evolving, incorporating new subgenres and themes.

-Horror films can be used to explore social and cultural anxieties, such as the fear of the unknown or the decline of society.

-The effectiveness of horror films often relies on the audience's emotional response and their willingness to suspend disbelief

HORROR FILM SAMPLES

SAMPLE 1:

THE TERRIFIER MOVIES

The "Terrifier" films by director Damien Leone, embodies the horror genre because of it's use of:

-Extreme Violence and Gore

-Disturbing Imagery

-Jumpscares

These three qualities make the films embody the horror genre through the sub genre of slasher films

SAMPLE 2:

SMILE

The movie smile is a phycological horror movie which embodies the horror genre by using features such as:

-Unsettling Atmosphere

-Mental Breakdown

-Subtle Horror

-Supernatural Horror

-Visual Horror

All these features of phycological horror embody the world of horror films greatly.

OTHER POPULAR HORROR FILMS

-The Excorsist 

-The shining 

-Hereditary

-Get Out

-A Quiet Place

Sound

 Throughout the last couple of days in class, I have learnt a lot about the many different effects that sound gives us in day to day events and especially in Films. Sound helps create atmosphere, trigger emotion,  and create dialogue. Using sound techniques such as doing Foley can really help bring films to life by using  random objects to make sound effects accurate to what's going on in the film to add realism and make a stronger engagement with the audience. In our class we were instructed to make a story purely from sound in which we would have to use Foley to make at least 4 different sound effects with a partner.  There were a couple of steps in the brainstorming process for the project. First of all, me and my partner had make a story up that we would base the sound around.  We ended up deciding on a final play NBA style kind of story. We made a sound outline which helped us decide which noises or sound effects would be needed in order to give the full feel of each sequence in the story. To edit we used Adobe Rush. We did everything pretty well. If I had to make a change it would be better figuring out the amount of noise every sound effect made as it sounded a little uneven.