Film Genre Assignment

Jack Willoughby

Film Studies Assignment

For this assignment I have been asked to examine and analyse four movies all together,two of which will be from one genre of film and the the other two will be from another. The two genres I have chose to look at are HORROR and SCI-FI. The reason behind choosing these genres is that they are both similar in ways but at the same time completely different. I will look at everything that the film makers have done to make this film fit into there genre and how it affects the audince whilst watching, this includes everything from what type of shot it is to what type of music is used and why.

I will be examing the two films from the horror genre to bein with for this assignment. I split horror into about 5 sub genres, these being;

SLASHERS

SUPERNATURAL

CLASSIC

PSYCHOLOGICAL

and ACTION HORROR

I chose slasher and supernatural horrors to look at for this assignment, the reason for this choice is because they are extremely popular in the horror movie industry and have been around since the beginning and they normally are box office hits. So I wanted to look into why people always seem to like watching these types of movies and look at how the film-makers are making these films in such are terrifyingly amazing way that makes audiences all over the world tremble in their seats.

SLASHER

Everyone loves a good slasher movie, even im guilty of that, even though they make turn every light on in my house and make me check to see if all my doors and windows are locked atleast three times every five minutes I still love to watch them. One of my favourites has to be Wes Craven's A NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET because just the idea of the Freddy Kruegar makes me tremble.

IDEA OF FREDDY KRUEGAR

Now the plot of this movie is that a man called Freddy Kruegar who used to murder kids when he was alive got murdered by the parents of the children because they wanted to take revenge out on Freddy, then they burn him alive and kill him. So then years later he returns to kill the kids but this time in their dreams, because you cant escape him in your dreams and the parents cant stop him.

Now the thing I most find terrifying about him is the fact that you have to sleep and eventually he will get to you and plus he controls your dreams so he can make anything happen. That and the fact that when he kills you in your dream you die in real life.

So firstly I am going to analyse the way Freddy looks and why the film-makers have decided to make him look the way he does.

The choice of clothing to begin with, Freddy wears a green and red stripped jumper and a brown fedora hat. Then to top of his whole outfit he has his classic hand crafted slasher glove on his right hand. Looking at the colours to begin with I think the red and green sweater is just so cool and I dont know what it is about it its just so simple yet drennched in terror. The colour red is used a lot in horrors because red is often ocosiated with anger, rage, power and most of all blood. Now blood is used a lot in this film just like any other slasher should because that is exactly what a slasher movie should consist of. Then it is partnered with this dark green colour and green is a colour that often represents luck, pride, healing and nature. I see it as a warm colour and that it represents good and just how fire exit signs are green and they are designed to get people away from danger it juxstapositions with Freddy's character because he is wanting them to run towards danger. I think the reson they decided to put this colour in is because its in contrast with his personality just how it is in contrast to the red that it is knitted next to because often people go to their dreams when theyre asleep because it is a place people can escape their problems but sadly Freddy is waiting for them. Also red and green are the type of colours that I see together at times like chrsitmas and christmas is commercialised and thought of as a time for happiness and warmth, this I believe is also another way to look at how they are contrasting good and evil in this movie to just show how truly petrifiyingly evil Freddy is.

The glove, not only has this glove slashed thorugh our minds and even featured in a few of our very own nightmares a few times, it has deffinately left a scar in pop culture since the 80s and I have no doubt that it will stick around forever in cinema because it is such an iconic weapon just how Freddy is such an iconic character. Even if you have never seen A nightmare on elm street you still know who Freddy Kruegar is and you know his glove. Freddy made it himself out of sheet metal, pipes, knives and an old leather glove that to me is so terrifying because it makes you realise that someone can just scrap up a few things together and cause so much horror now although I find it terrifying it is also what I love about the glove, the fact that that how homemade it looks, the rust of the metal to give it the old vintage look and the fact that its got so many imperfections is makes it perfect for a horror because it looks rough and unpleasant so it sets people in the state of fear and that something isnt right as soon as they turn on the movie and see that hand scraping across the screen.

His make up is done so amazing aswell in this film, the whole burnt and peeling away look to constantly remind his victims about that he has tried to be killed before but he came back tells us as the audience and the characters of the film just how much of a powerful threat Freddy is. That mixed with Robert England's acting for this movie and how he dances around the scenes, laughing and joking around as he slashes these teenagers to pieces adds to the terror and makes him more sinister because we see that his character is so evil that enjoys killing and we know to begin with he didnt really have motive for doing to when he was alive, he purely did it for his own pleasure and that simply just sends a shiver down my spine.

SUPERNATURAL

For the supernatural film, I wanted to choose the theme of ghostly supernatural films because supernatural stretches out into many other sub genres within this sub genres but ever since the 80s, ghosts have always stuck around and only gotten more popular so since I chose A nightmare on elm street for my SLASHER film. I will be analysing a film that is much more recent and then I could compare the difficulties that modern film makers face when creating a film compared to the sruggles of 80s cinema. So I think I will analyse James Wan's The Conjuring (2013) because it is one of my favourites from the modern age of horror films.

PLOT

The plot of this film is the classic chliche of a family that moves into a new house to learn that it is haunted but by the time they realise this they also learn that the ghost is too powerful and is stuck with them. This leeds to a bucket full of jump scares and climactic terror scenes and eventually leads to the mother of the family becoming possesed and then trying to kill her children. The film is not just centred around the family but focuses on Ed and Lauraine Warren who were actually real life paranormal investigators. The warrens come to the rescue and save the family from the ghost.

One of the things that I actually like about this horror film is that it opens up with Ed and Lorraine talking to three people about the paranormal events that are taking place inside their apartment whuch includes the infamous Annabelle doll which after doing some research on after the film made me shake in fear of it. Then it fades to an opeing title where it states that this movie is “based on real events”

now I know that what happens on this film isnt 100% true but still knowing that the movie had been inspired from actual events that actually took place just makes the movie seem that little bit more terrifying because it plays with the idea that I too could have poltergiests and evil souls in my home.

So me being skeptical wanting to see how much of this movie was true and I found a suprising amount of things in the movie that links to real life. Like for instance the family that currently own the house where all of this stuff supposedly happened in, filed a lawsuit on Warner Bros because their house was keep getting vandalised because of the impact that the movie had.

Now in this movie the evil ghost is called “Bathsheba” who is witch that owned the home years ago and performed sacrifices in the name of devil and her soul still haunts the land. We dont see much of her in this film so its hard to analyse what she looks like in this film but I can say that in the times that we do see her, she is wearing a white dress. Now a white dress for centuries has been a sign of power and wealth, for instane when royalty were getting married they wore white to show of their incredible wealth because you would only wear white if you werent going to get muddy and scruffy. And if on an average day in them times if you werent going to get muddy then you were deffinately werent poor. So this witch is wearing white to give off the image that she has power over everyone in th house and wants to make it clear.

In films audiences like to see opposites beause they normally work so well together, just like Levi Strauss' theory of binary opposites. We see them all the time and just like Freddy Krueger in A nightmare on elm street he surrounds him self in things that are opposite to what he is and is neccesarily what makes him great. The film makers also wanted to achieve the same effect here beause a white dress can represent purity, cleanlineess and love but that is everything what this ghost is about and her costume juxtapositions with her personality and desires.

But the costume ans makeup for the rest of the entire cast fit the 70s style perfectly and nothing is out of place in the movie. What I like is that everything isnt perfect in this film and that it feels real, peoples make up isnt done to perfection and everyones outfits are random and vibrant. This is a ood twist compared to how cinema and TV were made to look from the 50s to the 70s because everything had to be picture perfect. But this film feels even more real because they get rid of that vibrant flower power filter that evryone likes to put on the 70s and show what an actual real family from that time would have looked like.

Now this film is soaked in religious ideology like demons, excorcisms and evvn many props used in this film show the power that religion supposedely has. They focus on things like the crucifix and bible in this movie and this is again to remind the audience about the fact that good will conquer evil and light will always banish the darkness. Just how like at the beginning tof the film the kave a very high key lighting scheme but as the problems start to happen in the house and the disruption of the equilibrium part of the narartive takes place the scenes become darker as they move to a much lower key of lighting and the shots shakier. These camera and lighting techniques are used to make the audience feel is to make the audience feel more isolated from the scene because they are seeing less information, which in some cases less is more and the viewer will fill in the blanks with their own imagintion and ideas creating tension as the scenes progress as the anticipation grows and grows. But back to the end of the film when we are put back to equilibrium, it returns to high key lighting to compare the audience with the characters as they will be relieved and happy that all the horror is over and done with.

For example this shot is taken from the beginning of the film, where the family is moving into their new home. Notice the lighting is very high key and there isnt many shadows, this is because the audience are emant to be feeling the characters feel and the charaters feel excited about their new home and shadows in movies represent fear or negativity. The fact that there isnt many shadows in this scene show that they are feeling very positive and havent got their minds on anything negative at all.

This shot is taken from near in the middle of the movie when all hell has broken loose and the distruption is at its best. Notice the lighting in this shot comapared to the first one, they are complete opposites in every way. This one is full of shadows and we arent gathering loads of infromation from this shot excpet from the danging corpse but thats it, now although the hanging corpse is scary what might scare people even more is the fact that they dont know what else is in that room with her and that the audience dont even know so it creates a connection between the characters and audience once more. The woman holding holding the flashlight is Lorraine Warren (paranormal investigator) and she is shown to be quite religious in this movie so in this shot I see a very strong religious imagery becasuse she is the only light source in that room. This connotates abck to the idea that good will conquer evil but it makes more sense in this instance to say that light will destroy darkness. It can also be linked to the fact that when people die they say the will head towards a white and the flashlight is creating a very strong and bright white light this could give the idea that the movie makers are foreshadowing something that is yet to come.

Now what I found in both Horror films is that firstly they like to use juxtaposition to emphasise the personality and feelings of a character, they use many on screen technigues and film making strategies to relate a viewer to the on screen character so they can feel the same as them, or in case to feel the fear they are going through.

Lighting plays a big role in film but especially in Horror and what I saw is that the way they light the scene is a way to restrict the information that a viewer of the film will get from the scene.

For instance they will use tense and really frightening parts of the film and shoot them in a low key lighting that has loads of shadows and they arent grainy just matte black shadows. This creates more fear for the audience because they dont know whats hiding in the dark spots on screen and they are filled with anticipation which leads to fear. Plus the only things that are lit or in focus is normally the main driving point for the emotion of that scene or shot.

Also I found that the choice of music is very important when making a horror and these two films used high pitched, fast tempoed soundtracks. This is because the soundtack and music is a very powerful component in a scene and can alter the mood and emotion that a viewer will have. The choice of fast paced music is used to show the intensity and danger that the scene holds. For example in both films they used very dramatic and loud music when there were scense of intense action (AKA when freddy was attacking his victims or when the ghost was taking part in some paranormal activity) so that the emotion of the viewer will be furthermore driven into a state of fear.

SCI-FI

This is the part of the assignment where I am going to analyse two other movies from the genre of Science fiction and I will explore the uses of film making techniques that the film makers have used to make these films unique and fit the mood of a sci fi film.

The first film from the sci fi genre I will be analysing will be

MEN IN BLACK 3

and the second one will be

BACK TO THE FUTURE.

I will first start by analysing Men In Black 3 as I started with an old horror first then a new one so I just thought id write about a more modern sci fi then an old one.

MEN IN BALCK 3

men in black 3 is the last movie in the men in black trilogy and it finishes it off fantastic in my opinion. The plot of the movie is basically an alien called Boris/ Boris the animal who was arrested by K in the 60s escapes out of a secret prison (on the moon) and seeks revenge on K. so he goes to earth and collects time travelling gear to go back to the 60s and kill K, which he does successfully. But Ks current partner J, played by Will Smith, is the only one that remebers K from his timeline and tries to figure it out. Realising that with K being dead leads to an alien invasion he goes back to 1969 to stop Boris the animal from the past and future but runs into K from the 60s and has to protect him from Boris. Very confusing when you write it down but nevertheless I still think its a great film.

I couldnt gather much from the outfits in this movie because most of the actors that had any significance like K and J wore balck suits, which I know is a classic outfit for the men in black. But black is a very strong colour and I think the reason that secret agent chose to wear the black suits is because it shows authority and anybody who follows the story from the very beginning knows that a black suit represetns an agent from the MIB. Plus black can represent shadows and mystery and that is what a secret agent is all about, not being seen and being very secretive and mysterious. So I will comment that the colours of the costumes can connotate in a way to link to the ideology of the MIB.

What I love about this film is that it is full of references to the 60s, even the little bits about how Andy Warhol was part of the men in black and I guess that it makes the fillm seem more real and interactive with the audience. Plus this fillm is filled with establishing shots that keep reminding the viewers that it is aking place in a highly powerful place in pop culture, New York City. Which many movies these days seem to take place in where there is an element of herosim but it is to show that the production of the film is very high in budget. New York is a very high demanded media spot in the world, infact one third of all american independent films are produced in New York. So they use very attractive establishing shots of the big apple to remind the viewers of the movie that it is a very important and superoir compared to any other films that are being relaeased.

The 60s was known for the flower power and the hippies which means there is a pop culture tattoo of the image of the 60s to be drowning in bright colours, love and happiness, so the film makers purposely wanted to have this vibrant feel to the film. But in the scense of the film where the time is set in the present it looks naturally lit but when the narrative timeline jumps to the 60s there is a slight artistic difference in the feeling of the shots. Maybe the writers are making some sort of statement like the current day is the way it is and it doesnt need any filter on it because although there is problems that the current people in this day and age but want to highlight the political and national issues that america no longer faces.

But then again one of the many colours that seem to “pop” in this film was blue, many of the vital parts of the film were blue like the props for example. The arcnet in the movie was ultra blue and that played I major part of the movie as it is the piece that prevents an alien invasion. Or the sets were coated in an ultra blue colour just like the men in black HQ was purely white and blue, also the white on the set was also used to contrast between the balck suits and make the agents stand out which is probably the only place in the world where theyre allowed to “stand out” so we see that all the agents are in a confortable enviroment so we as viewers and recievers of the same emotions that our characters experience feel confortable in the MIB HQ. Back to the blue it is used in scinece fiction because for years upon years blue has been used to represent a technilogical feeling to it. Thus, over time the colour conatation to blue has developed to represent futurisitic ideologies and new technology. As a result of this, the audience can associate fantasy imagery with the colour blue therefore, distinguishing the genre of film as science fiction.

BACK TO THE FUTURE

Back to the future is one of the most undeniably iconic films of the 20^th century and is considered a classic by nearly all ciniphiles. In my opinion, it is an outstanding film with all the main features of a science fiction film generating so much audience curiousity, suspense, and anticipation which is why it is still just as famous and successful than it was in 1985 when it was produced. The film still makes a signifigant amount of profit today as over time, generations of audiences have distingushed it as a “classic” which I definitely agree with.

PLOT

The plot of this film is one that submerges the audience in new, exciting, futuristic fantasy creating effects that perpetrate the featuress of a classic sci-fi film perfectly. So the film begins with one of the main characters; Doc creating a time machine out of a dolorean (a car that was very popular in the 1980's). Already, we as the audience, can see the immense juxaposition of futuristic science and technology, that creates an effect curiousity and amazement to the audience of 1985 and still today to current 2017 audiences which contributes as to why it is rated as a “classic” film, contasting with technology at the time we thought was amazing. Then throughout the film, this theme is carried on and sen more vividly than others in different scenes and shots.– doc creates a time machine out of a dolorean, marty mcfly accidentally goes back in time to 1955 with no power to get back he sees past-doc for help but alters time and alters the course of history so that his mam and dad dont get together which creates a huge problem for marty and his isblings exsistence. The uranium that powers te dolorean gives of 1.21 giga watts which is how much energy is need to power the time flux capasiter ( device that makes time travel possible) On the hill valley watch tower it gets struck by lightning so doc has a plan to direct the lightning bolt into the dolorean because the actual power that a lightning bolt generates is 1.21 giga watts. So martyy has less than a week to fix time and make to to the watch tower otherwise he is stuck in 1955.