Pitch: Psychological horror movie

NOSHIN,

SADIA,

MAHFUZA &

MARIAM

Our objective

A 5 minute (or less) short horror film

Our film is a psychological horror and we include elements of gore and the tricks of the mind.

We are unsure of the film title, however we aim to have a pun-like title.

Our (potential) tagline: Everybody has a good and bad side. Spencer’s bullies unfortunately discover both.

Treatment

Title: ?

Running time: 5 mins

Format: Film

Certification: 15+

Target Audience: 15 and over

Target Audience

Our target Audience is aimed at 15 and over due to

gory scenes

Active audience

Demographic: D/E, has income, appropriate age

Mainstreamer: Wants to know what is in trend and

would simply watch to fit in with a crowd.

Explorer: Wants to find out about different things and

try out and discover new things

Target Audience

Research

Research

Research I asked several people on WhatsApp

the kind of movies they watched and

preferred. Overall, most of the people

I asked mentioned that they preferred

psychological horror as they believe

psychological horror seems realistic

and most of the time the movies that

they watched that were psychological

horror were smart and allowed the

audience to piece a puzzle together

and it involves the audience in

figuring out the ending.

Although some preferred

supernatural horror as it portrayed a

type of horror that can be brought to

life through imagination.

Research

Through the research we added elements to our

short film idea according to the research

conducted.

Most people preferred psychological horror films,

therefore in our short film we will aim to include

elements of a twisted mind and a pseudo-

identity.

Moreover, people who preferred supernatural

films, prefer movies that brought the

unimaginable to life. Our short film allowed us to

bring an idea to life that doesn’t really exist, but

still includes jumps and scares that brings a

sudden jumpy fear.

What has inspired us to do psychological horror

Personally we feel that with psychological horror it explores a type horror beyond imagination but something that frequently happens in reality, terrifying stuff we hear about in the news. For example, when we hear about serial killers, we cannot fathom how a person could do something so horrifying and inhumane.

We understand that although these serial killers have a serial killer label attached to them, they must have a tormented past that causes them to commit such atrocious acts.

Psychological horror Most horror films rely on sudden scares to startle the

audience, which sometimes doesn’t even correlate with the plot.

With a psychological horror film, the suspense can be built through a successful and gruesome plot. This allows the viewers to feel terrified and kept on their toes throughout the moment rather than a few jump-scares that startles them from time to time.

Film Moodboard

Poster Moodboard

Radio Moodboard

The general idea

It’s a psychological short horror about a teenage girl who has been bullied in the past and has a dangerous pseudo-identity that murders her tormentors.

Overview of our psychological horror film

A young woman who has been harshly bullied as a little girl is tormented by her past, this makes her view the world differently. She has an avenging pseudo-identity and kills her enemies, she realizes what she has done through flashbacks and the film ends with her as the killer who is afraid of herself and talks to her other personality blaming it.

Character

A timid girl called Spencer who mercilessly kills her bullies from her past to get revenge to what they have done to her.

She has poor eyesight which sometimes plays into her forgetfulness of the murders she has committed.

Mentally ill, and has a split identity she is unaware of that wants to get revenge of her tormented past.

Also suffers from manic depression

She cannot fully come to terms with the things she has done.

What is a pseudo-identity? Floating is a dissociative phenomenon that is best

described as a sudden switch back to the pseudo-identity, a regression which is most commonly triggered by certain sights, sounds, touches, smells, or tastes in everyday life that were ubiquitous and salient stimuli in the cultic milieu.

Credit: www.dreichel.com/Pseudoidentity.htm

For example: Spencer does this, as she suddenly remembers the murders she’s committed but her poor eyesight could play into her forgetfulness as she tries hard to remember what she did and why she keeps getting these awful flashbacks.

Beginning The movie begins with low shot of a murder and the

killer running away from the scene and the corpse. The next morning, Spencer wakes up and does normal things- morning routine- then looks in the mirror and puts her glasses on, sees small flashbacks of herself getting bullied and tormented as a young girl, which has deeply scarred her.

Camera: She has poor eyesight therefore the camera will be in her pov perspective when she looks in mirror everything is blurry. This is an important aspect of the film as the glasses is her key to finding the truth.

Sound: Silence and her heavy breathing; intensifies the horror of what she has done.

Middle She receives the monthly newspaper and and sees an

article of her bully dead, and she has flashbacks of the bully tormenting her, she is unaffected. In the flashback the camera stops focusing on her killing and focuses again as a way of her trying to remember and see it for herself. Through mise-en-scene we would display her normal self and her serial killer identity with different clothes and locations.

Camera: An ECU of her mouth- she’s smiling sadistically-and then we see that she has a straight face through a mid shot. This connotes her pseudo-identity enjoys the struggle her normal-self goes through. Also it could suggest to the audience that their double personalities cross-over from time-to-time.

Sound: music begins to intensify from when she sees the article and then it stops at its summit as we see her gradually smirk. During flashbacks we hear slashing of a body with a knife and a scream of agony from her bully.

End Spencer looks at herself through the mirror and

sees the personality that she has been trying to reach all along. She screams towards the reflection of her serial killer identity. She understands what happened and faces the harsh reality of what she has done. During this scene, the camera is facing towards both Spencer and her reflection, while she screams at herself her voice fades out.

Sound: her voice are dissolving into the dark screen.

Editing: dissolve to dark screen and sound dissolving as she screams

Climax When she sees the newspaper clippings of the murders

of her enemies, the suspense rises at this point as she doesn’t know how to feel. During this scene the audience get to see the pleasure her serial killer feels after avenging for her past self. This scene is the most sinister scene in the play as the audience get a glimpse of her fighting with herself to find pleasure in the murders. The sinister thing about it is that she wants to enjoy and revel in the deaths she committed as they caused her years of suffering.

Eerie background music

Flashbacks of the gruesome death and her screaming with joy of finally getting revenge.

Camera/editing: Slow motion, handheld camera movement, zooming in

Mise-en-scene

Spencer: Fearful/timid body language

Clothing: Normal, this enhances the scary reality of what normal people are capable of.

Wes Craven a horror film theorist says ‘murders are more scary in a safe place’. Therefore the setting of our film would be in a home, which is a safe for many.

Her normal clothes and her serial killer clothes are quite distinct, to show the difference between the personalities however it is similar to connote that her identities are not quite so different and have the same objective which is to get revenge.

Editing When she walks past a mirror, the mirror reveals

her true self as smiles back at her and it reveals a true moment of weakness.

Flashbacks: 2/3 seconds long and very abrupt and occurring suddenly.

Slow motion=disorientation

At the end the sounds and screen dissolves into darkness this connotes that now she can feel a sense of peace as her vengeance is over as the dark connotes closure it could however connote the darkness that she is forced to live with and the serial killer identity winning and taking over her body and mind completely.

Camera Extreme/mid close-ups allows the audience to view the

tension in her facial expressions and it also gives us a peak of her pseudo-identity wanting to reach out.

Handheld camera shot, many horror film use handheld camera shot to enhance verisimilitude, it also creates the illusion that someone is being followed.

POV shot allows the audience to see the perspective of our character. It gives us an insight to the mind of a serial killer.

Low camera angle to portray authority and control of the serial killer identity that has control over her mind.

High camera angle to portray the vulnerability of Spencer’s weaker side.

Sound

Diegetic Ambient sound of police sirens and her harsh breathing

Silence is a good method to intensify the eeriness. Silence would be used effectively to enhance the verisimilitude of the situation.

Eerie non-diegetic background sounds and music add to the tension and brings among a sense of fear and anticipation.

During the climax of the film, the sound intensifies and increasingly gets louder, at this point the audience is able decipher that she has a pseudo-identity and she is unaware of the killings she carried out due to her shock.

Issues we address Mental illness exists EVERYWHERE and if

some people do not address their problems of metal illness, there could be terrible consequences. Some people feel they’re strong enough to handle issues on their own, when there are consequences they would suffer.

Bullying is a huge issue with potential serial killers. Carol Clover a horror film theorist says ‘Killers in horror tend to have either issues with their childhood or are sexually disturbed’. We address this problem as our character Spencer, has been tormented with bullying in the past and from that she develops a serial killer pseudo-identity that wants to get revenge.