INVESTIGATION

Horror
Mandy-insidious-The Thing (John Carpenter)
What I will be doing
I will Identify and explain the different codes and conventions of horror films
and explore and develop the fundamental media skills needed to produce a piece of work
of Mandy, The Thing and Paranormal Activaty.
Codes and conventions
Technical codes refer too camera, sound, editing and lighting in a film.
Symbolic codes refer too setting, acting, colour and costume in a film.
Convention is something we expect from the genre like gore and blood in a horror or
guns and a cowboy hat in a western.
Form conventions is the order the audience expects to see the order of the film example
is titles first then credits at the end.
Story conventions is how the audience expects the story to go and end like the hero
always wins in a superhero film.
horror
Horror is a genre of film and television that is meant to scare, startle, shock, and even repulse audiences. Some
famous examples are friday the 13th, saw and conjuring.
Saw works well to startle and repulse the audience as its torture porn made to gross out the audience.
Conjuring is a modern horror and scares the audience and makes them feel tense and jump.
Friday the 13th is a slasher what makes the audience scared and disturbed its sickly imagery.
They all have different codes and conventions different noises slashers will have loud and tense music as the
villain shows up or kills. Torture porn like saw will have minimum effects and less based on sound and more on
the screams and gore. Supernatural horror haunted houses, ghosts a lot of tense sounds to build up to jump
scares.
Even though all these are horrors they all have different codes and conventions because of their sub genres.
Codes and Conventions of a typical horror
• Jump scares, when you think horror uoi think of jump scares they scare you and are there to grab an audince and marketing.

• Low-key lightin, Low-key lighting is used for horror films due to the effects it creates. The dim hue and shadows created by this type of lighting
are suited to the conventions of a horror genres
• Red theme/lights, red makes us think of blood and death

• Low angle shots, low angle shots make the subject seem powerful and belittle you.

• POV shots, point of view shots put you in the shoes of the subject.

• Close up shots, close up shots are used for putting emphasis on objects or people and to show an eerie emotion
• Gore, gore is obvious in horror to creep the audience out

• Suspence, suspence is used to make the audience on the edge of their seat and the buildup to showing something gorey or a jumpscare
• Wide angle shots, makes the subject feel lost and lonely gives the sense of isolation

• Music, music can be used in every as[ect of horror to the tense low base sound to feel every kill to the upbeat of the teenagers and the contrast of
the two.
THE THING
The thing is a horror film about an alien organism coming to earth what can be
identical too any living life form in the antartic.
Establishing shots of the helicopter and it going over to the base where the rest of the
film happens.
Keeps the audience on the edge of their seats making us guess who has been taken
over.
Gorey imagery of bodies twisted, and bodies being torn apart.
Camera panning to the dog and people to make us keep guessing and us involved.
It gives us misleading information based on who the camera is positioned too.
The practical effects are very good and give you more feeling of what's going on and it
looks realistic.
It doesn’t use jump scares or much to scare you but the tenseness and the thought of
someone being able to kill anyone at any point and not knowing who it could be is
what is frightening.
Insidious
Insidious is a modern ghost house horror about a boy who gets taken into a
different world full of dead people. This film is big on the supernatural and is
full on about ghosts and possessions.
The film poster is all on saying "from the producers of paranormal activity and
saw" to attract active audience of big horror films and sets the aesthetic of the
film this is called branding. The dark poster and the kid in the front showing
what the center of the attention and what the film will be based it on with the
house in the back kind of saying it's not about the house in this one changing
the horror stereotype. The handheld camera what moves naturally, and shakes
gives you a bigger essence of fear as it makes you seem small and an actual
person in the room with them.
MANDY
Mandy is a modern splatter/thriller horror film. This film emphasis on coloured
lighting what gives the effect of death, blood, revenge and anger before you
even see anything like that.
The films intense and in your face with the action and gore. The practical
effects are effective and make the film seem real. And you feel every kill. The
close-up shots of the eyes fading in and out of the girl and the man is a
disturbing image. The establishing shots of the cabin and the car in the in the
forest just gives off loneliness as the darkness is consuming the environment
and all we can see is the car or the cabin.