Reflective Evaluation, Question 1 (Harrison Lee)

Here I have made a compilation of images that I have taken influence from while making my horror film.
We have planned for our film to be a largely generic example of the zombie genre and to include many of the main convention of this sub-genre.


Logo:

For this logo the colours of the original Warner Bros. logo have been changed to red with a darkened background, this colour combination connotes fear, death and blood. I have chosen this logo because the colour scheme is concordant with our films theme.

                                                  Title:

This is a shot of the title from Dawn of the Dead, the title uses a dark background, which connotes evil/darkness and fear, to make the red coloured font of the title stand out more. The red font has been used probably due to it's connotations of blood. The words DAWN and DEAD are in larger fonts than the rest of the title, DEAD being the largest over all emphasising the zombie threat in the film, elements like this could be used in the making of our title to emphasize our sub-genre.

Existing Sub-genre:

This image shows zombies in a conventional 'undead horde', zombies are portrayed as gathering in this way in many zombie films as it increases the danger in the scene because it is harder to escape such a large threat. I our film we're going against this common convention as it begins with only one immediate threat, this shows how dangerous the threat can be even alone.

Establishing Character Shot:

The shot shows the main character with his weapon (a cricket bat) showing that he is a strong character also he is covered in blood which is one of the main connotations of the horror genre. The other characters are also holding weapons but are standing behind the main character showing that he is the leader. This picture advertises the effectivity of blunt objects and tools against zombies, characters seen without a means of defense are seen as allot weaker and more helpless.


Mise-en-scene:

This shot zooms out to show the destruction left by the zombies, common conventions of the zombie genre can be seen i.e. blood, abandoned streets etc. It builds the tension up to the zoom out, not showing much of the scene till the final shot of the film. The lighting is rather dull this could be to connote that apart from the main character there is no life visible in the scene and is reflecting this.

Key Images:

Film: 28 Days Later

This is one of the first scenes in the film, in this image the aftermath of the spread of infection can be seen. The character is alone in the shot and the abandoned bridge can be seen, the long road in the background enhances the feeling of loneliness in the scene.

This image is a scene later in the film during Jim's first encounter with the infected, his pursuers are then set alight by other survivors. This scene establishes the zombie threat to create fear as it portrays them as fast runners and are eventually only stopped by blowing up and entire fuelling station. This scene 'sets the bar' for the zombie element in the film, they're fast and they're hard to kill.

In this scene one of the characters is infected by the virus and begins to turn. He is subsequently shot by soldiers. What is important about this scene is that his daughter is left with a group of people she doesn't really know, and though they have been travelling together she now has to go through the death of her father relatively by herself. I feel that this contrasts with most films of this sub-genre as zombie horrors are usually more concerned with the gore and fear elements and so lack more emotional scenes like this.

This is an image of an infected persons eye's. The zombies in this film do not follow all the usual conventions of the genre, they're fast, they're nor all necessarily dead/undead and they even exhibit a level of intelligence. The biggest giveaway for the zombies in 28 days later is the eye's, all the infected have red eyes, sometimes 'crying' blood. On the other hand they do exhibit all the main qualities of horror zombies i.e. a hunger for flesh, covered in blood and can survive most mortal injuries.

Comparison to 9 Images from our film:

 This is the production logo from our film, We've used a font and image that reflect the genre and themes of our film in the same way the warner bros. logo used colours that related to the genre of the film.


 For for our title we used a red font to connote death and blood, similar to how the titles for dawn of the dead used colour to reflect the genre, and included the silhouette of the threat in the film to create fear and anticipation.

 This image establishes the sub-genre by show in the threat but not directly to build tension, the audience can tell they are zombies because of the human form but animalistic gestures made by the shadows.

 This shot establishes one of the possible victims in our film as his expression of fear can clearly be seen, this also makes the character look more vulnerable as he is hiding behind a wall.
 This image clearly establishes the mise en scene of our film giving a clear establishing shot of the environment in which it takes place.

4 key images:
 
 
From top left clockwise: The victims realizing their way out is locked, the victims hiding from the zombie, the zombie looking for it's prey, the zombie biting one of the victims.

I have chosen these images as they basically sum up the narrative of the film, the victims are trapped with the threat then one of them gets bitten and subsequently becomes a zombie too.