Problems Agreeing on a Story...

After meeting on Wednesday, my group has still not fully decided on a story. We have lots of ideas on what we want the message to be. We only have a little bit of an idea, which is having the main character have a doll that seems to be haunting her, but it is actually a girl that she kidnapped and is keeping hostage. We seem to be set on this idea, but we definitely still have to develop it.

This story developed because we at first came up with the idea of having the main character secretly steal things from her friends and create a doll from these things. This doll was supposed to be the epitome of perfection and we wanted our message to be about how girls are always trying to be perfect. After some thought, we didn't really like this idea and came up with the other idea.

It is stressful that we can't decide on a story, and I am hoping by next class we solidify an idea. We are still definitely sticking with our genre of thriller. We also want to make sure that our film doesn't seem funny because we want to make it serious.

Brainstorming Story Ideas

After talking with Joanne and Taylor today, we have discussed different plot ideas and what the main conflict will be. We are still set on the idea of a thriller, but want it to have a deeper meaning instead of it just being a film about some creature trying to kill the characters. We like the idea of how Get Out is a social thriller, and have come up with some ideas similar to it. 

We were thinking of having the story be about having someone you trust and love betray you and basically turn into a totally different person. We thought back to the film Halloween (2018), where Michael kills his sister. This is an example of when someone you completely trust turns into someone else. So we have different ideas of having either someone's twin or parents or significant other be the person who the main character realizes isn't trusted. 



Another idea that we are brainstorming is having the main character have trust issues or anxiety and are possibly hallucinating specific plot details so the audience doesn't know what is going on until the end. This is like the thriller The Girl on the Train where the audience has no idea which partner is abusing the other until the end where it is revealed. Of course with this idea we could also leave clues to the audience about what the ending is. 



In the next blog post, we are going to make a movie summary which will have a concrete story. We have also discussed that we are going to film our project the weekend of March 15-17 to make sure we have plenty of post-production time. This week, we are also going to talk more about the characters and make a schedule of when to write scripts, location scout, storyboard, etc.

Starting Genre Research

The genre of our short film is going to be thriller/suspense. According to this website, a thriller is characterized by "suspense—a feeling of pleasurable fascination and excitement over what is to come next, mixed in with apprehension, anticipation, and sometimes even, fear. These feelings develop throughout a narrative from unpredictable events that make the reader or viewer think about the consequences of certain characters’ actions. The suspenseful feelings build towards a climax that is sure to be memorable."

This is why we really want our story to be thought out properly so we successfully create this feeling of suspense. Movies like Get Out had the audience in suspense because of the feeling that things were not right. Also the climax of the film was worth the wait and was definitely not disappointing. 



According to this website, "Thriller films are typically hybridized with other genres; hybrids commonly including: action thrillers, adventure thrillers,  fantasy and science fiction thrillers. Thriller films also share a close relationship with horror films, both eliciting tension." This is something to talk about with my group more in detail because we have the option to maybe mix genres. It's just something to think about.

Another thriller film that I really like is A Quiet Place because it was about family, but also had the twist of having other creatures in it. The story was very well written and the thriller genre was used well. I also like how the film ended with a semblance of hope. 



My group also has to discuss what thriller elements we are using and the next blog post will talk about what our story is going to be.

Introduction...

Hello! Here is my new blog for the A Level Project. I am excited to work on the short film, and this time with Joanne and Taylor. I think since AS level I have learned a lot more Photoshop and editing skills and I feel a lot more prepared this time because I am used to writing these blog posts. Doing the movie trailer project really helped with editing and thinking of how to show a story. I was good at managing my time with the blogs last year and I definitely do not want to procrastinate writing them. This year I have learned even more that planning and research are vitally important because of the documentary project that was not planned as much as it should have been. In the short film project I really want to focus on creating a good story and challenging myself with new editing techniques and new shots/angles. I am excited to learn more about creating a website and collaborating with my group on this project.

We are leaning more towards a thriller movie and we want to really focus on creating meaningful characters. We still have to discuss more of our plan, which I will talk about in my next blog post. We worked together on a thriller trailer for a project we did this year during Halloween and we all really enjoyed doing it. We really need to do copious amounts of research on the technical elements of the production and how to not be super cliche. I can't wait to start!