Urban Legend Analysis

Urban Legend – 1998 – Jaime Blanks

The titles appear in a specific order which is the two production companies, the producer, title of the film, the lead and most famous actors, casting, costume designer, the music, the editor, the production, the photography and the executive producers. This will influence my own film by having the appropriate titles in the right order.

Mise-en-scene

The weather in the opening is shown to be raining with thunder and lightning at night time when the titles are starting, it then shows a car driving through the woods, the effect on the audience is that it sets the atmosphere for the opening few minutes. This will influence my own film as we will include an effective establishing shot.  The colours are very dark for example the trees are dark shade of green and the car is black, the effect of the audience is that they should have recognised that the opening is going to start with something negative in this case the first victim of the film. This will influence my own film as we can use certain colours to send subtle messages to the audience.

Sound

The non-diegetic sound is an eerie sound the effect on audience is that it makes the atmosphere feel tense, this will influence my own film as we can use eerie music in order to make the scene tense. There is diegetic sound which is played in the car called ‘Total Eclipse of the Heart’ which contains the phrase ‘turn around’, the effect on the audience is that they will find it ironic that as the killer is at the back of her car. This will influence my own film as we can include a song that is ironic for the future events.

Editing

When the camera cuts to the close up man at the gas station up against the window, the effect on the audience is that the audience will be scared as they might have been startled by the man suddenly appearing and they also think that the woman is about to murdered by this man. This will influence my own film as we can use this editing technique to create fear for example we can cut to the killers face at the end of the 2 minute opening.

Camera shots and movement

The aerial shot of the car driving down the road in dark is effective on the audience as it sets the scene of the opening sequence which is set in a dark, isolated and dreary location. This will influence my own film as it is an establishing shot which we need to feature in order for the viewer to know where that scene is taking place.

Intial ideas

Storyboard

Prop's

Props

The phone is a major part of iconography in our film as the unknown number calling Amelia’s phone starts to raise suspicion. The crack on the phone suggests that the character is careless and vulnerable. We watched ‘Scream’ and used the idea of having a phone ringing this hints that something severe will happen to the character later. For example when ‘Casey’ picks the phone in the first scene of ‘Scream’ she starts to have a conversation with what will be her killer but she doesn’t realise this as she is a naive and immature character.

The fake blood on the trees which was made from red and blue food colouring with gelatine, this made a realistic blood effect is an important aspect for our film as it makes the opening daunting and make it seem more a horror rather than our previous attempt where nothing sinister was happening.                                                                                                                                                                         

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                      

Shooting schedule

We had changed our shooting schedule as we had changed from our intial idea, before we were going to be fiming at a house with different actors however since we changed our horror film idea we therefore had to create a new shooting schedule for the new location and actors.

Preliminary task

This is our premliminary task.

Opening Synopsis

The original synopsis

The film opening is set on the outskirts of Norwich, Costessey in the 1980’s era. The opening focuses on Amelia. Amelia is a 16 year old, brunette. She dresses appropriately and she is very intelligent, she is also naive and adventurous. Amelia lives in a semi-detached single-family house with her 45 year old father David and her 43 year old mother Karen.

Amelia is first seen running out of her house and down the road in with her dad following her early afternoon for an unknown reason. This reason is found out soon.

Amelia is upstairs in her room playing a (80’s artist) record on the 25^th November 1987 then she hears a strange noise so she warily walks down the stairs. The camera sharply cuts to a hand holding a knife covered in blood. When Amelia reaches the bottom of the stairs she finds her mother dead on the floor. Amelia begins to overwhelm with emotions as she screams at first then kneels beside her mother and begins to cry. Watching her cry beside her mother is David standing on the other side of the room with a sinister look in his eyes.

Amelia is looking around and her breathing gets heavier as David is getting closer to her.

The new opening synopsis

The film opening is set in Norwich at the school Ormiston Victory Academy, in 2012. The opening focuses on Amelia.  Amelia is 16 years old and brunette.  She is intelligent and cares about her studies, she wants to gain the best grades.
Amelia is first seen studying in an empty room. As she’s studying she is getting calls and text’s from an unknown number, she ignores the unknown number, but not so long after she hears strange noises and she doesn’t know where it is coming from.  Amelia decides to leave the empty room and walk home.  As she’s walking home she gets another call from the unknown number and is still hearing the strange noises. Amelia  is looking around and her breathing gets heavier  and you see the villain in the darkness .

We changed our opening synopsis because it was difficult for it to be set in the 80’s due to the setting such as buildings, cars and other surroundings out of our control being to modern and we also struggled to get an accurate representation of people in the 80's so we didn't know how to clearly signify that our charcters are in the 80's.