Props in Horror Movies

Horror movies constantly draw on the use of props to create mood and atmosphere, propel the story, or to add to the antagonists fearful, threatening persona. Weapons have been used since the beginning of the horror genre, and they range from heavy duty fire arms to household knives. Here are a few examples of the different, commonly used weapons.

Knifes

Knifes are always being used in horror films. A main exaple is in the Scream sieries and the Halloween sieries. Their fear factor is that they are items that we all have in our house making the antagonist seem more human.

Axes 
Axes have been used quite alot throughout the horror genre. One of the main examples of the use of axes is the film Hatchet. Their fear factor is that they can cause alot of harm and they link well to the character in this film.

Chainsaws
Chainsaws are an extremely iconic weapon in horror, mainly due to their appearence i the texas chainsaw massacre sieries. They are now synonimous with the horror genre.






Horror films are becoming more and more creative with their weapon choice, some even coosing to use no weapons and instead, put their characters in mental danger. However, this works both ways and now a film that uses a knife or an axe could be seen as 'classic' or 'old school'. I also think it is interesting the apart from torture devices and guns etc., most of the weapons in horror films had a seperate primary intention and were not meant to cause harm.

Plot Summaries

Themes
Stock Characters

Locations
Stock Situations


A Nightmare On Elm Street


While at the Springwood Diner with his girlfriend, Kris Fowles (Katie Cassidy), Dean Russell (Kellan Lutz) falls asleep at the table and meets a man covered in burn scars, wearing a red and green sweater and a clawed glove on his hand. The burned man cuts Dean's throat in the dream, but in reality it appears that Dean is cutting his own throat as friend and waitress Nancy Holbrook (Rooney Mara) looks on with Kris. At Dean's funeral, Kris sees a photograph of her and Dean as children, but cannot recall ever knowing Dean before high school. Kris begins to dream about the burned man herself and refuses to go to sleep for fear that she will die in her dreams. Jesse Braun (Thomas Dekker), Kris's ex-boyfriend, shows up at her house to keep her company while she sleeps, but Kris meets the burned man in her dreams and is murdered. Covered in blood, Jesse runs to Nancy's house to try to explain what happened and he learns that Nancy has been having dreams about the same man; that man's name is Freddy (Jackie Earle Haley).

Jesse is apprehended by the police under suspicion of murdering Kris, and is killed by Freddy when he falls asleep in his jail cell. With her friends dying, Nancy begins to question what everyone's connection is to each other, given that none of them can remember each other before their teenage years. Eventually, Nancy and her friend Quentin Smith (Kyle Gallner) discover that all of them, including more children, attended the same preschool together. Nancy's mother Gwen (Connie Britton) reluctantly tells Nancy and Quentin that there was a gardener at the preschool, Fred Krueger, who hurt Nancy and the rest of the kids. Gwen explains that Nancy was his favorite, and came home one day telling her mom about Freddy's "magic cave" and the things that happened down there. Gwen claims Krueger skipped town before he was arrested. Nancy does not believe her and attempts to track down the remaining kids from the school. Nancy eventually discovers that all of the other kids have been killed, most of them in their sleep. Meanwhile, Quentin tries to accept that everything is nothing more than repressed memories, but he falls asleep during swim practice and witnesses what really happened to Krueger. Quentin sees everyone's parents hunt down Krueger, and then burn him alive. Quentin and Nancy confront Quentin's father, Alan Smith (Clancy Brown), about the reality they murdered Krueger with no actual evidence that he had committed any crime. Nancy and Quentin, who both begin sporadically dreaming while they are awake as a result of insomnia, decide to go to the preschool and learn what they can about Krueger.

On the way, Nancy falls asleep and is attacked by Freddy, but when Quentin wakes her up they discover she has pulled a piece of Freddy's sweater out of the dreamworld and into reality. Quentin takes Nancy to the hospital for cuts on her arm; there, he steals some adrenaline and a syringe to help them stay awake. Nancy and Quentin leave the hospital and eventually make it to the preschool. Quentin uncovers Krueger's "magic cave" and the evidence that proves Krueger was physically and sexually abusing all of the children. Nancy decides the only way to end this is to pull Krueger out of their dreams and kill him in reality. Quentin tries to stay awake long enough to pull Nancy out of her dream when she has Freddy, but he falls asleep and is attacked. Krueger then goes after Nancy, and explains that he intentionally left her for last so she would stay awake long enough that when she finally fell asleep, she would no longer be able to wake back up. While Nancy struggles with Freddy, Quentin wakes and uses the adrenaline to bring Nancy up and pull Freddy into reality. With Krueger distracted by Quentin, Nancy uses a broken paper cutter blade to cut Freddy's gloved hand off, and then slice his throat. Afterward, Nancy torches the secret room, with Krueger's body left inside, while she and Quentin leave. Nancy and her mother return home from the hospital, with Nancy being told she should get some sleep. Krueger suddenly appears in a mirror's reflection and kills Nancy's mother before pulling her body through the mirror while Nancy screams.

Horror movie Stock Characters

 Through our research of horror films, we identified 5 main stock characters thatr make repeat appearnces in alot of horror movies.

the wanderer- The character that always leaves at the tensest moment to go for a pee, often killed first.
the popular girl- The girl whos everyones friend, shes pretty, bitchy and mean.
jock- Athletic, handsom and mean to other boys. often sees himself as the protector of the group.
the final girl- The main character in the film who is always lft till last and often survives
the pervert- the man who peeps into the girls locker room then gets killed

Film Trailer Analysis

In order to gain an understanding of the common conventions of a film trailer, and how various methods and techniches are used to promote the film, I analysed an existing trailer.

Paranormal Activity 2


I chose to do my film trailer analysis on the film trailer for Paranormel Activity 2. There are several common conventions of horror movie trailers that are used in this trailer.
       The use of editing techniques such as quick cuts between shots to create an exciting atomosphere in the advert is often used. Some visual images only stay on the screen long enough for you to realise what we are seeing until it quickly cuts to the next shot.
       Another convention used, is the editing of the shots so that we are not shown the story in narrative order, for example, we are shown two disturbing shots of people flying at cameras and a possesed woman, then we are shown scenes of relaxed family environments, then we are shown more disturbing images, creating a disjointed narative.
      One line conversations are also used to tell the storry but keep the trailer flowing and not slow it down with unnessasary extended dialouge.

The Meeting

We were given a brief to use tripods, cameras and iMovie to create a 1 minute film based around the title, "The Meeting". Our teacher gave us little advice or help on how to shoot the film, however, this was done intentionaly to make the task an introduction to filmmaking. As Mr. Rosen said, he was 'Setting us up to fail'. The film was about a reunion of two old friends, one has become popular and confident, and the other isshy and timid, and the popular character does not seem to have time for the other character, resulting in an awkward situation. Dan, Alex, Joey, and me worked together to make the film, we applied shooting techniques we gained from the previous project, yet our understanding of them was poor. 

 

Evaluation

When everyone had finished filming and editing, we viewed everybody else's final edited film, all entitled the "The meeting". None of them were of very high quality or very entertaining, due to a lack of time, and knowledge of filming and editing techniques. There were several key areas that needed improvement across the class.

Utalize your existing knowledge of editing techniques. In this particular task we were alright in this area as joey due to his expierience in creating film, was confident with the i Movie software, however alot of the movies were poorly edited.

          Try to keep all of the shots quick and interesting, as a long shot can often become dull and uneventful, therefore boring your viewers and resulting in an unentertaining film.

          Try not diverge from the story. If the narrative has no definite parameters, it can be hard to hold your audiences attention