Sunday, 7 November 2010

Film Proposal & Narrative Structure

Once we analysed some trailers, the next step was to decide upon a storyline which our trailer will follow. This required group input and a lot of thought as we needed to be different from the rest which was our unique selling point. We all created our own narratives structures following different storylines and decided on the best one and improved it. The chosen narrative structure was mine which we all improved and is located below alongside the film proposal:



Narrative Structure:

Four 18 year old male students are on a road trip having just passed their exams. They were on their way to Bournemouth excited about their trip, some characters are drinking, and the music is loud. Suddenly the car is out of control and crashes. The students find that they are in the middle of a country road with no houses, or people in sight. It’s getting dark and they have no reception on their phones.

They notice a forest area in the distance and decide to camp for the night seeing as it is getting dark. As they approach the forest they see signs saying no entry, they ignore these and trespass in as they set out their camp.

As they begin to set out the tent, Josh who is holding the camera films the area, he walks around thinking he is making a documentary, as he zooms the camera out he catches sight of a strange man who seems to be wearing a mask, the camera is out of focus so this cant be seen very clearly. As the camera‘s autofocus kicks in, the masked figure seems to have vanished. Josh rushes back to the group to inform them of what he saw. They all appear to be frightened, but decide to carry on setting up the camp.

The spot is enclosed by many bushes and trees which restrict the sight of them, they gather firewood into their campsite to start a fire and they start to construct their tent. As night falls all the students sit around the fire, sharing stories discussing the masked figure, one of the characters starts to get really scared. Saif left the group to go to the toilet and strolls deep into the forest. After a few minutes, the group hears a loud scream and somebody choking and believes that it’s Saif trying to scare them and it’s all a big joke. The group slowly approach the bushes calling out “Saif.. Stop playing around.. jokes over..”. Josh was scared so was walking behind the other members when suddenly he trips over something on the floor. He turns around whilst on the floor and sees Saif dead next to him with blood on his face and his eyes open. The group began to stress and ran back to the campsite to find their tents and belongings demolished. The boys are all speechless and don’t know what to do.

The decision was to leave the area as soon as possible but they could hear a creeping sound coming from the bushes. They all slowly approach the sound trying to find out what the sound is but suddenly an axe comes flying through the bush. Josh gets scared and falls on the floor. The two other boys leave Josh and run for their lives and make it over the fence into a neighboring graveyard. Josh gets up quickly and starts to run after his friends whilst getting chased by the killer. He manages to get half way over the fence and just as he is about to get over but the killer grabs his leg and pulls him back in the forest. We, as an audience, only see Josh’s head over the fence then him getting pulled in suddenly. We hear him scream and shout for help which suddenly comes to a stop when he dies. The boys start running through the graveyard looking for a place to escape. They are lost and have no idea as to where they are.

They sit down behind a tree trunk where they cannot be seen and are stressing as to what to do. They hear a dog barking and leafs rustling fast and they panic. They both jump up and run different ways. One of the boys tries to run away from the dog and find a way out whilst the other sprinted the other direction finding a place to hide. The boy trying to hide keeps glancing back to see if the dog is behind him and suddenly he falls into a dug up hole ready for a burial ceremony. He falls in to the 6-foot deep hole and is lying down as he broke his leg therefore unable to get up. He looks up and sees a dark shadowy figure holding a shovel with a dog beside him. The antagonist begins to fill the grave with dirt and the boy is shouting for help but there is no response to help him.

The other boy stops running and begins to pace walk through the graveyard and can hear a voice. He shouts out “ is anyone there? Help me.. please.. please somebody’s after me!”. He then has visuals on a torch and sprints towards it in hope for help. The member was a police officer on patrol who has come to investigate a reported issue of some abnormal activity in the forest. The last survivor begins to explain what happened and the police officer tries to calm him down and calls for backup. Several police cars and officers with dogs arrive on the area and cordon it off. The dogs are patrolling the area along with armed police officers trying to catch the reported antagonist. Suddenly, there is a scream from one of the officers in the forest and a dog howl. This comes to a stop and all the police officers at the scene sprint towards that area but there is no one to be seen. The boy was sitting down in the police car wrapped in a blanket and is unaware of what is happening outside his secure environment. Suddenly blood splashes on the front windscreen and all the police officers start to emerge from the darkness with red eyes and vampire teeth. The boy doesn’t have a clue what is happening and tries to get out the car and run but was unfortunately unsuccessful. The camera cuts out and the audience is left in a question.