Day for Night

As well as shooting at night, I am going to try the technique that lots of hollywood directors use. This avoids the film looking grainy, you don't have to use such a bright light, which can make a film look unrealistic, and it gives a nice early hours, twilight feel.

It can sometimes be very effective:

In Sleepy Hollow, they have used the same technique:

Set design - Alleyway Scene

For one of the shots, there is a patchy wooden wall on the right hand side. In order to make this wall more interesting, and involve it in the period feel of the film, I have made and got hold of some old victorian posters to litter it with.

In these screen shots from the film Little Dorrit 1988, the same poster technique has been used.

Recce - Act/Scene 1

Location Shots - Alleyway Scene

The location I have chosen is a small path which goes up a hill. It is surrounded by brick walls, or gothic railings. There is also a church and graveyard that surrounds it. The street lights are old fashioned too, they could be victorian. There is however a problem with the lighting, it is a large area to cover, and i think the camera will be following someone, i will have to light the scene very carefully. The street lights are very orange, and i want the scene to b more grey/blue, so i think the only way i can get round this will be in post-production.

Trailer – Outline

Act 1

The trailer opens with the sound bridge of heeled footsteps on the ground. A shot dissolves in, it shows a woman walking down an alley, and we see her from the front. She is wearing a big frilly whitish dress; the clip then fades back to black. In the black an old man appears holding a golden lantern. He is possibly a gravedigger for they are in a graveyard. He speaks, ‘On the seventh night, of the seventh day, the day that god rested from his toil…(during this part of speech we see the young handsome detectives face) …that’s when the killer strikes. The scene cuts back to the woman walking, she’s walking faster now, the camera is following her from behind, she stops for a second, looks to her right, and from the shadows to her left a white gloved hand grabs her neck and pulls her into the darkness, her scream echoes throughout. The shot cuts back to the handsome man in the same scene, exclaiming, ‘But that’s tonight’ ‘Then he hath already striked.’ Cut to black.

4 shots flash up, each a beat long:

1 = Detective running fast, camera following. 2= detective shooting, different scene. 3= A victim falling in to a lake. 4 = killer standing in alleyway, silhouetted.

Act 2

Camera opens on detective, he is speaking to a friend, he looks a wreck:

It was adequate before, (A beat of the pathologist and dead body, than a second clip of the detective with his wife) I could cope (a beat of him leaning against a wall, out of breath.) But now, (another beat of the girl looking back over her shoulder, smiling) Its personal. (Shaky (documentary style) camera clip of a flashback, the detective is asleep next to his wife, a dark figure abducts the woman, there are screams, the detective grabs his gun and shoots, but they are gone.

Break

Act 3

Act three is the build up of shots to the title.

First shot: a girl, possibly a prostitute, running from the camera.

2: The killer putting on his glove.

3: A shot of someone’s shoes walking slowly on grass or a croaky floorboard.

4: His wife dancing in the snow.

5: The killer grabbing an axe

6: The detective kneeling in a church, before the altar.

7: The killers half lit face

8: A burning house? If achievable..

9: His wife again, walking out of the darkness in her nightgown, blood on her hands.

Main title

At the end, over the titles, the killer sings a chilling nursery rhyme.

‘Coming soon...’

My Production company

I think the right studio for my film would be a small branch of a large company. For example, like Working title’s branch WT2, which produced films like Billie Elliot. This choice of Production Company is because the film is likely to be independent and British, and drawing on a gothic approach, and therefore a new type of film for British cinema. So it’s slightly experimental, and due to the genre, needs more money to be able to compete with the Hollywood blockbusters in the same category. The Money from the studio would be spent mainly on distribution and perhaps a few upcoming British actors.

The studio ident is very simple and replicable.

A good distributor for this film would be Lionsgate UK, a company known for investing in independent horror films. They distribute experimental films like Heartless 2009 and more high-end indie films like The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus 2009 and Harry Brown 2009.

Their current ident is very advanced and I wouldn't be able to create something as complex, for it is completely CGI; The camera zooms out of the mechanical workings of a clockwork structure, to reveal the title which sits in the clouds behind. However, their old ident is a lot more simple; The title is superimposed on top of some stars and it appears with some sparkling effects over the top. Perhaps the right distributors for my film should be an upcoming, new company, whose ident isn't perhaps as advanced as the other older and more successful companies.