Initial Ideas for Horror Teaser Trailer

Today we discussed what kind of horror film we would like to makes a teaser trailer for. We discussed how most horror films will follow a set of conventions, regardless of what kind of artistic flair may be imposed; horror films still manage to fall into a certain category that defines its angle and approach of suspense, fear and dilemma.

The three subgenres that horror movies will tend to fall into are:

1. Horror-of-the-personality: Threats in this story are normally stemming from human beings

2. Horror-of-Armageddon: A menace which usually comes from nature going mad threatens human’s existence

3. Horror-of-the-Demonic: Horror stems from the idea that evil otherworldly entities exist

Upon these conventions we then started to generate some ideas on a mind map that we could stem something from.

After mind mapping we choose a couple ideas which we could flesh-out as a group. We came up with 3 premises:

1. A man has recently been released from a hospital with head injuries. When returning to his given address he walks through the front door and his house starts to reveal itself as a labyrinth of bizarre and dark events. When he walks through a door the setting completely changes. He always watches people being hunted by a crazed masked killer from a removed perspective like a fly on the wall. Eventually he realises that the killer was himself before he suffered from amnesia.

2. A boy and a father move into a new house in the country and begin to hallucinate occasionally seeing each other as demonic figures. Strange occurrences take place in the house; bizarre reflections in mirrors, sinister shadows creeping across the walls etc. Both the father and son find themselves being haunted by each other. The father tries to discover if his house is haunted and why, but he eventually starts to suspect his son of being possessed by an evil entity.

3. A farmer begins to suspect that the scarecrows on his farm are moving independently of their own whilst he is asleep. All his possessions start to go missing and turn up in strange places. His anxiety is heightened when the animals on his farm get slaughtered over night. Locals then tell him that they’ve seen men walking around outside his house at night suspiciously. His objective is to uncover the mystery.

We then considered from here what would be the best plot idea to develop by realising the possible flaws in all of them. We eventually determined that:

• Our first idea was probably our favourite but we realised that it may not be realistically simply to create, pitch or convey a real sense of threat and suspense with by just using a teaser trailer. We were eager to see if you could match the special effects with the software available, but considered that it may be more trouble and time than it would be worth.
• Our third idea would be too difficult to produce in terms of location and props as well as getting actors to play the necessary characters and use of farm animals. It may also be difficult to convey the plot and angle of the film with just a teaser trailer. Essentially, the idea wasn’t practical in far too many areas.