Suicide club

Introduction

Suicide Club otherwise known as Suicide Circle in Japan is a Japanese horror/thriller film directed by Japanese director Sion Sono and was released October 29 , 2001. Unlike other critically acclaimed Japanese horror film, this film did not receive a western transitional film adaptation; which is what influenced me to use this film as an influence for the narrative of my horror teaser trailer.

 I am planning on replicating the successful conventions that were placed in place by other directors that had transitioned Japanese horror film into western horror blockbusters.

Plot

The story takes place in Tokoyo, Japan in the course of six days. The story follows a band of detectives as they are tasked with uncovering the case of the mass suicides that keep occurring all over Japan. The first case of suicide occurs when a massive group of school girls jump in front of a speeding train and thus taking their lives, this causes mass hysteria as more and more suicides are being committed. During the course of the story the detectives were tipped about a website that displays red and white circles that signifies the amount of male and females that had committed suicides in the past few days. At the end of the film the detectives discover that the cause of the mass suicides were the doings of a Japanese pop group called Deserts who's music had drawn people to commit suicide.

My interpretation 

In order to avoid plagiarism I have been advised by my teacher to use the narrative of the movie as influence for my own narrative as I am not allowed to replicate or mimic any of the original source. As I am using the original narrative as influence for my own narrative I will focus on some of the key themes in the original source to use as a  stimuli. I have decided to keep the theme of mass suicide as a major plot point in my narrative. I want to set my narrative in modern day London and thus I will research into the conventions I must use to make the regional location of my narrative known.

Instead of using a Japanese pop group as my main antagonist I will be enforcing a practical and western stereotypical uncanny antagonist as my antagonist establishes that I have successfully translated the film from eastern to western as most western horrors follow the conventions of having a uncanny/paranormal antagonist in their horrors.

One shot perspective

One shot perspective is a visual technique that was popularized by acclaimed director Stanley Kubrick. This techniques refers to the center of the attention being in the middle of a grid. This type of technique has been acclaimed by many critics praising it stating that the one shot perspective is visually pleasing to the eye.

In the image above we can see an example of Kubrick's famous one shot perspective from the movie 2001: A space odyssey, from this image without knowing what the one shot perspective is it is obvious what the main focus of the image is the man in the middle, this is simply because our brains recognise that the subject is the most important part of the image straight away simply because it is placed in the middle. Many believe that this practice contradicts with the rule of Z; this can be disproved because the rule of Z is used whenever the content creator is trying to draw the attention of the viewer to the different subjects on the screen periodically whilst the one shot perspective is generally used when the surrounding objects are smaller than the main subject in the shot thereby making the viewer pay attention the subject first.

Rules of Thirds and Rule of Z

Introduction
The rules of thirds refers to a technique that is used mostly by photographers to establish and separate the center of attention from the surrounding objects, this technique as also been adapted by content creators as a technique that they go by to create an eye fulfilling shot were everything that is present of the shot.
   The technique is titled the rule of thirds because the guideline consist of a three by three grind with each grid being equal in size.

When using the rules of thirds it is important to strategically place each subject and its surroundings in a particular grid in the guide line. In the example above the exist to road is placed in the furthest right of the middle row of the gridline. It is evident that the photographer had placed it there to connote that it is not the subject of the picture, the  subject of the image being placed in the middle grid thereby attracting the viewers attentions first. To contradict this there is another technique called the rule of Z; this technique is quite similar to the rule of thirds as they both use the same grid guide line. The rules of Z is called this because it states that the attention of the viewer of the picture will firstly directed to the upper left grid of the image followed by the attention being directed to the upper right section of the image and then the center grid of the image, this then continues by the attention of the viewer being directed to the lower left section of the grid and finally the attention is directed to the lower right section of the grid. After following the rule of Z the viewers attention will then be directed to the section of the image that they had not viewed; these sections being the middle left and middle right section of the of the guideline.

Todorov narrative theory

 Introduction

Tzvetan Todorov is a Bulgarian-French philosopher who had lived in France since 1963 during his life span he had written a lot of essays and books detailed several theories of his. One of his most influential theory was his narrative theory. Todorovs narrative theory details the different sections of a given narrative in the films and multimedia content of today. Todorovs theory transcends past whether a film as a clear "beginning", "middle" and "end" but rather states a film consist of an "equilibrium", "a disruption", "realization", "restored order" and "equilibrium again".

Equilibrium

Equilibrium refers to stability, this is the beginning of the film, this is the part of the film where the characters are going around living their every day lives unaware of the events that are about to unfold before them. Content creators achieve a state of equilibrium by incorporating a lot of content that the audience at home are familiar with and can relate with into the scene, a fine example of this could be a middle aged woman returning home from work only to head off and pick her children from their primary school or a teenager having am argument with their parents. The content creator knows that these are part of the everyday scenery of an average person their by making the scene canny to the audience allowing them to make a mental link that this part of the story is the "normal/average" part or better yet the equilibrium.

Disruption and Realisation

Disruption refers to the part of the film that is uncanny to both the audience and the characters that exist in this diegesis world. This part of the film signifies the beginning of the adventure or even the beginning of the unrest as it "rips" the characters out of their everyday lives and violently tosses them into a "realm" of uncanniness, the audience is then also disrupted by this sections are they had already made a mental realisation that the events that occurred during the equilibrium of the film also transpire during their everyday lives but know are faced with an unsettling sense of uncanniness but cannot do anything but watch the events unfold before them through the eyes of the characters, because the audience had already made these links with characters their can project themselves onto the characters as they embarked on during the film.

Restored order

Restored order refers to the part of the film where the characters attempt to repair the disruption that had occurred earlier during the film. It is at this point that the audience see the characters begin to develop. The content creators used this point at the film to showcase the characters emotions are their different responses to each stimuli this allows the audience to further strengthen the link that they had made to the character most similar to them, as the audience once again make a canny link to the ways in which each character handles the position that they are in. Restored order is very crucial to the narrative of the film as not only does it showcase character development but it also ties each individual uncanny plot hole together thereby making the viewing experience canny for the audience again.

Return to equilibrium

Return to equilibrium refers to the "general" ending off the film as everything returns to "normal" and a state of canny that the audience is familiar with. This allows the audience of the film to evaluate the personal journey that they had taken during the film my projecting themselves into a canny character. The return to equilibrium also signifies the return to a state of stability and for the most part a happy ending.

Sound and music developed

In addition the diegetic and non-diegetic sounds there are also a vast array of other sub-conventions that the content creator may use to fully enrich their multimedia piece. like I have stated before many of these conventions are put together in the post-production process but some of these conventions are engaged during the production process such as conventions like soundscaping, ambient sounds and ambient lighting.

Volume control

Volume control is am effect used by the content creators during the post productions process to emphasis the tone and emotions that have already been set in the scene by the diegetic and non-diegetic elements present in the scene. Volume control usually parallels with the pace of the scene.

Example of volume control


In this clip we can see a fight scene between the protagonist and antagonist of the narrative. The volume control is used most effectively in the sections of the fight scene when the protagonist is the danger, the first instance is when the fight begins; as the volume and the tempo of the fight scene is greatly increased to let the audience know that a fight is about to transpire. Volume control is the further used multiple times across the scene whenever the antagonist gains the upper hand during the fight as the rise in volume control will influence the rise in the audience anxiety. The most successful use of volume control is at the very end of the clip as the antagonist had won the fight this sparked the decrease in the volume and tempo of the clip and signifies the "all is lost" moment to the audience.

Dialogue

Dialogue is any speech or spoken language that is given in the multimedia piece and is really self explanatory. When using dialogue the content creator has to consider three major aspects. These aspects are language, tone and accent. The use of language refers to the words that are spoken by the characters and the connotations of these words, language is used by the content creator as the main story telling contributor of the multimedia piece. Tone refers to the way that the character delivers that dialogue that they are saying, giving the tone of the scene that the content creator is trying to achieve that character can deliver the dialogue in parallel to the tone that has already been established by the content creator, for example the is an aggressive tone as been establish the by the use of the diegesis and non diegetic elements the actor will have to deliver the dialogue in an aggressive tone. Accents are used to allow the audience establish the origins of the characters, there really not that much to it, from the accent exhibited by the character the audience can establish the regional identity of the character and thereby make a further judgement on their possibly upbringing and lifestyle.

Sound and Music

Introduction

When creating a piece of narrative sound and music are very useful conventions that could be used to set the theme and strengthen the motif of the piece. there are different sub-conventions of sound and music that can be applied to a multimedia piece, with a combination of editing and clever planing the director of the piece can create the pseudo world that they can immerse the audience into.

     Just like editing sound is part of the post-production process. The different types of sub-conventions are then placed to emphasis the emotions or the reality that the director had envisioned.

The Diegesis world

The diegesis world is a the reality that in which the TV programs, film and music videos takes place; this world inhabits the subjects of the media and is also made up the dietetic elements. Diegetic elements refers to the subjects in the diegetic world that the characters are aware of; this consist of natural sounds such as raindrops and car horns otherwise known as ambient sound. The use of these diegetic elements are used to fully immerse the audience into the diegesis world. The opposite of diegetic elements are known as non-diegetic elements, non-diegetic elements are elements of the media such as music and noises that the characters are not aware of this is simply because the non-diegetic elements do not exist in the diegesis world. The non-diegetic elements are used by the content creator the aid the audience interpret the tone and mood of the scene. popular examples of non-diegetic sounds are voice overs or background music.

 Example of diegetic sound

In this clip we can see that the character is aware of the music used in the clip, as when the song begins he makes an eyeline match the the source of the music, this allows better immersion for the audience as the fact that they can hear the same music that the character can then makes a link between the audience and the characters diegesis world.

Example of non-diegetic sound

This clip showcases a man shoveling snow as it is accompanied by a jolly Christmas carol. because the clip is only showcasing the lower half of the mans body the audience is unclear on what emotions the man may have but because the Christmas carol is quite upbeat the audience is left to interpret that the non-diegetic music is highlighting the mans emotions. The non- diegetic music can also be used to to set the scene because the music is a Christmas carol the audience can also interpret that the clip takes place in December somewhere around Christmas.

Ancinary Task

Introduction

Like I have stated before in addition to producing a teaser trailer I am also tasked with an ancinary task that comes hand in hand with my teaser trailer. The ancinary task sates that I must create a corresponding movie trailer and movie magazine showcasing the movie. Since the ancinary task bears a lot of similarity to the coursework I had produced last year I believe this give me an advantage when researching and producing the final product.

Movie Posters

Movie posters are a popular means of  advertisement, we see them everywhere. We can spot movie posters displayed in cinemas, billboards, magazines, on the internet and even on buses. The primary goal of movie posters and or any other medium of advertisement is to "sell" the movie and persuade the targeted demographic to watching the film. Common conventions of successful movie posters include; a masthead in big, bold and eye catching font; Images of the movies main cast; details of the film such as its release date and the names of the cast; the certain design style of the movie e.g. the colour and fonts. All of these conventions can also be used to effectively reflect the tone of the film.
By analyzing movie posters I can gain more knowledge on how to effectively grab the attention of the audience without giving away the plot of the movie.

Movie Magazines

Similar to movie posters film magazines can be used as a very effective technique for promoting movies and other media services. This type of promotion/advertising is called below the line marketing this is when a movie magazine or any other type of publishing house pay you to feature your content in their magazine, for example a publishing house may pay you to part take in an exclusive interview to feature in their magazine, which in turn will boost their sells when compared to competing magazines. Similar to below the line marketing there  is also above the line marketing in which you pay a publishing house to feature your content in their publication, magazine adds being a fine example of this.

Cross Media Convergence and Synergy

In addition to movie posters and and movie magazine big conglomerates and indie films also promote their films through cross media convergence and synergy. Cross media convergence is the term used to describe the way that different products are produced and distributed in a majority of different platforms, cross media convergence can also be applied when marketing, for example a film company can use different platforms such as; TV's, YouTube, apps and print to promote their films.
Synergy on the other hand is when two or more institution come together either vertically or horizontally to achieve an objective that could not have been achieved independently. Synergy can also be used as a marketing strategy whereby a film company can team up with a game developer to producing a video game or an app that in turn will hype and promote the film to the gaming demographic a demographic that they may have not been able to appeal to when left to their own devices.

My Influences

I have created this mood board to act as the visual stimuli I would need when fleshing out the narrative and conventions for my teaser trailer. In addition to my mood board I find that researching on youtube can be very usually when fishing for influences for my teaser trailer. The mood board contains still images from iconic horror films most of these still images also denote iconic scenes from their respective horror movie.

Like I had stated earlier in my blog I am interested in using Japanese horror films as some sort of stimuli for my teaser trailer much like America does when remaking the Japanese horrors. In addition to J horrors I am also open on using true horror stories as a stimuli for the narrative for my teaser trailer, this is very popular with a lot of horror films such as classics like The exorcist too recent films such as The conjuring and Annabelle.

Japanese horror films

Japanese horror films 

  

Like I have stated in my blog in recent years there have been many re-imaginings of popular Japanese horror films. Ringu was one of the first and also most successful to be remade in America as The Ring, and later The Ring Two although the sequel bears little to no similarities to the original that it was based on. Unfortunately American remakes of these classic Japanese films do not receive the critical and commercial success as their Japanese counterparts as The Ring is the only remake to not receive negative reviews with One Missed Call an American remake of a popular Japanese horror of the same name has received the worst reception of them all. 

Male Gaze Theory

Introduction 

In an earlier blog post I had posted a deep analysis of the audience feedback I had received from my questionnaire in my focus group. Overall the audience feedback was quite insightful as it had helped me develop my understanding of my chosen demographic. One of the questions I had featured in my questionnaire was "Would you prefer a female or male protagonist?" like I had stated before thee feedback I had received from this question was more female centric as five out of six of my participants stating that they would prefer a a female protagonist over a male protagonist whilst the remaining one participant had stated that they would prefer to have both a male and female protagonist in a horror film.I had also stated that the majority of my male participant wanted a female protagonist because of the Male gaze theory.

What is the Male gaze theory 

The male gaze theory was a theory mentioned in the controversial essay "Visual Pleasure and Narrative cinema" by Laura Mulvey who strongly argued that when viewing a piece of media the audience is placed in the perspective of a heterosexual male, this is highlighted in the strong sexualisastion of females that are very common in modern music videos and films. The conventions of the male gaze theory goes as follows; scenes that focus souly of the curves and features of the female body, slow motion., deliberate sexual camera movements and cut aways.
    According to the male gaze theory female is usually seen through two different perspectives, the first being an erotic reward for the dominate male characters in the narrative whist the latter being seen as an erotic object for the spectator/viewer watching the film.
Mulvey's theory also states that the female gaze theory is more passive than the male gave theory further underlying unequal power symmetry between genders. Mulvey's essay also states that the male gaze theory applies to female themselves as they view themselves through the eyes of men.

The inclusion of a female in mainstream film/media is quite vital as the female characters tend not to have any real importance herself, but is rather the way she makes her male counterpart feel and act that is important, this mean that the female only exist in relation to the male protagonist.
The male gaze theory states that the gender roles of males in the media text are active whilst the female counterparts are seen as passive who in turn often slow the narrative down and act as sexual influence for the active roles, they are under control of the males gaze and are only there for viewing pleasure whilst the males in other hand push the narrative forward.
      The male gaze theory holds a majority of similarities to the ideology of voyeurism. Then term voyeurism comes from the French word voyeur which translates to "one who looks"; voyeurism is the sexual interest in or spying of someone in intimate scenarios. One key characteristic of voyeurism is that the voyeur does not practically have any direct interaction with the subject of his/her interest.

Focus group Data analysis

In addition to asking my focus group open questions using popwerpoint, I had also given them each a questionnaire that I wanted them to fill out. The questionnaire I had given my participants simply just expanded on the questions I had asked them during my powerpoint, in addition to expanding on my powerpoint I had also featured new questions which i was planing on using as research to begin to flesh out my narrative of my teaser trailer as well as understanding which features and conventions that my audience response to the best.

From my questionnaire I had gained more insight on my audience than I had from the focus group powerpoint is self, I am planning on using the information I had gained to further convey more coursework to the level of authentic and professional horror film trailers.

Transcript 

In my focus group I had featured an equal amount of each gender.  I had chosen three girls and three boys to participate, I did this because I wanted to appeal to a mutual demographic and wanted both genders opinions on each of my stimuli I found that boys frequently gave short and quick responses to my stimuli whilst girls gave more developed responses, this could connote that the female half of my demographic will be harder to carter to.

	What is your age group?
Bellow 15	0
15-16	1
17-18	2
19-20	2
21-22	0
23-24	0
25	1
Above 25	0

For my focus group I had got a wide range of people of all ages, must of the females in my focus group tended younger whilst must of my males tended to be older, in total I had one 16 year old, one 17 year old, one 18 year old, two 19 year olds and one 25 year old.

            I believe that having the wide age range in my focus group in will help me relate more to the members of my audience of different ages. 

	What is your favourite sub-genre?
Action horror	1
Body horror	0
Comedy horror	4
Gothic horror	0
Natural horror	1
Psychological horror	2
Sci-fi horror	2
Slasher films	1
Splatter films	1
Zombie films	2

The majority of the responses from my focus group had stated that their favourite sub horror genre, I could reflect this piece of research into my final product by making my horror trailer a comedy horror. Due to my lack of knowledge on the comedy horror genre I will need to do intensive reteach into the conventions of the genre to properly carter to my audience.

            Drawn in second place for my focus group favourite genre is Psychological horror, Sci-fi and Zombie horror and closely followed by Action horror, Natural horror, Slasher films and Splatter films. 

For my question 4 I had asked my focus group why they enjoyed each of their favourite sub-genres. The general response I gained stemmed from people explaining why their enjoyed the comedy sub-horror the best. One of the responses I got for question four was “Because it is funny & it makes the film less scary” most of my responses went along the lines of this.

Question 5 was quite an open question; I had featured this question in my questionnaire to use as a stimulus for the narrative of my teaser trailer. The responses I had gained from my focus groups were more along the lines of my participants stating the jump scares were the scariest part of the trailer closely followed by the ending. I can apply this knowledge to my coursework by being sure to use conventions in my final teaser trailer, I also believe that this will greatly increase the authenticity of my coursework because it greatly reflects the conventions that are apparent in blockbuster teaser trailers.

To help further flesh out the narrative of my teaser trailer I had asked my focus group participant whether they preferred horror films with male or female protagonist. The results I got from this particular question was certainly more female centric as 5 out of my 6 participants stated they would prefer a female protagonist whilst the reaming participant stated he would prefer both a female and male protagonist for my teaser. To reinforce this convention into my final teaser trailer I would need to briefly research into the horror films that include a female protagonist and the different conventions that come hand in hand with having a female protagonist.

In question 6 I had asked my focus group why they chose their particular answer for question 6, the female majority of my focus group had stated that they preferred a female protagonist because they find that the hero is more relatable that way and the narrative is also more “suspenseful”, whist my male majority had just stated that having a female protagonist is the “norm”. The general reaction of my male participants could be credited to the male gaze theory; theory that states all media outlets created to be seen through a heterosexual male eyes.

For question to I had asked my participants another question to help me further flesh out my narrative. The response I had gained from this question was just generic horror movies settings; to list a few there was haunted houses, graveyards and hospitals. There is not much to analyse from this question apart from the fact that it helps me when I’m looking for filming locations.

Focus Group transcript

Below is the transcript for my first focus group. 

Focus group consent letter

Here is the letter of consent that I will provide to the participants of my focus group before the session begins. 

Focus group Questionnaire

Here is the Questionnaire that I will provide to the participants of my focus group before the session begins 

Focus group powerpoint

  

       Here is the presentation that I will be using to prompt the Q and A section for my focus group 

Target Audience Questionnaire

Target audience

When creating my visual piece I will need to fully understand and demonstrate the importance of target audiences and how I may research certain traits of my demographic in order to properly carter the conventions of my visual piece to their interests. To further develop my desirable narrative for my target audience I would need to research into the type of sub horror genre that they enjoy/fear the most and also research into other strands that could possibly affect the outcome of my narrative such as; whether my audience would prefer a male or female lead as well as what time era would they want my narrative to be set and etc. in addition to this I could also be able apply my demographic research into the representations of certain aspects and connotations of my horror trailer, for example; using my research I could determine how my demographic would like my protagonist to be represented, how my antagonist should be represented and most importantly how the mise en scene of my story to be represented.

  

Overall the general demographic for my horror film teaser trailer will be mostly teenage males aged between 15-25 who enjoy gore but will also settle for a more narrative based horror film than violence that they could perhaps enjoy with their significant others due to the fact that females do

also fall into my target audience.
A large majority of my target audience will come from homes that are working class and above this is because this outlet of entertainment and relief will be affordable for them since they come from a family of some sort of wealthy income.

Market Research

Here is a mood video that I made depicting the interest of my chosen demographic. 

Introduction
When tasked with creating a multimedia piece that can carter to a particular audience, it is very important to properly research into you're market audience. Researching into the brands, trends, music and etc that you're audience is into is equally as important as researching what type of content that you can include in your project in order to address you're particular demographic.
But before I start researching my audience I will need to to identify my audience, as I have said before I will need to understand the trends, brands and interest that I believe the demographic of my product will be interested in. I have included a list of said brands and trends below.

Demographic Identifier list
Causal movie goers
Soundcloud
YouTube
Partying
Instagram
Family Guy
South Park
American Dad

First Person Shooter Games
Zombie Themed video games
Horror Themed video games
Cheap Thrills
Theme Parks
Fright Nights
Game shows
Extreme Sports
Night life
Crime Documentaries
Dark humor
Skateboarding/ BMX/ cycling
Gym

Chosen Brief

Like I have stated earlier in my blog I have been tasked with creating a visual piece for my coursework, the two briefs that I have been given to choose out of for my coursework are, music video or horror movie trailer, I personally believe that both these brief will be the most effective when it comes to showcasing a strong narrative piece as well as representation which I believe are the most important conventions when creating a captivating visual pieces. 

   Overall I believe that a Horror movie trailer can not only enforce these two conventions the most effectively but with ease as well. In addition to narrative and representation, audience and genre are also both key convention in when aiming to effectively reinforce the audience attention to my visual brief. The Horror genre is a genre of film that is composed of a multiple of sub genres each with their own unique characteristics and conventions that set them apart. The main purposes of horror films are to inflict a negative emotional reaction out of the audience by effectively playing on the audience primal fears.

Blog Introduction

Welcome to my new Media Studies coursework blog, this blog will be used primarily for A2 media studies coursework. In this blog I will be posting the detailed analysis of the progress I'm making daily. This coursework will be a continuation of the coursework I had done for my AS media coursework (which you can find the link for below). Last year I was tasked with designing and creating a music magazine that included a front page, content page and a double page spread. Whilst executing my coursework I had gained quite a few researching and developing skills in which I will  apply to the process I will be making this year. The specification for my coursework this year has tasked me with planing, directing and producing a visual piece; this could range from music videos too short films. In addition to producing the visual piece I am also expected to design and digital marketing pack that would be used for further promotion of my visual piece.

http://ochukoasmusicmag.blogspot.co.uk/