Official Film Opening Proposal

This is an adaption from our original group idea, which was too complex, too fast-paced and more like a trailer than an opening. An ordinary morning when a teenage girl's memories come back to haunt her.

Starts with her brushing her hair, looking in a mirror. She walks down the stairs and finds a letter addressed to her, she opens it to find a drawing of a little girl holding a toy. She then leaves the house to go to school, on the way she walks past a park. She sees a swing set and one of the swings is swinging by itself. Suddenly the little girl in the drawing appears on the swing holding the toy but quickly disappears again. The girl is spooked and leaves the park and walks under a bridge/underpass where she sees the same toy lying on the floor. She bends down to pick it up and then the camera tilts up to show the little girl standing at the end of the bridge/underpass and it finishes there.

Inspirations: 'The Woman in Black', 'The Girl on the Train', 'Insidious'

Preliminary Task

This is my preliminary task, we had to show different editing and filming techniques, including shot reverse shot (when the two girls are talking) and match on action (when the girl opens and walks through the door). But making sure the 180 degree rule wasn't broken. It was useful to get more experience using a camera and editing the clip and next time i would like to get practice with the sound recorders. One thing that was challenging was getting the actors to pay attention when filming them.

Opening Proposal

1: Summary
Starts with mum and daughter reading a book together at dining table, then the dad returns home from work, clearly angry. Daughter runs upstairs and hinds under duvet, close-up of her under duvet with shouting in the background then a loud smash of a cup or plate and the screen goes black. The mum goes into daughters room in the middle of the night and they leave in a hurry to the train station, lots of high-speed editing here. Dad notices and rushes after them but just misses the train. Scene ends with him calling someone on his phone telling the receiver to track the train. Ends with a close up of his face.

Genre - psychological/action thriller

2: Audience
Target audience - 16-25, mature theme not suitable for younger ages.
Certificate - 15 as it contains violence and possibly strong language.

3: Plot
Mum and daughter are on the run from abusive dad/husband, but he has a lot of power as he is has the technology to track them down.

4: Style and Tone:
- Keep audience on the edge of their seats.
- Full of suspense and tension.
- The start, when they are reading the book should have a slightly warmer feel, for example by using yellow/orange lighting. But once the action starts it should have a colder feeling, by using blue lighting. Similar to the colour change between the flashback and reality in the opening of Shutter island.

5: Characters, costumes and props
Woman - age 35-45, wearing jeans and a plain top, hair down (nothing fancy)
Daughter - age 5-8, wearing pyjamas
Man - age 35-45, wearing a suit with shirt half untucked and lose tie, scruffy hair, indicates that he's tired/doesn't care about appearance.
Props - children book, digital clock showing the middle of the night, rucksack that mum carries, phone that dad calls on, plate/cup to smash for sound effects.

6: Graphics
The title would likely occur when the screen suddenly goes black and could possibly fade in and out, joining the scenes together.

7: Sound
Diegetic - reading book, shouting, calling phone.
Non-diegetic - music or fast beat when they run to station.