Planning for the main task

WHO IS THE TARGET AUDIENCE?

For our main task we have decided to make our target audience 15-24 year old as this group are the main cinema-goers and if we make our opening sequence appeal to them then they would bring more profit towards the film. Moreover, the age group we are targeting are mainly students and so therefore would be interested in horror films more than people older that 24 years old. The youngest of our target audience is 15 and so there are certain rules that we have to follow in order to make our opening sequence suitable, therefore, we went onto the BBFC website and found that we cannot dwell on dangerous behaviour that the audience could copy. We also found that strong language should only be used frequently and that we cannot strong gore, however, we found that this may be an advantage because the scariest moments are normally unseen. 

In order to appeal to our target audience we have chosen characters of a similar age to this age group as our characters are 16-17 years old, therefore the audience may relate to them more. Moreover, we have chosen to make the victims a group of friends going out together, and so consequently this would represent the audience because 15-24 year olds often go out with their friends. This would also make the audience feel more unsettled because the characters are like themselves and so the audience may think that the events could happen to them. 

CHALLENGE OR CONVEY THE HORROR GENRE?

We do not want to challenge the horror genre because by conveying the horror genre  we feel that this will keep the audience at the 'edge of their seat' because the conventions of a horror genre always create suspense and tension for the audience and this is what we want. 

We will convey the horror genre by making the girls seem weak and vulnerable because this will let us lead onto the events of the girl victims being killed. 

PLOT SYNOPSIS

For our opening title sequence we have decided to make it begin with showing missing posters of different people that have gone missing in 'Happy Valley'. This would create an enigma because it is a mystery as to why they are missing. After the missing posters have been shown, the main characters are presented driving into 'Happy Valley' and talking amongst themselves, they then see a girl who looks hurt, and so Laura gets out the car to see if she is okay. However, it turns out that the girl is a zombie and so she bites Laura and Laura falls to the floor. The others then get out the car and run into the woods, Emma then falls over and another zombie comes out of the woods and attacks her. Jess and Eloise are the last two left, however, they see two other zombies who are running towards them; Jess quickly runs away whilst Eloise gets caught and is then attacked. When Jess turns around she sees Eloise is gone, she then turns around to her front and sees two zombies in front of her and then another two behind her. The scene ends with her scream, after this we have decided to have a transition and then show a new day where a man puts up another missing poster of Jess.