Friday, October 12, 2007

Zoom In On That Thing Right There

It's called "Anathema".
Or rather it will be called Anathema, once it gets made.

The assignment is I will have thirty seconds to scare the everloving fuck out of you and yours.

Now, like any good obsessive artist/filmmaker/motiongraphicisisist/closet psychotic I want to avoid cliches when making something like this. It helps that the cliches of the modern day horror extravaganza don't really consist of terrifying people anymore.
Certain horror flicks go with gore. All over the place. Intestines and stomaches and hearts and brains and chainsaws and knives and more intestines and more knives and hey how about some more intestines guys I think this scene needs more intestines what do you think more intestines, yeah more intestines. And that works sometimes, it gets a reaction out of the crowd.

Others go with LOUD NOISES.

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....
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LOUD NOISES

And that's always guaranteed to get the audience to jump, right?

But is it really scaring them?

Showing a few dozen liters of red liquid in a scene and throwing in some screams, murder weapons and maybe a lampshade made from human skin isn't really terrifying someone, as it is more of a elaborate and puppeted disgust dressed in the trappings of fright. Also unsanitary.

Flinging loud noises and sudden scary imagery onto the scene is the movie equivalent of jumping out of a corner and going "BLAGHLABLGKHAL". This too isn't scaring someone as it is just surprising the crap out of them.

Its cliches like these that I will seek to avoid. The gore, the gotcha moments, the sudden loud noises and things rushing towards the camera going "AAAHHH!"

Instead I will rely on things more substantial...chilling imagery, the unseen, the implications of the unknown and a vague conceptual story about a curse, or a possession, to grab you by your ribs and leave a mark.

Or, at least.

That is the hope.

The script has been revised, and a style sheet is available for your viewing pleasure. Check it ouuuuuttttttttttt. T.

1 comment:

Akemi said...

I hope I can do your project justice.