Character Costumes

January 29th 2018

The costumes for the two main characters, Bobby and Poppy, are both quite casual outfits. I did a bit of research into typical outfits for serial killers and had no real luck because they all dress quite normally/casually. I did find that Ted Bundy typically wore turtlenecks, but that was really all I could find. We're going to make the outfits quite smart-casual so that the outfits are suitable enough for a first date.

 Ted Bundy

Taking inspiration from Ted Bundy's outfits, I think a smart-casual outfit like the one I will show below would be suitable for Bobby's character:

The outfit consists of a black turtle neck jumper and a dark coloured blazer, however the blazer doesn't have to be black, we could use a dark maroon or even navy. I would swap the suit trousers out for a pair of dark coloured jeans to make the outfit a bit more casual and fitting for a first date.

In terms of colour, I would plan for the turtle neck to be red so that we can use the meaning and representations of colour in the film to evoke certain feelings within the audience.

Red typically represents danger and violence, so this colour being shown on our killer almost foreshadows the danger surrounding his character and what is to come further on in the film. I feel like this gives us a great opportunity to represent the danger in the personality of the killer, and evoke feelings of hazard in the audience.




Poppy's costume has a lot less inspiration as there aren't as many widely known serial killers who are female, and the ones who are more known have very generic outfits or don't have any records on what they wore at all. Because of this, we've had to take a stab at making her outfit up and still making it look smart-casual but still a little bit strange/eerie at the same time.

We were thinking about possibly giving Poppy some glasses that are very 1970's style because they add a bit of a strange vibe to her as she wears accessories from different generations than the one she is currently in, which makes her a bit different. We also took this inspiration from Rosemary West who was convicted of killing 10 young girls with her husband, Fred West, in 1995.

Rosemary West

Mockumentary Film Research - The Purge: The Morning After

Characters - Characteristics

January 27th 2017 

Our film will only feature three characters, as well as a narrator who narrates many areas of the film.
The two main characters are the two serial killers who go on the date with each other, Bobby and Poppy. The third character is a lady who works for the dating agency. She briefly features in the film during the scenes where we show a bit of the dating agency office space such as the shots of her answering the phone and flicking through client's files, as well as the scene where she is on the phone to Bobby discussing his date.

The narrator will sound pretty similar to those on shows such as First Dates or The Undateables. Most of the lines for the narrator are plays on the common lines said by narrators in both of these shows, which will make the film sound as much like a real documentary as possible. The same goes for the woman working for the agency, she won't really show a personality, she's just there to fill a blank in the film to make it as similar to these shows as possible. She also will help us to make the story flow more, as she delivers the news about Poppy being Bobby's date.

In order to make sure that our two serial killers are as accurately portrayed as we can possibly make them, I decided to do some research into typical characteristics in serial killers. I used a few sources which I'll link here; 

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-3169359/How-spot-serial-killer-Criminologists-reveal-five-key-traits-common-notorious-murderers.html

https://listverse.com/2013/01/02/10-most-common-traits-of-potential-serial-killers/

http://twistedminds.creativescapism.com/serial-killers-introduction/holmes-typology/characteristics/

Profile Of A Killer Example from Agrosy University

These articles and facts helped me to mould the characters around the typical traits that serial killers tend to have. 

Bobby the Butcher Bennett
Bobby's character will come across as confident in the way he speaks, however he will be quite psychopathic. We want him to have similar characteristics to a typical killer, which will be made clear by the fact that he has an instability in his relationships (hence why he is using the dating agency) and an inability to maintain long lasting relationships.
Some of his psychopathic characteristics will be displayed by the fact that he has no regret, remorse, or expression of guilt. This is will be shown when he speaks about his previous murders, and shows the camera his murder weapons from those killings - and speaks about them in an almost joyful tone, which comes across as pretty sociopathic and creepy to the audience. From this scene, we can also take from his character that he is a repeat offender.
We can portray his psychopathic tendencies again after he kills Poppy, as he shows no signs of panicking about his actions, he just drags her into another room and proceeds to eat his meal. Bobby is also a very impulsive character, which is a similar characteristic in many killers, which we can show as he originally was looking for love through the dating agency, and instead, he brutally murders his date.

Another common trait that is found in serial killers is the fact that many of them are egotistical braggers, which we have decided to include in Bobby's character. Referring back to the scene where Bobby shows off his collection of 'trophies' to do with his killings, the fact that he is proud and bragging about his crimes and even keeps the murder weapons would make the audience very aware that he again, shows no remorse, and seems to be taking pride in the murders, which lets the audience know that Bobby really is a sociopath.

I would consider Bobby as the organised serial killer, the polar opposite of Poppy. Bobby is socially adequate, and seems to have good housekeeping skills. Although organised killers usually plan their murders a bit more than the average joe, many of them are still quite impulsive which is the type of killer we want to classify Bobby as. Organised killers are also more credible for dismembering bodies and leaving a clean scene - which is why we have the idea of portraying Bobby as a cannibal also as he cleans the scene up by literally dismembering the body and cooking it.

Poppy the Poisoner Parker
Poppy's character actually is based upon a woman who featured on an episode of 'The Undateables', so her character was quite a bit easier to plan in terms of her actions because we could physically see how she acts and the impression she makes on her date. The girl with the dark hair is the character we're basically trying to base Poppy's character around. By watching the clip of their date, especially the beginning of the date, you can see that she is quite awkward, not incredibly sociable and almost a bit shy. She struggles to keep eye contact throughout the date. We want Poppy to show these same sort of signs, such as not being able to hold eye contact or make conversation about anything other than murder - hence why she asks about Bobby's top 3 favourite kills in Wes Craven films.




Poppy's character will be a bit more subtle in terms of showing characteristics of being a serial killer; she will show more characteristics of a shy serial killer, more like an outsider, similar to a mass murderer who had been ostracised for years of their lives. She will appear as a more awkward character, avoiding eye contact and finding it hard to hold conversation. 
Poppy will appear as more of a disorganised serial killer, meaning that she is more socially awkward. She doesn't plan her killings, she is often the type to leave the body where it was attacked and flee the scene. She would be defined as the more dangerous killer, because she's unpredictable, lives on the fringe of society and doesn't have a daily routine. And frankly, people would be scared away by her strange aura and ostracise her because she seems weird and different (which she is). Poppy definitely fits into this category of killer, as they typically are very alone and rarely date, hence why she is at the dating agency. 

Another thing that is pretty common for disorganised killers is that they usually leave the evidence of their crime and flee the scene, which is exactly what Poppy will do after she pours the poison into Bobby's wine. She just leaves the empty poison bottle on the table and quickly goes to the bathroom. 

Film Title

January 26th 2018

We constructed a mind map of possible film titles by coming up with key words surrounding the general theme of the film and what it represents such as death, blood, murder and dates. From these keywords we came up with, we came up with any possible short and snappy titles that we could think of.

Some of these were too bland and boring, such as "The Killings" and "In For The Kill", and others were too long, such as "How To Murder Your Girlfriend".

We came up with "The Undeadables", which was almost like an homage to "The Undateables", which we are taking most of our inspiration from. However, this title seemed suitable for a film that was about supernatural beings like zombies or vampires, not as suitable for a film about serial killers.

From these titles, we narrowed it down to a final three of the best titles, which included; 

• Come Die With Me
• Last Dates
• The Deadly Dates

We decided on 'Last Dates', as it is short and snappy but also acts as a reference to another show which we are taking inspiration from, 'First Dates'. It also gives an ominous vibe to the film as 'Last' could leave the audience wondering why it is the last date - which they will soon find out is due to the fact they both cause each other's death.

Mockumentary Film Research - Strange Beasts

Mockumentary Film Research - Codes and Conventions

Codes and Conventions


The word 'mockumentary' has come from a combination of documentary that has been mocked by the producers of a film or TV show.

A mockumentary is a type of film in which fictional events are presented in the same style as a documentary to create a parody. They can either be comedic or dramatic in form, however the comedic approach is much more appealing to the audience and tends to be much more popular within the genre. Mockumentaries tend to add over dramatic effects to add comedic value to the film. In order to create the overdramatic and comedic effect to the mockumentary, they are often improvised in order to maintain the aspect of reality. Dramatic mockumentaries can often be confused with Docudramas. These types of films typically feature unrealistic situations/scenarios which are very out of the ordinary. 

Some examples of mockumentaries would be 'Bruno' and 'Borat', which are both produced by Sacha Baron Cohen. These are both incredibly popular in the film industry, possibly because of their shock factor, as much of the content in the films are very controversial and have crossed the line of being very offensive. Mockumentaries aren't only produced in the form of films. The popular US sitcom 'The Office' definitely fits into the mockumentary genre, and is a great example of a mockumentary themed show, as it adds a comedic value and unrealistic situations to an otherwise very boring, basic office job. 

Mockumentaries 'work' because of the expectations we have of a real documentary. When we see a text that looks and sounds real, we naturally tend to believe it. Mockumentaries use a lot of the same codes and conventions as documentaries and related media, such as an authoritative voice-over narrator, or interviewing the cast as if the film is surrounding their real life situations. The narrator usually encourages the audience to believe that they have some sort of specialist knowledge over the subject in question, such as narrators like David Attenborough and Liam Neeson; the voiceover can either be a 'voice of God' where they are only heard and never seen, or a 'voice of authority' where they are seen and heard.

They usually include apparently 'real' footage of events and all events presented to the audience are meant to be perceived as 'real' events. Documentarians also often go to great lengths in order to convince the audience that the content in the documentary is true. Interviews with supposed 'experts' or 'witnesses' are used to authenticate the views expressed in the documentary. Sometimes, they may disagree with the message of the documentary or other opinions that have been presented in the documentary. 

Non-diegetic sound is often used in documentaries as a bridge between two scenes, as in documentaries there are often lots of location changes, so smooth sound transitions are often very difficult to do.

Mockumentaries tend to have a 'feel good' nature. Many popular shows focus on characters facing serious, stressful, high risk situations, however, the general tone is positive and light-hearted. Mockumentaries also seem very natural which helps the audience to relate to the action and the characters. There is no laugh track on shows like The Office, Modern Family or Parks and Rec, so we aren't constantly reminded that the show is fictional. The character's speech often comes across as unscripted, due to casual and occasionally awkward dialogue. 

As there are usually interviews conducted throughout mockumentaries to give the film a similar feel to a documentary, the subject will usually be framed to the left or right of the screen, following the rule of thirds, meaning that the audiences eyes will always be immediately drawn to the subject in the frame. Close ups are the most common type of shot used in mockumentaries to enable the audience to focus on the character's face and concentrate on the emotions displayed on their face. The interviews are usually static with the camera placed on a tripod, because there isn't really a need for the camera to move around a lot as the purpose of the interview is for the audience to concentrate and focus on the character involved. However, it is common for the camera to make cutaways to things around the room to give an insight into the character's surroundings. 

Adding to the 'natural' feel of mockumentaries, the shots taken are usually a lot more of an  amateur style than other genres, such as including clips where the camera is still focusing on the subject, or more shaky and sudden camera movements or zooms, to add to the fact that these films are more of a one-on-one setting, with real life characters going through day to day situations. This also makes it more believable to the audience that the events occurring are true, as the film isn't shot as a professional film would be filmed, and seems like a much more low budget, amateur job rather than a high profile Hollywood film.

Still images are often used to assist in what the narrator or interviewee is talking about,  which encourages the audience to not just watch the film, but also think about what is actually occurring on the screen. There are usually minimal graphics used, the only time they're really used is to introduce characters involved in the mockumentary so that the audience is aware of who they are.

Location Ideas

January 24th 2018

As we finally finalised our film idea and planned our beginning, middle and end; it's finally time to think about locations for our film. We figured that planning our locations would make it much easier to write a script, as we can write it keeping in mind where all of these events are taking place. There won't be a lot of location changes in the film, and most of them are pretty easy to change if necessary. 

The main part of the plot, the date, takes place in Bobby's house, so we need a house to film in which has a downstairs bathroom due to the fact that we have the scene where Poppy goes to the bathroom and is then murdered; this would be much easier to carry out if the bathroom was on the same floor as the kitchen, rather than wasting time by filming Poppy travelling through different floors of a house. One of our group members, Maeve, has this in her house, so this is very possible for us to carry out in this location. Maeve's house is also quite plain looking; ie. she has plain cream coloured walls, cream carpet etc. meaning that there isn't any issues with mise en scene in terms of location, because there isn't anything that wouldn't fit the film, and it gives us space to add our own props to make the house fit a serial killer a lot more. We were thinking of adding props like axes which would be hung to a wall, or other typical murder weapons such as knives. This would reflect how Bobby has had a serious past of murder, and this would also be a really entertaining and interesting part to include in the interview stages of the film. 

The other areas of the film really only include the interview parts where we initially meet the two main characters. All of these scenes could really be filmed aywhere, but we've decided to follow the approach that is usually taken on 'The Undateables', where they film the people walking through random public places such as streets, along beaches or in public parks. This gives us an opportunity to show a bit of the serial killer's everyday lives when they're not killing, which could be pretty comical to the audience. We're currently thinking about the idea of interviewing Bobby walking through Wallace park, which is a really big public park in Lisburn. This works for us because it's easy to get to for all of our group members so there isn't any travel issues, but it's also really similar to the locations filmed in 'The Undateables', so it really will seem like a real documentary to the audience because it follows the same format that 'The Undateables' has.

Mockumentary Film Research

This year, my group and I must create a 5 minute short film. After lots of discussion, we've decided to go with the idea of shooting a mockumentary themed film. We've never shot a mockumentary before, or written the script for this type of film before so a lot of research will have to go into this project as we have practically no experience in this genre of film, bar watching these types of films. The best way for us to research this genre and really get to know it better is to watch a couple of short films, or films in general within the mockumentary genre, and analyse these films in terms of how they're shot, the editing of them, scripting, mise en scene, the target audience, the characters in the film and the social classes represented in these films. I'll also be researching the general codes and conventions of a mockumentary film, which will hopefully be portrayed through the films I'll be researching so I get a general idea of how we should shoot our film in order to apply the codes and conventions to it.

The short films I will be researching are:

• Movie Mind Machine (12 mins)
• Strange Beasts (5 mins)
• The Purge: The Morning After (6 mins)
• In A Relationship (19 mins)
• Crack (12 mins) 

The majority of these mockumentaries are classified as comical mockumentaries including; Movie Mind Machine, and The Purge: The Morning After, In A Relationship, and Crack. The reason I chose to analyse these films is because our final film will definitely fit into the comical mockumentary category, so these films will definitely help me to understand the way these types of films are shot and edited. I decided to also analyse a Sci-Fi mockumentary named Strange Beasts, simply so I could see how the codes and conventions of mockumentary films still apply to a more serious mockumentary based on a fictional topic. 

Film Layout - First Draft.

January 23rd 2018

We've definitely settled on the idea of the short film being like an episode of 'The Undateables' but set for serial killers. Today, we figured out our beginning, middle and end for the film. It's not very detailed as we're still making slight changes, but this is roughly our overall plan for the film. 

BEGINNING

• Voiceover narration over shots of everyday life
• Intro / small facts about love, statistics etc. This will be really similar, almost mimicking the narrative introductions from 'The Undateables' - "Looking for love can be difficult"
• Bobby saying their idea of what love is / their struggle with finding a partner. Bobby is speaking to camera, or someone behind the camera - giving the audience the feel of a real documentary.
• Preview of Bobby's everyday life - shots of him walking through a park as parts of his struggle are explained, as well as a narrator overvoicing. Shots of Bobby in his house, possibly showing the camera people his framed murder weapons, briefly explaining a bit of a few murders?
• Phone rings in Bobbys house
• Shot switches to office (shots of files and paperwork etc), receptionist talks to Bobby, switch between shots of him being told he has a date/ found a match for him etc. Brief introduction of who the date is.
• Just before date - shot of Poppy, small bio / interview of why she’s here and her struggle with finding a partner.

MIDDLE CHANGE TO KNIFE ON COUNTER

• Shot of Bobby sharpening blades in kitchen as the door knocks 
• Poppy nervously stands at the door 
• Quick glance of poison bottle (unknown to viewer what it is - foreshadows events)
• As Bobby walks to the door,  he makes indirect comment /subtle hint about what is to come..something quite creepy or a pun about butchering someone.
• Door opens (match on action shot) - Bobby brings Poppy into main room - table set up for dinner
• Both sit at table - the two start to make small talk, and their voices slowly fade out and narrator leads, almost commentating the date
• Close up individual interviews about how nervous they are etc. ‘a stab at love’
• Bobby pours wine for both himself and Poppy. 
• Bobby checks watch/time 
• ‘Im going to get the starter’ - Bobby.
•  As Bobby leaves the room, Poppy pours the mysterious poison into Bobbys wine.
• Bobby returns and they have a convo. In the middle of the convo, Poppy drinks her wine and gloats about how nice tasting it is, encouraging Bobby to drink some of his - Bobby makes a comment about how he doesn't drink until he has his meal. (use this as an opportunity to get to know characters & puns throughout their conversation)
• Finish convo with Poppy saying;  ‘I’m going to go freshen up, can you show me bathroom?' or something along the lines of that.
• Bobby shows Poppy to the bathroom, she leaves the main room first, and there is a shot of Bobby picking up a sharpened knife from behind an item of furniture near the door. He holds it tightly behind his back
• Bobby and Poppy share small talk such as Bobby offering her directions like "just straight through here". Poppy then walks into the bathroom, and turns around to hint at Bobby that she's okay/close the door.
• Poppy's face changes to fear
• The shot reverses to a shot of Bobby with the axe about to kill Poppy.
• He whacks Poppy with the axe  (this isn't shown, we just show the shot of Bobby forcefully throwing the axe down with his arms)
• We hear Poppy fall to the ground
• Shot of her body on the ground in a pool of blood

END

• Narration: ‘oh dear, the date has not gone to plan/taken an unexpected turn’ as camera zooms in on her dead body/drop camera
• Bobby drags her body into the kitchen
• Insert of recipe with pun (Bobby is planning to cook her)
• Jump  to him sitting down to eat his meal 
• Bobby sips his wine
• Bobby begins to choke, his face goes red and he falls from his chair.
• Bobby is dead.

Further Idea Development

January 22nd 2018

For the past two days, we've been discussing a possible timeline for the idea about a serial killer in a job centre. The progress was going well, we had just about decided on a beginning and a middle; the story was going in the direction of the job centre being for serial killers only, and it essentially surrounded trying to find new victims to serial killers who were struggling to find suitable victims. We wanted the entire set up to be really professional looking, as if it was a real job centre and completely serious to add to the sarcastic and comedic vibe of the film. 

The storyline basically consisted of our main character who was a male serial killer going to the job centre to find new victims. There would be a waiting room where serial killers wait to be interviewed by the employees at the centre, where they would find some suitable victims for the killer, and in the waiting room there would be some well known killers such as Ted Bundy. Throughout all of this, we would be going back and forth between interview styled shots of the main character talking about why he is going to the job centre. The main part of the film would consist of the actual interview between the employee and the main character, and finding their suitable victim. This was all okay, but we really struggled to find a good ending. Of course, we wanted to make the ending include the actual murder, but we thought that the ending was pretty boring, predictable and didn't do much for the audience. There really was no way for us to make the ending entertaining, because there isn't much you can make exciting about a job centre. So, we tried to make the actual plot better so that we had more of an idea to build off of. 

We started to think of shows like 'The Undateables' which have 2 people going on a blind date, so we thought we could film something like that but put our twist on it. So, essentially, we would have 2 serial killers who are trying to change their ways and find love; pretty much leaving their psychotic want to kill people behind and settle down with someone like regular people. However, of course it's not going to work out. We figured that this gives us a lot more of an interesting plot to base our ideas around, and lets our film timeline flow better. We have a rough idea of the beginning, middle and end but it isn't yet finalised, so I'll update about it in the next post. 

Idea Development

January 19th 2018

Throughout the week we've been expanding on our film ideas. The serial killer idea definitely seems like its going to stay, however our main issue was figuring out which genre would suit us the best. Originally, we were thinking a drama (pretty much the same sort of style as 'Mindhunter'), so we did a bit of research into these type of shows. Dramatic-documentary was the path we were kind of edging towards.

Mindhunter was our main source of inspiration throughout researching the Docu-Drama genre. We also did some research into other Docu-Dramas like 'Jeff' (The Jeffrey Dahmer Files) which is an experimental documentary basically explaining the story of Jeffrey Dahmer and his killings.

As keen as we were on the idea of a docu-drama, we decided that our recreation would be too similar to an episode of Mindhunter, and it just wasn't really as original as we wanted it to be. We aimed to have an idea that was different and interesting to the audience, so by going with this genre we would simply be regurgitating material that has already been done. This inspired us to look into other genres that still had the documentary sort of style to it, and that's when we came to the idea of a mockumentary.

We started researching mockumentaries such as 'The Office' and figured that this genre allowed us to still keep the interview set up, and also allowed us to keep the documentary style. However, this idea also lets us to create new material that hasn't been done many times before - how many times have you seen a mockumentary about serial killers? We tried to think of a couple of ideas that seemed quite funny to do in combination with serial killers, just to give us a ground to work on before we started researching the genre. We were thinking of ideas like job centres and employment, like a serial killer trying to get a job in a job centre - a basic idea but still comical. We started exploring this idea and planning out a couple scenarios - Would we incorporate more famous killers such as Ted Bundy? Would we have the serial killer going for a real job, or just another kill/victim? Is the job centre FOR serial killers, or is this just a serial killer in a normal job centre? All of these questions helped us to give us a ground idea, and we thought it was a really random and funny idea, and definitely possible for us to do. 

Film Ideas

January 15th 2018

This year for our Year 14 5 minute short film, my group and I have decided that we want to do something very different from what we had done last year. Last year, our film was a homosexual romance film which highlighted the difficulties of relationships - however, this year we want to completely switch it up and do something completely different from that. Originally, we wanted to film a 5 minute short on a really shocking and chilling idea, like a school shooting, and it seemed like a great idea but ultimately it would be really hard to sort out in terms of location and acting. It was definitely a big idea which would be difficult to portray in the space of 5 minutes, so we decided to look at other approaches for us to bring a twisted and chilling scenario into the film.

We're looking at lots of different stories to do with murder that we could incorporate into our film, to add a really shocking plot line. Serial killers seem to be the most common theme of a lot of the murder stories we've seen, which is making me more curious to look into different serial killers. We're currently looking at many high profile killers, such as Ted Bundy, The Zodiac Killer, Edmund Kemper and Harold Shipman. The stories are really fascinating and crazy to think about, so I really think they'd be interesting to incorporate into a film, or even make up our own serial killer and base it around that.

At the minute, we're bouncing around lots of ideas in terms of genre and plot line, so firstly we're trying to find a decent idea for us to go off of. I'm liking the idea of an interview style, serial killer documentary type of film - kind of like the Netflix Original 'Mindhunter'. It's a show basically surrounding 2 FBI agents who attempt to catch and understand serial killers by studying their damaged psyches. Along the way, the agents pioneer the development of modern serial-killer profiling. (Sidenote - Edmund Kemper [one of the serial killers we had researched] actually features in the show, obviously not the real Edmund Kemper, but his character is one of the serial killers who are investigated in the show!!) The show features a lot of scenes where the agents interview these high profile serial killers who are currently facing time in jail, and ask them lots of questions and eventually try to find common areas between the killers - such as how they were treated in their childhood etc.

 I'm really fond of this idea, it's really interesting and I feel like it would really draw the audience in if we tried to recreate this type of idea - speaking from experience too as I was definitely hooked on the show 'Mindhunter' within one episode, so I'd say its a pretty interesting topic. Not to mention that lots of people seem to be instantly drawn to shows/documentaries/podcasts about serial killers because it really is so odd and something so many people can't understand, so naturally we're drawn to these type of topics because we want to understand how someone could do such a thing as killing other people so horrifically. I think it would be a really smart idea to take advantage of this curiosity within us and make our short film about that because it instantly catches the audience's attention because it's such a tabu subject.

We're more than likely going to stick with this topic idea but we're still exploring genres so there's still plenty more to think about regarding our plot.