Mise-en-scene Planning

SJFO PRODUCTIONS

Mise-en-scene planning

• It is important for us to establish the different characters we plan to use and the MES elements involved in their character. For example, clothing. However it is also important to note additional MES elements such as fake blood, papers/documents etc.

• It is okay if our final idea isn’t entirely following our plan. However, planning out these MES elements is vital since it will make things easier when we plan on actually filming it since we’ll know exactly which MES elements we plan on using.

Actors

• Protagonist (James)• Victim – Woman (Laura)• Young protagonist (Billy)• Younger victim (Danielle)• Girl’s friends (Tamara, Amaris, Shantay,

Renace, Ella, Megan etc)

Protagonist Protagonist (present) will ideally be wearing all dark colours and preferably black. These dark colours which he will wear will be ideal since they have connotations with danger and give an eerie and ominous vibe. We have chosen James to be our present day protagonist as we believe he can act as this character to a good standard and give off this eerie vibe.

Young protagonist Protagonist (past)-boy will be dressed similar to the young girls in the playground. He will wear a plain white shirt, a tie and a jumper. The use of contrasting colours will be representative of the alter-ego the young protagonist. Billy is the name of the boy acting as our young protagonist. This is since he is of the same/similar ethnicity as James and looks similar to him. Therefore we believe it will be fairly obvious that Billy is the younger version of James.

Victim – WomanVictim (present)- a stereotypical teenage girl outfit, jeans and a top with hair in a pony and converse trainers. This is the ideal outfit since it creates a sense of normality which contrasts to the protagonist who will stand out and seem out of place with his costume. We have decided to use Laura as this character. This is because we feel the victim in thriller movies corresponds with Laura and therefore is appropriate.

Younger version of woman (victim)

Victim (past)- a typical stereotypical primary school girl outfit, black skirt, white shirt and black cardigan. Potentially black dolly shoes would also be worn. This is the ideal outfit since it creates a sense of normality of school and thus verisimilitude. One problem we have encountered is the fact that our school girls do not look as young as we had hoped. Thus, we must dress them and make them appear young.We have decided to use Danielle as this character. This is because we feel the she looks similar to Laura and thus the audience will be able to make the connection that she is the younger version of Laura.

Girl’s friends Victim and friendship group of girls (past)- girls in primary school uniform – white shirt, black cardigan and black skirts. All girls will look and dress similarly to represent a typical close group of friends in school. This will also represent a lack of individuality of being in this typical ‘popular’ clique.

Girl’s friends

Locations

• Bus (INT)• Alleyway (EXT)• Dark room (INT)• Playground (EXT)

Bus (INT)The opening sequence has two-three main locations where we will be filming. Our first location is on a bus which we feel fits well with our storyline and shows a sense of normality and thus brings out verisimilitude in the storyline for the audience to relate to.

Alleyway (EXT)

The alleyway is our second location. It is the the scene after both characters get off the bus (previous location). It will be filmed in the dark or at twilight since this will give off the mysterious vibe we hope to achieve.

Dark room (INT)Our third location will be in a plain dark room where the protagonist will make his evil plans. We chose this type of location as it will create mystery and suspense as the character is showing his creepy and darker side as he is planning some sort of murder. The dull, boring and dark lighted room reflects to the audience the darkness of the character and the movie

Playground (EXT) We’ve decided to use a playground setting during the flashback scene to make it obvious that the children are in school and to make obvious that it is a flashback. There will be children both in the foreground and background to bring out a sense of verisimilitude since playgrounds are normally noisy, loud and full of people.

Props

• The use of particular props is important in setting the storyline and adding to the typical eerie vibe which should be given off in a thriller movie.

• Thus, we will use the following props within the filming of our opening sequence to add to the verisimilitude and create a mysterious and ominous vibe leaving the audience wanting to know more.

Fake Blood

We’ve decided to also use fake blood in our opening sequence. Although blood is very common in thriller movies since it connotes danger and death and thriller movies is about exactly this, we must make the blood look realistic but at the same time not overdo it.

Scissors, Kitchen Knife and Rope

We’ve decided to use scissors, a kitchen knife and a rope since these are MES elements fairly common and expected in a psychological/horror thriller movie and is therefore appropriate for our opening sequence. These props all have connotations to danger, too and will therefore be useful in telling the story without dialogue.

Lighting We’ve decided to use two different lightings for the different parts in our opening sequence. For the present day filming, we will use fairly low-key and dark lighting to connote the mysterious effect. For the bus scene, since the natural lighting will be fairly dark, the lights in the bus would be on. This is the lighting that will be used in this scene.

Lighting However, the flashbacks will contrast to this and instead have natural lighting since the scene will be set outside. This will fit into the scene but also contrast to the bus and alley scenes making it obvious that the different scenes are at different times on the timeline of the supposed film. Furthermore, the natural lighting will bring out better quality of the footage as opposed to harsh/artificial light.