Hidden Footage and Horror Genre development.

As we decided to do the Genre of a hidden footage horror, I thought it would be a good idea to research into a variation of films, hidden footage, and horror films alike. The first question was what monster was to feature in the film. Zombies are quite popular with this genre, as within these films,cast members are usually eaten in gory ways, and by leaving tapes behind gives the film a chance to "Kill all the survivors" that is popular in the hidden footage genre as you don't need anyone left to progress the story as its already happened.
  Firstly, I attempted to look at zombie films in general and how they handled themselves. Looking at films like the original "Night of the living dead" is a good example of the zombie genre.

Being a black and white film around the time of 1968, Night of the living Dead has become a classic within the horror genre, thanks to creepy, yet unrealistic settings, shambling radioactive zombies and the isolation of being trapped in a farmhouse. Due to low budgets, and probably the time period, the effects aren't amazing (chocolate syrup for blood, wonky gravestones and such) but this, in its own right, helps to establish the film as a cult classic by creating a captivating, yet bleak atmosphere that at its time helped to create a general public appetite for these kind of films. What Night of the living dead seems to achieve as a zombie genre, is that while it may look corny, the use of genre conventions (isolated, spooky settings, soundtracks of eerie noise and cliche horror elements).
If I was to use zombies as the creature within our hidden footage, I would have to take into account the style of the horror genre that is perceived today, which is used to fast, energetic zombies who have mutated from viruses.As Night of the living dead contains similarities with the Hammer horror generation, or perhaps on the verge of breaking from those stereotypes, most people wouldn't be interested in a black and white film with faulty sets, so sadly this wouldn't be the best zombie film to pick.


Next I looked at Shaun of the dead, as a contradiction to the usual zombie genre as it its a romantic comedy as well as having the undead. Realising we wouldn't be spoofing a hidden footage film, I used this film mainly as an example as to the sort of audience that enjoys today's horror film. As Shaun of the dead did both well in the UK and USA, it was seen as a rather decent comedy horror. When compared to other films in its genre like Scary Movie, is seen as a perfect example of  a homage to a film.

Another factor as to why the film stands out, is perhaps the fact that the film is essentially British. Using  a   relatively known comedy cast, the film enables itself to seem quirky, in comparison to the thousands of  American horror films. By adding the comedy element, the genre is able to develop a bigger audience. If we were to do a Zombie hidden footage, then I wouldn't try to spoof  a hidden footage, as its supposed to be realistic, so Shaun of the Dead is just an example of the different themes within the genre of the zombie flick, and to see the elements that helped to create success.


The final Zombie related film I looked at was Diary of the dead. This was a perfect example of the hidden footage film, by having the same type of characters as we wanted to use (students) and more or less a perfect, urban setting. By using a younger cast, the film is able to connect with a younger themed audience that seem to take up the majority of  the horror viewings these days thanks to Scream or Saw.

This in itself would be a perfect example of how we could feature our own hidden footage, with the use of grainy effects, shaky camera movements, and dramatic off screen encounters found within the film.

Sadly we realised that if we were to do a realistic hidden footage zombie film, we would require a large cast of zombies, that would probably wouldn't look frightening enough and would also need a place, which was to look perhaps, barricaded and isolated, which we possibly couldn't find without having to create a budget. So sadly the zombie Idea was dropped.

Instead we opted to do a more supernatural theme, like what is seen in the Blair Witch project and Paranormal activity. Not wanting to do a similar style like Paranormal activity, where there is a fixed point in the room that records the footage, it seemed that this would be too difficult to create a naturally realistic effect in this way with what we could do, so Paranormal activity was out of the question.

Another of the film examples we looked at was the Blair Witch project, which seemed like a good idea to develop into our own opening, because the start of the film is set out, as a rather bland outing of some students who are going through their day to day basis of checking equipment and location. This idealistically was a perfect film genre as we could recreate a similar atmosphere, and we had the location of the Pendle Hill which is surrounded by witch folklore at our disposal, as it is also a regular walking site. The Blair Witch project is another cult classic, that was made with a small budget and basic equipment, yet created a scary, horrifying film. I think at this rate of the planning, getting a cult audience was probably our best bet, as it appeals to a younger, quirky group.