Location Ideas

Location Ideas

The typical locations that tend to appear in horror movies are generally very isolated. These locations consist of isolated homes in a suburban setting, a forest, motels or a lake side area. These locations are used in horror movies to add to the effect of the victims not being able to get contact with anyone for help when they are in trouble. Isolated locations also allow vast building with a lot of rooms where the victim can be chased and it also created a maze like feel which adds more intensity to the chase. Amytiville horror is a key example as to where the location is an isolated house in a suburban area which allows the characters to have no contact. The strangers is another prime example where a couple are in an isolated house essentially in the middle of no where, and it is almost impossible to get help. These locations tend to be dark and dull areas which allow the audience to feel on edge when seeing these locations because they are typical areas where everyday people tend to be in. In supernatural horror movies a normal family home is used in order to scare the audience further because it is tainting the comfort of their own home, and they can no longer feel safe in their home. An example of a normal family home is Paranormal activity, although it may be a normal house, there is obviously something wrong within the house, and this scares the audience because they feel unsafe in the comfort of their own home. Locations in horror movies are key conventions which add to the movie’s success of scaring the audience. The location of a horror movie must be dark, and must be away from social contact; otherwise the audience would not feel scared. For example, a horror movie based in a forest makes the audience feel on edge because someone could be lurking in the trees, which gives a sense of someone watching them. Friday 13th is set in a cabin on the lake, which is in a forest, therefore is very isolated and a typical location for a slasher movie, because no one will find them and no one can help them except themselves. 

Our ideas

Taking into account existing locations for horror movies we have decided to use an isolated house for the majority of the trailer, because we feel that tainting the comfort of someone’s home will be key feature to scare our audience, some of the other scenes that we would consider using are an establishing shot of a mental hospital, a scene in the bathroom, and a hallway of a mental hospital. We feel that these locations are reasonably isolated which fits in the conventions of a horror movie. The establishing shot of the metal hospital will allow the narrative to become clearer for the audience because this will show them that there is something wrong with the character “Mary”. We would film these locations in available lighting to give it a dull atmosphere that creates more of horror movie feel. As we progress more through our portfolio, we will have images of these locations and we will get feedback from our target audience to see if these locations are effective to make our horror movie successful.