Examiners from 'British Board of Film Classification' (BBFC) watch films and videos all the way through and award an age rating and insight to each one. They reach an age rating by applying the standards and criteria contained in their Classification Guidelines. They examines and age rates films and videos before they are released.
They did this to protect children from unsuitable and even harmful content in films and videos and to give consumers information they might need about a particular film or video before deciding whether or not to view it. The same process exists for DVDs and Blu-rays.
They look at issues such as discrimination, drugs, horror, dangerous and easily imitable behavior, language, nudity, sex, and violence when making decisions.
Their decisions on the age rating of DVDs and Blu-rays can occasionally be stricter than at the cinema because there is a higher risk of underage viewing in the home and a greater potential for watching scenes out of context. Factors BBFC consider:
= My comments. = Highlighted relevant informations. Article: The Reasons Those Scary Games You Played At Sleepovers Actually Worked
There’s a bathroom in my house I
can’t go into after dark because I’m still scared I’ll get pulled into the
mirror by Bloody Mary.
At every sleepover, someone would
suggest playing Bloody Mary, a legitimately terrifying “game,” and off we’d go
sneaking into the kitchen to find a suitable candle.
If it wasn’t Bloody Mary, we’d play
rocks-paper-scissor to decide who would become “light as a feather, stiff as a
board.”
These classic sleepover games totally
freaked me out and made me wonder if real ghosts and spirits were actually
causing all these creepy things to happen.
As an older and slightly less naive
person, I can acknowledge most of the sleepover phenomena was less magic and
more science.
This is what made your sleepover
games work:
Light as a feather, stiff as a board…
Directions: One friend lies down flat on the floor. Everybody else sits around
and puts a finger or two under that person’s body. The circle starts chanting
“light as a feather, stiff as a board” and counts to three.
Supposed outcome: On three, the group should be able to lift the center person off
the floor using just a finger or two.
What actually happens: By chanting and counting to three, everybody in the circle is in
sync and makes the lift attempt at the exact same moment.
This means weight is equally
distributed across everyone, and your fingers only have to hold so much weight.
Your fingers are actually pretty strong and can hold up a lot, so it’s not that
hard to lift your friend.
Bloody Mary
Directions: The directions vary, but in my experience, you take a lit candle
into a dark room with a mirror and repeat “Bloody Mary” 13 times.
Supposed outcome:A woman covered in blood will appear in the mirror and try to take
your soul.
What actually happens: Your brain is an assh*le. Seriously. There’s this thing called the
Troxler Effect where if you stare at a point for a while, everything else will
fade away. Then your brain will start filling in the outside space with a
distortion of what you’re staring at.
So if you’re staring at your face in
the mirror, your brain will start filling the outer area of your vision with a
distortion of your face… or a monster. This is especially pronounced in
low-light spaces.
In an experiment where people stared
into a mirror in low light for 10 minutes, 48 percent of people said they saw
“fantastical and monstrous beings” in the mirror. Thanks, assh*le brain.
Ouija
Directions: Put your hands on the ouija board. Ask ~the spirits~ a question.
Supposed outcome:The spirits will move your hands to form the answers.
What actually happens: Ouija works thanks to the “ideomotor effect.” Basically, your
subconscious is making your hands move, even if you aren’t consciously directing
it. But yeah, it’s all you, not spirits.
After looking at this article and the author said these sleepover games freaked them out, this made me come up with the concept of my one minute short film, couple of friends were having a sleepover on Halloween night, one suggested that they should play a little scary game but the situation got out of hand as it couldn't be controlled any more. There a different range of scary games challenge including Bloody Mary, Ouija and Charlie Charlie etc.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Short Film: MAMA
This video gave me couple ideas to come up with my short film plot, e.g at the minute '2:38' & '3:18', where the two little girl's mother is a monster, it represent an alcohol abusive mother. It is their "mother" but she is a monster when she comes home from drinking, maybe a symbolic of how kids see abusive parents. (YouTube comment). This remind of the movie 'Coraline' because the parents are similar as they both creepy. Although it's not similar to my idea but the way 'Mama' was chasing her daughters/the little girls pretty fast, this gave me an idea that I could have someone with scary demon possession inside them chasing people stutter running really fast, possibly male although I prefer female as they are scarier especially a little girl but female alway get possessed in horror movies and this what lacked originality even though I did not completely made this idea up.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Twitter Trend/Article: Charlie Charlie Challenge (Charlie Charlie Challenge - what is the spooky craze, and what is the explanation for it?)
A strange new game is taking over Twitter, fuelled by speculation that its players can connect with a dead Mexican spirit known as Charlie.
The Charlie Charlie Challenge has been played by thousands of young people after a number of videos purported to show supernatural goings-on.
The game entails placing two pencils on a piece of paper in the shape of the cross with the words 'yes' and 'no'. Participants then repeat the phrase "Charlie, Charlie can we play?" in order to connect with the demon.
If Charlie is there the pencils will move to indicate his answer.
You’ve probably heard of using a Ouija board to contact spirits, but I bet you haven’t heard of using pencils to have your questions answered by supernatural beings! The Pencil Game, also called “Charlie, Charlie,” is a traditional Mexican ritual wherein players (usually children) are said to contact the spirit of a child named Charlie.
To begin the game, both players must chant: “Charlie, Charlie, can we play?” If the pencils move inward or up, the answer is yes. If they move outward or down, the answer is no. If one side goes one way and the other side goes a different way, it means maybe or the question can’t be answered at this time. You can then ask the spirit of Charlie yes or no questions, and he will respond by moving the pencils. Charlie is kind of like the spirit world version of a Magic 8 ball. To end the game, both players must chant: “Charlie, Charlie, can we stop?” After the pencils move, both players drop all of the pencils on the floor to break contact with Charlie." Needless to say the reaction to the craze has been mixed:
who's charlie??? what did i miss???
— Jeffrey Eli Miller (@itsjeffreymusic) May 25, 2015
After looking at the scary sleepover game article, this led me to think about other scary sleepover games like 'Sandbags, Candyman, Light as a Feather Stiff as a Board, Cat Scratch etc. Then this made me think back in May 2015, I remember there was this scary game that was trending on many Social media apps like Facebook, Twitter, Youtube etc. This scary game was known as 'Charlie Charlie Challenge', which can be a new scary sleepover game. This led me to come up with the concept of my short film.
PG-13 (15 in UK) | 89 min | Horror| 24 October 2014 (USA)
Plot: A group of friends must confront their most terrifying fears when they awaken the dark powers of an ancient spirit board.
Budget $5,000,000 (estimated)
Opening Weekend
$19,900,000 (USA) (26 October 2014)
Gross
$50,856,010 (USA) $51,673,769 (Non-USA)
$102,529,779 (Worldwide)
Paranormal Activity 3 (2011)
R (15 in UK) | 83 min | Horror | 21 October 2011 (USA)
Plot: In 1988, young sisters Katie and Kristi befriend an invisible entity who resides in their home.
Budget
$5,000,000 (estimated) Opening Weekend
$52,568,183 (USA) (21 October 2011)
Gross $104,007,828 (USA)
The Possession (2012)
PG-13 (15 in UK) | 92 min | Horror, Thriller | 31 August 2012 (USA)
Plot: A young girl buys an antique box at a yard sale, unaware that inside the collectible lives a malicious ancient spirit. The girl's father teams with his ex-wife to find a way to end the curse upon their child.
As my idea was based on a scary game, I did some research on three films that is similar to my genre, age rating and idea/plot. As I will read some of their review, the good ones and the bad ones. So this will help me to meet my audience's expectations for film to be successful.
Hook, a term in film making. It's what grabs the audience's attention, it usually catch people's attention in the first five to ten minutes of the film they're watching.
In my 1 minute horror/thriller, the structure i will be using is non-linear as it will contain flashbacks in the story so we get to understand what has happened in the past. As I will be using flashbacks in the story, this will make the audience to understand the film as flashbacks are used to show or tell past events, it helps describe the character and what they've done to make the story occur. It also tell the background of a person and explain what made them feel that way.
I was mainly inspired by a short film by Michael Evan called "2AM: The Smiling Man". I thought I find it thrilling because of the thrilling soundtrack, naturalistic lighting in the dark, the editing etc. I would like my minute thriller/horror story to bring fear to the audience and keep them on the edge of their seats. I was also inspired by "Light Out - Who's There" where a woman seems to be playing with the light as she think there's something in the dark which there was, it reminded me of scary creepy game challenge you play at home with your friends such as "Charlie Charlie" and "Bloody Mary" challenges etc. Maybe I could make one of those challenges I pointed out as my one minute horror/thriller short film.
This screenshot shows a short film by Michael Evan called "2AM: The Smiling Man" has 3.7 million views, 28K likes and only 2K dislikes. It has nearly 6,000 comments.
As I was looking through the YouTube's comments on "2AM: The Smiling Man", I found a couple of feedback I screenshotted, for example, 'Bob Parker' prefer little girl than a man as Bob think it will more scarier. This made me think that maybe I should include a little girl as a ghoul/ghost in the story to make it more scarier as Bob think it will be creepier. In another comment, 'fraud1980' said that the costume was not right as it took some horror off, this will make me try to avoid costumes that doesn't fit the genre so it wouldn't ruined the film and received less or no negative feedback.
After I could not find out their age and gender, although they were both possibly male because of the username they have. As I did research, I found out that the usual age for someone watching a horror/thriller movie is 15+ as it includes violence which can be disturbing to younger viewers. The young audience usually want to try new things and experiment emotions and feelings, they want to experience life for themselves and make their own choices and be excite by many things. Horror/Thriller films usually excite young audiences more than older audiences, the audiences are often a groups of friends rather than just themselves. Males are more likely to a fan of horror movies than females, they tend to like the thrill of violence, blood etc. This research has helped me because it has given me a couple of ideas of what to do for my one minute short film like having a little girl who is possessed by the demon etc.
This is my mood board which include beginning, middle and end. I gathered these pictures as it based on my ideas which is murder.
Pitch
Couple of friends were having a sleepover on a random Saturday night, they're all having a nice time until one suggests they should play a little game that got out of hand.
Production Requirements:
Location
The location will be in the wood near Chislehurst War Memorial. But before I asked for a permit from Bromley Council as it's their property to shoot in the wood, I need to do research on the distance, for example, how long it will take us to get there on time and return back on time, we will also need to know if there will be any traffic or if it going to rain so there won't be any electrical damage while we're shooting our film. Facilities We will need production equipment such as a video camera and a tripod etc. As we're students, we don't have that sort of money to go and buy good production equipment, so our college provide for us, this mean we can get booked and borrowed production equipment for free from college (Christ the King: St Mary's). We will also need post-production equipment such as computers with software that allowed us to edit and add sound effect where need. Our college also provide that, there are editing suites in the college that contain Apple Mac Computers with good editing software known as 'Final Cut Pro X'. As they are free to use in college from 8am to 5pm on Monday to Friday, I will be using the editing suites in college to edit my 1 minute short film. I can also edit at home as I have this software that I know inside out which is very similar to 'Final Cut Pro X', it's called 'Sony Vegas Pro'. I use to edit a lot with this software before so I know how to edit, add sound effect, add transition, add colour correction etc. Time Deadlines are very important so we have to be prepared and organised. I make sure my short film is produced before the deadline given to us so if my audience is not satisfied with the outcome, we have more time to re-edit to their satisfaction. As I will be using the equipment given from college to shoot the short film, this will save time and money for me to buy one and wait for delivery. As I said before, I will do a research on the location to know how long it will take us to get there on time and arrive back on time or if there will be any traffic. Personnel I will need a director to make sure everything goes to plan. Secondly, I will need a cameraman to record and shoot the production. Thirdly, we also will need an editor to make it thrilling by adding colour correction, sound effects, tracks etc. Last but not least, I will need actors to be in my films, as I am in college I won't have to pay for actors as my classmates or friends will be the actors. I will only need 2 or 3 actors in this short film.
Before editors edit a film, they put each footage they received from their director into specific bins, for example, I made and renamed three new events for me to put the footage in. 'Train Station', 'Street' and 'Home'. Professional editors do this because it is important to put footage in each bin which should each have a name as it would be a whole lot easier for a editor to find the footage he wants and to know if they got all the footage in each bin. After the editors have sorted out the footage in the right bin, they should add comments to each footage, so this way the editors will know if it is a good or bad shot to use for the film and then know what shot to use when they start editing and dragging footage into the timeline. Following this procedure will save time and money for editors because they are reducing time in the editing suite.
