Jordan Brown As Media Blog: Horror Research

What is horror?

Horror films are usually films that are designed to create a disturbing and unsettling emotion to the viewer. They often raise feelings of disgust or fear. Horror films usually contain fantasy and fictional characters such as ghosts, monsters, vampires, demons or characters with supernatural abilities. In almost every horror there is a evil force. Whether its a character; mad serial killer or an out break of disease. Also there is a lead character in almost every horror films, who is on the side of good and will survive until the end. So horrors tend to be a battle between good and evil. However not all horrors follow this principle. There story lines usually derive from fear of the unknown. The themes of horror films are usually forces of evil, Satanism, torture, evil and ancient magic.

This is monster was intended to disturb
the viewer. The object is strange, unknown. possibly effecting him

Examples of horror films:

Saw
Paranormal Activity
Resident Evil
Semum
28 Days later

There are types of horror films and difference approaches. Horror such as Exosist use religion to disturb and unsettle the viewers. It focuses on negative, satanic aspects of religion often ignored due to fear and presents them in a shocking matter.
There are gory horror films, such as the Chain Saw Massacrer. The scenes from this film are extremely violent. Its evokes a response from the viewer due to its graphic nature. It's scenes could be related to a worst nightmare. This type of horror is scary because it shows our vulrunbilites as humans.
There are other types of horrors such as monster/alien invasion. This uses the technique of fear of the unknown to disturb viewers. The grotesque appearance horrifies the viewer and the actions of the creature also disturb the viewer.

Conventions

In horror films a lot of Extreme Close ups are used on characters. This is usually to show how distressed or scared the character is, in the situations they are experiencing.
The Dutch Tilt Is also used to create an effect of disorientation to the viewer.
Horror films also tend to use long shots with a character closest to the screen and a force of evil behind them. This usually allows us to see what the character is running away from.
Some horror movies choose to use hand-held cameras in scenes such as chases.The jerking camera is used to confuse and disorientate the viewer and is used in chaotic situations.
The lighting in horror films is usually dark with very little light getting in to the scene. Sometimes the light is only focused on certain objects or characters most important. This darkness creates an unsettling feeling and can cause distress if the viewer can't quite make out whats happening due to the lack of light. Horror films are also dark to represent the idea of evil and darkness and that bad things only happen in the dark. Many people also have a fear of the dark.
The editing in horror films is usually vert fast choppy in chase scenes. Sometimes the editing is whitewashesd and blured at the edges to present the idea of a dream, or a nightmare.