Filming Our Thriller Opening - Day 04 (Final Shots)

Finally, we finished filming on our fourth day. It was a successful few hours, in which we shot the entirety of the killer's contribution, and also a couple extra shots of Jake we could add in, to add a further sense of peculiarity to the piece. We no longer had access to our extras, and also had to wear the same clothes, simply for continuity purposes. By the end of our shoot, we had achieved all that we wanted therefore we were incredibly thrilled with the end product.
           Originally the plan was to have me (the killer) dress in female clothes as a somewhat of a homage  for Hitchcock's 'Psycho' however, upon detailed group discussion, we bagan to feel that this would change the killers image to a more comical and ludicrous portrayal. Bearing this in mind, we began to emplore the different routes to take and eventually decided to take inspiration from Heath Ledger's presentation of 'The Joker', and put together a costume on the day, which accordingly will be explained within my costume blog post.
  
Killer Preparation
Once my costume was chosen and everyone was happy with the look, we began to manipulate make-up to change my features to complement the killers psychotic mind frame. We began by using bright red lipstick, smearing it all over my lips and surrounding facial area, and shaped it in to a vulgar frown, subverting, Heath Ledgers portrayal, who instead employed a smile shape. This frown emulates the killers character, embodying him as a lonely and frustrated individual. This is my favourite feature of the killer, as it is the most stand out and haunting factor. The other aspect we altered about my face was the eyes. By adding a brown coloured eyeliner, it seemed to present my character as a deprived, perhaps even abused individual, whom is unable to get away. Everything that we added to this character, can connote any number of things, that could be used to decrypt this mans back ground and history, that if we were creating an entire film, we could easily develop him in to a more 3 dimensional character, that could even be empathised with by the audience! However, due to the overall creepy look of the killer, empathy or sympathy is made impossible, simply because of his threatening demeanor and appearance.   


                

The Killers Dwelling
We wanted the killers home to have a completely eerie, and psychotic atmosphere, for example, ''Buffalo Bills' basement in 'Silence of The Lambs' (1991). We strived to make the set reflect the killers mental state. We did this by fashioning a strange shrine in Jakes bathroom we did this by placing a black bin bag over the mirror, on which we placed pictures of 'lonely boy', on which the killer had marked with the same red that smothers his face. This connotes that the killer has some kind of attachment to 'lonely boy' and has perhaps even been watching and observing him for a while, silently planning. Furthermore, to increase the audiences perception that the killer is abnormally bizarre, we filmed a shot of me gazing in to the covered mirror, applying my make up, despite no reflection being visible. Additionally, flickering candles were added to further the atmospheric mystery and even hint at some forms of the occult or satan worship.

              

In Conclusion
This shoot was not unnecessarily lengthy, as we didn't need to many takes, i suspect this is because most of the time, only one person was involved in shots and did not need as much cooperation and work from everybody else. We had not filmed anything of the killer yet, so, being the shoots main on screen performer, I felt pressured to do things correctly and did not want to make to many errors, for the benefit of everybody. We did a brief stint on location, away from the set, in which we discovered a secluded alley we felt to be perfect for one particular shot. Overall, i am happy with my performance, but find it difficult to watch myself on screen. I tried to adapt my personality to coordinate with the planned persona  of the killer, and was told i performed relatively well. I am proud of the characters we have created over our 4 days of filming.

Now that we have finished the filming process, I am very much looking forward to contributing towards the editing and indeed seeing peoples responses to our creation.