Synopsis for Film Idea 3.

A young girl, Emma, starts a new life at a new school where no-one knows anything about her. Exceeding the expectations of her parents, she quickly makes friends with Jane; a girl in her year at school.
However, the secrets of Emma's past soon come to light and we discover that a number of the people she has held close to her are purely figments of her imagination, including Jane. Battling through her mental health issues means battling with her own mind, but Jane puts up a strong fight and is determined to stay with Emma forever.

My chosen idea;

I asked a range of people which of my film ideas they liked best and here are the results;

The majority of the people I asked chose Idea 3.
Personally, Idea 3 was my favourite Idea as I believe it contains many interesting elements and themes of the thriller genre i.e. mental health issues, murder, mystery, suspense, red herrings and a cliff hanger ending.
Therefore I shall choose this idea for my opening scene.

Film Idea (4)

• A girl and her twin brother do everything together and have no other friends.
• The twin girl begins to make friends with other girls at school and her brother becomes jealous.
• The girls she becomes friends with are each mysteriously murdered one-by-one and the girl fears that she will be next. The girl is mentally affected by the deaths and has flashbacks of her past as as a little girl when she pushed her childhood friend in a lake when playing and she drowned. She was treated horribly by people who judged her as a "devil child", which lead to a very insecure upbringing and having to move towns every time a resident found out about the death.
• The boy becomes increasingly protective over his sister and she begins to suspect him to have committed the murders. Though she keeps her suspicions to herself as she believes he would never do such a thing.
• One day the twin sister finds a knife in the bedroom she shares with her brother but still she protects him and he tells her to never tell anyone about what he has done because he knows a secret about her that no-one else in the town knows; the murder at the lake.
• However, one day the girl decides to tell her mother about her suspicions of her brother. The mother becomes very distraught and tells her they will deal with it the next day.
• The following day, the girl is woken up in a hospital and a doctor explains how they had to perform tests on her. They discover that her mental health had deteriorated over time and she was having frequent hallucinations. The girl is admitted to a psychiatric hospital, one day the girl asks why her brother hasn't visited and her mother explains to her that she had no twin brother, he was just a figment of her imagination that she conjured up after her distress of the treatment she received after killing her friend. She asks if she will ever leave the hospital and her mother tells her that she cannot, as she has murdered, and not just murdered the little girl at the lake, but she murdered  her friends too.

Film Idea (3)

• A shy girl, Emma, moves to a new school and meets a new confident friend Jane, on the first day.
• They spend a lot of time together and the two girls become inseparable.
• We see that Emma takes tablets, which the audience will believe are for her immune system.
• We do not see anyone else speak to the two girls except Emma's family, who do not share any screen-time with Jane. They are pleased that Emma has made a new friend.
• Everyone else at the school seems to avoid the two girls and we see them look oddly at them and make cruel remarks occasionally like; "Freak", "Weirdo" etc. At this point the audience will believe that it's because she is a new student they are treating her differently. Jane tells Emma to block out and ignore everyone else as she doesn't need anyone except her.
• One day, Emma tries to speak to a boy she has a crush on but he completely rejects her and says; "I can't be seen talking to a person like you."
• Later, Emma becomes upset as she doesn't understand why people are acting so cold towards her, Jane fuels her anger by taunting her and telling her that people hate her.
• Emma goes out for a drive, and suddenly Jane appears in the car beside her, Emma does not seem at all phased by Jane's sudden appearance. Jane continues to taunt Emma, saying cruel things about her being a freak and pathetic for having imaginary friends at 17 and she talks about her old imaginary friend James. Emma has flashbacks of being cruelly treated and stops the car and tries to run away from Jane, she pulls out a knife she was going to use to kill herself but instead she brutally murders Jane.Quickly driving away she drives to a far away lay-by takes a handful of pills and cries herself to sleep.
• The next morning she wakes up in hospital bed and her doctor tells her that she was found shortly after taking the overdose and needs to be admitted to a psychiatric hospital. She sees Jane standing behind the doctor, not a scratch on her. She nods but doesn't speak.
• The doctors try to treat her and tell her that she needs to block out the imaginary people and one day they ask her if the new tablets are working and she says she only sees Jane in her nightmares. She is admitted from hospital and we see her taking a walk in the same place she met Jane. As Emma walks we see Jane standing behind her staring and as she takes a step Emma gasps and looks up.

Film Idea (2)

• A young girl Emma, living with her parents, appears to lead a normal life but has recurring dreams every night about her sister's death.
• Her mother has suffered serious depression since the incident and takes tablets to control it.
• As we get to know Emma better, the audience learns through the protagonists conversations with others that she witnessed her sister's murder at a very young age and the murderer was never identified. Her parents are very over protective of her and her father insists she carries a small knife around with her for protection.
• The audience will see clips of a man stalking the young girl and taking photographs of her. His identity remains unclear.
• Emma unknowingly stumbles across the scene of the murder one day and she has a flashback similar to the nightmares she has but more intensified and realistic.
• Her health deteriorates as she has insomnia due to the fear of the nightmares.
• One day her parents have a huge argument in the middle of the night and Emma walks out of the house, a man from a few houses down offers her to stay round his for a few hours until the argument stops, she says no but he grabs her and covers her mouth and takes her into his house. He sits her on a chair in the middle of a room covered in pictures of her that he had taken and newspaper clips about the murders. However she notices that everything is covered in petrol. She can see the place of the murder from a window and has a flashback of this man murdering her sister. He says that he was aware it was only a matter of time before she discovered it was him through her flashbacks and therefore he needs to ensure that everyone else will remain unaware of the truth. He gets some rope and advances towards her but she pulls out the small knife her father gave her and stabs him in the leg, quickly running from the house.
• As she reaches her house her parents are gone and she realises they are out looking for her. She desperately runs around trying to look for them and then she notices the smell of burning, neighbours start to emerge from their houses and the murderers house is engulfed in flames. She notices a crowd of people gathered around the murderer and an ambulance and police arrive. People notice Emma and accuse her of doing this, she is arrested.
• She is accused of attacking the man and setting his house on fire with the intention of locking him inside. The evidence is against her as they describe her as "disturbed" from her past experiences.
• She is admitted to a secure, mental institution and becomes more disturbed as she has time to think. The flashback of her sister just continues to circle her head and the image of the murderer is clearer than ever.

Film Idea (1)

The protagonist will be female, as more people voted for a female protagonist in the questionnaire.

• The teenage, female protagonist moves to a new house with her older sister. We discover early on that she has a history of mental health, yet her past shall remain ambiguous to intrigue the audience.
• The girl is attacked near her house and begins to have traumatic nightmares of murders.
• As she begins to get to know people in the new area, they start to feature in her dreams. The people in the area are very close and they make her feel like an outsider.
• A girl she has met, and has been in the nightmare, goes missing.
• She ventures to the place the girl was murdered in her nightmare and finds the dead body and weapon.
• Residents become suspicious of her knowledge.
• She begins to predict the murders and as she does so residents suspicions grow.
• Her sister has a new boyfriend and the girls nightmares start to appear at any moment and include the boyfriend as the murderer, she believes he will try to murder her and her sister, yet no-one believes her.
• The girl comes home one night to find her carer and the boyfriend tied to chairs. A masked man suddenly appears at the scene and mentally torments her about her past. We find out that she had a violent past, in which she saw her mother kill her father.
• The murderer is out to seek revenge for his daughter's death, who died in the killings and plants ideas into her head that she murdered his daughter and all of the other people in the area. She has images of committing the crimes and we begin to question if she actually did or did not do them.
•  He threatens that if she owns up to the crime, he will spare their lives but if she refuses he will murder them and create the scene to look like she murdered the family and he will provide a witness testimony.
• She refuses and he shoots the boyfriend, he gives her a final chance to spare her sister's life, and suddenly the police surround the area. Despite the fact that the man obviously has killed someone, the police arrest the girl as they feel she is a threat to the community and the man was not in his right state of mine. The corrupt police take the girl away and we see them burying two bodies in a field. They killed her sister too, so she couldn't protest.

This idea contains themes that run throughout many thrillers; death, murder, crime, supernatural.

Music and Sound effects in a title sequence; "Jaws"

 In the lesson we were shown the opening scene of "Jaws" because the music and sound effects play a big part in creating a certain chilling and tense atmosphere throughout the sequence.

Even beofre the visulas begin, a low water-like sound is played, which immediately creates a dark and eerie atmosphere. Gradually more sounds are overlapped and built on top of the original sound, which builds tension and suspense. The visuals onscreen show an underwater shot of dark murky waters and I think it could present a P.O.V. shot from the shark's perspective. I think the layers of music could symbolize a shark approaching it's prey.

We are also introduced to the classic, well-known piece of music associated with "Jaws". We hear the sound of a horn, which sounds very familiar to a hunting horn, also we hear a sound similar to a sonar. These sounds are both assosiated with with hunting and therefore creates a deathly atmosphere. The music has a serious tone as it is made up of orchestral instruments.

However this non-diagetic sound changes to diagetic as the sequence cuts to the next scene. The tone and atmosphere changes greatly to a calmer, more relaxed scene in which we hear gentle voices and we hear and see people playing informal instruments such as guitars and harmonicas. This contrasting tension and serentity fluctuate to keep the audience interested and on the edges of their seats.