CCR ~ Foundation Portfolio

Done By Imogen Managh

Preliminary Task  1 - Treatment

Imogen Managh

12 February 2025

Media Studies

Preliminary Task One - Treatment

 

                                                                  A TREATMENT FOR 

                                                                       ‘OBSESSED’

                                                MISA Media - Imogen Mnaagh’s Treatment 

                                                                          12/02/25

The Film, ‘obsessed’ will be filmed on campus at city impact church school and will have a duration of about 1:30 minutes as the plot of the film is based outside a  school. This film is a stalking film which means a mix of outside the school and an under the school construction site will be incorporated. Outside provides an isolating feeling compared to an inside setting and the dark construction sight after-hours, achieves the mysterious, unfamiliar setting, also isolating. This location is well-suited as we have access to all facilities and is on campus for us meaning we do not have to drive anywhere with equipment and talent. 

This Film will include the following Codes and Conventions Of Thriller Films:

Sound:

In our film we want to use a few techniques and elements in order to cultivate suspense. Firstly we want to use diegetic music playing in Rileys headphones. This music in her ears is what is preventing her from hearing her stalkers movements. We will switch between the perspectives of the non-diegetic sound of the stalkers movements and the diegetic sound perspective of Riley's music playing in her ear. This is an attempt to create suspense as the audience worries for Riley’s safety because she can’t hear her stalkers movements making her vulnerable. 

Lighting/Shadows:

We are aiming for a sunset/dusk natural lighting in order to achieve a slightly more suspenseful feel that we would in daylight. As Riley is walking home from school we see it fitting that it is evening, aiming for the winter season, in terms of the sun setting earlier. We also want to make use of artificial lights to manipulate shadows, where we can. This is also in effect to add tension.

Irony:

The music in Riley’s ears will be a form of dramatic irony as the song. We had three options, ‘Creepin up on you’ by Darren Hayes, ‘Run Like hell’, by Pink Floyd and ‘One way or another’ by Blondie.We found that ‘Run like hell’ was slightly too intense for our vision of Riley. Our main two contenders were ‘One way or another’ and ‘Creepin up on you’. The decision was made to use ‘One way or another’ as it was slightly more well known then ‘Creepin up on you’ and the lyrics are more straightforward on ‘One way or another’. The lyrics being “One way, or another, I'm gonna find ya, I'm gonna get ya, “

Symbolism and Iconography:

Our victim, Riley will be portrayed as an innocent stereotypical school girl. She will have her hair done in either braids or pigtails to symbolise her innocence and vulnerability. Riley will represent young teenage girls, the audience will be able to relate to her weakness in the sense that she is young and helpless in the hands of an offending man.

Our stalker, will be dressed in darkly toned colours and will have a crude and rough look about him, symbolising unsafety and danger. Rileys headphones which will be over-ear, will symbolise her point of weakness. Those headphones prevent her from hearing her stalker, exposing her to more danger.

 

Narrative:

The narrative itself is very thrilling as we follow the story if this innocent girl unaware she is being followed and when she discovers in the reflection (shot-reverse-shot) and then ultimately the suspenseful chase scene which ends

After watching the following films/openings, I have been influenced by:

The Quiet Place: 

The Quiet Place is a film based on an alien- type creature invasion where sound is what attracts them. This film has influenced our film as we are using a similar technique and symbolic feature. The daughter in the quiet place is deaf and cannot hear the predator which lurks upon her. Similarly we are trying to achieve the same thing with riley. This feature in the quiet place symbolises a point of weakness and severe vulnerability.

Jurassic Park

In Steven Spielberg's Jurassic park he successfully creates suspense and jumpscares all throughout the film. Spielberg uses lighting to hide the dinosaurs, creating a mysterious presence. The infamous scene with the T. rex attacking the Jeep uses minimal lighting, with only the headlights illuminating the massive creature. This darkness and shadow make the dinosaurs feel even more threatening. In our film we want to use a similar lighting to make our stalker more threatening and dangerous to the audience. The scene mentioned is embedded below.

Alone

John Haymonds ‘alone’ is very successful in achieving suspense and has a similar storyline to ours as it is about  a widow who ends up running into a strange driver who begins to stalk her and later kidnaps her. Although she manages to escape, she soon finds him back on her trail. They vitalise isolation to achieve tension among the audience, similarly we also aim to have the feel of isolation with only two characters present. Haymonds uses a lot of close ups to engage the audience with Jessica’s emotions. This has the effect of bringing the audience into her emotional state, making her fear and exhaustion more real and personal. We are inspired by this and aim to incorporate multiple close ups to achieve audience engagement and create suspense.

Problems we have encountered :

-We have encountered issues within time management for our group, just working on tightening that up.

-We may encounter a problem with the lighting in the construction/carpark area as it may have automatic lights, we are finding out what the deal with that is as it will have a huge effect on our film, especially on the scene where we use it as a dark room and create shadows

-We may have issues with the natural lighting. As it is summer, the sun sets at 8:10 pm, so we have to navigate a way to still get it as dark as possible but not keep all our talent and crew late on a school night ( we aim 6:30-8:30).

- our reflection shot may be a bit hard to achieve as we dont want the camera to appear visible in the shot.

- we are not so sure how the camera will do in low light, as i am on camera, i will research to find out the best way to achieve the type of shot we want.

The Characters:

Riley-  We want to have our main character in two braids, representing her age and in a summer school outfit. We will put her in mufti as it allows us to express her character more.  She will be wearing a pink summery top and dark -wash denim shorts as it resembles her youth. 

Jase - contrastingly, we want to have our stalker to slightly normal looking but have an eerie feel to symbolise discomfort. He will be wearing a school bag as well so the audience develops the idea that he too goes to the school too. The cap is symbolic of his under -the -radar approach to stalking Riley, it also conveys a mysterious tone.

Ideology:

 

Riley is a young and innocent teenage girl, supporting the stereotype of vulnerable and helpless young girls. She is innocently listening to music while being unknowingly stalked, representing this naive stereotype. Again when she resorts to calling or contacting her mother the moment she realizes she is in danger, representing her helpless nature and need to depend on others.

Jase is a stereotypical obsessed stalker, partially disguised and has a threatening look. He dresses in low key clothes symbolising his need to not stand out, in hopes to achieve his obsessive goals.

This is the message we want to achieve as the activities that Riley is doing such as singing and walking home from school, is verisimilitude. Therefore an incident such as this could happen to any young girl on her way home.

Mood and Tone:

The tone and mood of our film is one of fear and tension. We aim to create this through the different perspectives and change of audio as well as the lighting which will be dark and have the use of shadows, which is conventional thriller aspect.

Camera And Lighting.

As mentioned earlier the camera will swap between shots of the stalker and the girl in an attempt to build suspense. We will vitalize the use of many close ups to capture the fear and terror in Rileys eyes, in hope to cultivate similar emotions among the audience.

We will use natural lighting mostly when we shoot outside as the sun will start to set and create a more eerie feeling. When the action transitions into the carpark we have a few options in terms ​of providing some artificial light as it is dark. A main light connected to the camera is one option, especially for our close ups. Most likely we will use a back light as it adds some light but still maintains the tense feel and mysterious movements.

Themes and Motifs

Our main theme is the theme of vulnerability and innocence, particularly about the young girl. She is symbolic of many teenage girls and the fears of being alone as to what might happen. A motif would be the phone or messages as it appears a few times and symbolises her need and dependency for it, further supporting the idea she is weak and vulnerable

Narrative

Our narrative and storyline creates suspense through the tense moments where the audience knows she is in grave danger but she is not yet aware. A cliffhanger is at the end as the audience becomes curious to what happened to her after she lets out a crippling scream. As this is is an opening to a film it doesn't actually come to a conclusion hence why it ends on a tense note.

Mise en scene and setting

Our short film is set outside the school then moves into the construction and parking site​. We have chosen this as the school is where Riley is walking from, symbolising her normal and stereotypical life and the construction area has an eerie feeling as it is completely isolated and is perfect for an abduction.

Symbolism

Jace is wearing low key clothes symbolising his need to stay under the radar. He will be wearing a cap as it conveys a mysterious vibe. He will also have subtle mannerisms, such as keeping his head down, further adding to the “not there” almost ghost like appearance. Riley will be wearing two braids and have her school bag and headphones, symbolising innocence and a typical teenager, representing that age demographic.

Sound and Music

We want to make use of non diegetic sounds that support the narrative, such as footsteps and sounds which would propel the feeling of suspense. However we do intend to make use of non diegetic sounds where needed and also to create effect. Such as the song playing in Rileys ear, it gives a sense of what she can hear and cant hear. The song one way or another is chosen as while it plays in her headphones, the lyric correlates with the situation and plot, foreshadowing he is going to get her one way or another

Credits and logos

Our misa media logo will appear at the beginning of the film, we will have minimal background music paired with that as we intend to keep it low key, making way for the short film. We will have credits at the beginning and the end of the film but the beginning is brief and the end more in depth.

Editing

We want to make use of parallel editing as it is a way of driving suspense up for the audience. Long takes is also a way to emphasize each shot, we will use this where we feel the need to, such as moments where we see Riley in the foreground and Jase in the background.

Summary of the opening of our Film

Riley will end her extra curricular activities at school and let her mum know she is on her way home. Immediately Jase comes into frame and follows her from a distance. Riley is completely oblivious to this as she has music blasting in her headphones, until she sees in the reflection of a window his figure. She then becomes more alert and lowers her headphones, until she decides she needs to run. Riley turns into the construction area and sprints to somewhere safe. Jase follows and we see her calling her mum after finding a dark room. A jumpscare occurs as Jase covers her mouth and we hear a crippling scream.