PRACTICAL WORK & DEVELOPMENT

INITIAL 'GRACE' MUSINGS
INITIAL PITCH
For one of my interviews for university, I was asked to bring a screenplay pitch to demonstrate my creativity. I chose to write a small pitch about this horror film idea, revolving around a girl called Grace who drowned and came back to haunt her old home. The pitch is as follows:

It’s a supernatural horror focusing on the conflict between a newly-wed couple and a vengeful spirit of a drowned girl.

In a semi-rural English town, a newly-wed couple move into a new home to start a new chapter in their lives. They soon discover that the house is not all it seems to be, as it is home to a vengeful spirit of a young girl who is hell-bent on defending the house against its new residents. She was the daughter of a young woman who was left by her husband for a younger girl. This left the woman in an emotionally vulnerable state of mind, which led her to start to rely heavily on alcohol. Her daughter was neglected and mistreated and eventually the woman cracked and drowned her young daughter, whilst reciting the ‘Patience is a virtue, virtue is a grace, Grace is a little girl who wouldn't wash her face’. As she died a violent death, Grace’s spirit remained in the realm of the living to terrorise new occupants of her house. The couple have to somehow find a way to stop Grace, holding on to their humanity and each other as they do so. The more they investigate, the more truths about the house’s history they find. This leads them to believe that they only way to stop Grace, is by killing the woman that originally killed her- Grace’s mother, Heather.

From this initial pitch, I realised that I really liked this idea and, thus, ideas stemmed from this screenplay pitch.

INITIAL ROUGH STORY

From my first brief pitch about this idea, I created a rough outline of what I envisioned a finished film or story about this idea to look like.

A newly-wed couple (Chaz and Brooke Wilson) move into a new house soon after their wedding in order to start the next stage of their life. They are first seen on the road, talking and laughing whilst on their way to the new house. As they pull up to the driveway, those of keen eyesight can briefly spot a girl standing at one of the top floor windows of the house.

The couple unpack and explore the house. Apart from a few puddles of water, everything is fine and this remains so for the first couple of weeks of the residence. One day, as Brooke is taking a bath, she closes her eyes and relaxes into the bubbles. She hears creaking, so opens her eyes. However, she sees nothing so closes them again and starts to relax once more. This is followed by more creaking. She opens her eyes again and is shocked to see a little girl standing in the corner of the room. After the initial shock wears off, she settles down, but is noticeably a little scared. She asks the girl her name, to which the girl replies: ‘Grace.’ Brooke asks her how she got in to which Grace replies ‘I live here, silly.’ This confuses Brooke who tries to tell her that she doesn’t and that she and Chaz live there. This upsets Grace and, as she starts screaming, her face becomes greyer and she becomes drenched in water, with her mouth opening wider than should have been possible.

The camera cuts to Brooke opening her eyes, gasping for breath and sitting up out of the bath. There is water all over the floor and her husband is sitting with her, clutching her hand- clearly concerned. He says that she must have hit her head and gone underwater. Brooke tries to convince him of the little girl, but Chaz doesn’t believe her. She eventually concludes that she must have hit her head, even though, in her head, she knows what she saw. Brooke seems to be the only one who notices some strange things happening around the house and Chaz refuses to believe that there’s anything wrong. This results in a few arguments and puts a strain on their relationship.

As the days go by, both Brooke and Chaz begin to notice strange happenings around the house. They hear a child reciting ‘Patience is a virtue, virtue is a grace, Grace is a little girl who wouldn’t wash her face’ in the night. Whenever a supernatural occurrence happens (such as wailing, belongings flying of their own volition, etc), they are accompanied by the presence of puddles of water- indicating Grace’s involvement in them. The Wilsons call a plumber who inspects the pipes and find nothing out of the ordinary.

After this, Grace becomes more aggressive and starts attacking them during the night. They barely manage to escape and after a few nights like this they book a room in a nearby motel. They start investigating the house’s past and look through county records and old internet sites to try to piece together the history of the house. It’s there that they learn about the house’s sinister past. Earlier in her life, when she was in her early 30s and Grace was 7 or 8, the previous owner’s husband (several decades ago) of 11 years left her for another woman. This event left her mentally unstable and prone to aggressive outbursts of anger. She began to drink heavily and neglected her daughter. One day, she drowned her daughter whilst reciting the ‘Patience is a virtue...etc’ phrase. Chaz and Brooke are horrified and livid at their salesman, who neglected to mention this when they bought the house. They confront him at his office and he is apologetic and points them in the direction of the previous owner of the house- Heather Pastor. The Wilsons decide to pay her a visit in the care home for the mentally ill where she resides. They believe that as long as Heather lives, so does Grace.

Upon arriving at the care home, they discover that the woman (Heather Pastor) is wheelchair-bound and seemingly unable to move. Her mouth is agape and she can only make gurgling sounds (noises one would make if drowning). Upon further inspection, the couple notice a puddle of water around the wheelchair.

Suddenly, Heather’s body jumps up and violently assaults Chaz, all the while wailing in her gurgling voice. Chaz fights back, but is overwhelmed by Heather (who is possessed by the spirit of Grace). The nurse attending to Heather screams, which prompts hospital guards to burst into the room. They pry Heather off of Chaz and try to hold them back as the nurse and the Wilsons make their escape. As they leave the room, Heather tears the guards apart and flings their lifeless bodies across the room. During the fight, the nurse had managed to call the police. The Wilsons run hand-in-hand towards the exit, with Heather in pursuit- levitating off the ground hurtling towards them with one arm outstretched. They manage to reach the exit and fling open the doors. The police, who had arrived shortly before, start shooting- not realising who is coming out. Chaz is caught in the leg and falls. Brooke screams and tries to help him, but Heather reaches him first. Heather claws at Chaz a bit, before being shot in the head by one of the police. (The camera could follow the bullet as it torpedoes towards her head). Heather’s body crumples to the ground and, what seems like bathwater, gushes out of her body- indicating that Grace is finished.

A few close-up camera shots of the shocked police and couple could follow this. A monologue in Chaz’s voices starts in these close-ups.

Cuts to Heather’s room in the care home, where there is blood and water everywhere along with the bodies of the guards. The shot fades and cuts to the care home several days after the ordeal, where everyone is going about their daily business now the Heather/Grace has gone.

Cuts to people gently lowering Heather’s body in an unmarked grave- whilst Chaz and Brooke look on.

Cuts to the couple signing the papers that put the house back on the market.

Cuts to Chaz finishing off writing a note, as the monologue finishes as well. He leaves it on the kitchen table, for the next owners of the house to find. The note’s title read:

‘A warning

To whom it may concern’.

In the monologue, he recounts Grace’s grisly demise and warns of the possible dangers of the house- even though everyone believes Grace to have disappeared.

Back in the kitchen, Chaz hears Brooke’s voice telling him to hurry up. The camera follows Chaz as he leaves the house and meets his wife. The drive out of the driveway behind a couple of mover’s vans. The camera turns back towards the now empty house. Cuts to the front hallway, cuts to the kitchen, cuts to the living room (with each cut, a new room is displayed), as serene music plays. Cuts to the bathroom last. In the corner of the bathroom, those of keen eyesight can briefly see a small puddle of water.

Credits roll.

After the credits roll, Grace’s voice can be heard over the black screen reciting the ‘Patience is a virtue...etc’ phrase. After the phrase finishes, the screen cuts immediately to a close-up of Grace’s face looking out the top floor of the window.

'GRACE' KEY MOMENTS IN THE STORY

The rough outline of the story gave me the opportunity to pick out the key moments in the story.

> Chaz & Brooke arriving at their new home for the first time.

> Brooke meeting Grace for the first time.

> Initial supernatural occurrences, such as levitation & breaking of household objects.

> Grace becoming more aggressive in her acts of the supernatural.

> Chaz & Brooke arguing about the existence of Grace.

> Grace violently attacking Chaz & Brooke, leading them to flee the house.

> Chaz & Brooke researching the history of their home.

> Flashback to Heather drowning Grace.

> Chaz & Brooke meeting Heather for the first time.

> Heather attacking Chaz, the nurse & guards in the hospital for the mentally ill.

> Heather chasing Chaz & Brooke outside.

> Heather getting shot by the police outside the hospital.

> Chaz writing the warning back at the house.

> Chaz & Brooke leaving the house, as Grace looks on from a window.


INITIAL DRAWINGS
After visiting Polesden Lacey, the location where I think i'll take the photographs, I have drawn some quick sketches to help give me an idea of which scenes I want to take photos of.

INITIAL FILM POSTER IDEAS

After taking some photographs at Polesdon Lacey, I have produced some initial movie poster designs for my proposed film idea.

Tree idea

Stone bath idea

Stone bath with arm idea

ADJUSTMENTS

As part of my peer feedback, some people suggested some adjustments that could be made to improve the posters.

Original

With adjustments

Original

With adjustments

STILLS FROM THE PROPOSED FILM IDEA
In order to display some of the key moments from the story, as suggested above in the outline of the story, I took various photographs around my chosen location of Polesdon Lacey in order to create these 'scenes' from the proposed film.

The main characters' (Chaz and Brooke) first view of their new house

Chaz and Brooke exploring thier new surroundings

The main antagonist (Grace) begins to awaken

Chaz and Brooke discover a lone grave on their property and begin to investigate

Chaz and Brooke are attacked and chased by Grace

At the climax of the story, Chaz and Brooke stand over a defeated Grace

STILLS FROM PROPOSED FILM - ADJUSTMENTS
After reviewing the self reflection and the peer feedback, it is clear that in order to improve my photographs some adjustments should be made.

Original

With adjustments

Original

With adjustments

Original

With adjustments

STILLS FROM PROPOSED FILM - PROCESSES

I started the process using Adobe Photoshop CC. Above is the original image.

Firstly, I changed the Brightness/Contrast. I decreased the brightness and increased the contrast slightly to soften the image and to start to slightly make the image more cinematographic.

Secondly, I adjusted the image using the Curves tool. I created an 'S' shape using this tool, which then brought the colour out- making it more prominent.

Thirdly, I adjusted the colours using the Colour Balance tool. I increased the levels of greens and yellows to further accentuate these colours.

Next, I adjusted the colours again using the Hue/Saturation tool. I decreased the Master saturation a bit and changed the yellow saturation levels too. At first, when using these tools, I was experimenting a little bit to see what kinds of effects I could accomplish.

After that, I added a new, separate layer. I then overlayed this layer onto the previous one and subsequently used the Burn tool to darken the trees in the background. This would make it seem like they are shrouded in mist.

Then, I created the mist in a separate layer, labelled 'Mist'.  The process for making it can be seen below the process for this photograph. It took a lot of trial, error and tutorials, but eventually I managed to find a satisfactory outcome.

The next step in the editing was to duplicate the mist layer and to distort it slightly. I moved the second mist layer up underneath the trees and made the mist thinner.

With the mist in its correct place, the next phase was to get the lighting and colours right. I used the Curves tool to bring out more of the shadows to attempt to make the photograph more like an image from a film.

I decided that I wanted more colour in the photo, so I used the Hue/Saturation tool. I increased the saturation of the green and yellows to bring out the colour in the grass, whilst retaining the darkness of the trees in the background.

Next, I used the Brightness/Contrast tool to see what the effect was on the fog in the background was.

In order to complete the photograph, I thought I should make it slightly darker so it wouldn't be too light in comparison with the other photographs. I still wanted it to feel like part of the series. So lastly, I used the Brightness/Contrast tool to adjust the lightness of the image.

MIST - PROCESS

The mist seen in several of the film stills was fairly tricky for me to produce. As stated above, it took a lot of trial, error and tutorials to reach an outcome that I liked.

This is what the finished layer looks like.

The first step in creating mist is to apply a clouds filter. To do this I selected the top layer and proceeded to click on Filter > Render > Clouds.

Having made sure to have clicked on the top layer, the next step was to convert that layer for smart filters. To do this I clicked on Filter > Convert for Smart Filters.

After this, I blurred the clouds onscreen using the Gaussian Blur tool. This can be found at Filter > Blur > Gaussian Blur. I set the radius to 45 pixels, as seen above.

Next, I clicked on the smart filter icon on the mist layer, then used the gradient tool to create a gradient from bottom to top.

Afterwards, I moved the mist into its correct position (at the bottom of the photograph) and distorted it to fit the image properly. To do this I clicked on Edit > Transform > Distort.

And lastly, I used the smudge tool to better distort the mist and to make them look more like mist.

The result was a subtle, but effective, mist layer.