Real Life Inspiration - Soham Murders

One of the real-lfe events which influenced my film was the high profile murder case in August 2002 of two 10 year old girls in Soham, Cambridgeshire. The victims were Holly Wells and Jessica Chapman. The convicted killer was a local school caretaker - Ian Huntley. The murders particularly horrified people, as Huntley was in a position of trust, and used the fact that the girls knew him from school.


Shortly before the murders on 4 August 2002 at around 18:15, Holly Wells and Jessica Chapman had attended a barbecue at Holly's family home. They then went out to buy some sweets. On their way back they walked past Huntley's rented house in College Close. Huntley asked them to come into the house. He said that Carr, his girlfriend, was in the house as well, although in fact she had gone to visit family back in Grimsby. Shortly after Holly and Jessica entered 5 College Close, Huntley murdered them.
Huntley's reasons for committing the murders may never be known, but minutes before seeing the girls, Huntley had slammed the telephone down on Carr, after a furious argument. Huntley had allegedly suspected Carr of cheating on him. The police suspected that Huntley killed the girls in a fit of jealous rage. There may have also been a sexual motive. It seems likely that either, or possibly both, of these motives drove Huntley to kill the girls - the police found no evidence of pre-meditation.

Above: a picture of convicted murderer and care-taker Ian Huntley.

Below: picture of the two 10 year old girl victims Holly Wells and Jessica Chapman.

Poster Inspiration

This poster relates to our film as it has a school based theme; the children in the poster are roughly the same age as the children portrayed in our film; they are wearing school uniform in a 'upper class', public school manner- shirts ,ties and short hair. The colour scheme is dark red which in this poster stands out with the black and white background - the red here symbolizes blood and danger rather then lust and passion which it can also show; you can tell it means danger and death by the black background. The black and white relates to such films as "Sin City" and "Natural Born Killers" which are inspiration to our film as well. I believe the reason the main image is black and white is to help show all the students looking the same, this shows order and unity in the group as there is no difference; the teacher, however, in the image is wearing black which shows him to be outside of the group and away from the order and unity. The black and white also shows darkness and uncertainty which is what the film is mainly about. Our idea for our poster is a black school blazer covered by a hand, but on the hand is dark red blood, so the main colours used in our poster is red and black - the same as this poster. Also the only text on the poster is the title and a one sentence sub title, which is the same amount of text that our poster will use. The white writing also stands out to the dark background, the review and tag line are both white and stand out

The reason why the reviewer said "a cross between 'A Clockwork Orange' and 'Lord of the Flies" is because they are both well known films and most people are expected to be able to refernece them before watching this; as this is a Japanese film people would want to know in the UK which Britsh/American films it is mostlike before watching it. The tagline "Could you kill your best friend" is a catchy and funny rhetorical question; it also, in the one sentence, reveals to the audience the genre of the film and that it is in fact going to contain death and killing, rather then a usual school drama.

Trailer Analysis

The opening of the 'Evil Dead' trailer (1982), starts in utter darkness with just a dark black shot; this makes the audience curious about what is happening and leaves them witha false sense of security. However, the only sound you can hear is a tape recorded voice of an old man, which in itsself is creepy, he is acting as if a comentator telling the audience what is happening, even though we can't see anything, making us want to view what he is speaking even more, building up tension and fear- during his speech you can hear a heart beat. To the audience this builds up fear, - the heart beat is at a steady pace, this could be because of fear or nerves, the audience's hearts would also be beating at the same sort of pace as the sound in trailer - they are in blackness listening to the gruesome things an old man is saying on a tape recorder. The man in his speech uses typical 'horror' language, making the speech more terrifying, for example he uses words like "dark shadows moving in the woods", "ressurrected" and "come calling... for me", all of these sayings are very spooky. Then it goes quiet, and the film title comes forward from the back and into the audience's face in clear bold white letters saying "Evil Dead".This makes the audience sudden;yaware of what they are watching- when the title comes hurtling towards the front of the screen, creepy eerie music starts playing, quite fast-paced and in-your-face sort of music- violins and trumpets , building up suspense and fear in the audience.

Genre

Genre is a set of criteria for a category of composition.

Actor List - to be confirmed!

Steve "Biker" Wood - Groundskeeper -Confirmed
Me, Mel and friends - Students
Mr Casebourne - Teacher
Mrs Edwards - Newsreporter Voice
- Parents

Prop List

School register
Pictures of Pupils
Various groundskeeping materials
- Rake
- Shovel
- Leaf Blower
- Grass fertilizer
- Hedge Trimmers
and more....

School equipment
School bags
Table
Chairs
White Board
Fake blood


Costumes

School uniform - Kids
Suit and tie - Teacher
Baggy dirty clothes - Groundskeeper

Location Shots

various places around William Parker Sports College.
Field
Rugby Hut
Classrooms from sixth form block and upper and lower schools
Playgrounds.

Basic Storyline

Setting: The Past

Location: Old deserted house – later we find out it’s the caretaker’s cabin.

Flash back, Faded,blurry- distortion.
These 7 shots are set before the second set of 7, but are synced 1-1, 2-2 etc...eg past-present, past-present
.1) Shot of boy lying on floor, bleeding, crying, and screaming (Short and sharp).
2) Boy screaming this time the audience get a sense of location – shows it’s the cabin.
3) Boy screaming, dying, sense of location this time feet appear next to the boy.
4) Find out the feet are the caretaker’s, (Tilt up) caretaker with blood on him crying.
5) Police break in and take away distressed caretaker.
6) Mysterious man comes in when everyone is in panic about the situation and grabs hold of boy.
7) Tilt up turns out to be TEACHER (WHAT A TWIST). Drags body out, still screaming, everyone else in the room doesn’t care they believe teacher will help, as the teacher is helpful and good.
8) Final shot, (In teachers home) camera follows the teacher into the basement, where all the missing kids are, screaming and crying.





Setting: The Now aka The Present.

Location: School, - camera normal, no effects.

1) Happy kids playing football, one kid goes missing – (kid in the cabin) from afar you see police run in school and into cabin.
2) Find out that caretaker has been convicted of murder. However as he lives on the ground he is allowed to return.
3) Kids make fun of him, tease and laugh, abused caretaker. Another missing kid.
4) Teacher tries to help the kids – reassure them keeping them safe, become a father figure. Another missing kid.
5) Teacher convinces kids to hunt down caretaker and seek revenge for there friends.
6) Kids arrange to meet up and finish caretaker. L
7) Kids kill caretaker, HAPPY ENDING?! Boy who kills him gets arrested, teacher lives, boy treated like a hero.



Basic Plot:
Basically in the past one student (Matt) goes missing, the school is in panic, children are scared. Months later when the school is back at peace, the word gets around that the school caretaker has been released from questioning and prison, this clearly makes the students unhappy. The caretaker lives on the grounds, kids tease and torment him; then however more kids go missing, yet there’s no evidence that the caretaker has done it, Mr Casebourne (Teacher) is nice and treats the kids well in these sad times, by being a sort of father figure to them; when more kids go missing, Mr Casebourne convinces the kids that the only way to stop the mayhem is to kill the caretaker; the kids in all their anger go along with it and meet up together and kill him. The caretaker is now dead, everyone is happy, the kids think they are safe, parents are pleased, and the main kid responsible goes to jail but is a legend around the school.
The twist you infact find out that the teacher killed the boy and the caretaker was just there to help him. You were made to gain all the trust for the teacher and grew to love him: however you just lose all love and trust for him at the end when you find out the truth; in contrast, you are made to feel hate for the caretaker for the whole film and even to be happy when he is dead- however when you find out the truth your emotions are turned upside down and inside out!