R+P Post 7: Our opening sequences planned mis-en-scene

The overall look I would like for our opening sequence is one of desaturated, plain colours, mainly blacks, blues and whites, as this is common in the thriller genre, being used by many current films such as recently in the Harry Potter franchise and in many serious and critically acclaimed films such as 'Ex Machina' in 2015.

Camera: I want to use a variety of shot types that all allow the story of the opening sequence to move along swiftly. There will be several stylised shots and sequences, such as the quick close-ups of the lawyer putting on different parts of her outfit, but they will hopefully add to the uncomfortable, tense atmosphere of the opening.

Lighting: Lighting will ideally be naturalistic, in order to stop the opening looking unrealistic or surreal. This will emphasise the unsettling atmosphere, as it hopefully will make the audience feel as if the stalker situation could happen in a normal, everyday street, therefore making it feel more personal. An inspiration for this would be the lighting present in BBC crime/thriller series 'Sherlock'.

Settings: Similarly to lighting, we want the settings to look like a real bedroom, kitchen and street in order to give the impression that the events in the opening could happen in real-life suburbia. These settings will be empty other than the lawyer, rapist and jogger in order to give the feeling of isolation, heightening the atmosphere of danger as there is nobody to save the lawyer from her stalker.

Props: None of the props I plan to use are particularly unusual and are normal household objects. Important props are a kitchen radio, the business outfit for the lawyer, an alarm clock and some official documents for the lawyer to read at her kitchen table. None of these props will be particularly brightly coloured in order to fit with the desaturated colour scheme. The exception to this is the kitchen radio, which might be a brighter colour in order to signify the importance of what is being broadcast through it.

Costumes: The two costumes shown in the opening sequence - belonging to the jogger and the lawyer - will ideally both look typical and 'normal', with the lawyer wearing a blouse, a pencil skirt and high heels...

...and the jogger wearing a t-shirt, shorts and trainers.

 These are everyday clothes that will hopefully add to the realistic atmosphere of the sequence.

R+P Post 6: Our opening sequence's characters and how we plan to represent social groups

The two characters who are properly seen in the opening sequence are a female lawyer (The main focus of the sequence) and a male jogger (who only appears in full for a single shot.). There is also the character of the lawyer's stalker, although we only ever hear his heavy breathing.

The Lawyer: The lawyer functions as the main focus of the opening sequence, with the audience following her morning routine. She is in some ways the archetype of a victim in a thriller film - especially in the 'stalker' sub-genre of these films - because she is female, fairly young (late twenties), middle-class and lives alone. Through the character of the black female lawyer we are trying to target several different social groups, namely women and ethnic minorities. We plan to represent both groups as challenging to their social stereotypes, by showing her in a positive light as a strong, independent and successful woman. However, she will still fall into some female stereotypes in order to make her more relatable and realistic, for example through her costume where she will wear a skirt and high heels.

She was inspired by the character of Jessica Pearson from US TV series 'Suits', who is one of the few  black female lawyers on screen. She is a strong, independent character similarly to what we want Molcott to be.

The Jogger: Being a very minor character, there is little chance to develop the jogger as he serves mainly to worry the lawyer when she hears his footsteps in the forest. The character is a white male in his early twenties, and follows the stereotype of men being physically fit and interested in fitness, but this isn't a particularly negative stereotype. This will be connoted through his typical jogger attire and through his actions of taking a jog.

R+P Post 5: Our opening sequence idea

The idea we have for our opening sequence is typical of the crime/thriller genre. It largely consists of the main character's morning routine, which is an idea that is present in many other thrillers, such as in various episodes of TV series 'Black Mirror'.

Beginning:  The sequence starts off with our main character of a female lawyer waking up, putting on her business clothes and going downstairs, all as part of an implied morning routine.

Middle: We enter the next location through a shot of a kitchen radio, broadcasting a story about the release of a previously-convicted rapist. The name given in this broadcast as the name of the lawyer who helped to prosecute and put away this criminal is the name of the lawyer we have been following. While this broadcast is taking place we see several Point-Of-View shots of the rapist watching and filming the lawyer from his hiding place in her back garden. The lawyer doesn't notice and carries on as usual, checking her legal documents on her kitchen table.

End: The lawyer walks out of her front door and starts to walk next to a forest that is on her route to work. She hears footsteps coming quickly towards her and quickens her pace. A jogger runs out of the forest, revealing the source of the footsteps, and casually runs past her. The final shot is once again from the rapist's point of view, watching the lawyer as she walks out of shot around a corner.

This opening sequence uses several common narrative conventions such as the lawyer being followed by an unseen criminal and not noticing him. An example of the subversion of the action code is also present in the form of the building of tension and main character's reaction to the jogger's running in the forest.

R+P Post 4: Our film's genre, title and plot outline

Our film is a crime thriller and a stalker film inspired stylistically by films such as 'Seven' (1995) and 'P2' (2007). The title of this film is 'Shadow of Your Past'. The plot line of the film contains many elements that are common in thriller genre films.

The initial equilibrium is that the main character is a successful female lawyer, who has a lot of money and is generally living a good life.

The disruption is that she finds a dead rat on her doorstep, coupled with the note 'I'm Back!' she becomes paranoid and wherever she goes she starts seeing glimpses of one of the criminals she once helped put into prison. Eventually her stalker catches up with her and kidnaps her.

The attempts to resolve this disturbance take the form of the lawyer attempting to escape from the room she is kept in. She fails and is stopped by her kidnapper.

The resolution comes when the police arrive and save the lawyer, although the stalker manages to escape.

The new equilibrium at the end of the film is that the lawyer moves house and changes her job and lifestyle in order to try and stop the stalker finding her - although it is left ambiguous what has happened to the stalker.

R+P Post 3: Our production and distribution institutions

We have decided as a group to use Summit Entertainment as a distribution group to distribute our film and BBC films as a production company.


We chose BBC films as our film has a strong British feel, with it's London-based location and British cast. BBC films have produced crime films that have a similar audience and appeal including 'Blood' (2012) and 'Brighton Rock' (2010). The BBC is also has a good reputation with thriller and crime  fans due to the large amount of TV dramas that they produce in these genres, such as the popular 'Sherlock' series, meaning that it will likely have a good reputation with our target audience.



We chose Summit Entertainment because they are experienced with distributing small-budgeted thriller films, for example 'P2', a stalker-thriller from 2007 that has a similar plot and audience as our film. In addition to this, some of the most successful films to be distributed by Summit Entertainment in the past few years have been in the crime/thriller genre, specifically the 'Now You See Me' franchise.

R+P Post 2: Our target audience and how we plan to attract/address them

Our primary target audience are crime/thriller fans with a secondary audience of young adults and a tertiary audience of fans of British films. We hope to interest crime/thriller audiences who are familiar with the stalker sub-genre of film with an original creation, as it has been several years since a significantly critically acclaimed or heavily promoted stalker film has been given a release in the UK. We will try and target young audiences by having a cast that consists mainly of characters in their twenties and by having a high volume of action and tension. Finally, we will attempt to gain the interest of fans of British films, with our film's British cast, crew and locations.

In order to see what young people enjoyed (and disliked) in modern thriller movies we asked several people who were aged 16-25 why they watched or why they didn't watch thriller/crime films. For clarification, question 1 was "Do you watch crime/thriller films?" and question 2 was "Why/ why not?"

The certification we want for our film is 15+ as specified by the bbfc. The boundaries of what a '15' film looks like are listed below on a screen-cap of the bbfc website:

This criteria is met by many of the shots and themes present in our film idea, as it will contain strong threat, strong violence and likely strong language, and especially when considering that the whole film will appear realistic and plausible.

R+P Post 1: How we intend to work as a group

My group consists of me, Meera Nakrani and Sian Richefond.

We intend to work as a cohesive group with our specialities in different areas, but with no clear leader. My area of speciality for example, is likely going to be in thinking of the practicality and cinematography of each shot rather than the actual ideas and plot behind. In order to communicate and maximise our skillset as a group we have set up a Whatsapp group chat so we can communicate ideas and organise meetings. We will meet mainly during lunchtimes at school, since none of us are busy and can all easily be punctual a majority of the time. We will also likely have several meetings after school if we need to discuss an issue further or if a lunchtime session is delayed.