Textual Analysis-Samuel Hutsby

Foundation Production Research: Textual Analysis (technical codes)

To make a successful Horror Film, you will need to carry out some research into the Horror genre. Use the following chart to note down your analysis of the opening of a Horror film. Consider how all the technical codes (in the left column) construct the themes and motifs along the top. You will need to look at a number of different Horrors to give you a clear analysis of the genre.

Film Name:The hitcher

Director:Dave Myers

Year:2007

Certificate:18

	Threat (Where does the threat come from? How is this established?)	Vulnerability (Who appears to be venerable and why?)	Characterisation (Good guy/bad guy, binary opposition, motivation etc)	Genre (Codes and Conventions)
Camera Shot/Angle (How is the camera used to control the audience?)	Threat is intitially shown from a distance(long shot) and in shadow. Its from an eye-line angle which gives a sence of the victims point-of-view and the way they view the hitcher intitially.	The couple because the way the shots are taken it shrinks the car compared to the hitcher,and automatically gives them a sence of being trapped. The angles are low to impose the hitcher upon them and the couple are seen from eye-line angles.	The hitcher after the opeing scene is always shown fully to he audience which gives him an apearence of having no fear of being captured. The shots always show him in clear sight and don’t mask his appearence. And several close-ups show the anger emitting from him.	The conventions that the slasher is always an imposing monster is somewhat challenged by eye-line angles,and constantly seeing the human hitcher without turning him into a monster and dehumanising him.
Lighting (Dark lighting, Backlighting etc, how does it present characters?)	The threat is mainly cast in darkness, even though alot of the plot happens during the daylight hours. And the light seems too degrade John Rider (the hitcher) and shows a  human side.	The darkness of night is generally the sign that danger is approaching the victim from then on are immediately portrayed as victims until that evenings bloodshed is over.	The lighting doesn’t show a gap between good and evil which I think makes it more effective on the whole because it equals out both parties as human and biologically and essentially mentally the same.	Although most of the plot is shown in daylight, the idea of murder in the dark is a conventionwhich this film lives up too.
Music/Sound (What does the music or background sounds bring to the opening?)	The music is quiet relaxed or rocky in places which seems too show disregard for the horror happening under the threats hand this is a good metaphor for John Riders callousness.	The same music is used in the same scene mostly because it can also represent the students care-free attitude towards life at the beginning of the film.		It challenges the atmospheric convention by the relaxed or normal scial music which plays. Yet it still maintains an element of fear.
Location/Setting (How important is the setting and location to the film?	It gives the threat a sence of being everywhere much liek the desert surrounding them.	It shows there’s nowhere to hide or escape in this barren wastleland.	The location simply shows the isolation of the victims and the sence of no escape from the desert or there killer which is where the metaphor summarises both there stereotypes.
Other (Does the mise-en-scene have a role in constructing meaning, are there any props etc?	The threats initial weapons are knives yet as he progress he gains more deadly attire which also represents his growing repetuare as a serial killer, getting deadlier and deadlier.	Although weapons are usually the threats speciality the victims aren’t as vuulnerable as they seem.		The genre of slasher is key and the use of the knife matchs this convention easily.

Name: Samuel Hutsby

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