Pitch

PITCH

WORKING TITLE: Mandy

GENRE: Horror Short film.

DURATION: Ideally 5 minutes or just a bit over five minutes.

BUDGET: Low

WHERE WOULD IT BE SHOWN: Either online on YouTube or Art house cinemas (as it is low budget, independently produced and a short film, it has a niche audience)

DEMOGRAPHIC FOCUS/TARGET AUDIENCE: 15 – 30 year olds. Typically, a young audience as they tend to be the ideal audience for horror films.

SECONDARY AUDIENCE: Professionals or beginners within the film industry, with knowledge/experience of short films.

LOGLINE: The anniversary of an ancient, haunted dolls ‘end’ has a dark twisted turn when she comes back in human form, with malevolence in her heart.

PITCH/PLOT:

For my narrative, my main idea is to create a supernatural horror based on a real life 'doll' coming back for revenge. How I would create and demonstrate this narrative is by having two main characters, one being a middle aged woman (the victim) and the other being a doll reformed into a young girl. The middle aged woman will be in her car driving and occasionally texting what appears to be her significant other when she suddenly puts it at a halt due to a strange young girl dancing in the middle of the street and repeatedly singing a creepy 'la la' song. Eventually after tense moments of silence and the girl stopping to stare at the women in the car, she will run off the road skipping and smiling away like nothing happened. This would act as the start of the build up to the climax of the short film and I also believe this will work well in an attempt to creep out the audience as the girl's behaviour is clearly not normal. As the narrative carries on, it will soon be revealed that the ‘young girl’ is not actually a young girl but a notorious doll named Mandy who has come back in human form. When the woman comes home strange things start to happen before she is eventually confronted by Mandy.

PRIMARY/SECONDARY RESEARCH:

I researched real life haunted dolls so I could have a background story/true story to base my piece on. The background story I found was most suitable was a doll called Mandy. Mandy was a notorious doll in 20th century who basically got the title of a ‘haunted doll’ after these reports: “visitors reported hearing tiny footsteps in the room where the doll is kept, and claim that their cameras malfunction when they try to photograph her. Some have even said their purses; lunches or other personal articles get moved around the building when they visit her display. Strangest of all, according to museum staff, other dolls kept in the same glass case as Mandy have been knocked over or damaged.”

So I based my short film based on that, with Mandy basically returning but within a human form, with the area she originally came now being for suburban homes – the current residents being completely unaware of the history. So the night my film is set is the anniversary of Mandy’s notorious end, and she’s come back for revenge. Throughout the short film I will give hints of the background story from creating fake newspaper articles regarding Mandy (or maybe even trying to relocate old ones that actually existed!) from text messages that will come from her husband. I will also put a short ‘background information’ regarding Mandy in the beginning (this being a common convention of horror films), for example: “In the 20th century a famous doll named…”

CHARACTER BREAKDOWN/CHARACTERIZATION: I will have two main characters and that is the woman (who will be Mandy’s victim) and Mandy herself in human form.

MISE-EN-SCENE/VISUAL MOTIFS:

Protagonist – Regular costume of just an everyday casual outfit. This to represent her and the situation as ordinary, this linking to short films as most take on the idea of a normal everyday situation with a twist.

Antagonist – Porcelain doll costume and mask, fake blood on doll which will increase as the short film goes on.

Lighting and setting – Low-key lighting, set in the night-time and in suburban area.

Visual Motifs: Will feature the biblical cross and possibly bible to link up to religious references within horror films, used to create a false sense of security.

RATIONALE: I chose this idea because I felt like although it would be a challenge (due to the complex and detailed narrative) I wanted to try and achieve this. Also, after a successful film opening I did in AS, I felt that I had more skills now so I could do an even better piece.

CONSTRAINTS AND CONTINGENCY: One problem that may occur is finding a correct, suitable doll outfit and makeup and another problem will be filming in the middle of the street at night as it may make neighbours feel uncomfortable, therefore, to fix this I will alert my neighbours that I am doing a school project beforehand.

SIMILAR FILMS: ‘The Boy’ ‘Annabelle’.