Our group had numerous ideas for our thriller opening sequence.
1.) We surrounded our first idea around the concept of clowns. A mother would be leading her eight-year-old son around a park, the boy saw a clown but when he directed his mother’s attention towards the clown, it had disappeared. This would happen in a few different locations, such as in a grocery shop/bus stop/café. The last scene would be in the boy’s home. The parents would be asleep upstairs, the boy would casually go downstairs for a drink of water and then see the clown staring at him through the window. The clown would then point at the door and the boy would open it. The camera would then follow the boy and the clown up the stairs, about to go into the parent’s bedroom. This would set the narrative for the story, being based around a clown killer.
I suggested to the group that this idea might be too predictable. I convinced the group that instead of the scene ending at the parents bedroom door, we should show the boy and the clown going into the room, but then only having the boy come out with a bloody knife. This would suggest that the boy subconscious side is killing. The boy believes it to be a clown but the reality is that it is he. This brings a whole new narrative to film. It tells us that the film will continue to be about this boy and his parallel mind.
2.) Our second idea was surrounded around the workings towards the black market. The black market consists of people selling kidneys and other human organs that were taken unwillingly.
The first shot would be of a man in a bath filled with ice cubes. He would wake up in a nervoce frenzy to find a note saying ‘sorry’. The shot would track around to the mans side to find a stitched up cut. The shot would then turn to the man’s P.O.V (point of view) looking at the cut moving around and then fainting, The next seen is still on the man’s P.O.V of him opening his eyes. The camera has a hazy view of him looking up at the nurses. The doctor is talking to a federal agent. The dialogue is roughly between the two men discussing how it happened. The federal agent will say something around, ‘Why would he cut out his kidney and then have the moral to call 911?’
3.) Our second idea led us into our final idea. The stealing of organs led us into this sacrificial element. The idea was that there would be a 1000-year-old scarecrow that people deliver human organs in sacrifice to.
The first shot would be the scarecrows P.O.V of a girl in a red cape walking towards him with basket of meat. The shot would switch between this shot and an over the shoulder shot of the girl. The shot would be post edited into sepia at this stage, showing the same sacrifice 100’s of years ago by another person in a red cape, with people holding candles around the scarecrow in a circle, chanting. Changing the shot back to the scarecrows P.O.V, we are establishing a sense of time, with the hooded girl’s clothes and face changing. This implies the length of this scarecrow tradition.
