Drafting and Planning: Potential Locations

Most horror film locations tend to be quite isolated, secluded and abandoned as this gives a quite dark, creepy and eery tone to the film trailer. In this blog, I will be analysing 5 potential horror film trailer locations that I could potentially use in my own film trailer. I shall also be trying to link these locations to real life films as these can help see what other films use these locations.

1. Haunted House

This is seen as a good potential location for a horror film trailer as on the outside it looks quite creepy and eery and inside it is similar because you don't really know what is inside. Haunted houses are atmospherical as they already have a personna of fear as it is haunted. You never know what you will find or experience when you go into the house.

This is the haunted house used in the horrror film 'IT'. It looks old, run down and eery. The grass is long and not cared for which gives it an abandoned feel to it. It is quite old fashioned and looks very old. The house is quite dark and gloomy looking. The front door doesn't have a very welcoming look to it. The

2. Forest

This is seen as a good potential horror film location as it brings about a sense of fear and mystery, as especially the deeper you go into the woods, the less you can see. In most horror films set in the wood (like Mama or A Cabin in the woods), the use of pathetic fallacy is used so the weather matches the location.

From the look of this wood, it looks quite gloomy and dark. The weather matches the location as it dark and foggy. This gives a sense of eeriness or mystery.

3. Church or Graveyard
4. Castle

Both a church and a castle have the same effect as each other. They are both seen as an isolating setting which allows the audience to feel alone and vulnerable so it seems unlikely that the characters will be saved which foreshadows events that could happen in the trailer. Churches also have graveyards which connote and foreshadows the death and also suggest dark theme. Castles are  similar to churches but much bigger. They are seen as quite mysterious places as they normally have lots of hidden rooms.

Churches and Graveyards are ideal locations for a horror film as they are known to be haunted and quite scary, eery and mysterious places. 

|Similar to a church, castles are normally in the middle of nowhere so are quite isolated, abandoned and mysterious places to be.

For my own film trailer, I am going to be using the location of a woods and a basement to present the serial killer and what he thrives off (which is time and clocks).