1. Treatment
Darkness falls on a dance studio. Five friends and teenagers, dancers: Buffy, Kirby, Tatum Nina
and her boyfriend Thomas, come to the end of their rehearsal and prepare to leave. One of them
decides to stay behind to perfect her pirouettes. As the friends leave, and the door begins to
close, Buffy will soon realize that she’s not alone. Whilst practicing her routine, she looks into
the mirror and screams as she thinks she has seen someone. In a state of frenzy, she turns around
to find no one behind her. Paranoid and frightened, she believes the hallucination was due to lack
of sleep and stress. She is unsettled therefore decides to leave. She picks up her belongings and
makes her way to the exit when the lights go out. Overpowered by darkness, she calls out to see
who’s there. The lights begin to flicker and she sees a masked figure running towards her.
Oblivious to the brutal murder of her friend, Kirby is on her way home and takes her usual route
through the park. Listening to the music from her iPod, she is unaware of the presence of the
masked villain coming towards her. She bumps into him and briefly apologizes but dismisses it
and continues walking. Recalling the brief encounter, she stops to think about the strange
appearance of the person. She turns around to reassure herself that she was worrying over
nothing and finds the masked person standing facing her ready to attack with a deadly knife. In a
state of fear, she screams and begins to run. Unable to hear his footsteps behind her, she turns
around hoping that she has lost him and falls in the process. Vulnerable and frightened, she looks
up and sees him standing over her.
The next day, Nina is flicking through the channels when she comes across the breaking news of
the death of her friends. The reporter emphasizes the similarity of the previous years events on
the same date where the victim was from the same college. Whilst watching the LIVE broadcast,
she notices a masked figure lingering in the far distance. She pauses the screen and edges closer
to examine further. Certain that the masked person is truly there, she gasps and has a flashback
of her involvement in last years accidental killing. Fearing Tatum’s safety, she calls to inform
her, Tatum doesn’t pick up as she’s having a bath, so she leaves a panicked voicemail ordering
her to keep safe. The masked villain answers the call and say’s “It’s all your fault” and then
hangs up. Upstairs, an oblivious Tatum is having a bath, unaware that the masked villain has
entered her bathroom. The cheerful song juxtaposes the brutal intentions of the villain. While
laying there with her eyes closed, the villain is shown entering the bathroom. Whilst washing
her hair, she dips her head under the water and then rubs her eyes to clear her vision. At opening
her eyes, she sees the masked villain standing over her; who blocks her scream by drowning her.
Nina arrives at Tatum’s house to see that the front door is open. She rushes yelling Tatum’s
name through the house, finally finding Tatum’s body in the bathroom. Crying and terrified, she
collapses onto the ground and begins wailing in utter disbelief. She calls Thomas and explains
what she has seen and he replies he will be there shortly; suddenly she hears the front door slam
shut. Is Nina destined to have the same fate as her friends?
Treatment Analysis
Conventions:
• Teenagers are popular in horror films as they serve to make the film realistic and
engaging for the horror audiences who are predominately young people. The

2. immaturity and extremity of emotions portrayed are convincing thus providing
platforms for postmodern films such as ‘Attack the Block’ to be made. Plot lines have
always focused on young people with famous slasher films such as Scream, The Texas
Chainsaw Massacre and Halloween being prime examples. Taking this into
consideration, our group decided to revolve our trailer around five teenagers: Nina,
Tatum, Buffy Kirby and Thomas.
• Screaming is an expression of shock and fear hence we have incorporated this into our
trailer. Screaming is a depiction of the horror that the character is experiencing and
this is dispersed through to the audience who are shown a vulnerable and helpless
victim.
• Knives are a good horror weapon as they allow intimate contact and cause a slow and
painful death. The majority of our respondents thought that knives were most effective
horror weapons consequently our group decided to use them in our trailer. According
to Freud’s sadism theory, the knife serves as a misogynistic tool when being used
against women and this fits our trailer which has mainly female characters.
• Blood is a vital in slasher films to illustrate the extent of the villain’s ruthless quest to
inflict pain onto his/her weak victims. By depicting bloodshed and gore, the slasher
film subgenre achieves its purpose of representing a dramatic and extreme bloodbath
playing on the fears of audiences.
• Masked figure conform to the Structuralist prop paradigms and not knowing the
identity of the person behind the mask unsettles the audience. The mask allows the
audience to undertake a journey to find out who is behind the mask and this adds
mystery conforms to Barthes pleasure of text theory. Our group decided to use the
mask paradigm due to its popularity after films like Scream, Friday the 13th and
Halloween.
• Chase scenes add a thrill and excitement which heightens the experience of a watching
a horror film. Used in probably all horror films, they serve to build up tension and
bring the masochistic viewers to the edge of their seats not knowing whether the
victim, usually Clover’s ‘Final Girl’, will triumph or concede defeat to the villain,
usually the sadistic voyeur. Our reason for including a chase sequence was to highlight
the power difference between the villain and the victim- who despite running as fast as
she can, will ultimately be caught by the villain.
• Bathroom scenes or scenes where the victim physically lays exposed to the sadistic
voyeurs is something which our group found effective after seeing the classic bathroom
scene from Alfred Hitchcock’s ‘Psycho’. The idea of subverting an everyday activity of a
tranquil and peaceful bath into a horrific and fatal experience highlights the merciless
nature of our victim accurately thus we decided to include this in our trailer.
• Darkness is imperative in horror films to create fear of the unknown and startle the
audiences when the unexpected happens. Accordingly, all of our scenes are set in

3. darkness to highlight the metaphorical darkness the characters have been plunged into.
• “Names are boundary markers of individual identity” as critic Parker has said
emphasizing the significance of the names of characters. As a result of this, our group
decided to name our characters based on the denotation of the specific names.
o The name Nina was our first choice for our final girl but as horror film
protagonists usually have an asexual name, we decided to change it to ---------
Clover’s ‘Final Girl’ theory argued that asexual names were used due to the
masculine personality trait adopted by the girl in her final confrontation with
the villain.
o The name Tatum was chosen to represent a promiscuous girl who is always
prevalent in horror films. This character always dies due to her engagement in
sexual activities as Clover suggests which is why our group decided to show
her death in the bath scene where she lays physically exposed.
o Kirby is short for Kimberly and the nick name reduces her significance
highlighting that she is one of the less important characters who dies early on
in the trailer.
o Buffy’s name suggests the stereotypical blonde girl who is first to confront the
villain. Conforming to the typical representation of blondes in horror films,
due to her own mistake, she decides to remain in the dance studio alone and
creates the perfect scenario for the villain to enter and commit his first killing.
o The boyfriend character is seen in most horror films either protecting the final
girl and dying nobly during the course; or assisting the villain in his quest to
avenge the final girl. Thomas is a popular everyday name and is relatable to
audiences.
We looked at Propp’s character types and used them to create the characters in our trailer. For
our first scene, we will establish these character types through the costumes of each of the
characters. Each character will be dressed in a white t-shirt and black leggings to create a sense
of equal danger that is waiting for them. Additionally, these costumes are effective in conveying
the characters as dancers.
• -------- will be dressed in a baggy white t-shirt, to form a basis for her being Clover’s
asexual, masculine ‘final girl. The white colour connotation serves to highlight her
virginity, a convention of horror films as the final girl usually does not engage in sexual
activities.
• Tatum’s costume will be a low cut skin tight t-shirt to convey her as a promiscuous and
sexually active teenager. She contrasts with -----, her sister and is punished for this by
dying before the final confrontation between the villain and -----
• Kirby will be wearing a long sleeved white t-shirt with three quarter length leggings and

4. glasses. This separates her from the other characters and establishes her as the ‘geek’ of
the group who gets teased for her unusual characteristics.
• Buffy’s costume will be a short sleeved, medium sized t-shirt. This practical costume for
dancing conveys Buffy’s passion for dancing alas her decision to rehearse longer than the
rest leads to fatal consequences.