Horror Conventions

Darkness: is used in horrors as it can hide so many things and everything is always more scary during the night, darkness is needed in horrors in order to fully scare the audience.
Token screamer: is used to unsettle the audience, show the character is scared by screaming. it tells the audience bad things are happening

• Victims: Victims are needed in horrors to scare the audience and let them feel as if they could be the victim. we need victims, people to die or go through intense horror in order for the audience to know the horror is out there, if no one dies, the audience won’t be scared of an evil force who just chases people, the characters existence has to be in danger.

• Teenagers/Young adults :
Horror films use young characters for many reasons:
o In order to make the stupid decisions that horror film characters make, they really need to be young and stupid. An older person would be wise enough to realise the danger and not let it get to a point where it will be a real danger to them.
o Horrors often include chase scenes and the threat of physical life, characters need to be young in order to be physically fit enough to ward off this danger.
o The threat of life is what horrors are all about, and if someone’s life was almost over anyway, what would be the point, whereas a twenty year old still has their entire life ahead of them, they need to protect this, the most important thing to them, whereas an old person couldn’t really say the same, they’ve already lived, already made the mistakes and redemptions.


• Evil people/forces: An evil force or evil person/people to terrify the audience and characters. Films also need to have someone the audience can hate and hope to lose, which is what the evil character is in horrors.

• Blood/gore: Horrors use blood and guts in a way of releasing horror to the audience, they will see the blood, see the damage to the human bodies, and get scared.

• Death: Death is needed in horrors as that can be one of the most horrifying things there., and it’s the deaths that bring the fear into the climax. If the audience hadn’t seen people lose their lives at the hand of the evil force/ The audience wouldn’t fear it, the audience need to know what threat they are in, in order to fully grasp the point of the film, to fully feel the fear.


• Big black guy (dies): Someone who is strong, powerful, as how could someone over power them, is murdered in horrors to show the evil force’s power and strength.
• Shadows: to represent the danger or shadows could be used to let the characters know that someone’s coming, that danger is imminent.

• Hero: We need someone to love when we watch a film; we need someone who will be there to defeat the evil force.
• Running/chase scenes: To show that the characters are in danger, the fact that they need to run away shows that evil is present. This also adds suspense of whether or not the evil will catch up to the good guys or not.

• Attacks: Like deaths, attacks are needed to show the threat the characters are in and the power of the evil power, how things are serious and people could lose their lives.

• Isolation: This is one of the worst fears, as the fear of being alone, of never having someone to save you if something goes wrong.

• Empty streets: Streets are usually quite busy, and in no one being there shows how the characters are alone and whatever they face they face it alone.

• Insanity: The loosing of the mind for the good guys shows what can happen to the characters with the evil force around, and often there’s a good character who goes insane and becomes the evil force ( like jack from the shining)

• Eerie lighting (blue/cold lighting): Sets the tone of the film, makes the audience feel the cold and fear the characters in the film are feeling.

• Spooky/suspenseful music: Adds to the feel of the movie, puts the audience on edge, gets them ready for the bad which is about to happen.

• Stairs: Going down stairs in horrors is like asking for something bad to happen to you.

• Close up shots: Close up of face shots allows the audience to see the characters emotions, to see the fear on the good characters, or the threat on the evil force’s face.

• Masks: Fear is the unknown, and so when an evil force is in a mask, we can’t see him, he could be anything, and undefeatable.
• Audience expects to feel fear: The whole point of horrors is to scare the audience, and so the audience expect to feel fear.