Tantiwassadakran 1

Alan Tantiwassadakran

Writing 39B

Greg McClure

3 March 2017

My group and I constructed a RIP Project that targets: peers in our own class,

peers of other classes, and a scholarly audience in general . Our project is designed to

follow a single students continuous struggle with mental illness due to depression . We

aimed at depicting a story through a horror film that shows how serious a mental

disorder can be to those who genuinely suffer from negative symptoms . The horror

aspects of the film have much to do with symptoms that are accompanied with the

typical person who has a mental illness. We chose to portray our character with

symptoms that include paranoia, hallucinations, and delusions . Horror films must excite

audiences emotions, this means during the filming process, many of our shots had to

include close-ups, fades, panning, and jump scares/cuts . We also utilized third-person

angles, while integrating the use of first-person angles to make it seem as if the

audience were in the shoes of the character . The overall message we are trying to get

across in our film is to display the reality of mental illness sufferers . We made the film

seem as if there was an average student going about a normal day, when suddenly a

problematic episode occurs. From that point on, the student can be seen constantly

barraged by his ailments symptoms. Our group feels this can be very similar, if not

parallel, to the truth when dealing with a mental illness episode . Essentially, our goal is
 Tantiwassadakran 1

to open our audiences eyes and widen their scope when perceiving mental illnesses .

The film begins in an average classroom setting, then eventually ends in a dorm room .

During the creation of the film, we stressed the importance of showing the average

college setting, so that our movie would more accurately depict a relatable story .

My group and I collectively decided to base our films plot off a mental illness

episode to appeal to UCI students and scholars in general . To make our film as

relatable and authentic as possible we also chose to shoot the entire film all on the

University of Irvines campus. The metaphor of mental illness in our horror film is directly

targeted towards UCIs students and anyone who deals with depressive states . In our

film, the main character is depressed because he recently failed a midterm . He asks his

friend how he did, his friend did well. When he tells his dad about his situation, his dad

is livid. We specifically had his dad send the main character cruel text messages, since

fathers symbolically represent authoritative figures . We utilize the mental illness and

horror aspect of the film by having the student hallucinate the Thing, a character that is

threatening and impure, every time he receives a text message from his father (Carroll

51). The Thing is considered threatening and impure, since it appears in a stalking

manner and has no noticeable facial features. The Thing was essential to our film to

symbolize the negative effects of depression. We know many people can relate to this

whole chain of events: failing a midterm that a friend aced, disappointing a loved one,

then becoming depressed. We wanted the film to have this seemingly cyclical nature

because mental illness has a cyclical nature. Students seem to get stuck in these cycles

and mental illness is a seemingly endless cycle . Often, people believe that you can just
 Tantiwassadakran 1

stop having a mental illness instantaneously. It takes much more than sheer will power

to overcome a mental disorder. You would not tell someone with cancer to just get over

it, like how you wouldnt say it to a person with a mental illness . Mental illness is a

serious problem today, especially in college, that is one of our messages.

Embedded in our film, are multiple aspects that are associated with horror films .

We utilized these aspects to meet expectations that our audience have for a horror film .

Tropes and very specific/intentional camera angles were put to use in order to excite

universal human fear, or normal psychological responses for a horror film (Clasen

314). One of the tropes we displayed was the trip trope, when we had a character

tripping and falling right before the Thing is seen stalking him (TV Tropes) . It is very

common for horror films to incorporate a scene in which a character or protagonist is

seen tripping and falling right before danger strikes , and we also used it to serve as

foreshadowing in our film. Following the scene where our main character trips and falls,

his father texts messages him and immediately the main character hallucinates the

Thing behind him. This chain of events is very similar to how other horror films utilize

the tripping and falling trope. It serves as an indicator to excite emotions for our

audience and hints towards what is about to come . The tropes mainly guide our

audience into becoming fearful by stimulating universal human fears . Another tool we

used to create a horror film was the use of camera tricks and angles . We noticed that in

many horror films directors choose to alternate between first-person and third-person

views, while having close-ups to excite fearful reactions . It is evident we played around

with different angles especially in the scene where our main character hallucinates a
 Tantiwassadakran 1

hand tap him on the shoulder. We know audiences anticipate these type of camera

tricks and angles when something in the film is about to scare them . We utilized the

difference camera maneuvers to, once again, serve as an indicator of what is to come in

our horror film and excite fearfulness in our audience.

During the creation of our RIP Project, I mainly contributed three things. One

main role I played in our project was to play the main character. As the main character, I

had to make sure I was portraying emotions accurate to what our horror film was trying

to accomplish. During the filming process, I forced our group to redo shots multiple

times in an attempt to perfect the emotions that the audience saw. I found myself many

times directing a scene then immediately acting the scene out. Since I played the main

character in our film I was designated to write most of our script. I wrote what characters

looked like, what emotions they were showing, and the overall storyline. I also wrote all

the transitions such as the cut tos, dissolve tos, and fade in/outs. We agreed that our

film would have a metaphor for mental illness, so throughout the entire creating process

I was also designated to keep our group in check every time we wrote words on the

script or showed scenes in our film. I had to make sure that what was heard and/or seen

in our film related to mental illness. I essentially had three contributions: acting, writing,

and making sure our film incorporated the mental illness metaphor.

I genuinely enjoyed working with my group members. I can recall more than once

literally telling them that I was having fun, especially during the filming process. One

notable thing that I appreciated about our group was that we did not procrastinate. We

took the challenge as soon as possible, working around all three of our hectic

schedules. We also continually questioned each other and put our egos aside to try and
 Tantiwassadakran 1

collaborate on making a successful project. There were countless times in which we

conversed about certain scenes or dialogue that we later decided to change. Overall, I

feel that my group and I had a positive experience during our RIP Project.
 Tantiwassadakran 1

Works Cited

"TV Tropes." TV Tropes. N.p., n.d. Web. 13 Mar. 2017.

Carroll, Noel. "The Nature of Horror." The Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism 46.1 (1987):
51-55. Web. 9 Mar. 2017.

Clasen, Mathias. "Project MUSE - Vampire Apocalypse: A Biocultural Critique of Richard

Matheson's I Am Legend." Vampire Apocalypse: A Biocultural Critique of Richard Matheson's I
Am Legend. MUSE, n.d. Web. 9 Mar. 2017.