In the opening sequence to our film our two main characters, although one is not completely revealed, represent two groups, the villain or bad character and the victim or the good character.
In the opening to The Night Before a young teenage girl has been attacked at a party, this type of storyline is quite common in films as it is popular and the audience understands, and can relate to it through things that are shown on the news. Staying with the same theme, a less common storyline is where a man has fallen victim to an assault at a party, and left abandoned in an unfamiliar place, this is because this does not happen as often in the real world, therefore it is less believable in the film world. This is why we stuck with the more stereotypical storyline of a female victim. The setting and narratives help set up the scene for these stereotypical characters.
Victim
It is clear to the audience who the social groups are in our film due to the way we have portrayed them, as to represent a victim they have to be either lost, scared, being chased, watched or attacked. The victim in our film clearly does or is the majority of these things, through her bruising, clothing which does not match her location, jumpy and sudden movements and the isolated location she is in. Also the fact that our victim is a female victim, highlights that females are more vunerable than males, this is the stereotype in most films.
Victim and Villain (upper torso)Villain
The other main character in my opening sequence is the villain who has attacked the teenage girl and dumped her on a bridge. The audience sees very little of this character, as he is only shown in a very short flashback, this is the impression we wanted to create with this character. This is because the victim also does not know who her attacker is, and therefore has to find this out throughout the rest of the film. This creates more suspense and enigmas which is important, to keep the audience interested. At this point in the film the attacker is suppose to be very secretive although causes injury to his victims. It is clear that this character is the villain as you only see a snap shot of them, and an effect called the ghost trail has been used here to show this flashback is unclear, as she gets attacked. Our villain is a amle character although this is maybe not 100% clear in the quick flashbacks, male characters are usually shown as villains as they are stereotypically seen to be more aggressive.
Teenagers
There is also a more common stereotype which we see in the media very often, which is teenage drinking. This is seen at the party and is seen to be the key factor for the attack. We included this in our opening sequence as it is something our target audience can relate to, therefore we felt this would keep our audiences captivated to watch the rest of the film. Teenagers are seen to drink, go to many parties to socialise and also put themselves in dangerous situations. This stereotype is quite commonly used in films and T.V aimed at the teenage audience, we felt we liked this in films, therefore we included this stereotype.
I feel that all of the stereotypes of characters we have included have been successfully represented the way we wanted to them to be, and they make our product easy to relate to which is important at the start of a film. It is vital for our representations to be clear at the start of a film, through locations and characters, as we do not want to confuse our viewers.
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