Repulsion...

Repulsion is a 1965 film directed by Roman Polanski. Repulsion was Polanski's first English language film and was filmed in Britain. It is widely considered a masterpiece of the psychological thriller genre and is the first installment of Polanski's 'apartment trilogy', the other two being Rosemary's Baby and The Tenant. The plot follows a young Belgian woman who lives in Kensington, London, with her sister. She suffers from androphobia, which is the fear of men. When her sister leaves on holiday with her married boyfriend, the young Belgian woman is left to withdraw deeper into her paranoia. She refuses to leave her apartment and experiences spiralling hallucinations. Food rots around her and her sister's flat falls to shambles. She blugeons a would-be suitor to death with a candlestick, and later, fends off the sexual advances of her landlord before slashing him to death with a cut-throat razor. When her sister returns, she discovers the dead mens' bodies and finds the young Belgian woman hidden under her bed, who appears catatonic and only a shell of her former self. At the end the audience sees a photograph of the young woman as a chld, who seems uninterested in the taking of a family photograph and as the camera zooms in, she is offset from the rest of the family with the look of a 'trapped animal'. This leads us to believe that the underlying reason for her phobia and psychological distress lies in possible childhood trauma.

I really enjoyed watching Repulsion which, surprisingly, i'd never even heard of before. I liked the way that as the narrative progressed, the protagonist's paranoia grew deeper. But we are never fully sure of the reasons behind her fear of men, as we experience the protagonist's fear throughthe cracks in the flat and the rotting food, as well as the dream sequences. This is almost a metaphorical representation of her paranoia, representing how the woman feels. I found it tobe quite full-on, putting us in the protagonist's shoes; the cracks in the walls and the hands coming fro the wall weren't real, but we are able to see them just as she does. I don't think there's one time where we don't see what she is seeing, but we are still able to tell she is paranoid. Even when we see her kill two people, her innocense allows us to forgive her. So I feel this films works extremely well as a psychological thriller because of the way the director makes the film confront us.

HELP!!!

hey everyone, does anyone know how to get the files on MyUCA to download. i've updated my internet explorer and downloaded firefox, but neither of them seem to work. All it comes up with is a blank screen and it says it's loading but nothing's happening. I need to download the content so i can look into the files Phil has given us for the Uncanny essay... thanks in advance.

Idea Development...

So i've started doing some sketches and thumbnails for my ideas, but being the idiot i am, i'm using an A3 sketchbook which makes it kind of hard to scan the images in. Therefore, i'll have to wait for my new camera for christmas to get good quality photos of them to post on my blog. In the meantime, i'm just gonna continue to draw and develop my ideas. I'll possibly bring my sketchbook in on Friday, if Phil's in, just to see what he thinks and if he feels that i'm going in the right direction.

I found this image earlier today and it has made me wonder if i actually need any animals in the forest, or whether the presence of something like fog would give a better effect. I really like this image because i keep expecting something to come from within the fog, possibly some Ringwraiths on horses :P I can't decide whether i like the black at the top and bottom of the image because it seems to be a lot of negative space, but it does centre the attention on the fog which seems to be grouping in the middle of the image. I also feel the three trees in the front make up the foreground, the tertiary trees behind make up the middleground and the fog seems to be in the background. But i can't decide what the focal point of this image is, i can't help but feel it should be the fog, but my eyes are definitely drawn to the trees first, starting from right (the closest tree) to left. I also feel that although it's only fog, there's something very like Close Enconters of the Third Kind in this image, perhaps this was what Phil was talking about when he said to pare my ideas. Really it's only fog and it's a normal image in the woods at night, but there is an unusual sense of eerieness to it, from something that is ordinary.

Original Ideas... Recapping...

So i discarded quite a few of my ideas early on and these same ideas seem thave been snapped up by ther people in the class and in other examples i've seen. So I thought i might just recap on some of the ideas i discarded and reconsider my ideas. Some of them definitely need to be discarded, but i felt it was important to show what ideas i've come up with so far to show some sort of progression. These are the ideas i came up with that i haven't already spoken about.

One of the first ideas i had was of animals being attracted to a light source which would be late at night and in a woods. I thought the colour choice in this idea would be interesting because i could make it quite fantasy like with a lot of 'magical' colours, giving a great visual aesthetic. I had the idea of either using a frog on a rock surrounded by water, staring at the light source, or buterflies attracted to the light source, both would be surronded by a typical forest/wood environment with trees, plants and rocks. When i thought about this idea, i felt the idea of creating animals would be difficult, but butterflies wouldn't be too hard. But, looking back at the idea now, after Phil's 'conceptual hand grenade', I feel this idea is too sci fi and fantasy related, althoug it has an eerie feeing, it doesn't seem ordinary enough.


Another idea i had was of a hand or body part in a broken floor board, the rest of the room would be empty and there would be a window with a car either pulling up or away outside, depending on how you interpret it. It would also be late at light with the moonlight shining through the window and onto the hand. I thought the walls could be red with a crack coming up one of them, and the floor boards would be quite sctratched and marked. I really liked this idea to start of with because i felt the idea of the car was quite ambiguous, not knowing whether it was just parking or about to pull away. I felt the way it was frozen made the audience feel the character's despair, seeing the car in the window and waiting for something to happen, but it doesn't. Again though, after Phil's comments, i feel this is too obvious, it isn't ordinary and follows a 'horror film' cliche.

I also had an idea of some baths in a room where the light shines in through a window, again, it's at night. I had the idea that these could be filled with either soil and plants, whilst the ground is flooded or covered in soil. An alternative idea was that the bath was blood stained, but the room was flooded. The camera angle would only allow you to see one bath full on and the corner of another one. To me, this idea was quite eerie because you are wondering what has gone on or if anyone one is under the soil. A lot of questions could be asked in this image, but i feel that it is too horror-like and doesn't seem ordinary. This was the problem i was having, i was making the image to obvious and giving too much away.

Another idea i had, which other people seem to have gone for, was a child's rooom or living room where there was a teddy bear in the corner and toys which had been played with but were all over the floor. The idea of the bear alone seems quite uncanny, i always wonder whether they are able to see things, it's possibly those black eyes they usually have, something i'd associate with evil. In this scene, there would be a car either coming or going that we could see through the window, similar to the idea with the hand in the floor boards. To me, this scene could be perceived in two ways, a typical room where a child has not bothered to clean up its mess or someone has kidnapped the child and is about to drive off. I feel this idea is much more ordinary than my other ideas and not so full on with genre cliches. It also has some ambiguity in there and the sense of the bear seeing everything, for me, is uncanny. It's the idea that the bear might be able to tell you something, but it can't.

One of the other ideas i had came when i was round a friend's house, there was some sort of hair machine (maybe a big hair dryer) in the corner of the room, i couldn't help but keep staring at it, not only did it seem out of place in an ordinary living room, but it looked like it had a face with the way the buttons were positioned. I liked this idea of something being out of place because it can often seem quite strange or uncomfortable. For this scene, i pretty much copied the whole room because it was such an ordinary living room and this 'out of place' object seemed so eerie. In my idea though, i felt that it should be isolated in the corner to draw your attraction, so we don't see the whole living room, our focus is on the corner of the room. For me, this idea could still work, but i did find it a little bit boring. It didn't have that eerieness and uncanny feeling that some of the other ideas had, although i do feel this idea is a lot more ordinary than the others, which was what Phil was saying.

When i was looking out of my kitchen window to my lovely view of the industrial site across the river. I always expect to see people working there; there's usually cranes, forklifts, and a big boat that they load onto. However, when i look across the river and nothing is going on during the daytime, especially Sundays, it seems so empty and desolate, like something should be happening but it isn't. For me, that is eerieness of abandonment, which is why Alan and Phil have talked to me about these abandoned places. This gave me the idea of an abandoned industrial site, with cranes and machines in a desolate area. I pretty much discarded this idea straight away because i had already decided on my two favourite ideas, but after listening t Phil's comments, i feel that this idea was heading in the right direction, at the time i seemed to think the more obvious ones would be better.

My next idea, again, was discarded early because of my preferred choices but looking at the links and websites Phil gave me, it was going down the right path, following the abandoned idea. The scene was a theme park, in particular a carousel, which was desolate or abandoned. Thise follows the conversation that I had with Alan, talking about how we expect these places to be full of people, so when they're not, it seems a little unnerving. My idea was focused around the carousel, and i felt this would be hard to do, but for some reason, i didn't follow up on this idea and look at a theme park as a whole. I feel it's possible that i might end up going back to the theme park idea after looking at the sites Phil sent me, it definitely ticks all the right boxes.

Another idea i had was a chair in a mental institute, which looking at some of the photography from different websites, is a popular idea. I liked the way it was just a chair in a room, but when i think of mental institutes it reminds me of how they are portrayed in films, and my mind starts to wonder what has happened in this chair and room. Essentially, it's not what we see in this image, althought it is eerie, it's what we imagine happened. I still really like this idea, and since i've been looking at the abandoned buildings photography, i feel it's worth pursuing. It also seems that this image would possibly look better in black and white or monochromatic colours and the chair would be the focal point with a broken window in the background. I will definitely keep looking into different images for this one because i feel it could work well.

I also came up with the idea of either a petrol station at night, or an abandoned petrol station. It seems that Dan has gone with this idea, and Alan was saying, it's the movies that have made our minds think badly of these sorts of places. I suppose this is another cliche in a way, we often find abandoned and desolate petrol stations in films, but i still like this idea. I suppose i probably like because it's such a filmic shot. Although, i feel the abandoned idea would work better for somewhere like a theme park, swimming pool, or mental institue etc.

The last idea i had from my original thumbnails was a clock smashed on the floor because the sense of time and the way the scene was frozen, to me, feels quite eerie. Time doesn't stop it keeps in motion so something like this could be quite unnerving, It also makes you wonder what happended at that time and why is the clock smashed. in this scene i feel the focal point would be the clock, possible an old pocket watch, and the rest of the scene would be blurred or out of focus. I like this idea because i find the idea of frozen time quite unnerving, but it is a bit basic and simple.

When Phil chucked a 'conceptual hand grenade' my way, i thought i was struggling for ideas, when in actual fact, it seems i alreadyhad some decent ideas, i just chose the wrong ones to look into. Some of the ones i discarded seem to be better than my preferred choices. A lot of them seem to follow that idea of abandonment which i am now coming back round to after Phil and Alan's advice. it seems if i would have stuck with those ideas, i would have been on the right path to start off with.

Looking at these ideas, you can see how Gregory Crewdson had influenced them, but as Phil said, 'the strength of Crewdson's work is that he plays knowingly with genre - but without confirming or denying the various possibilities suggested.' Therefore, my ideas need to be more pared back to their essence and i need to try to make the ordinary work a little harder for me. This is why i have begun to look at abandoned buildings and sites thanks to the help of Phil and Alan. You expect or want something to be happening in these places, but they're so desolate, that they transform from an ordinary place to something quite eerie and unnerving.

New Idea... Staircase...

So after Phil's comments and the websites he used to give me some examples to set me on the right path, i got talking to Allison about my ideas. We were talking about my other ideas and how they alseemed to make things in the image too obvious and stand out, they weren't normal. I was flicking through the Chernobyl fairground which definitely had an unheimlich feel, it was familiar, but i didn't feel comfortable, however i do feel the affect of the images would have been slightly different if it didn't say it was destroyed by the Chernobyl disaster, but i can't say this for sure. The second set of abandoned fairground images didn't have much of an affect on me, i didn't find them particularly unheimlich. I then started to look at the abandoned britain website, wich had some interesting images, i became interested by the Hornsey Road Public Bath images, particularly the ones looking up and down the staircase.

I loved the idea of the perspective you got of looking up or down a staircase, it reminded he of flats of big buildings where you could see all the way up the gap in the middle of the stairs. so i decided to look at different staircases where the camera is looking up or down, and i found a particularly interesting image which i believ looks like an eye staring back down at you. The idea of giving something inanimate or inhuman, human characteristics for me is extremely uncanny and follows a similar idea i had before with a hairdressin machine which had face like features and sat in the corner of a normal living room, based on a friends living room. I find after one particular image looks like an eye, it becomes more obvious in the rest. These are just a few examples of staircases which bare that resemblence.

I feel this idea definitely feels normal, it a staircase probably to someones home, but we feel safe and comfortable, we're indoors and away from harm. but the idea that something is watching you, in this case the fact that the staircase forms an eye shape, for me, creates an uncanny and unheimlich feeling, it's a familiar place but i feel slightly uncomfortable. This could also be to do with perspective and camera angle which is omething i will experiment with when i start my thumbnail sketches and concept designs for this idea.

I also found just the idea of looking up a staircase which has a view of the sky or outside at the end has a similar feeling of unhomeliness. We want to be outside where we feel safe, but it seems so far away. It feels quite clostrophobic and sucluded which, to me, doesn't feel comfortable or happy. Again it is familiar, but there's something about it which makes me feel uncomfortable.

Finally, i've looked at some ideas for looking down the stairs as a lot of the other images were looking up. I feel these have a similar effect to the ones looking up and i particularly like this image, which without the people could give a really unheimlich feel. That idea of a place that should have lots of people, but doesn't.

Phil...

I was wondering if you could point me in the right direction to get my ideas off to the right start. I can't help but feel all my ideas have a genre and aren't pared back enough.

Ideas...

So i've come up with a dozen or so ideas at the moment, i'm happy with pursuing a couple of them even further. My first idea is set at night and we see a car facing us in a confrontational position. The lights are on full beam and the camera sits behind a gate and fence which is padlocked with a rusty chain and has a lot of growth coming up. This gives the impression that this place hasn't been touched for a while and makes you wonder why the car is here, i also think it has something uncanny about, almost giving the possibility that car could be controlling itself. I will make the road up to the gate a long one so the possibility of a car just coming to a dead end and wanting to turn around is ruled out. I'm not too sure what the time period this would be yet, i was thinking a more futuristic concept for the car, giving the idea that it controls itself, similar to I, Robot, which incidentally, was where i got the idea from.

My second main idea was a living room which is rather tidy and normal, but the mirror is wonky or has slightly fallen down. I thought something could be knocked off the fire place from this, either stopped in motion or smashed on the floor. The canera will be offset to angle and the mirror will reflect throught to the bathroom where blood is spilled on the floor and up the shower curtain. I'm not too sure how the bathrrom will look, but i will create a murder scene, where we aren't too sure if the killer is still in the house or not. The offset camera angle and wonky mirror will hopefully create a distorted feeling, similar to the different angles Phil has been talking when we were watching films like The Haunting.

I will be posting some thumbnail sketches with notes soon, and hoepfully develop them into something i can take into Photoshop and Maya for my final piece. I will also be considering other ideas and new possibilities to make sure i get the best possible end product.