Treatment of film

The film I am creating a trailer for is called ‘The Railway Children and Zombies.’ It combines two genres; Period drama (a classically British film genre) and Zombie Horror (a genre British film makers occasionally dip into generally in a comedy way). The film was inspired by the literacy works of Seth Graham Smith who put a new slant on Jane Austen’s ‘Pride and Prejudice’ through re-writing it as ‘Pride and Prejudice and Zombies.’ The film’s combination of genres will obviously result in a product that at times will be humorous and at others horrific – the trailer will reflect this.

Films that have inspired this work include ‘Pride and Prejudice’ and ‘Shaun of the Dead.’ The films target audience will be cinema goers aged 15 – 24 who enjoy films such as ‘Shaun of the Dead’ and ‘Vampires Suck’ because it will be similar to these films in terms of genre. Obviously others who are familiar with the original novel ‘The Railway Children’ by E Nesbit may also be drawn to seeing a new comical take on this classic novel – as Austen fans were drawn to Smith’s work.

The plot of the film is quite simple, it follows the original novel only with a strange twist – the country has been struck with a strange zombie plague and the railway children’s father, unknown to their mother, secretly trained them as ‘zombie slayers’ before he disappeared in the war again the zombies (no one knows whether he is alive, dead or stricken with the zombie plague). When their mother becomes ill the children refuse to believe she has the ‘plague’ but soon realise when the kindly gentleman sends her a basket of brains. The children then have to stop the train reaching the next town because it has become obvious many of the passengers are in fact the un-dead searching for fresh brains. In short, this version of the story breaths fresh life into a popular tale.

In terms of the ‘look’ of the trailer I want to show a number of shots that show off the exciting nature of the film and give the target audience a taste of what they can expect from the film. The setting for the trailer and the film will be Victorian England in a country village new a railway station. Therefore the mise en scene will reflect this. In the trailer the main settings from the classic novel will all be featured in order to ensure viewers who enjoyed the text will be drawn to the film. The main locations of the film that will feature in the trailer include; the hillside where the children watch the train from, the station, inside the railway carriage and the children’s home.

Like many British films, the budget for this film is next-to-nothing and it will rely on its strong script, unknown actors and humour for its success.