Only in Whispers - Evaluation

When casting for Emily, we knew exactly what we wanted to see in her character. A character that influenced our creation would probably be Ellison Oswalt, the central actor in the film ‘Sinister’, 2012.

CASTING

When casting for Emily, we knew exactly what we wanted to see in her character. A character that influenced our creation would probably be Ellison Oswalt, the central actor in the film ‘Sinister’, 2012.

CASTING

Below is a screen-grab of the character we eventually casted as Emily. As you can see, we were inspired by the curiosity of Ellison as he enters the attic of his on home, and so we attempted to convey the same excitement through this scene.

Whilst we had the aid of inspiration, we

also initially had a thorough idea in our

heads of what we wanted her to look like

and how we wanted her to come across

to our audience.

We wanted a high-spirited, zealous

brunette with a great mind-set for

adventure. We couldn’t have found

anyone more perfect to play this role

than Emily Whitford.

EMILY

When casting for Megan, we knew exactly what we wanted to see in her character. A character that influenced our creation would probably be Katie Featherston, the central actor in the film ‘Paranormal Activity’, 2007.

CASTING

When casting for Megan, we knew exactly what we wanted to see in her character. A character that influenced our creation would probably be Katie Featherston, the central actor in the film ‘Paranormal Activity’, 2007.

CASTING

Below are screen-grabs of the character we casted as Megan. Evidently, we were inspired by the concern on (above) Katie’s face. This is why we attempted to deliver the same emotion on Megan’s face.

Whilst we had the aid of inspiration, we also initially had a thorough idea in our heads of what we wanted Megan to look like and how we wanted the audience to react to her.

We wanted a spineless, tentative brunette with an intellectual mind; effectively the complete opposite of Emily. We couldn’t have found anyone more perfect to play this role than Megan Davies.

MEGAN

One of the main social groups represented in our film is siblings; the two main characters are teenage sisters.

Again when we casted the two actresses for our film we wanted to reveal them to be nothing other than typically ordinary sisters who bicker and disagree, so that in many cases the audience will be able to relate to the two characters.

The majority of our audience will be working class, and we wanted to represent the two girls as distinctively English.

SOCIAL GROUPS

As a group we studied characters who have siblings in films. We also had shared knowledge due to the fact the three of us each have siblings of our own.

We noticed that it is not uncommon for one sibling to follow in another’s shadow. We tried to deliver this idea as much as possible in our production.

For instance, we placed Emily and Megan with a distant composition within our medium two shots of the two speaking. This reflected their contrasting personalities and relationship, too.

SOCIAL GROUPS

Despite there being a fairly small age gap between the two, we wanted to show how Emily convinces Megan to do pretty much anything.

Megan follows Emily into the attic even though she is extremely reluctant, she cannot stand up for herself and feels pressured by her sister.

We produced low angle shots for Emily climbing and walking into the attic to invite the audience to appreciate her superiority and leadership.

SOCIAL GROUPS

Emily’s dialogue throughout our opening consists of lines such as "don't be such a baby" and "you do this every time" to indicate that Megan is often scared of things Emily wants to do which can be common with siblings, however, we exaggerated this fact by ensuring that the concluding situation allows us sympathise with Megan, who didn’t want to meddle in the first place. Emily also frequently patronises Megan regardless of the fact Megan isn’t a lot younger than her.

SOCIAL GROUPS

Our costumes for the two characters were nothing exciting or particularly unusual. This is because we decided it would be a lot more believable and connote that this is just an ordinary night in a typical family home to begin with.

Traditionally, Ouija boards are dangerous and not something to be messed with. Therefore when Emily discovers it and is not at all threatened by the idea it automatically says to the audience that Emily does not care about consequences, unlike Megan.

SOCIAL GROUPS

We used several other props such as the book Megan is reading initially which may suggest to the audience that Megan is a lot less social than her sister Emily, who enters the room after frantically snooping around to find something more ‘exciting’ to do.

It may also imply that Megan is more intellectual. Megan is quite happy to be reading rather than going up into the attic, “I don’t want to. It’s scary.” board whilst saying "I don't want to. It's scary." which makes her sound childlike and perhaps boring in comparison to Emily.

SOCIAL GROUPS