Research : Analysing Codes and Conventions In Existing Teen Horror Films

Codes are what are used in films to create an idea for the audience of what might possibly happen. In this case the codes are used to create the horror element in the film. Code are separated into two categories: technical and symbolic.


Technical codes are ways in which equipment is used to tell the story in a media text. For example with the use of editing, sound and camera angles, shots or movements.
Symbolic codes show what is beneath the surface of what we see. They are usually seen through aspects of mise-en-scene. This is the use of characters clothing, make-up or props can all be suggestive or have connotations which the audience can decode.
Though, there are code which fit into both categories, such as non- diegetic sound.


Conventions are generally accepted ways of doing something. There are common conventions in any medium, such as the use of interviewee quotes in a printed article, but conventions are genre specific.

Dead Wood

At the start of Dead Wood, there is a diegetic sound bridge of bird song and nature which indicates the location that this is set, as the opening titles are shown. A camera movement show where the film is taking place and slowly moves down to the ground, stopping at a puddle on the woodland floor. The diegetic sound of a man stepping into the puddle. A following cut to the camera tracking the man from a distance shows him running through the woods. There is a close up of his face which is when we notice his mise-en-scene and his panicked expression as he struggles to get himself through forestry. His head is covered in blood, which is suggestive that, whatever he is running away from, is not friendly.


Once the man is through the thick mass of forestry blocking his way, there is a point of view showing him continuing to run through the wooded area, but it is blurry; a connotation that he is tired and disorientated, also displaying that the forest seems like an optical illusion. There is then an immediate cut back to tracking, changing to a crane shot as the man reaches a large ditch, stopping just in time not to fall into it. A low angled shot from within the ditch, exhibits the man and the stretch he will need to surpass. There is then a close up of the mans face establish the expression of a mixture of disbelief, panic and confusion.


The next shot shows the depth of the ditch and the distance of the other side as well as
show the audience the near impossibility it is to cross it, with an establishing shot. It cuts back, now as an extreme close up of the mans face showing him look side to side and a serious gaze, which is a clear signal that his about to attempt to jump over the ditch. He begins to move backwards, continually looking side to side as he does so. As he hears a sound of branches snapping from behind him he turns around to look, until the noise are heard to be closer and closer to his position. There is then an edit of slow motion as the man jumps across the ditch. He fails to get across and hangs off the edge. As he struggles to get up the other side, a stabbing noise is heard and blood floods out of the man's mouth; the thing that had been behind had caught up. It then dragged him down in the ditch and they disappeared. The diegetic sound of branches snapping and the man's body being dragged as the camera changes angle, panning up to see a tent on the side the man was attempting to climb upon. The diegetic sound of the tent unzipping is heard then a woman's face is seen peeking out, then gets out and calls "Rob". There is a cut to a camera movement of crane showing that the woman is alone and defenseless.

Dead Mary

The opening titles of the companies that produced the film are displayed, sounds of nature create the image of where the story might take place. Noises of metal squeaking is also heard, then a close up of chains attached to old wood shows that it a sign. There is then a low angled shot of a car, inside we see a woman dressed in revealing clothes, with her legs and feet mostly revealed which is used for sex appeal.