Research & Conventions Horror Genre Film (2014, Babadook)

The Babadook was a film made in 2014.  The movie was released in various film festivals until it was put onto the internet in november of 2014. They also released it limitedly on the same date. The movie was released onto netflix and hulu around the same time too. The movies ratings were overall good, all around a 4 or a high three. This movie was directed and written by Jennifer Kent.

Angles: 
The Babadook did some typical horror movie maneuvers with lots of low angles, point of views, close ups, medium close ups, over the shoulders and tons of two shots. They mostly shot things using a close up or medium close up but sometimes shot it in a two shot, just to get someone else in the shot.

movements
The movements, once again, are the stereotypical tracking shot, zoom in, zoom out, tilt and pan. The most used movement was pan, mostly to reveal what was on the other side of the room or what the mother was looking at.

costumes: 
the babadooks coat and top hat which he wears for the entire movie until he turns into the dad, in which he wears a suit. The mother wears a pink night dress for most of the movie. She then changes into her work uniform,  The boy wears his usual gray shirt with a blue coat. When he goes to school, he wears his school uniform. At the end of the movie, he changes into a striped sweater for his birthday.

Props:
The boy uses a crossbow, a catapult backpack, and various other weapons he claims are to fight monster with and save his mom. The mother doesn't use props, aside from the bowl of bugs she brings for the babadook and the babadook book itself.

lighting:
the lighting in the babadook is poor. They use this lighting to their advantage and make it creepy, though that was the purpose. They also sometimes keep it bright, only in certain scenes such as in the hospital. In the more intense parts, however, they use harsh lighting with bright shadows and dark darks.

scenes:
There wasnt too many different scenes in this movie. They mainly stayed in the house but sometimes they would change scenes. In a few scenes, the mom is in the nursing home, or the son and his mom are at the park. Though they never really left.

editing 
The editing was just as any other horror, jump cuts, fade in and fade out. They rarely used it but they had used a match shot for one of the scenes.

actors: 
The actors are

makeup:
There were no significant make ups aside from some sick looking blush around the eyes and nose. There was however, some black liquid coming out of the moms mouth along with some rope burns along her collarbone area.

sounds: 
The sounds they used were varied. Kids yelling, the rustle of people shuffling about, the sounds of things hitting the floor, the bed banging, and the babadook yelling into the phone or at the mom.

common elements:
The common elements in this movie were that something is coming after the main characters. They also had a basement trope where there is something down in the basement and the characters need to stop it. They also did a possession trope where the characters try to get rid of said spirit, they end up getting rid of it but something goes wrong.

things i didnt like about the movie: 
Some things I disliked about the movie were all the screaming in it. Though that seemed to be a big part in the movie, the loudness of it just bothered me. There were also some points that I didn't like so much such as the boy being dragged up the stairs. So nothing really too bad, just a few pet peeves.

things i liked about the movie: 
The idea of something coming after the main characters but turing out to be their own demon, aka the fathers death, was an intersting concept. The characters seemed to develp nicely in the movie, as we see them grow into the antagonist or the protagonist. The idea of the book coming back all torn up and taped together was intersting too, it was a nice attention grabber in the entire story.