Pre-production research

What makes films successful?

The storyline
A girl and her family move to Texas from England. Then one night whilst watching T.V a crazed man, who has just escaped from the local asylum, breaks into her house and slaughters Holly's family in front of her eyes and leaves her for dead. The movie is set 10 years after the murders and a 19 year old Holly discharges herself from a psychiatric ward. Doctors have trialled a new drug on her leaving her with no recollection of her past life. However, a few months after her new found freedom, Holly starts suffering for horrendous flashbacks. Follow the journey of discovery, but how will she handle the truth? and will her desire for vengeance take control?

Casting
Mum- Kate Winslet
Dad- Gerard Butler
Brother- Zac Efron
Holly- Brittany Murphy
Young Holly- Dakota Fanning
Doctor- George Clooney
Killer- Crispin Glover
Boyfriend- Aston Kutcher
Director- James Cameron

We have chosen these actors because of their high status and large fan base. This means that our potential audience will be higher as each actor has different types of fans, who will more than likely watch the film if only for the actors. People also assume that if a movie has a good cast then the film will be good and will be more likely to go and watch it at the cinema and/or buy the DVD.
We also chose James Cameron to direct the movie because he has made several huge blockbusters such as Avatar. This film has received a lot of publicity which has made James Cameron a household name. Therefore less publicity will be needed because once word gets around that James Cameron has directed the movie people will automatically link it with Avatar, which will be good for our movie as Avatar was a raging success.
Another reason why we have chosen these actors and this director is because more funding may be available to us if we have high profile people working on the film. The more funding the movie gets the more it can afford to splash out on things such as special effects, marketing and actor's wages which will attract more people to watch it.