Pitching our idea to Matt and Luke

We then pitched our idea to the school's filmmakers, Matt and Luke, who will be helping us in creating our final sequences. We presented them with this powerpoint, which consisted of the movie plot, the opening sequence, details such as locations, props, costumes, the moodboard, the test shoot, and a brief but potential back up idea.

In preparation for this, we also began to make some phone calls to potential filming locations. We contacted Hampton Court Palace, which is conveniently only around 30 minutes away; however their requirements include £350 an hour to film, and we must film outside of opening hours (10:00-15:45). We tried Hever Castle in Kent, which is double the distance from us than Hampton. They said that there will be a filming fee, however it will be significantly smaller than Hampton's, they also confirmed that the maze is closed in January anyway, so if we filmed there we would have no problems in terms of the general public. They informed us that to apply for filming, we must officially request to film it with what equipment we will have, number of crew etc.
As a backup, we also called a local vineyard called Denbies. They agreed to this with no fee and an availability at any time. We're glad to have a certain back up plan if we fail to recieve a filming agreement in any of the mazes.

The feedback we got was generally to rebuild our idea and develop it even further. One of them thought that the location of a maze and the whole 'chased by a man' idea is too overused and cliched, and has too many conventions towards a horror film, rather than a thriller. I think as our group was developing this idea, we perhaps lost sight of the conventions of a thriller and instead accidentally created a horror - as a thriller is meant to excite and anticipate an audience, rather than frighten them.

We were also told to perhaps look at a character who is more of a hero figure, rather than someone who is scared and frightened. The audience do not really want to watch someone lose. In addition to this, we were also told to consider whether our idea applies to anything that's happening in the real world right now. Perhaps we will look at BBC News and other articles on what is happening to obtain some themes for our thriller.