Research into Danilio Restivo

Danilo Restivo is an Italian man who was under investigation for the murder of Heather Barnett and was finally convicted. Danilo Restivo was convicted of killing his neighbour, Heather Barnett, at her Bournemouth flat and mutilating her body before placing a hank of someone else's hair in her right hand and a clump of her own beneath her left. The other lock of hair which was placed in Heathers hand was a piece of hair of a woman he had murdered years before.

Danilo was known for having a hair fetish and many woman had often complained of their hair being cut whilst on buses in his local area. His trademark in his killings was to place the victims own hair in their hands.

This investigation inspired some of our ideas in what our storyline should be. As our trailer was focused on obsessions and this murder investigation linked to that. We also felt by also using hair as our obsession and our killer having some type of hair fetish would add an eerie and more scary feeling as we would have a realistic element as many people know about this case, which would cause them to be more fearful as this type of obsessive killing can really happen.

By adding in ideas from the case, Masked Productions realises we have to be sensitive to the issues that arise as some parts of our trailer people may deem as to similar. We are aware that criticisms might arise as some people might not like that some ideas were inspired by a brutal murder case.

Although we are not the first horror movie to be inspired but real life events as many of the greatest horrors to date were so it is almost a norm for some horror's to have real life elements such as:

Alfred Hitcocks Psycho-  The character Norman Bates was inspired by Ed Gein, a Wisconsin man who was arrested in 1957 for committing two murders and digging up the corpses of countless other women who reminded him of his dead mother. He skinned the bodies to make lamp shades, socks and a "woman suit" in hopes of becoming a woman. He was found to be insane and spent the rest of his life in a mental institution.

The Hills Have Eyes- The movie was inspired by the legend of Alexander "Sawney" Bean, a Scottsman of the 15th or 16th century who reportedly headed a 40-person clan that killed and ate over 1,000 people, living in caves for 25 years.

Wolf Creek- Greg McLean originally wrote the script as fiction, but upon learning of two real-life Australian killers who attacked travellers, he edited the story to reflect the real cases –- namely, Bradley John Murdoch, who killed a British tourist and tried to abduct another in July 2001, and Ivan Milat, who picked up hitchhikers and took them into the woods to torture and kill them during the '90s.