Audience expectations of a thriller

There are many elements to a thriller the audience would expect to find within the film. People watch thrillers to receive a sense of mystery and suspense, therefore it is important they understand the concept within a thriller film. Within a thriller film, you should be expected to see the following:

• death; murder or natural
• stereotyped characters; villain and hero? or the stereotypical gang men
• some sense of romance
• mystery allowing the audience to think about what they may be watching
• location; dark nighttime scenes
• low key lighting/ shadows to give the audience less image creating mystery and suspense
• murder weapon
• eerie elements within the scene

When watching a thriller you will not find any supernatural beings; ghosts, zombies, devil, witch etc, as this genre is classified as a Horror, not thriller. Also, you will not find any scientific elements such as aliens or UFO's as this relates to the genre sci-fi. There are also no intended comedy aspects as this again is not a thriller, it is a comedy. There will not be any 'girl' elements of a 'chick' flick, as again this will not fit with the genre.

Opening sequence for Preliminary Task

Story Board for interrogation scene (Preliminary Task)

Preliminary task- Evaluation

As a group we have previously planned and then produced our preliminary task to our interrogation scene for our opening. To plan how we were going to film, we first had to create a story-line, to do this we planned out a storyboard. Also, we wrote a script ensuring we included any stage directions, shot types, character directions, character lines etc, this made the whole filming process alot easier, as we had our prompts. As a group, we planned our preliminary task very well, and in depth therefore when it came to filming our sequence we were very prepared and had an vast understandment as to what to do.

When filming we used black stage curtains around the scene, making our sequence look very professional and film noir like. We chose to make our sequence have the theme film noir as it looks very effective and it fits to the genre of thriller films very well, creating mystery and suspense throughout. Using a variety of different shots and camera angles to ensure our piece is as professional looking as it can be. We carried out match on action, whereby the character of Scarlett exited via the door, we stuck to the 180 degree rule and also the shot reverse shot, without breaking any of the rules. Tahnee was the lighting technician during the course of the filming along with being the camera woman, Georgina played officer Scarlett and James played Jim.

Georgina edited the footage using final cut pro, she had to piece it all together, and added the black and white effect to our video ensuring it fit the 'Film Noir' aspects. She also put a backing track of classical atmospheric music behind our video, again creating more suspense.

Overall, we feel our piece is very effective, as we chose correcting lighting and themes to fit the thriller brief, which then creates suspense and mystery. If we were to carry out this again, we would have held the timing longer for some of the scenes, for example the picture of the victim, as this was a very important aspect to our sequence and we did not capture the importance as we should have.

Thriller Soundtrack/ sounds research

Thriller soundtrack research task: Tahnee Research

I have recently carried out a research task, whereby I researched the expected sounds you would find within a Thriller movie. I used some class peer's to demonstrate what the sounding effects may be like; for example scream, footsteps, creeping doors etc. I then surveyed a couple of people and asked them what sounds they would expect to see within a thriller and why. Please watch the attached video to view my research task. Then I found the soundtracks to 5 thriller films and have linked the youtube web addresses below:

Fight club opening track: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1EOb7lcto0k

Shutter island sound track: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QGtN3lpI2f4

Silence of the lambs soundtrack: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WtN7gbal7nQ

Se7en opening track: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qzoISWwmH1s

Taxi driver sound track: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nnk4fg14Eho

Composition Expert

Rule of thirds- James research

The basic Principals behind the rule of thirds is to visualize breaking down an image into thirds (both vertically and horizontally) so this gives you 9 slots like the example below;

The theory is that if you place points of interest in the slots then it makes the shot look a lot more appealing as none of the slots are empty, because if they were then the shot would look out of place and dull in certain slots. It just makes sure that the things that you want to capture the viewers eye is on eye level for example;

Here the eyes are on the top line for primary interest and the tie and flowers and of secondary interest and they are on the lower line.

BBFC Certification for Thrillers

James research
BBFC

BBFC stands for British Board of Film Classification, they are in charge of putting films into the right classification whether it be;

• U
• PG
• 12
• 12A
• 15
• 18
• R18

Thriller films are 9/10 times either a 15 or an 18, the films that are certificated a 15 are likely to include a strong amount of violence and bad language, the use of bad language can also contain verbal references to sexual violence. However this cannot contain images of sexual violence or a large amount of pain. sexual scenes are not prohibited in a 15 although nudity is allowed. Films that are certificated 18 are aimed at adults as it usually contains sex within the films containing clear images 18 rated films are allowed to include the use of violence and bad language. it can be based on a criminal offence or an example of a thriller rated at 18 is Seven.

Film Noir research

Film Noir research- Tahnee

What is film noir? 

 Film noir is a type of film brought to view afetr WW2. Film noir is filmed in black and white as noir meaning black in French, therefore ‘Film Black.’ The main charactersitic of film noir are shadows, as the lighting used shows the type and characteristics of the person for example using shadows and dark lighting shows the evil side to a person.  The image converyed in ‘darkness in an up turned world.’ You will need a hardlight that it intense to show the film noir style, for exmaple using a  500 watt light as it shows the intensity of the shadows fulfilling the frilm noir style. Lighting should only show the parts the director wants the naudience to see, as it conveys a lot of emotion within this. The hard key light should be focused. Toc reate sihlouttes you need to place the light behind the person/ object. To show the imagery of the smoke to need to place the light behind this also. Light a person standing infront of a wall as this creates emotion filled shadows creating the mystery effect. 

Lock stock poker game sequence

 

This is our lock stock poker game sequence, we took eight images from the original and then made a short movie using the images, and we used a match on action shot. 

Se7en Interpretation

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SEZK7mJoPLY

In class we had to create our own interpretation of the Se7en opening scene. We used the programme final cut pro to do this. In our group of 3 we received some images and video clips whereby we had to create the video, by editing parts of the images and videos desired. To ensure the clip looked more professional and 'se7en like' we added effects over the sequence, focusing on Bad TV and film settings in order to look more effective and thriller- esque

Script

Script:

Dark room, door opens.

Scarlett: enters, with the clicking of her heels, she sparks a cigarette.

(Midshot) Spot light on Jim

Jim: (cocky) “I didn’t do it, I’d never hurt her.”

Scarlett: (In darkness) “I didn’t say anything about a girl Jim”

(Close up on Jim’s eyes- worried)

Jim: “Well I’m not here for nothing. Am I Scarlett?”

Scarlett: “I’m glad you asked, Jim. Maybe this will jog your memory 

(Close up on image on table)

Jim: “Never seen her” 

Scarlett: “I think you should take a second to look Jim.... because a key witness has said otherwise?”

Jim: “What is the time officer?”

(Close up on clock revealing the time)

Scarlett: “Half three, why got plans?”

Jim: (Smirks) “Well I think you should go and check on your key witness, they might not be as useful as you think” 

Scarlett: gets up and exits (match on action as she walks through door)

The Script above is taken from our Preliminary task, whereby we created a short scene from a thriller, we chose to do the integration of a suspect who was assumed to of murdered a young girl. Our script is very in-depth and shows all of the stage directions for the actors and the different shots used for the director. 

Thriller Research

In our groups, we had to take out research about thriller in order to find out excess information to get ideas as to what we may include in our thriller piece.

Typical Synopsis:

There are among many characteristics within a thriller. The main characteristics to determine a thriller would be the mystery aspect towards the film. The lightening, camera angles, and music all play a part to the mysterious aspect, for example if the lighting was dimmed, classical music playing and low camera angles then the film would appeal mysterious to the audience, not giving away too much information away, allowing them to actually think and have an understandment as to what is happening. Other characterisitcs in a thriller film would be;

• Thrills- Exciting and dangerous, keeps the audience hooked, feeling as though no characters are sacred.
• Action- No thriller would be the same without action, as it adds to the suspense and makes the storyline more thrilling to watch. 
• Big story- The storyline towards a thriller is usually very big and makes the audience have to think and understand what they are watching and the actions behind them. 

Sub genres of thriller films;

• Psychological thriller- Incorporates both mystery and drama whilst still giving the characteristics and traits within a thriller film. Psychological thrillers contain elements that use the mind, and require the audience to accquire their knowledge in order to understand what is going on. The themes within them are; reality, perception, mind, existence, identity and death.
• Crime thrillers- Relate to some sort of crime, usually murder or fighting. This genre is very action packed with alot of suspense to build up the emotions within the audience. 

History of thriller: Georgina

Thriller is a genre That uses Suspense, tension and excitement as the main elements. the primary subgenres are mystery, crime and psychological thrillers.

After the assassination of president kennedy, political thriller and paranoid thriller films became very popular. the brightest examples of thrillers are the Hitchcock's movies. the cover up of important information from the viewer and flight/chase scenes are common methods in all of the thriller subgenres, although each subgenre has its own characteristics  and methods common methods in crime thrillers are ransoms, captivities, heists, revenge and kidnappings. More common in mystery thrillers are mind games, psychological themes, stalking, confinement deathtraps, horror -of-personality and obsession.

Thrillers mostly take place in ordinary suburbs cities. though sometimes they take place in exotic settings such as foreign cities, deserts, polar regions, or the high seas.

The heroes in most thrillers are frequently ordinary citizens unaccustomed to danger. however , more common in , crime thrillers, they may also be 'hard men' accustomed to danger, like police officers and detectives.

Iconic Thriller Directors: James

We did research on 3 Iconic thriller directors and these were

·      Quentin Tarentino

·      Chris Nolan

·      Alfred Hitchcock

Quentin Tarentino

First we looked at Quentin Tarentino who is famous for lots of films but his most famous are Pulp Fiction and reservoir dogs, these two films are based on Criminals and that’s what Quentins favourite sub genre is “Crime Thrillers”. But he is also famous for his radical twists to surprise the audience.

Chris Nolan

Chris Nolan born July 30^th 1970 and he has done many thriller films including Inception, The Dark Knight and these are mainly “action thrillers”. He often works with his wife and brother who are in the film industry, he single hand idly rebooted the batman franchise into a modern film trilogy that was awarded 4 films awards.

Alfred Hitchcock

Alfred Hitchcock was a British film director born in 1899. He is famous for his techniques in psychological thrillers. He had a fascination with Skinny blonde women and they were frequently actors in his films.