What is a thriller? - Miss G

What is a thriller film?

Thriller is a broad genre of literature, film, and television programming that uses suspense, tension and excitement as the main elements Thrillers heavily stimulate the viewer's moods giving them a high level of anticipation, ultra-heightened expectation, uncertainty, surprise, anxiety and/or terror. Thriller films tend to be adrenaline-rushing, gritty, rousing and fast-paced. Literary devices such as red herrings, plot twists and cliff hangers are used extensively. A thriller is a villain-driven plot, whereby he or she presents obstacles that the protagonist must overcome.

( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thriller_%28genre%29 ) 

There are many types of thriller films such as:

Action thriller
This type of thriller film involves a race against the clock. It has a lot of violence, as well as an obvious antagonist.

Crime thriller
It is a hybrid of crime films and thriller, offering a suspenseful account of a successful or failed crime (or crimes).

Disaster thriller
The main conflict is between a set of characters against natural or artificial disaster such as floods, tsunamis, hurricanes, volcanic eruptions, meteor collisions, and nuclear disasters among others.

Drama thriller
The story consists of thriller elements intertwined with drama. Compared to thriller films, this sub-genre is comparatively slower in pacing and involves a tremendous deal on the character development and plot twists.

Erotic thriller
It is a combination of erotica (sexually-arousing depictions) and thriller, which has become popular since the 1980s and the rise of VCR market.

Horror thriller
The conflict between the main characters is mental, emotional, and physical.

Political thriller
The hero must ensure the stability of the government that employs him.

Psychological thriller
The conflict between the main characters, until the often violent resolution, is mental and emotional instead of physical.

Supernatural thriller
The conflict is between main characters, one of whom has supernatural powers.

( http://www.guideto.com/art-entertainment/movie-tv/film-genres/type-of-thriller-movie.html )

Own Credit ideas - Miss H

Our Thriler opening credit Ideas 

 

1) The name of the producing company.

As our producing company is 'Dark Arts', we will be opening our credits with the production company's name, we will use the effect of blurring into the credits to create a slippery effect.

 

2) The Movie title.

We will then have our Movie titles name which is 'Twisted Eye' sliding into the opening credits but innfront of the image being played.

3) The producers.

The producers are the people who have produced the film, and for us the producers are 'Ayesha, Dipika & Lauren'.

4) The actors.

We will then have the main people starring in the movie which are: 'Dipika & Lauren'

5) Actors Feauturing.

Followed by the actors featuring: 'Ayesha Ali'

6) Casting by.

The casters will be Lauren Vale.

7)Music Composed by.

Music composers which was 'Ayesha Ali'

 

 8) The Production Designer.

 Production designer which includes:
- Set Design - Costumes - Hairdresser - Make-up Artist - Sound Recording - Visual Effects Director

 

9) The Editors

The members who edit and finalise the move: Ayesha Ali, Lauren Vale & Dipika Sharma.

 

10) Sound Technicians

The members who were in control of the sound : Ayesha Ali & Dipika Sharma. 

Se7en Opening credits Analysis - Miss H

Se7en (Opening Credits) Analysis

Se7en is a brilliant example of a hugely successful thriller which has all the essential conventions a thriller needs, in order to be successful.

 

It throws you right into the action with the title sequence. The titles themselves flash and twitch in and out of the screen and have a font type which makes them look handwritten. I think this effect has been used to make it look more childlike and reflect the simple mind of the unknown protagonist.

Camera angles are effectively used in this opening. They don’t use any wide shots or mid shots which could possibly reveal the killer – by keeping the mystery of who the person is, it intrigues the audience and makes them want to carry on watching. The use of both close up shots and extreme close up shots ensures we focus on the important and disturbing aspects of the scene. This builds up intrigue within the viewer. The editing of these clips is very fast-paced and uses lots of transitions and effects. This is to give the impression of chaos and that his state of mind is disjointed like the imagery shown.

Mise-en-scene is quite important in this opening scene as it gives you a real glimpse of how the plot line will progress. This is the first time we get to see the killer and gives us key clues as to what he is going to do, his type of personality and who he is. The opening credits shows the man carrying out actions like, writing, developing photos, reading etc. This suggests that he is planning something thoroughly and from the way it is presented it implies that it is something bad. These images are surrounded by lots of black, which darkens the whole atmosphere implying that it is sinister. The colours used in these clips are very bland and no vibrant colours have been used. It almost looks as though a sepia affect has been applied onto the clips. The only bright colour to be shown throughout the opening credits is red. This may be to represent blood and ultimately death. 

 

 

 One of the more graphic scenes shows the man slicing off his fingertips. This suggests that he is going to commit a crime and doesn’t want to leave any evidence behind. It is not too much of a gory image, but it is very horrific which makes the audience feel much more tension. By cutting off his skin it indicates that he is very committed to what he does. He is willing to put himself through pain just to carry out these acts of crime. It also suggests that he is experienced as it is seems planned and that this is not just a one off killing. This keeps the viewers attention as they want to know what he is going to do next.

All the aspects throughout the short introduction illustrate it as very disturbing and horrific. This gets the audience right into the action and shows them immediately what the plotline and film is going to be like.

 

The music used is a remix by Nine Inch Nails called ‘Closer’. This sound has a gritty effect, and again sounds quite dysfunctional again to reflect the killer’s mindset. This builds up suspense and tension within the audience as the intensity of the music builds throughout the scene.

This is a successful thriller, because it uses all of the conventions which keep an audience interested and excited to see more.

Film Schedule - Miss G

Film Schedule.

We had planned and created a film schedule to help us plan out our days of filming, this helped us structure when and where to film. Our film schedule was a huge advantage to us as a group as we would relate to the film schedule to ensure we have not missed out any shots, scenes, or narratives etc.

Opening scene narration. Miss G

Opening Scene Narration

1) The beginning of our opening will be in our stalkers office which is an unknown location but the audience will get the idea that the location has got something to do with the stalker. For our opening scene we decided to started off using fast editing. We are going to do a number of camera shots such as mid shots, low shots, close-up, high angle etc, showing the stalker either burning pictures of his victim or writing about what he is going to do to her. This is conventional because straight away it introduces the character highlighting to the audience he is a stalker. They will be able to see this through the use of colours and costume, diegetic sound will be heard from the audience but not strongly as this is a very quiet scene where there are no movements nor actions from the characters or objects within the scene, we have chosen this as we believe the silent-less will help cause tension within the audience. We have chosen for the stalker to wear black in order for the audience to visualize the characters inner darkness. The back light will help separate the subject from the background, the angle for this back light will be towards the lens from above and behind the subject (stalker), now that this scene is finished, we will move onto the next scene by editing it using the wipe cut effect.

In detail the costume for the stalker is a black hoody, leggings, gloves and black boots. This is conventional because the colour black connotes death which gives the audience a sense of foreboding. We have used low key lighting to help create a shadow which is conventional to a thriller as it represents the inner darkness of the stalker, this creates tension between the audience as they can sense that this character has not got a good vibe and it leaves the audience questioning who this character is. The Diegetic sound will help contribute to the atmosphere making the audience even more anxious, the diegetic sound will be playing along with the movements of the scene to create the realism.
 
2) 
We decided to use a dark abandoned room because when the girl wakes up it helps create an enigma to our story line. It hides the details of the surrounding making the victim and audience unaware of where abouts she is.  The camera will zoom into a close up of the victims face (Dipika) to focus attention on the the victims expressions to illustrate her fear.
 
In this scene dipika will be wearing normal casual clothes, but her shirt she is wearing is white, we have chosen this as the colour white is conventional to a thriller movie as it symbolizes innocence, in our thriller opening Dipika is innocent. Dipika's hair & make up for this scene will be very messy as if she had just been isolated in a room for 24 hours, we have also used mascara and have applied wet tissues to the mascara on Dipika to make the audience think that Dipika is crying, this is conventional to a thriller movie as this will create a relationship with the audience and the victim as Dipika's facial expressions will help build sympathy and emotion, the mid-low camera angle will help annotate this, along with the parallel sound which will help compliment the image.
The colour used in this scene is very minimum as we are trying to show the victim trapped in a room, we have used low key lighting but a torch in the back to help us create a shadow of the victim. This lighting is conventional to a thriller as it connotes that the victim is trapped in a small dark room, it enables the audience to help understand the narrative.
The iconography used in this scene is ropes and duck tape, we have used the ropes to tie the victim up and the duck tape to stop Dipika from talking, this is conventional to a thriller as the audience is aware that the vicitm is tied up and is in pain and the audience can undertake the emotions the victim is going through.

Continuing the analysis from this scene, we have positioned the victim tied up laying on the floor as she has just been kidnapped from the stalker. This is conventional to a thriller as the camera angle is on the floor showing a close up of the victim, this shows that the character lying on the floor is a victim. We will zoom out of the victim to show the audience the surrounding of the room. We will first zoom into Dipika's face so the audience thinks that the face is a normal ordinary character who is sleeping, but as the camera zooms out, the audience are shocked to see that the character is actually tied up.
 

3)The final scene will be a flashback showing dipika walking home through the forest. We are going to use angles such as long shots to show her walking with the stalker standing behind her. We will use the location of the forest because it is conventional to the thriller genre. It highlights to the audience that it is an isolated setting and no one would be able to hear her scream. The time we will film it, it will begin to get dark which is conventional to the thriller genre because it creates a mysterious atmosphere. We will use diegetic sound such as the twig snapping to get victim to look behind her. She notices the stalker standing there and the audience can clearly see this through our shot-reverse-shot we have used. We have also used the panning movement to show Dipika turning her head side to side to see if anyone is there. Dipika then screams and starts running. We are going to make this particular scene effective by using a tracking movement to show Dipika running away from the stalker. This camera movement is effective because it makes it appear chaotic and unsettling. The non-diegetic sound will be fast at this point to help contribute to the tense atmosphere. The final camera shot is a close up on the victims face and the stalkers hand over her mouth. It is then going to fade to black and goes back to the scene where the victim wakes up in the black room. The camera shot will zoom back out of her eye and leave on her hearing the stalker walk towards the door.

Planning Mise En Scene - Miss G

Planning Mise En Scene.

 Opening scene Mise En Scene

The setting: for where the beginning of our opening will be in our stalkers office which is an unknown location but the audience will get the idea that the location has got something to do with the stalker. 

In the opening scene we have used low key lighting to help create a shadow which is conventional to a thriller as it represents the inner darkness of the stalker, this creates tension between the audience as they can sense that this character has not got a good vibe and it leaves the audience questioning who this character is. 

The iconography: used in the opening scene is match sticks as we believe that the fire affect created helps emphasize that the stalker isn't a safe character as his tools are all related to death/harm in some way.  We decided to use low-key lighting in our thriller because it is easy to create shadows which keeps the audience in suspense. It also helps conceal the identity of the stalker which keeps the enigma of who is it.  

Costume, hair and make up: The stalker will wear a black hoody to highlight to the audience the character they play. This is conventional because the colour black connotes bad and death. To show the audience which character is the victim she is going to wear a item of white. This connotes her innocence highlighting that she is the victim in the situation

The middle of the opening

Settings:  We decided to use a dark abandoned room because when the girl wakes up it helps create an enigma to our story line. It hides the details of the surrounding making the victim and audience unaware of where abouts she is.  

Iconography: the iconography used in this scene is ropes and duck tape, we have used the ropes to tie the victim up and the duck tape to stop Dipika from talking, this is conventional to a thriller as the audience is aware that the vicitm is tied up and is in pain and the audience can undertake the emotions the victim is going through.

 Costume, hair and make up:

In this scene dipika will be wearing normal casual clothes, but her shirt she is wearing is white, we have chosen this as the colour white is conventional to a thriller movie as it symbolizes innocence, in our thriller opening Dipika is innocent. Dipika's hair for this scene will be very messy as if she had just been isolated in a room for 24 hours, we have also used mascara and have applied wet tissues to the mascara on Dipika to make the audience think that Dipika is crying, this is conventional to a thriller movie as this will create a relationship with the audience and the victim as Dipika's facial expressions will help build sympathy and emotion.

  

Lighting and colour: The colour used in this scene is very minimum as we are trying to show the victim trapped in a room, we have used low key lighting but a torch in the back to help us create a shadow of the victim. This lighting is conventional to a thriller as it connotes that the victim is trapped in a small dark room, it enables the audience to help understand the narrative.

 Positioning of characters/objects within the frame.

Contingent the analysis from this scene, we have positioned the victim tied up laying on the floor as she has just been kidnapped from the stalker. This is conventional to a thriller as the camera angle is on the floor showing a close up of the victim, this shows that the character lying on the floor is a victim. We will zoom out of the victim to show the audience the surrounding of the room. We will first zoom into Dipika's face so the audience thinks that the face is a normal ordinary character who is sleeping, but as the camera zooms out, the audience are shocked to see that the character is actually tied up.

  

Ending of the thriller opening.

Settings and iconography: The setting for the ending will be in a forest as it is the most suitable setting for us to portray a chase for when the victim runs from the stalker, also this is a good setting for our thriller opening as the stalker will be hidden under trees in most scenes in the forest so this will be conventional to a thriller as the audience will unexpect the stalker coming out unexpectedly.

 Costume, hair and make up: The victim will be wearing white to symbolize her innocence and the villain will be wearing black to connote his mysteriousness and an evil hidden character.

Facial expressions: The victim will be screaming when she see's the stalker walking towards her following her, when she see's this her eyes will open widely as she is scared and terrified and her mouth will drop open speechless.

Overall, i think our groups mise-en-scene is conventional because all five areas have been displayed in our thriller to help keep the audience in suspense. The audience will be able to tell who the antagonist and protagonist is due to the colours they are dressed in and can build a relationship with the victims through their facial expressions. Each code and convention help contribute to the suspense making the film a good thriller. 

Preliminary Task - Miss G

Preliminary Task - Ayesha, Lauren & Dipika.

Our preliminary task was to plan, edit and record a 1-2 minute diaglog to help understand the use of equipment. Our group had recorded a scene that included two girls (Ayesha and Dipika) walking in the same direction but then bumping into each other without realising. 

The type of camera shots we had included were: close ups, mid shots, point of view shots. While using these shots within our task we had come to a conclusion to use most of these cinematography for our own thriller opening as we thought it would create a very effective sequence. We had learnt to use variety of shorts for our thriller, this will leave an effect on the audience and will follow the conventions of a thriller film more strongly.

Overall the preliminary task helped me with planning my thriller film as i had experienced different camera angles, lengths of certain frames, and how to use the camera equipment. We had a few difficulties with which type of shots to use, but eventually after placing the tripod and changing the camera directions we had a good practice with the camera, the preliminary task helped us to gain experience and skill for the future planning of our thriller opening. 

In terms of the camera, as a group we now have a basic idea to who will be in charge of recording as we had found who had recorded the task the best.

As this task was a preparation in my planning, this did mean that the task does not have to be perfect but as a group we tried getting the best shots and hopefully no mistakes. However, there were a few difficulties we had found, the first dificulty we had was with the tripod, we was not able to get most of our shots right due to the tripod not being able to move in the directions we would want it to so we would have to make do with what we had and try to change the camera around to capture a different shot.