Sub Genres used alongside Thriller films.

SUB GENRES

Psychological Thriller

One hour photo is a Psychological Thriller. Staring Robin Williams the film is about a man who is stalking a family taking photo's of this family. The film is very Psychological as we have a man who is a Psychopath which is making this film creepy. The trailer shows you that it is a Psychological film. Usually a Psychological film will have 1 person who is known as a psychopath and will be different to everyone else. That this person usually has OCD or some what different way he lives. In a Psychological there is usually a mystery or a twisted plot which you have to unravel yourself.

Sci-Fi Thriller 

A Sci-Fi thriller will usually be based in the future or maybe in a different world. To have a Sci-Fi Thriller a male usually plays the main part as most Sci-fi films have a sense of violence and war. An example of this is Minority Report which is based in the future and on war. 

Crime Thriller

A crime Thriller can be based in many different times. This sort of Thriller usually has a strong plot and has many murders as it goes along. There are usually 2 main characters who could be policemen or who are linked to the case.

Thriller

Thriller

I have been thinking about our filming and how we can fit the genre of Thriller. I have been watching some Thrillers and looking at the opening. A majority of Thrillers have an dark opening not much going on bit is leading up creating tension and suspense. Thrillers usually start in a dark gloomy place, with some music maybe to suit the location. 

I looked at the opening of Jaws where there is a shark attack. Jaws which is a successful Thriller has a strong opening. The music is powerful and the credits at the start are strong. I like the idea of the opening of Jaws as there is tension but that element of excitement as well.

Plot Summary for a Thriller

Plot Summary For A Thriller

The Main Character will be a young man who, to make the audience feel he doesn't know as much and  is less experienced. As he starts uncovering more evidence he meets a middle aged man, the middle aged man will come across as experienced and wise. The middle aged man will put the last few pieces of the puzzle together and they will work out what the government is doing.This will be the intense part of the film, as the more the two men find out the more they feel they are being watched. 

As the plot again develops the you men decide to infiltrate the governments base and this will add tension to the plot as they will be in unfamiliar territory. As they are spotted they will attempt to put an end to what the government are doing by setting of explosions. As they set the charged they will come under gun fire and the middle aged man will be shot and killed. The young man will (after a few moments of shock) then make an escape succeeding in his mission and putting an end to the conspiracy.

Plot Summary for Thriller.

  Plot Summary for a Thriller!

 A boy and girl meet although the boy is an escaped criminal on the run. I chose this as my story plot and I thought as the film goes on I could un-ravel why he is in prison and what he did to get there. However when the boy was in prison girl met another man who she fell in love with but When the boy has escaped the girl falls in love with the boy all over again.

The middle of the film leading up to my climax will be the death of the girl murdered by the killer (man from ex relationship) who is killing her who is also pregnant. I thought with a death the boy has a motive to go and kill this man. This man is very lonely after this point and is very much wanting to claim revenge showing his love towards her.

The ending will be the boy killing the man and claiming his revenge. This was to have the good side win as it typically does in these sort of films and to also see that he got his revenge.The boy then runs away from the police leaving the viewers with a sense of mystery if he ever gets caught or not.

Plot Summary Idea For Thriller

Plot Summary Idea For Thriller

My plot summary idea for a thriller film is:

A young girl about the age of ten or eleven who lives with her mum and her younger siblings in the countryside of a calm remote village where you would suspect nothing to happen. Until one day her belongings start to unexpectedly disappear one by one her most prized possessions are no longer to be seen. As she makes her way to school on one morning she disappears and does not return home from school that day, after hours of frantic searching her mum is unable to find her daughter so calls the police. Days and days go by and shes not to be found, until a voice mail is left on her phone which may be the clue to finding her. Hours later she's found at the old house that they used to live in with the girls father, he's keeping her there due to being unable to see her as the court would never allow him to due to the violent history that he had against the mother many years ago. The girl is  eventually taken home, and the father is arrested and jailed for abduction meaning never will he be allowed near any of his children again.

The Girl with the Dragon Tatto- opening credits editing

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo- it has used a black and white effect to show the film is either a thriller or a horror. It also reveals that the film will shock the viewer and be very intense through out. It also makes all the object covered in what looks like a black paint, also adding to the intensity of the opening. There is also a close up on the main characters, one of them being Daniel Craig, this is used to let the audience know who is in the film. It could also be an early introduction to the main characters in the film. The music that is played in the background is very fast paced; it is used to make the opening fast paced.

Themes and symbols in thrillers

Themes and Symbols in a Thriller.

Thriller films use different themes and symbols to help make the film more tense or to make it a Thriller and to define its genre. An example of this could be a gun found at a crime scene or generally a murder weapon which is usually less obvious and significant. 

 Theme's in Thriller films can an emphasis psychological, something that can mess with your mind leading you to think different things or having a ending which you have to decide. This means if there is a killer he may have O.C.D (Obsessive-compulsive disorder)

Thriller Sub-Genres Prezi Powerpoint

Narrative structures of Thrillers

Narrative structures of Thrillers 

Binary Opposition

   Claude Levi-Strauss, took the theory of Propp one stage further by suggesting in order to move from one place to the next you need to use the repeated establishing of actual or potential conflict. we obtain the meaning of a film by the way in which the elements clash. For example in Jurassic park we can see the following: Movement/stillness, light/dark, control/panic, machines/human beings.

These opposites are what allows the story to develop as it creates conflict between them as a result. the way that the characters try to solve this problem is the narrative.

This method can be achieved by following these steps:

• Find the binary oppositions
• revise or undo the invidious structure
• reconstruct a new meaning

Propp

Vladamir Propp was born in 1895 and died in the year 1970. Propp was a soviet formalist scholar who analyzed the basic plot components of different Russian folk tales to identify their simplest irreducible narrative elements. He broke up fairy tales into sections, he was able to define the tale into a series of sequences that occurred within the Russian fairytale. 

After the initial situation is depicted the tale takes a sequence of 31 functions, for example;

1. Absentation: A member of family leaving the security of the home environment. This maybe the hero that later needs to save someone, or the person that the hero needs to eventually save.

2. Interdiction:  An interdiction is addressed to the hero ('don't go there', 'don't do this'). The hero is warned against some action (given an 'interdiction').

3.  Violation of Interdiction: The interdiction is violated (villain enters the tale). This generally proves to be a bad move and the villain enters the story, although not necessarily confronting the hero. Perhaps they are just a lurking presence or perhaps they attack the family whilst the hero is away.

  

This relates too the way that character types are shown in thriller films as in thrillers, their is always a character that has a different trope to them. For example the hero, the stupid one, the crazy one etc etc. 

barthes Enigma code.

Barthes- Enigma code.

Barthes Enigma code is the mystery side to a film. This is where if you are watching a film (mainly Thrillers) there could be a mystery part or some part where you have to make your own decision about what happens. The Enigma code, at the end of a film you may  pose you with the question such as in Shutter Island. "Was he a policeman or mad man" so Barthes Enigma code is that.Good examples of this is. Shutter Island, Inception and also Da Vinci Code. 

Opening Credits Analysis

Opening Credits Analysis

The Avengers Opening credits: it starts with the director name, typical of opening credits as the director is the most important person who made it. This is important as for some people the director is very important people like Michael bay and Stephen Spielberg are well respected directors. It then goes through the avengers armory, this makes the opening credits very interesting and enjoyable to watch as everyone likes to see what weapons they are using and their costumes. It also has a very clever way of showing which actors play which characters. When the weapon comes up that everyone will resemble with a superhero the name of the actor will come up, this is effective as it is telling the audience in a discrete way who the actors are.

 The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo opening credits: The opening credits starts with names 'Columbia Pictures' and 'Metro Goldwyn Mayer' these probably being the distributors of the film. It then goes on too say 'A Scott Rudin and Yellow Bird Production' These being the companies that made the film. After that it says 'A David Fincher Film' and that is more than likely the director of the film. It then says 'Daniel Craig' and hes the main character in the film the girl with the dragon tattoo.

  Panic Room Opening Credits: Panic Room has 2 minutes opening where we see different things. We very much see where it's going to be set such as New York as there are many sky scrappers and also we see in the distance the empire state building. The opening credits has very intense music creating suspense and a sense of mystery of what is going to happen. We have quick movement shots moving around where in big 3D letters we have  actors names and also director and producer. This is also linked with where they are as the credits are up against the buildings.

storyboard

Preliminary Storyboard 

This is the storyboard for our preliminary task, it demonstrates the camera shots that we are going to use and it shows what action is going to be taken in each shot.

Final Preliminary Video

This is the final piece for the preliminary task, we've realised the mistakes and errors that we made and we've suggested on the video with tags what we could improve on next time and what could be added, changed or not be done.

Character types

Character Types

There are many specific character types in a thriller, usually all of them play a role in the film (unless they are normal people in the backgropund. here is some examples fo character types:

• Detectives- usually use there minds and inteligence to work out where the villain is and tries to catch and convict them. Usually intense as the villain is usually one step ahead. Sherloch Holmes
• The Insane Villain-usually always one step ahead of main character, usually adds tension to the film and makes it fast paced as you dont know what the villain is going to do. Phone Booth
• Handsome Hero- usually comes in at the end and saves the day, usually very charismatic, making him stand out from the crowd

PRELIMINARY TASK

The Task 

This task involves:

-Story Boarding

-Script Writing

-Plan of Action

-Shot lists

-Final Quick piece

For our preliminary task we have to make a quick video which must include a character opening a door to a room, they then have to walk through the door to then walk across the room and sit down at a table to where another character is sitting and finally an exchange of dialogue between the two characters.

We are doing this task to get used to the editing programes on the mac computers, we are also doing this to help us to begin to understand how each shot is done correctly and to understand how a filming camera works. 

Audience research results - Survey monkey

 

Audience Research Results from survey monkey

Here is the link which takes you too our survey online on survey monkey:

http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/93JK22G

 

To find out the information that we needed to make a detailed analysis of what people watching thriller films want we created a survey on survey monkey (www.surveymonkey.com)

including questions that find out specific things about our audience these included things like:

What age range of people typically watches Thriller films, what gender is more likely to watch them, aswell as what kind of characters people are interested in seeing in a thriller and what kind of things people want to experience when watching one. For example do they want:

-Excitement

-Tension

-Dramacticness

-Anxiety

-Anticipation

-Uncertainty

The results of what people look for in a thriller film came back as this:

  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We also asked the people filling out the questionaires about what tupes

Character types

Character Types

-Character types within thrillers and micro-elements (CEMS) used in their portrayl

The character trope that i have choosen is the 'silent but strange';

-This being someone thats silent/keeps to themselves with a strange sense of attitude and always creeps around everyone. 

This is a diagram of all the ideas I could think of that this type of character may be like when shown in a film. For example I thought that most characters shown of this nature are ones that like to keep to themselves, this linking too them wanting to spend most of their time alone and by themselves not associating themselves with anyone else.

An example of a film that relates to this character is Natalie Portman who plays Nina Sayers in the film the Black Swan. Here is the trailer of the film which I found on youtube after typing in 'The Black Swan Movie Trailer':

We can see just from watching the trailer that some of the traits that I have thought of in the diagram correspond and are extremeley similar to Nina whos plays the main character in the film. Shes odd, and eery, and keeps to herself alot of there time and doesent let anyone in on how she feels this gives us the perfect indication that she is almost identical to the character trope of 'Silent but Strange'.

  

Cross/sub-genres used alongside thriller films

Thriller Cross/Sub-Genres

Psychological Thriller-  The conflict between characters are usually mental and emotional. Characters are usually dragged into a dangerous situation by their own curiosity or by accident. The film is usually fast paced and intense on the viewer, they are considered to be hard to keep up with at times.

 

The characters of a Psychological thriller do not rely on strength, more on there intelligence to stay alive or overcome the situation.

For example: 

• Inception, 
• silence of the lambs, 
• seven, 
• one hour photo
• Trapped
• Don't say a word

Techno thriller- usually an advanced piece of technology a.k.a a robot, will play a prominent role. usually contains some action and Sci-Fi.
For example:

• Eagle Eye
• Future World
• Jurassic Park
• i,Robot

Crime Thriller- this genre of film tends to focus on the criminal rather that the policemen. usually slow to begin with then becomes more intense as an event is about to unfold.
For example:

• Seven
• No country for old men
• Mind-hunters

Supernatural thrillers- In which the film brings in an otherworldly element mixed with tension, suspense and plot twists. Sometimes the protagonist and/or villain has some psychic ability and superpowers.
For example:

• Lady in the Water
• Fallen
• Frequency
• Knowing
• Chronicle 

 Spy thriller-In which the protagonist is generally a government agent who must take violent action against agents of a rival government or (in recent years) terrorists.
For example:

• The Tourist
• Spy Game
• Taken
• Unknown

Plan - Preliminary Task

Plan for Preliminary Task .

In our video we will have Rory as the main character who will start of by walking towards the classroom door, he will then put his hand on the handle of the door so its down and the camera will then change to inside the classroom to where the Zoom of the handle will be shown. After Rory has entered the Classroom we will track him until he sits down at the table to where Ben is already sitting. They will then exchange dialogue from the script that we have already written and we will use the 180 degree rule to swap between the two characters talking. We will then fade out the conversation and the task has then finished.

Script Draft - Preliminary Task

Script

characters:  Rory and Ben who are students at Newport 6th form.

Rory walks towards door, opens it, then he walks towards the table were George is sitting, Rory sits down and begins conversation.

Rory: (To Ben) "You got it?"

Ben looks at Rory knowingly and nods.
 
Rory: "How much do I owe you?"

Ben: " The usual"

END OF SCRIPT. 

Shot list - Prelimanary Task

Shot List

For our preliminary task we have decided to use four different shots, these are going to be:

1. Mid-Shot on Rory walking towards door (duration time 4 seconds)
2. Close up of door handle (duration time 3-4 seconds)
3. Tracking of him walking into the room (duration time 3-4 seconds)
4. Shot Reverse Shot of him having a conversation with Ben (duration time 6 seconds)

Blizzard Production Task - Who are we?

Who are we?

WE ARE..
 

Blizzard Productions: This is our production name. We chose this after out group name which is Blizzard and also we are making a 2 minute film so we chose to have production after woulds. We used Live Type to make our Production. We are making an Independent production company, so the film will be 100% made by our group.

We want the logo to indicate that we are making a thriller film so we are using a stormy background and a icy looking text, which makes it look cold and chilling. This works well in indicating that it is a thriller film.

Our opening showing our production company lasts for about 3 seconds which we find is long enough to show our opening and enough time for our audience to see it.

Themes and Symbols used in Thriller Films

Themes and Symbols:

Suffering: There is usually a character who suffers in the film which makes the audience grow more emotionally attached to the character.

Weapon: A weapon is usually used whether its a gun or a baseball bat, usually more common in crime or psychological thrillers.

Forensics: usually used in a crime or spy thriller it makes the film more intense as the character is getting closer and closer to the killer.

OCD traits- a main character is usually may be portrayed as having OCD traits. It emphasizes on detail which makes the film more intense.

Voyeurism- creates a sense of being watched, this makes the film more psychologically intense as we feel the killer is one step ahead of the main character.

peril- there is always someone in peril in a thriller film, they usually are saved by the main character or sometimes are killed for a dramatic affect on the audience.

Characteristics of a Thriller