1. 1. In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?
2. 2. What is a thriller and why are they soWhat is a thriller and why are they so popular?popular?Definition of a thriller: - a novel, play, or film with an exciting plot, typically involving crime or espionage. There have been many ideas about why thrillers are such popular genres of films, maybe for recreational purposes? Interest? However one of the main theories I found interesting in explaining why cetain genres are so popular is the Zeitgeist theory created by John Fiske in 1987. John Fiske asserts that generic conventions embody the crucial ideological concerns of the time in which they are popular. This suggests that genres tell us something about the way of the world in the time in which they are popular. So, in application to 2015 there is a lot in the media which makes audiences question, these genres automatically involve audiences everywhere as a lot of films of late raise modern issues. For example dystopian novels such as the hunger games have been a massive deal for the nations, as it is appealing to audiences due to it being a popular book, big actors and actresses but also the fact it does raise questions about what the world is going to be like when resources run out and which governments and countries will becoming powerful and which ones will fall. Thrillers are now even more popular due to the fact the internet allows audiences to look into conspiracy theories online. Thrillers usually raise issues that are current in the news, for example, environmental destruction, over population, increasing the roll of science and technology. It also brings up many controversial points which further involves audiences. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EAzGXqJSDJ8
3. 3. The conventions of the thriller genreThe conventions of the thriller genre It was really important for us to incorporate our research of the thriller genre into our film. To begin our research we studied the different sub genres of a thriller, this helped us decide which direction we wanted to go in terms of the content of our thriller. The contents of a thriller usually include fast paced, frequent action, and resourceful heroes who must thwart the plans of more powerful and better equipped villains. Literary devices such as suspense, red herrings and cliff hangers are used extensively. We tried to use some of these techniques in our thriller opening. We used a cliff hanger at the end of our opening to try and encourage people to want to keep watching. However we opposed the traditional contents of a thriller by not creating a heroic character but instead a sense of mystery as to what was really going on with our characters. We were making the audience think rather than just feeding them the information. Here is some of my research I did about thrillers and how it shaped our main task!!
4. 4. What are the genres and sub genres ofWhat are the genres and sub genres of a thriller?a thriller? There are many types of sub genres within the thriller genre. Before deciding the content of our film we had to decide which direction of thriller we wanted to go in order to recognise what kind of locations we might need to film in, what kind of characters would be realistic and also what kind of props we would need to help tell our story. Here are a few of the types of thrillers we could have done: Spy thrillers- typically a government agent who must take violent action against agents of rival governments. Political thrillers- have features of conspiracy thrillers. Military thrillers- normally uniformed military officer. Conspiracy thrillers- hero confronts large powerful group of enemies. Forensic thrillers- forensic experts. Psychological thrillers- conflict between the main characters is mental and emotional rather than physical. Horror thrillers in which conflict between the main characters is mental, emotional and physical.
5. 5. What sub genre did we go for?What sub genre did we go for? We decided that we wanted to do a psychological thriller. We chose to create this sub genre of thriller because we thought it would be interesting to change typical human behaviour. We knew we could interpret this genre anyway we wanted to and wouldnt have to know any facts to make it realistic and believable. By doing something psychological we could bring in all our previous ideas into our film and incorporate lots of different elements. We really wanted a strong psychotically unhinged female presence in our film and these women were some of the leads that inspired our female character:
6. 6. A bit of brainstormingA bit of brainstorming As part of our research we did some brainstorming, we wrote down any creative ideas we had and tried to incorporate these ideas into our film. We have come up with a large range of ideas that we think will work excellently. We want to twist the typical stereotype of a thriller and create something new. Also we want to change the empowered man (typically seen in a thriller) but instead, create a strong empowered woman in our thriller who creates all the danger and drama. I adore Lana Del Rey videos that are full of short clips of different scenes with vintage effects put over them, so I would love to incorporate this in to our main task. This was my original blog post when planning our thriller.
7. 7. How did popular thrillers shape ourHow did popular thrillers shape our ideas?ideas? Whilst doing our research and planning I decided to do three textual analyses of some thrillers that I thought would help shape our ideas. When brainstorming for our film we decided we wanted to do a type of psychological thriller, so I decided to analyse the bone collector, Sherlock and seven. These real media products helped develop our film and ideas about thrillers.
8. 8. SevenSeven I found the opening sequence for this film really interesting and useful in terms of giving me alternative ideas to the basic title sequences I had previously seen. I never noticed before how much key information is hidden in a lot of title sequences and I knew when I had analysed it that that was what I wanted to do with our film. In order to keep the audience involved the whole way throughout the film. Here is part of my analysis for seven: We learn a lot from the mise en scene of this section of the film. During the opening title we learn different things about the killer to prepare us for what is to come. Everything the killer is doing is very precise and articulate, he sees pages together and pins things. Showing his great psychotic attention to detail. In one particular section of the title sequence we see that the killer highlights/ crosses out certain words of phrases. The words pregnant, intercourse and transexual are crossed out. Later on in the title we see the killer cut out the word god. Presumably we could assume from this that the killer is a religious character and has a hatred for anything that goes against god. After analysing this opening I knew I wanted to create hidden meanings behind the majority of the footage we used. On the next slide there are a few examples of where we did this!
9. 9. How we used media products in ourHow we used media products in our thrillerthriller We used this shot to show the beginning of their relationship and the lighting of a flame between the couple. However we slowed the clip down and made it linger to present that psychotic mind set of being somewhat mesmerised by the flame. The slight twisting of the wrist to move the flame shows the strange obsession. Although this is not a very clear shot when screen grabbed, we see the flame go out which could represent that something is about to change. It could also represent a change in our character. We know this character is a woman as she has petit hands and nail varnish. This could suggest to the audience there has been a psychotic change in the female character, representing the fact she will be the character to cause havoc in this thriller. This shot shows the slow burning of a candle and the melting of the wax. We decided to use wax melting as opposed to the typical clock shot you see to represent time, to show that time is running out for one of our characters. The candle light also creates a mysterious and melancholy feel to the scene. In this shot I edited two pieces of footage together and altered the opacity on one of them so we could see the female characters reflection staring back at her from a different angle. I was really proud of this shot as it really represents the psychological change in the character. It makes it look like her alternative personality is watching her, making her
10. 10. Does our thriller adhere to theDoes our thriller adhere to the conventions of a typical thriller?conventions of a typical thriller? In some ways our thriller adheres to the typical conventions of a thriller. When creating the soundtrack for our film we wanted to incorporate something different but still making sure it had the same creepy tones that a thriller generally has. So we decided to use one of our favourite groups songs every breath you take by the police. We changed the song up so it sounded really psychotic and disturbing. Me and my sister recorded a cover of the song on my iPhone 5C using the voice recorder. Later during the editing process I put an effect on the audio track so it had a echo and slight ringing in the background, giving it that uncomfortable sound. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OMOGaugKpzs the police version https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sJBSLP83f0U our version on our thriller
11. 11. Part 2- Our storyboardPart 2- Our storyboard In terms of the storyline in some ways its quite typical as we know a murder has either already occurred or is going to occur. We also uses a cliff hanger which is quite regularly seen in all different styles of thrillers. Here is our original storyboard:
12. 12. Is our thriller at all unconventional?Is our thriller at all unconventional? In many ways we intended to make our thriller unconventional. In lots of different ways we altered the typical perception of characters and the plot of the film. In our film I wanted to use this theory as a way of contrasting and subverting the typical roles of women in the media. This is why we reversed some of the typical roles around. For example we made the male in our film passive and the female active. We don't present our female character as a sexual fantasy or objectify her, instead we give her the power and make the male the victim. In this shot the chaos is beginning and the femalecharacter is still looking calm and powerful.