Evaluation - Question One

Question One – In what way does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

A thriller is a novel, play or film that includes an exciting plot which usually involves the storyline of crime creating tension keeping the audience interested. In a thriller, a protagonist is included, who is against a problem such as being trapped or in danger and tries to resolve it. Despite what sub-genre the thriller is, the protagonist will always be shown in danger, being watched by the antagonist or a chase scene; leading to a high climax through all of the tension that they would have faced as well as trying to get away from the antagonist, by seeing both points of view.

There are many sub-genres of thrillers. One sub-genre is an ‘Action Thriller’, such as ‘Die Hard’. These types of thrillers are used to create a lot of suspense throughout the film. This genre will have continuous motion and action such as chases, stunts, fights, battles and races, through using most of these it will show how much danger the protagonist is in.

Next is a ‘Crime Thriller’, for example ‘The Usual Suspect’, incorporating the aspects of thriller through a use of a crime film plot. Usually, in these thrillers the plot centres on a specific thing, such as a murder, killer, robbery etc, showing how the storyline focus’ on the protagonist as well as the antagonists from both points, for example, how the crime is set up and the result of the crime, usually to the protagonist. From a crime thriller, they also include psychological and action aspects to build the tension of the thriller to make the storyline more interesting and complicated.

Also, there is ‘Film-Noir’, ‘Sweet Smell of Success’, not a specific sub-genre but used as a style of the film mainly in the 1940s and 1950s. Film-Noir uses black and white styles with lighting effects, including a main character which is the ‘hero’. The film mainly reflects on flashbacks with a narrative voice to help explain the plot.

Furthermore, there are ‘Psychological Thrillers’, like ‘Memento’, for me the most interesting thrillers to watch. This is because it all comes from the mind rather than from a threat, for example, the protagonists must rely on some sort of mental resources to solve the situation. As Psychological Thrillers can be very deep and because of their nature they can cross into the horror genre.

Science fiction is another type of sub-genre with a science-based theme into the plot of the film, including heroes, villians, unexplored locations, fantastical quests with advanced technology showing how the future has gone bad. For example ‘Aliens’.

There is also a sub-genre of a religious thriller, an example of this would be ‘The Ninth Gate’ including religious questions, ceremonies and objects. Some films can revolve around a specific church some of which included supernatural experiences but not showing a specific religion. This can be through showing exorcisms, demon possession and church cover-ups are the typical themes of religion.

 

What we chose

We chose to have a crime/mystery thriller for our opening. The reason that we chose this was because we thought it would be the most interesting one to create as we as a group had many ideas about what we wanted to do. We felt that a crime thriller we could incorporate many ideas to one to make a successful thriller. The audience’s expectations for this thriller would be to build up tension based around a murder or killing, that’s what we did, however, did not show the killing as we wanted to leave it up to the audience to ask questions and try and work out what they thought happened, therefore we didn’t show the identity of the antagonist, challenging the typical thriller as the antagonist is usually aware about what they did creating enigma, but they are not afraid to tell people about what they did. Fast paced shots were also a typical convention to use which we added at the end but also use the complete opposite as slow shot following the rope was used to build up the climax giving suggestions to the audience of how the protagonist was murdered, for example, the rope and the knife on the side.

The conventions we used were slow paced close ups. We went along the body showing the injured parts in an extreme close up; showing bruises however slowly so the audience could get an idea about how battered the protagonist was, which is conventional as we wanted to make the audience feel scared for the protagonist. However, we did use certain types of long shots to show the audience the location that the actors were in to show how much or a dark gloomy place it was implying that it was isolated so nobody would know what happened there.

The editing was fast paced towards the end to create the confused sense of what had happened as well as build up climax to the part of it all being finished with unanswered questions. We did vary the pace as there were climax parts then it brought the audience down to relax until another peak point came in the opening. Also in the editing we added some effects to add to the secrecy of the scene. We added darker effect in certain parts, for example where the torch was shown to be going along the body as it was crucial that was the main focus, of importance first, showing the main characters.
We also included flashes and fades to white and black at the ending to split the image but give the audience a sense of confusion as so much is going on at once and as it is fast they would find it hard to concentrate building tension. These were useful to be able to put the shots together as well as make it scarier for the audience to watch therefore creating tension and suspense, which is a typical convention of what a thriller should do.

Mise-en-scene was so important to get right in our opening as it would make it look professional or unrealistic. We needed the location to be right as it would look like a gloomy setting as well as mysterious to engage the audience into wanting to watch more of the opening as well as it being a typical convention of the thriller genre. The location needed to low-lit therefore making it harder to see what is going on with the sound added to create another effect of adding tension, which is usually some diegetic sounds with high-pitched noises, therefore using common conventions to make it seem as real as we possibly could. We felt that the location worked well as it was slightly isolated and a big building and only using one room giving the sense of claustrophobia to the protagonist.

Props are important in the thriller genre as it will emphasise the danger of what could happen and how it would affect the protagonist, the victim, usually carried or committed by the antagonist. In our thriller opening we wanted to give a ‘scare-factor’ to our audience and make them nervous to watch, therefore the rope was a useful prop as it didn’t start off to be a threat, however following the rope, then showing that it lead to her neck was a huge jump to the sense of fear. We didn’t really include a lot of threatening materials such as knives, guns as we didn’t want our audience to think it was a different sort of genre from the beginning, even though they are important props in thrillers, we kept it simple however did include words, such as ‘death’ stressing that something has happened to the protagonist here. As we only showed an opening we didn’t want to confuse the audience by including too much as we only had two minutes to show them this opening.

The beginning of a thriller doesn’t typically start from the beginning; it usually is a flashback or shows an event that had happened to give the audience some background knowledge of how they have got to where they are now usually a problem leading to it being fixed by the protagonist. We wanted to use this convention by showing the death of a girl, for her friend to see, so the audience would then know what happened, who saw it and what the results of the protagonists death was. Typically, the narrative would be leading up to the climax part of the narrative, which would affect the protagonist, as well they could do this by showing clues etc. and some significant props that would need to be remembered, our would be the rope. Furthermore, the end of a thriller shows a death, typically the antagonist, however we have challenged that convention and used the protagonist’s death to make it seem a bit more confusing and not what they would typically expect, however, the protagonists friend is still alive and left as a cliff hanger to carry on the narrative of the film.

We had some inspiration from other thrillers, such a ‘Psycho’ which came out to be one of the most popular thrillers in history. We had the same idea of the protagonist being the victim to be killed. The protagonist is female like ours which stereotypes to be powerless as she would be weak looking compared to the antagonist. Especially, in ours you can see that the antagonist is broad and well-built compared to the innocent victim who you can see has seen the effect of being weak through her injuries.

The costumes that we used were effective in the way just by looking at them you know what role they play. Laura wore a plain white top referring to her innocence. She had ripped in her clothing to show her role as being a protagonist as it refers to her being weak. The red blood stained top showed her injuries and in the places on her body where she had been hurt. Scott, the antagonist was wearing smart office business wear; however did not look unusual and suspicious, which in ‘real’ thrillers, are a common convention so they do not get caught, however wear clothing that reflects their class showing their wealth. Becky, the protagonist’s friend is looking normal and modern as the thriller is aimed to a young generation of people so it will be more relatable if she looked like a normal teenager herself.

We used a variety of shots to show how different angles could make things look dominant, such as the antagonist over the body showing the power that he has over her as well as the close up of the injuries to show what had happened and where on the body they were to make the audience want to know more and ask questions about the murder. Like a ‘real’ thriller we used a lot of angles to show the  importance of something, the  closer up the importance was more, suggesting that they will remember it as it was a close up and was repeated a few times to show its significance.

Characters were introduced to the audience by being written on the body as well as titles that were edited in. Unlike typical thrillers which are usually all one type of title, either edited in or put on the item. We chose two as it would make it more interesting for the audience as well as to keep the narrative going whilst introducing people so it would hold the narrative but it would also add to the suspense of the opening by it being on the body.