Question 1 Finished

Question 1

The genre of thriller is most likely shown as a film. An example of this would be The Bourne Ultimatum. I.e. they heavily rely on suspense and anticipation of the audience to keep them on edge but still wanting them to watch more. Most of these types of films are adrenalin rushing and fast paced.

Typical shots you would find within Thriller films would be, Panning shots of either the bad guys. Also a shot that we found effective and that we saw where used a lot in thriller films where close ups. This was an effective shot as it builds tension. It makes the audience consider. Who is this person? What will he do and why is he doing what he is doing?  While being circled buy the protagonist trying to stop them. With the good guy hiding in the shadows, this makes for a great way of building suspense as see the odd close up of the worried faces of the villain. Making the audience feel who what the antagonist will do to them.  As you can see from the image below this shot is used a large amount and is rather effective at building tension. As you feel that the antagonist has the power.

 

When looking at framing in these close-ups we see how we have used the golden mean in this shot, which shows our technical framing ability. That we can use different shots effectively showing our knowledge of media.

Editing during action scenes is fast paced this way you are building suspense. However slow paced editing is also used as during tense scenes. This is done to build suspense within the audience as you are getting them to ask question what will happen?  Like the scene in Seven where the two detectives are looking through the building and about to discover a dead body. For our film we kept our editing pace at medium. As we did not feel we had enough action to speed editing. So the slow to medium paced worked well as it kept the audince in suspense.

With mise-en-scene lighting I would feel is one of the key things as most of the films and film openings we have looked like No Country For Old Men, Seven and many more. When trying to build tension and suspense the lighting is extremely low key almost to the point where you can’t see anything. This is done to add an eerie effect, which builds tension within the audience to make them feel on edge, which is a key point of a thriller.  Costume and make-up are also key as you tend to find that the bad guy is a bit crazy dressed or looks creepy. An example of this would the guy from no country for old men.

As we can see from this image antagonist in the film No Country for Old men he is dressed in dark clothing.  The mise-en-scene could be to insinuate he has a dark personality.

As you can see with our media piece we have tried to do the same with the mise-en-scene to show the antagonist wears black leading to his dark actions of torturing a man. With no resentment 

As you can see he has a blank expression on his face which he has throughout the whole film and when he comes into shot the lighting is lowered to show his significance as an antagonist. Also his costume is black again emphasizing his bad characteristics.

 

The most important things in a thriller opening are titles, narrative, Camera work and Music. Each factor is very important in film openings, such as Seven. Mimicking all four factors. The titles of a film are always important and it must take a lot of time and effort to product a great title sequence. The film Seven is an excellent example of great titles, the reason why it is excellent is because the audience want to see something new and they want to see more than just a name. From this image in the top left hand corner you can see that the editors of Seven have added moving scenes into their titles. They have done this to show you what some of the film may contain however it is also done so that they are not giving too much away.

The Narrative in the thriller opening is probably one of the most important parts of a thriller and it usually grabs most the attention. It is important that the director meets the needs of the audience, which are Excitement, suspense and action. At the same time the director should not reveal too much and they must make sure that the audience is urging for more after the opening scene. In the build up to the thriller opening.  However over doing this can actually do the opposite. It can push the audience away, which is what we tried to avoid. Flash backs are usually used in the narrative these are then explained as the film goes on. These are normally added to grab the audience’s attention and to get them to carry on watching. This is why we used the idea of flash backs within our opening

 

Camera angles and shots Camera angles and shots are very important good use of camera shots always has its impact on a film. We used the over the shoulder shot, the reason we have chosen this is because we feel that it builds suspense and it brings the feeling that something is watching.

Music is very important to a good thriller opening. Music can have just as much effect as the story. The music must be appealing and tense. It must build up a tense feeling amongst the audience. This is exactly what we are aiming for. The soundtrack that we used for our thriller open was John Murphy The Church. We found that this track was good at holding the audiences at suspense. When creating our film we added non diegetic sound. This was done in the shot where we burnt the paper. We felt that this added tension however not suspense as it was only a background noise designed to make the audience feel eerie

A real thriller that inspired our group would be the film like The God Farther or Gangster squad. The ways these films are edited relate back perfectly to what we have try to mirror in our opening the way that there is an air of mystery around our bad character and that is the kind of thing we have tried use. I.e. this shot of the guy with the bag on his head. Who is he what has he done this is how we chose to add or suspense to our thriller opening.                    

                                  

This first screen grab is from the film gangster squad one of the films we tried to mimic. To do this we had to make sure that our mise-en-scene was correct. By that I mean costume as you can see we have the hat shirt and tie.  As this was the fashion of the time and kept within continuity of the film.

           

 

This next screen grab is a shot that seem to occur quite a bit within the gangster films that we studied. We had to make sure that for this we did not change the mise-en-scene by that I mean props the gun had to be shown at some point as it is a great way to hold the audience on suspense. will he pull the trigger who will die. That whole format works well with our opening as at the end of the film we see the character on the floor still alive but wearing the watch of the bad guy.

This shot here just had to be added. I know that it’s not quite the same but I feel that a good gangster film is not complete unless there is a fight. However you can see how the lighting matches in away as it is low key this is used to build tension before the first punch is thrown. Also our mise-en-scene costume is correct keeping continuity. And also we have made sure the antagonist is the one in black. This emphasizes for the audience who is on who’s side.