Initial Ideas- Our Thriller

Plot Synopsis

• Our story is set in South London in 1995. In a rough neighborhood.
• A teenage girl (16) has been kidnapped, the police have been called and the mother is struggling with the realization.
• The mother cannot cope with the depression and she breaks down. Meanwhile her daughter is being abused by her kidnapper.
• They run away and move far from the police, her kidnapper manipulates her and forces her into marriage.
• Years later she goes back to her neighborhood and sees that it is destroyed. She knocks on her old door and finds out her mother doesn't live there anymore.

Possible Locations

I took all of these images at night because i wanted to display the settings in the dark to make them fit the Thriller genre better. These are mundane locations because my groups film is about a girl who gets kidnapped. This also ties in with the fact that it is dark because it indicates danger and venerability.

Analyising our genre through VoxPops

These VoxPops were a useful way to get the viewers opinion on Thriller films so we know what are conventions and what are not. This is audience reaserach I've done as I found a variety of opinions.

Survey

5 people who filled out my survey were female and 10 were male. Therefore the majority of opinions  are males and they are the majority.

The majority of women preferred low-key lighting  and the majority of males also preferred low-key lighting. This proves that the audience expects to see low-key lighting within the opening sequence of a Thriller film and this means that low-key lighting is a convention of a Thriller opening sequence.

This Pie Chart shows the ages of the females that filled out the survey. The majority of females who filled out the survey are 11-16. 

This Shows the ages of the males who filled out the survey. The majority of them fall in the age group of 17-25.

This is out of everyone who filled out the survey- grim, quiet music is expected more than loud, shrieking music therefore making grim and quiet music a convention of a Thriller.

Title Sequences

This Prezi presents information and research i did on title sequences. This helps me when it comes to creating the titles for my opening sequence because it gives information about different title sequence, how the vary and what sorts if order they come in. 

Conventions of a Thriller

THRILLER

Mise en scene

- Thrillers are normally set in mundane locations like a house or an abandoned house. The props may consist of weapons that give clues to the crime that has been committed.
- There is low key lighting to create an unpleasant atmosphere and an uncomfortable mood.

Characters

- A protagonist could have a team or another person (secondary protagonist) to help them figure out the problem. 
- There is the authority where they are in denial about what has happened and they need persuading to realise what bad things are happening.
- An exposer exposes the person or thing that is causing terror and they uncover how to solve the problem. 
- Antagonists are the villains that cause all the fright and issues.
-The protagonists sometimes come out as antagonists- its always the last person you would expect.
-Protagonist normally are blamed at one point and things sp horribly wrong 

Cinematography

- A lot of long shot are used to show locations and spacial awareness
- Also extreme close ups are used to give away clues and add suspense.

Editing

- Editing gets faster with confrontation and it mixes with the music to build tension to be built up to the climax.

Themes

- Serial killers 
- To do with mental illness
- Story line to do with something that can actually happen in real life

Sound

- Lots of high pitched scores 
- screeching noises 
- mainly incidental music 

Plot

- Twists and turns and solving a misery
- More to do with solving the problem then all the gore and violence otherwise it would be a horror.

SE7EN

Spiderwick Chronicles

Conventions of an opening sequence



Briget Jones' Diary

Wallander

Brick

The Sixth Sence

At first the viewer was intreged to see the light bulb,we can tell that by the state of the bulb is it from a neglected place as its dirty and old fashined. There is very little noise to begine with and the audience knows we are in a quiet place because we can hear the noise of the bulb and slight gental but creepy wind. The dirctor purposly chose not to show the audience the door before it makes a loud noise while the camera is focused on the light bulb, this startles the viewer. This is all diegetic sound.

There is a winerack in the foreground and the camera is positioned so it sees through the rack and at the woman, this gives the feeling that she is being watched. the bottles look dusty like they haven't been looked at in a while and have not been looked after. this character has an intence expression on her face as if she has stopped to think of something or has just realised something. She then proceedes to turn her back after looking behind her which would display her has vulnerable.

This follows the rule of thirds because she is placed within the frame to the left hand side with her shadow in the middle. She gives the impression she is scared by the way she is holding the bottle close to her chest and her body language gets smaller and looks like she is intimidated and frightened. She may be reasuring herself the way she is almost hugging herself. She does not look like she belongs where is is because her costume looks like she should be in a fancy, dressed up, warm enviroment and she looks inferior comapred to the room.

Memento

Straight away we see an image that is quite grim and unpleasant. A close up of the photograph shows us the importance it has to the storyline and how detailed the photograph is. There is only focus on the hand and the photograph however the floor benieth him is blured out. This may symbolise that the photo is all thats left of that dead man and he no longer has purpose because the director hides the floor which he is laying on. Also the text 'Memento' is in bright blue, all in capitals and has a slight glow to each letter which relates to the bright colour in the photograph which could tell the audience it is day time. the man holding the photo has old looking hands and shows he is mature enough to cope with a death and is what we would expect. The director has choosen not to show us the tottoo on his hand as this would leave the viewer questioning.

Here we can see the detail in the man's face, he looks like he is sweaty and has blood on his face. The blood doesnt look like it is his because how it is positioned on his face like it has been sprayed of splattered in a result of conflict. The man might be in dispear as he is looking down and his eyes look tired and half shut, this could show how his mind is trying to reject what he is looking at. The location is low key lighting however the little bit of light shining through is highlighting his scratch on his face which could tell the audience that he does this sort of thing a lot. scince he doesnt looked shocked or upset we can tell he is usto bad situations and may do this as an occupaton because he is dressed up smartly and has the stereotype of being a strong educated man who has power.

This character clearly has the higher stautus because he is presented from a low angle shot showing he has all the power, especially since he has a gun in his hand and his serious facial expression gives the viewer the impression that he knows how to use a gun well.

10 shot story

Still Images

Jobsite

Push A Little Button

We included an eyeline match when Hannah looked at the door, shot reverse shot when Hannah and Shaun were talking, a master shot before Shaun sat down so the viewers could get an idea of the space they were in, match on action when Hannah passed the file over and the shot type changed angle and we also followed the 180 degree rule and only filmed one side of the conversation when Shaun was on the right and Hannah on the left. What could of been better about the filming would be how there was very little dialogue and there was not much of the story being presented. Also how some shot were not as steady as they could of been.

Here is my annotated class video of Donnie Darko. i added speech bubbles to give some information about what types of camera movements were added and why. To do this i had to click on 'Annotations'.

uploading a word doc using scribd

A screen grab of the desktop.

Hello, I'm starting my blog in media class.