Psychological ThrillersAlthough locations for thrillers depend on the movie itself, there are common locations that are used regularly within the genre. Common places that psychological thrillers take place in are forests and dark alleys and dark houses (such as old flats and old estates). This is to create tension and a sense of mystery. If the mise en scene is dark and dreary, it keeps us on suspense and hard to see which makes us suspect and think about what could be round the corner. For example, the psychological thriller "The Forest" is set within a dark forest where a mother's daughter is abducted. We have chosen to do a psychological thriller, and feel the best place to set it in would be a children's park and a forest. We think that the forest will create an eerie atmosphere and it would be easy to portray our thriller is psychological by setting it in a forest. Supernatural ThrillersSupernatural thrillers tend to be located in family homes, old gothic mansions or holiday homes out in the woods, which are usually all in a secluded area away from the majority of civilization. If they take place in a family home, the family have often only just moved in. An example supernatural thriller with one of these locations is The Exorcist. This takes place within the family's home and a supernatural being takes over a child's body. Romantic ThrillersRomantic thrillers tend to be spotted in a lot of different locations. However, a large number of romantic thrillers are set in exotic places or war zones. This tends to help create plot twists and a dangerous tone to the plot and to the lovers. An example of this is in Casablanca, a World War II romantic thriller of complications and love.
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The scene starts off completely black and is edited so it fades in to a follow a piece of chalk being dragged across paper. As the chalk is dragged across, black writing of the credits comes up. Each time the chalk changes positions and the camera gets closer or further away, the editing is cut so that each video fades into each other. This continues the whole way through the opening scene. This helps suggest this is a psychological thriller because it is relatively simple and you wouldn't have something complicated.
The scene ends with a close up of the final drawing and the final title comes on screen. I have researched the editing of the opening of Black Swan because I felt it could potentially be applicable to our film opening as it is also a psychological thriller. The panning of the shot and the simplicity of the opening is a regular connotation of psychological thrillers, there is not usually a lot happening. In the opening, it starts off with an eerie sounding non-diagetic music which consists of the higher pitch (and in a minor key) of an organ and a xylophone. The organ has connotations of evil and supernatural and the high pitch matches with the young children. It sounds like a children's nursery rhyme in a minor key, which we decided would be appropriate for our opening too as ours also involves children.
When the children stop playing, the non-diagetic music adds minor chords in a lower pitch which suggests that something bad is going to happen. A drum is also eventually added which makes the sound deeper in bass. This creates a dark atmosphere. Just before the girls jump out the window, all instruments stop and there's just a chorus of low strings in minor. This connotes a supernatural and dark sound. As I am creating the sound mainly by myself, I decided it would be a good idea to look at different thrillers to try to see if there was a regular pattern within the different music. I found that most of the music involved in the opening sequences of different thrillers was generally rather high pitched and always in minor, which I found helps create an engaging and intense atmosphere. This photo inspired our opening sequence. We liked the idea of something mysterious and unknown reaching out towards the victim.
To us, this picture connotes loneliness and fear of the unexpected. Also by looking at this photo, we got the idea of doing a flashback in our opening scene as this suggests fear of the past and the past following us, the same way the shadow is behind the boy and still attached and shadows "follow" us. Detention is a Comedy Thriller about a murderer who dresses up as a character from the fictional film "Cinderhella" and tries to kill the main character. In the opening scene, Taylor Fisher, the school "bitch" is getting ready for school and showing us her guide to not being a total reject. At the end of the scene, Cinderhella murders her.
After, the scene cuts to a wide shot/birds eye shot with writing on the screen. The fact that we have an acronym of the word "bitch" tells us immediately that this is a comedy film. In the mise en scene, most of the surroundings are pink which connotes femininity and a young female. The camera then pans up to show the poster of the band she is talking about that is above her head. The poster contrasts in the mise en scene because while most other objects are pink, the poster is dark and gloomy. Now we have the shot switching and is seen panning down to the alarm, and she is seen hitting the alarm. Most of the surround colours are purple and pink and again connotes young femininity.
We are particularly interested in Psychological Thrillers as we enjoy watching them and feel that they are a good way of showing suspense. This is most likely the sub genre that we are going to choose for our piece. If we don't do this we will do Supernatural Thrillers as these are also quite interesting, and something that we watch, however there are certain supernatural effects in this type of Thriller that may be very challenging to recreate.
We created a mind map in order to explore and examine the sub genres in order to see the different aspects of each one and decide which we liked best. While Caitlin liked conspiracy thrillers, Georgia liked the idea of an apocalyptic type disaster thriller because of it's connotations and dark atmosphere. Low angle shot This shot shows the object from a lower angle than the eye line. It is often used to show power of a character or that they are important. Low angle shots are very powerful in the way they can emphasise just how scary or intimidating a villain is. This could make the actors in the film and the audience feel weak and insignificant. Close ups This shows a certain part of someones face. It can be used to show a certain detail that may be otherwise missed. This is used to see the reactions on the actors face. This shot shows the most emotion from the character and captures the important details from the scene. Oblique angle The oblique angle consist of the camera being tilted the making the shot look askew. This creates a feeling of chaos and uneasiness. Establishing Shot An establishing shot shows where the characters are and where the film is set. An example of this would be a wide shot of Paris. Reaction shot This is used to show someone reacting to seeing or hearing something. This angle is used so you can see the actors expressions. High angle/Birds eye The camera is positioned from high up, looking down on the subject. This is mainly used to make a character look small and therefore weak and vulnerable. Over the shoulder shot The over the shoulder shot is used so it allows the audience to feel like they are in the scene. This can also be used when there is someone scary behind the actor and you can see the actors reaction when they turn around. The camera angles we are hoping to use are over the shoulder shot, close ups and low angle shots. We like these because they are quite simple, however they also look very effective.
A thriller is designed to keep the viewer or reader on the edge of their seat with suspension and action. It is a large genre, as it often overlaps with other genres, for example mysteries are often thrillers. Thrillers usually involve lots of plot twist to keep the audience unaware of what is going to happen. Often, thrillers have very complex plots to keep the audience's attention on the film for the whole time, afraid that if they look away, they'll miss something. The dictionary definition of a thriller is: "a novel, play, or film with an exciting plot, typically involving crime or espionage." An example of a thriller is "Scream"
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