My first project

Our first project was to practice filming and get to grips with using the camera and editing our piece. We filmed it within the school building, we had to film somebody walking along a corridor, walking in and out of a room and then to film two people having a conversation. This was a challenge considering there was only two of us that were doing the task so it made filming difficult. I filmed Joanne walking down the corridor and walking in and out of a room, this helped me as I got to get a feel of filming. When it came to having a conversation it was difficult as we had to plan who would turn the camera on to come and sit down without making it look like they'd just turned on the camera. When it came to editing it was also an experience as neither of us were used to using the equipment, some of the effects we added really made a difference to our clip as it added suspense and tension when needed. Having done this task, its now given us a feel of the equipment and technology we have to use and next time we film it will be much easier. We also have decided that next time we film we will work in a group of more than 2 and will therefore make filming much easier.

Famous Thriller movies-

• The Godfather
• Inception
• Pulp Fiction
• The Dark Knight
• Rear Window
• Fight Club
• Psycho
• The Usual Suspects
• The Silence of the lambs
• Taxi Driver
• Vertigo
• The Shining
• The Departed
• The Prestige
• Strangers on a train
• Jaws

Thriller themes


The themes of thrillers frequently include:

• Terroism
• Politics
• Conspiracy
• Pursuit
• Romantic triangles or dysfunctional relationships that lead to murder

Conventions of the thriller genre


The thriller genre contains a number of typical conventions including:

• Mystery
• Suspense
• Tension
• Plot twists- they engage the audience and retain their interest
• An atmosphere- dark, terror, paranoia
• Heroes and villians
• Conventionally they have a 'happy ending'

Typical thriller characters often include-

• Criminals
• Stalkers
• Assassins
• Innocent victims
• Characters with dark, mysterious pasts
• Mentally disturbed and psychotic individuals
• Terroists
• Police
• People involved in twisted relationships
• Disillusioned individuals who want to take revenge on society
• A hero with a mysterious past or a point to prove to society

Crime Thriller

• This sub genre is a hybrid of both crime, thrillers and often action.
• It offers the viewer a suspenseful account of a successful or failed crime(s).
• They focus on the criminal(s) point of view (narrative) rather than a policeman or a victim's.
• Crime thrillers usually empahsize action over psychology aspects.
• Central topics of the sub genre include serial killers/murderers, robberies, chases, shootouts, heists and double-crosses which lead to violence.

Psychological Thriller

• The conflict between the main characters is mental and emotional, rather than physical.
• There is usually a violent resolution as there is some psychological imbalance.
• Alfred Hitchcock was famous for creating psychological thrillers including Psycho.

Action Thriller

• Action thrillers contain- Suspense, conspiracies, the plot usually revolves around fights, action and revenge.

Political Thriller

• They contain plots that revolve around conspiricies.
• The hero/heroine fights to ensure the stability of government/organisation that employs him/her.
• They often have tense power struggles and conflict.

COLLATERAL

We watched 10 minute clips of five movies, Collateral, Kill Bill, Perfume : Story of a murder, Psycho and Batman- The Dark Knight and had to analyse a few things in particular. Things such as the interesting types of camera angles, scenes which created tension and suspense for the audience and the pace of the movie.
All five movies were very different, the first movie we watched was the opening scene from Collateral.

A cab driver finds himself the hostage of an engaging contract killer as he makes his rounds from hit to hit during one night in Los Angeles. He must find a way to save himself and one last victim.

This movie was one of the hardest to analyse as we were watching only 10 minute clips it was hard to get to grips with the story line straight away.

The interesting camera angles I picked up on were firstly:

• A close up face shot with the blurred city lights behind him, the colours and reflections enabled the audience to create an atmosphere for them.

• The camera switched from person to person a lot of the time, creating a tense and exciting feel.
• When the car was upside down and the camera was inside the car, this was great as it made everything seem so real and it created a real sense of fear not only for the audience but because it was so real you could feel the fear of the characters.
• Smoke slowly drifting in front of the camera created a nice effect, it gave a mysterious feel.
• When the police officer discovers the body in the car, the camera really zooms in. This is effective as you are not expecting it.
• Another thing I found really effective was when the man was running towards the camera, this really built up the tension and as someone in the audience it was exciting for me as it felt like he was running towards me.
• When the camera zoomed in on the lit up mobile phone was effective as it was a key object at this point in the movie, it was something which he was relying on and the camera really showed this.
• Also when he enters the building and the camera closes in on him swiping the card for him to get in to the other part of the building. When the camera zooms in on this, it clearly tells the audience that it’s a key part; in this case, he wasn’t supposed to be entering the building.
• We also looked into the parts of the movie that created tension and suspense for the audience:
• The lighting being very dim at several parts in the movie created tension as a lot of it was set at night and gave it a more mysterious feel.
• The police cars driving past, flashing lights and sirens created suspense and tension as it emphasised either trouble or danger.
• The car chases in the movie were exciting and kept the audience gripped.
• The music was fast, tense and exciting.
• The characters running and all you could hear was them breathing, this created a real sense of tension as you had no idea what to expect next.
• The phone ringing and the waiting of the person to pick up created a lot of tension and suspense for me personally.
• When there was no music being played, just pure silence was also another key thing for me that created an awful lot of tension and suspense.

PERFUME- THE STORY OF A MURDER

Finally, the last movie we watched was a thriller called Perfume- The story of a murder.  Its a story of a man born in the stench of the 18^th century. He develops a superior olfactory sense, which he uses to create the world’s finest perfumes. His work, however, takes a dark turn as he tries to preserve scents in the search for the ultimate perfume.

I very much enjoyed the clip I watched of this movie and found it very interesting analysing the particular things.

• The camera angles which I found interesting in this movie were:
• The close up shots of the potions being made.
• The close up of his eyes, this gave a really creepy feel.
• All the dead women that were filmed were naked, this was interesting and also created a very creepy, mysterious feel.
• The murderer being seen through the door but the shadow that is created only allows the audience to see one side of his face, this was very effective.

Tension and Suspense:

• The music was fast and tense at certain points throughout.
• Everyone putting locks on their doors, this was very cleverly done as you could hear the clicks of the locks, this created a lot of tension for the audience.
• The concentration in his eyes when he was creating and arranging the potions.
• The dark alley created tension, purely because it was dark, quiet and she was on her own.
• The main thing for me that created suspense and tension in this movie from what I saw was the clip from in the maze. There was no music being played and all you could hear was the breathing from the characters. The audience knowing that the murderer was in the maze also created a lot of suspense.

PSYCHO

The next movie was Psycho, a thriller from 1960 directed by Alfred Hitchcock. You could tell this movie was from 1960 as it was very different to the others, very old fashioned and it was filmed in black and white.

The interesting camera angles I picked out were:

• The shadows created on the walls and as the movie was filmed in black and white it almost created more of an effect.
• The close up of objects that were clearly very relevant at the certain points in the movie.
• The close up of the number plate on the car just before he pushes it into the swamp.
• The car slowly moving was an interesting shot as usually when cars are being filmed it’s a fast atmosphere.
• The close up of the letter, this portrayed to the audience that it was clearly an important object.

• When the camera was moving backwards in the room, the room slowly was getting bigger, creating a sense of space.
• At one point there was a mirror in the background and the man was being filmed just in front of the mirror, the mirror being there enabled the audience to see more as they could see a lot of what was going on in the mirror.

Tension and suspense was created an awful lot in this movie:

• The fact that it was black and white created tension as it had a very dull feel.
• The music was definitely a key factor; it was very loud tense music at points throughout.
• The turning off of lights and the music getting faster built up a lot of tension.
• When the music suddenly stopped, it left the audience on the edge of their seats dying to know why the music has suddenly stopped and what is going to happen next.
• The fading of scenes.                                                                                      
• The fast, sharp music and the flicking of scenes created a lot of tension.

THE DARK KNIGHT

The next movie we watched was The Dark Knight, Batman, Gordon and Harvey Dent are forced to deal with the chaos unleashed by an anarchist mastermind known only as the Joker, as it drives each of them to their limits. I love this movie and I found there were some really interesting camera angles such as:

• Close ups on the characters made it clear to the audience how they were feeling, it really emphasized their emotions.
• When the camera was moving through the city, this was a really interesting shot as it was at night so was therefore dark and gave a very mysterious, creepy feeling.
• The close up shots of the two characters holding hands, this quite clearly showed the audience the feelings being portrayed.
• The close up of Bruce with the city lights behind him, this was interesting as it created a lot of depth.
• The close up of the Jokers face, this was a great camera shot as you could see in detail his facial expressions.
• During this movie there was an awful lot of tension and suspense created, the ones in particular I picked up on were:
• The music being played throughout was very tense and a lot of the time it was being built up to something big.
• The lighting was dim which created mystery.
• The awkwardness and hate between the characters at certain points in the film definitely created a lot of tension.
• The jokers evil laugh.
• I found Batman’s deep voice created suspense.
• The masks which the characters wear also create a lot of tension and suspense as they have hidden identities.

KILL BILL

The interesting camera angles that particularly grabbed my attention:

• Close up face shots are very effective as it’s making it all about that character, also it emphasises the emotion the character is feeling.
• At the beginning of the movie, there is a close up of the woman’s face and a wandering hand, you cannot see who the hand belongs to. This works really well and is effective due to the fact that it keeps the audience guessing and makes them want to continue watching.
• There were a few camera angles where you could only see the characters outline and around them was complete darkness. This gave a very mysterious feel, almost creepy. It also creates a very tense atmosphere, keeping the audience glued for what’s about to happen next.
• There is a close up shot of a finger on a doorbell; I personally felt that this suggested that it was going to be a big and quite important scene. It turned out to be that exactly, a very tense fighting scene that had a lot of relevance to the story.
• After this fighting scene took place the camera focused on her feet walking back through the smashed glass all over the floor, the sound of her carefully treading backwards through the glass made the scene very tense.
• There is one point at the beginning of the movie where the camera is set over two rooms, bird’s eye view. It was very effective but also made me as the audience feel I had to concentrate as there was more to focus on.

I then looked in to the clips that created tension and suspense:
 

• The first scene is a woman heavily breathing and it’s being filmed in complete darkness. For the audience, it’s exciting, keeps them watching as they want to know who it is, and why there heavily breathing.
• Footsteps slowly getting louder creates tension, keeps the audience gripped.
• A wandering voice, the camera is not actually on the character speaking, this gives a very mysterious feel; it also creates suspense, where is the voice coming from? Who is it?
• There is a gunshot then the opening credits follow, its unexpected.
• The music is tense during the fighting scenes, keeps the audience interested. The music makes the fighting scenes seem so much more exciting as the music really emphasises the tension between the two characters.
• People whispering rather than speaking aloud, creates a tense atmosphere as it gives a secretive feel.
• The pace of the movie is generally quite fast, the fighting scenes are quick and tense, and the music really shows this.