EVALUATION

Evaluation Activity, Question One

Does your sequence follow/deviate from a conventional thriller's narrative content, format & style of presentation?

Our sequence does follow the forms and conventions of a thriller film genre by the narrative (or plot) having elements of suspense and thrill. our opening sequence being in black and white helps to contribute to the authenticity of the film. Our different shots, camera angles and editing techniques indicates that our thriller comes under the sub-genre of horror thriller. It uses mostly typical thriller characters, with an atypical character being the villainous child. Our thriller indicates that we have been influenced by films such as 'The Orphan' and 'The Ring'; as these thrillers have characters similar to the ages of ones in our thriller opening sequence we were able to use these particular movies as inspiration. Seeing as these are the thrillers that influenced us we decided to call our opening 'Inseparable' connotating something or a bond that cannot be broken, it relates to other films we've been influenced by because its catchy as it sounds dark and mysterious.

It establishes setting and location by having a high angle shot of cars on a motorway, showing that a journey has taken place. Our opening was mostly set in a domestic environment being the home as in a home you would believe you are safe, so we used this setting as we believed it would have a good impact as you wouldn't expect bad things to happen to you here. Themes are established when the mood changes by having creepy shots and the soundtrack changing to fit the mood of the action on screen, establishing the good and bad characters, protagonists and antagonists. We used editing such as speeding the antagonists head up because it contrasts reality by being unexpected and freaky. Our antagonist was wearing a black coat as black connotes fear, mystery and evil.

 

 

 Evaluation Activity, Question 4 (continued)

When our target audience viewed our thriller opening whilst it was in the post production process, they said that there were a few things which we needed to change. For example, they wanted us to make the title more interesting and eye-catching as at first it didn't really stand out from the background or stand out in general. They also said we needed to add more shots which were scary and adding to our sub-genre of psychological thriller, so we added the shot of our young girl - the antagonist - spinning her head and we speed this particular shot up so it had more of an impact. This influenced how we edited our opening as we wanted to have things which attracted our target audience, as these were the things that they wanted to see and liked we added them in.

 

   

Evaluation Activity, Question 7 (continued)

In some ways we subverted our codes and conventions by using a young female as an antagonist in our opening and by setting our opening sequence in a domestic environment. These things challenge the codes and conventions of thriller films as we don't expect to see them in thrillers which we normally see. Our reason for doing these things is that we believe it would capture and entertain our audience more by keeping them guessing and making them want to continue watching.