Thriller Questionnaire

In order to create an effective and well produced thriller, we created a 20 question questionnaire to give to people aged 15 years and up (as our thriller will be certificate 15). By doing this, it helped us to understand what our target audience wanted to see from our thriller film.

1) Are you male or female?

2) How old are you?

15-25 26-35 36-45 46+

3) What is your favourite thriller film?

Seven  Red Eye  Silence of the Lambs  Jaws

4) What type of music genre would you like to hear in a film?

Rock  Classical  Metal  Industrial  Metal  Dubstep

5) What music would you relate to a thriller film?

Rock  Classical  Metal  Industrial  Metal  Dubstep

6) What’s your favourite colour?

Black Blue Green Red Yellow Purple White

7) What scares you most?

Spiders Darkness Blood Footsteps Ticking clocks Heartbeat

8) What time of day do you think is most suitable for the setting of a thriller?

Morning Afternoon Evening Night

9) Do you prefer the narrative to be slow or fast paced?

10) What kind of location do you think is most suitable for a thriller?

House at night  Forest  Alley

11) What font is most suitable for a thriller?

Thriller Thriller Thriller Thriller

12) Would you prefer a thriller title to be short and simple or long and detailed?

13) What is your least favourite thriller?

Seven Red Eye Silence of the Lambs Jaws

14) Should the editing be fast or slow paced, and why?

15) Would you rather characters remain concealed during the opening or not?

16) Should the narrative be linear or non-linear?

17) What scares you least?

Spiders Darkness Fear Footsteps Ticking clocks Heartbeat

18) What is your least favourite colour?

Black Blue Green Red Yellow Purple White

19) Do you think that sound effects have an impact on the atmosphere of a thriller?

20) Do you think the lighting in a thriller should be low-key or high-key?

Certificate Rating for Thriller

Our film will be the '15' age rating. The reason for this is because none of the group members are over 18 and therefore cannot legally watch a '18' film unsupervised. As it is a '15' there will not be excessive (or no) amounts of gore and/or foul language as well as no nudity or any other things disturbing to those under the age of 18. Due to it getting dark early during British winter time, we will film the bulk or all of our thriller indoors. Instead of using teenage characters, we will use adult actors.

Initial Planning - Thriller Ideas

To enable us to understand what our group wanted to do for our own thriller film, we created a mind map of all our individual ideas. By doing this it helped us to experiment with different ideas for our thriller. As you can see from this mind map, individual ideas can be put together to make different thriller ideas. This helped us to decide on our final thriller idea.

Thriller Analysis - Red Eye

Thriller Analysis

  Red Eye

Narrative Structure

Linear narrative

Thriller Codes and Conventions

Concealment and protraction – no one’s face is seen in opening sequence

Question and Answer Model – Who are they? What is in the box? Who is looking at the pictures? What are they for?

Partial vision – No faces are seen during credits

Transformed City – Cab/ crowded city

Camerawork

Close ups of wallet/ belongings

Phone conversation – Shot reverse shot

Focus turned to wallet instead of pictures – zoom in

Mise-En-Scene

Night time – Stormy weather, ominous

Woman seems stressed but seems safe as she is surrounded by people in airport

Family photographs – girl seems like model student

Wallet placed down- attention drawn as wallet is then taken away quickly

‘South Florida Sun Seafoods’ – An idea of location?

It is known that the father or daughter is the victim from seeing the wallet – cards are thrown away but pictures are kept.

Angry man in line

Intimidating man in queue

Woman in combat boots

Sound

Diagetic – dialogue

Non-diagetic – Music, dramatic

                         Sound of plane during credits – related to film

                         Music tense and loud as suspense builds then makes a sudden stop

                          Sound becomes louder as wallet is taken

Editing

Fast paced during conversation

Fast paced opening title

Graphics

Fades out

Typewriter print – white on black

Centre placement

‘Red Eye’ – Bold and red on black – Red signifying danger and related to film title

Thriller Analysis - Silence of the Lambs

The Silence of the Lambs

Narrative Structure

Linear narrative

Thriller Codes and Conventions

Questions and answer model

Concealment – Why is the woman shocked? What is the woman looking at? Who is approaching her?

Maze and Labyrinth – The woman could be lost as she looks confused and disorientated.

Questions become answered midway through opening

Camerawork

Tracking shot – MCU of woman’s face

Long shots

Close up/ Extreme close ups add mystery

Establishing shots of both training camp and training centre – show location to inform audience

Camera placed to track running woman

CU’s of feet running – could signify panic or hysteria

Mise-En-Scene

High key lighting – less intimidating

Woman could be seen as a vulnerable character as she is alone in the woods

Reaches new scene – Audience can see more and are less scared

Mist in forest – Suspense created

Woman looks lost in the open space – lots of trees, empty and alone feeling

Transformed character – Woman goes from looking vulnerable to strong as scene changes from the forest to the training centre.

Words seen on tree – ‘Hurt, agony, Pain, Love’ are related to conventions of generic thrillers

Sound

Diagetic – Dialogue, footsteps on leaves, heavy breathing (suspense building)

Non Diagetic – Music is calming for the first few seconds then builds up suspense as woman builds up speed.

Editing

Fade in from black to first image

Long shots, relatively slow paced editing.

Establishing shots fade in from previous shot

Graphics

Block capitals – Black and white used as it stands out on the busy background

Font on picture – Establishes location

Seven - Analysis Notes

Narrative Structure

·         Follows generic thriller storyline

·         Theory of equilibrium

·         Non linear

·         Audience immediately faced with questions

Thriller Codes and Conventions

·         Question and Answer model – Who are they? What are they doing and why?

·         Concealment – Face is hidden

·         Transformed City

·         Protraction – Partial vision

Camerawork

·         Sequence – Close up / extreme close ups

·         Slow zooms

·         Short shots

·         Various angles

Mise-En-Scene

·         Low key lighting

·         Black and white

·         Red slides/ wash

·         Person creating book

·         Person stitching

·         Person deleting words from book

Sound

·         Diagetic – Dialogue, metronome, tv, radio

·         Non Diagetic – Suspense building music.

Editing

·         Fast paced – typical of Thriller

·         Beat match – Match actions to music/sound effects

·         Collage

·         Double vision – Camera shakes

Graphics

·         Text – Some look handwritten/ stamped/ sketchy

·         Printed

·         Flashing – Confusion

·         Text in white

What is a Thriller? Notes

                       

What is a Thriller?

   A broad genre of television, literature, or film that involves suspense, tension, excitement and mystery to appeal to an audience.

Sub-genres of Thrillers:

·         Psychological  - Donnie Darko (2001)

·         Crime – Seven (1995)

·         Supernatural- Carrie (1976)

·         Action- Silence of the Lambs (1991)

·         Medical-

·         Erotic-Eyes Wide Shut (1999)

·         Horror-The Exorcist (1973)

·         Political-The Contender (2000)

·         Religious- The Da Vinci Code (2006)

·         Disaster- The Day After Tomorrow (2004)

·         Legal – A Time To Kill (1996)

Martin Rubin – ‘Thrillers’ (1999)

·         C K Chesterton – The Transformed City

·         British author

·         Modern genre set mainly in urban environments

·         ‘poetry in modern life’

·         Transforms the ordinary into the extraordinary

Northrop Frye – The Heroic Romance

·         Hero is almost always an ordinary person

·         Ordinary person is forced to behave in extraordinary ways because of his situation

·         “Moves the world in which ordinary laws of nature are suspended slightly”

·         Enchanted forest – Modern city

John Cawelti – The Exotic

Modern city – enchantment and mystery                            

·        

·         Intro of the familiar

·         Location

·         Artefacts/objects /props from the middle East/Orient

W H Matthews – Mazes and Labyrinths

·         Origins- Greek mythology

·         Hero often finds themselves in an extraordinary situation

·         Faced with mazes full of dead ends and twists in order to reach the villain

·         Audience are presented with hero’s puzzles and problem solving

Pascal Bonitzer – Partial Vision

·         Audience only see so much

·         Elements hidden to create suspense for the viewer

·         Blind spots leave unanswered questions for the audience

·         ‘What we don’t see is just as important as what we do see’

·         Character is placed in an ‘unlimited prison’

Lars Ole Saurberg – Concealment and Protraction

·         Suspense works in 2 ways to pull the audience in different directions:

·         Concealment – Hiding something from the audience

·         Protraction – Deliberate delaying of a suspected outcome ie. A bomb explosion/a planned killing

Noel Carroll- The Questions-Answer Model

·         Audience are presented with questions that they wait in suspense for the answer ie. Will the hero die?/ Who is the killer?

1.       Probability factor – A ‘sure thing’ is less exciting than the battle against the odds.

2.       Moral factor – Morally right outcome increases involvement

·         Maintains focus and interest