Prelim Evaluation

The amount of time it took us to shoot the whole of our preliminary work was roughly an hour and a half. I think for the amount of time we were given for this task and for the amount of knowledge we had in this subject, the end result was encouraging. The dialogue throughout the task was irrelevant so we took this as an opportunity of humour. The shots we used include:

• Long shot
• Medium shot
• Close ups
• Extreme close ups

We wanted to use quite alot of shots to vary our skills and show that we have considered most of the shots into this task. The camera angles include:

• Eye level
• Low angle

There was not a particular reason for why we chose these angles. Camera movement included:

• Pans
• Zooming in
• Hand held

We chose hand held shots because we thought it would be the most challenging to keep the camera still and that specific type of movement fulfilled are expectations.



This shows the classic shot of me opening the door and the shot after that is to show myself and Luke walking into the room. It shows crosscutting well and focuses on where the subjects are going.

This shows a great example of how we used our extreme close up shot. We picked up on the tie being corrected and this shot not only gives an insight to what the character is like but also how well the camera man executed the shot.

I would say this is more of a close up then an extreme close up because it shows quite abit of the table that the mugs are on. This shows the objects that will be involved in the scene and we really liked this shot.

Overall I think we managed to complete our prelim task effectively, considering the time span we were given. The camera wasn't hard to use and neither was the tripod. We wanted to follow the rules we had been taught; 180 degree rule etc. Sound was uploaded and put into the sequence, we thought this piece of music by "Scouting for Girls" was appropriate due to the lyrics involving James Bond and our prelim including smartly dressed men and no actual subject. What i think we have learned most about this task is that EVERYTHING needs to be taken into account before filming. We never thought of lighting when we were shooting and we had to change location before we shot what we had initially wanted to film. The thing i would improve on for our prelim would be to involve more camera shots and angles. It would have been a sensible thing to do if we tried to cram the prelim task with as much as we knew but we didn't want to make it look distasteful.

There are many conventions used within a crime sub genre. One type of convention is the use of a villain character, as well as a good character. It would usually contain a bad character steeling valuables and the good guys would try to stop them. Another type is the location establishment; this would be within a bank or safe where the valuables would be kept. Mise en scene is used as the type of props and costumes used would be guns, usually dark clothing for the bad character and a cop type costume for the good character. This relates to the crime aspect as people committing crimes would be likely to own weapons and destroy anything or one who gets in their way.

Opening credits can vary between none at all, a title sequence, just the title or the credits showing over the action. Unfortunately, the times limit on my thriller of 2 minutes means and my showcase including my cinematography ability that I cannot afford the luxury of choosing which type of opening credits I will use. However, this just makes my job so much easier at the editing stage because I do not need to worry about how to show my credits, just what is in them.

The list below details the order in which the opening credits occur:

• (Name of the Distribution Studio)
• (Name of the Production Company)
• (Producer's Name) Production or/and (director only) A Film By (Director's Name)
• Starring - Principal actors.
• (Film's Title)
• Featuring- Featured actors.
• Casting
• Music or Music Composed By or Original Score By
• Production Design
• Editor
• Director Of Photography
• Producer - Often, though, the name of the producer will be the next-to-last opening credit, just before the director's name is shown.
• Story
• Writer
• Director

In using these credits and this order, my thriller's opening will conform to the conventions of professional film credits, but it will also help me to meet the mark scheme for the course.

Research and Summary on The Thriller Genre

Research and summaries of the Thriller genre

Uses and Gratifications Theory (PIES)

Personal Identity - finding reinforcement for personal values, finding models of behaviour, identifying with another (in media), gaining insight into ones self.

Information - finding out about relevant events and conditions in immediate surroundings, society and the world, seeking advice on practical matters or opinion and decision choices, satisfying curiosity and general interest, learning, self-education, gaining a sense of security through knowledge.

Entertainment - escapism, being diverted from problems, relaxing, emotional release, aesthetic/cultural/sexual pleasure, filling time.

 

Social Interaction and Integration - gaining insight into circumstances of others; social empathy, identifying with others and gaining a sense of belonging, finding a basis for conversation and social interaction, having a substitute for real life companionship, helping carry out social roles, enabling one to connect with family, friends and society.

Why do people watch thrillers?

Using the uses and gratifications theory we are able to see that thrillers are watched for entertainment, information, social interaction; integration and personal values, therefore are a popular genre.
People watch thrillers most importantly to be entertained and thrilled - this relates to escapism, and emotional release because you get so into the film that you forget about your own problems in life and escape into it, feeling the emotions expressed within the story. Thrillers are not particularly relaxing films as they create a lot of suspense so people wouldn't watch in order to relax. Like all films, thrillers are sometimes watched to fill time also.
People may watch a thriller film to gain an insight into others' circumstances and identify with others. Maybe someone they know is in a similar situation. They are also watched for social interaction and a basis for conversation. For example films are involved in social gatherings like trips to the cinema and film nights - this then creates a basis for conversation afterward. A thriller film in particular can generate conversation because thrillers are not only action-packed but take a lot of thought to work out. The psychological aspect of a thriller film aids conversation because people like to boast about working out the ending before their friends.
A further reason why people watch thrillers is to find models of behaviour. This is because there is usually a clear difference between good and evil in this genre which could influence people to act heroically by identifying with that certain character. In addition, a person may be able to gain insight into them by seeing similarities between a character and themselves.
Lastly, people may want to watch a thriller for information purposes. There generally isn't a great deal a person can learn from a thriller but occasionally historical or social events are explored. For example the event of global warming is explored in many thrillers like 'The Day After Tomorrow'. Society around the world can be explored as thrillers can involve a lot of travelling, therefore seeing different parts of the world's differences. You can learn a lot about human behaviour by self-educating and gain security through this knowledge.

In 2009, out of the 503 total films released in the UK, 31 were thrillers, taking 4% of the year’s box office earnings with £42,578,104. The most popular thrillers were Angels and Demons, Harry Brown and Knowing. I think that one of the main reasons that thrillers took a relatively small percentage of the total box office earnings is because not that many people (in terms of all cinema goers) watch thrillers.
One of the main thriller subgenres is psychological. These types of films are often quite hard to understand, and usually feature more dialogue and storyline than action and excitement; meaning that most young people aged 12-18 (who are the most frequent cinema goers) would probably not enjoy these films.
Another reason that some people do not watch thrillers in the cinema is because they can’t. Many modern thrillers feature violence or other things (such as explicit language), which means they have an age restriction of 15 or 18. This automatically cuts a significant amount of potential viewers for these films, as it is illegal for people under the required age to see them. Also, most types of thrillers tend to appeal more to men than women, while other the other way around, although this is not as true for thrillers as for some genres (such as action Sci-Fi for men, and romance/drama for women).

STATS on questionnaire

This was to show how our STATS were recieved and processed from our questionnaire

Questionnaire about thriller films/movies                                                Name:

1. What gender are you?                 Male                    Female 

2. What age group do you represent?        15-20           21-30           31-45+

3. Please list a few of your favourite thrillers?

4. What do you consider to make a good thriller? (please tick)

• Impressive non-diegetic sound
• Special effects
• Good camera work
• high-quality acting
• good quality lighting

5. How many times during a month would you watch a thriller movie?

6. Are you currently in further education at school?

No

Yes

7. Who would you say are typical actors/actresses to appear in thriller films?

8. Who would be someone you would likely to watch a thriller movie with?

Boyfriend/Girlfriend 

Family 

Friend’s 

Grandmother 

9. Where would you expect a thriller movie to be set?

Town

City

Forest

Countryside

Other ________________________

10. What other conventions do you think a thriller should contain? (Please state below)

11. Who do you consider to be the hottest actress within the thriller film industry?

12. What is your favourite type of thriller genre??

13. What is the average rating of film you would watch?

12 

12A 

15 

18 

R rated 

Thank you for taking the time out to read through and fill in this questionnaire. Here at JLS production we pride ourselves on your opinion to try and make our company the best we can be. We also believe in equality and world peace.

 Productions Ltd.

These were the questions asked at people selected at random. We did this because we wanted our statistics to have a naturally occuring correlation.

Conventions Of A Thriller

American Beauty - A must see!

This opening sequence does use some of the typical conventions of the Thriller Genre. For example, in the dialogue used at the beginning of the scene, the main character, who we assume is speaking, says "..In less than a year...I'll be dead..". This, from the very beginning leaves us on sort of a cliff-hanger as it does not give any specific reasoning as to why he will be dead in a year, enticing the audience of this film to watch on and find this information out. Another convention used is the way in which the mood of the audience is played with straight away, by using death as an immediate topic within the monologue, which is very typical of this genre.

The dialogue used in the opening sequence is spoken in a fairly one-dimensional voice, giving a dull mood to the film from the very beginning. This use of dullness is reflected in the character, played by Kevin Spacey, as he is shown, through the camera angles/shots, Mise-en-Scene and editing which in this case is the soundtrack. The camera seems to mainly focus around the main characters and their actions, rather than the setting around them, which hints at the psychological side of the thriller genre, however, we are automatically shown the key setting of this opening from the very start with an establishing shot of the city in which Lester, the main character, lives. The first shot we see of Lester is when he's in bed. There is a use of a high angled shot looking down on him. This can already connote that he has no power within his life.

A key area that needs to be highlighted and that I would like to discuss is the soundtrack that is played over the top of the whole opening sequence. It is a score created by Thomas Newman, which creates quite a specific persona; a simple, repetitive theme, picked up through the continuous xylophone notes. This piece has no under lining bass at all. This possibly connoting the daily lifestyle of Lester's character.