Thriller Audiences (Research)

Thriller Audiences

503 films where released in the Uk in 2009

31 (4%) of these where Suspense/Thriller films...
Genre Gross : £42,578,108
The top three films that year: 

1. Angels and Demons - (age rated; 12A) 
2. Knowing-  (age rated; 15)
3.  Harry Brown  (age rated; 18)

Why are thrillers popular with people?

According to http://www.filmsite.org/thrillerfilms.html the main reasons why thrillers are so popular is because:

• They provide thrills and suspense
• They keep the audience at the edge of their seats as the plot builds towards a climax
• the main character(s) is placed in a menacing situation or mystery, or an escape or dangerous mission in which the escape seems impossible their life is threatened, usually because the main character is unsuspecting or unknowingly involved in a dangerous or potentially deadly situation
• thrillers keep the emphasis away from the gangster, crime, or the detective in the crime-related plot, focusing more on the suspense and danger that is generated
• Characters in thrillers include convicts, criminals, stalkers, assassins, down-on-their-luck losers, innocent victims (often on the run) etc.

The themes of thrillers frequently include terrorism, political conspiracy, pursuit, or romantic triangles leading to murder. These are all things faced by individuals in the audienece troughout their everyday life making it easier for them to feel empathy/ sympathy for a character.

Psycho-thriller - audiences (Research)

Psycho-Thriller Audiences

Since most psychothrillers are still produced by mainstream institutions there will be certain basic gratifications that will apply such as....

Star Appeal;, eg. Brad Pitt and Morgan Freeman in Seven.
Diversion;, Basic entertainment or pleasure from the narrative.
Personal Identity;, As Se7en is seemingly more 'complex' than other typical Hollywood films that use Star appeal, people may associate themselves with this film to appear more intelligent.

Personal relationships;, Sin City and Se7en are bothcommerciallypopular and as such, people may watch the film for social purposes, to be able to engage in social conversations about the film.

However there may be other gratifications such as.......

Transgressive pleasures - This is where voyeurism (watching something through anothers perspective, often the lead characters, that we are not 'supposed' to see) provides pleasure. Eg. Watching Marion Crane through the 'peep hole' that we see Norman using.

Enigma of revealing the mystery or crime through a clue based narrative may be one of the biggest pleasures (Barthes HERMANUTIC CODE). Eg. Seven through its seven deadly sins.

Visceral Thrill and Oneiric feel

Since it is more "complex" and deep, sometimes villains can be ambiguous or sympathized with, eg. (seven) where John doe explains the art of his crime and makes fun of Brad. Because of this most of these films tend to be rated R.
Or a simple gratification may be the binary oppositions between brad and freeman or the battle between Freeman and Johndoe's battle.

In Psycho, the male roles are 'active' as they advance the plot. The woman is still the victim. In Seven, the role of women in the film is less significant than the males, like Psycho they are often victims. Therefore It could be argued that a male audience would be more attracted to this genre as they can identify or aspire to the 'tough', 'cool' or 'desirable' male representation.
However in Sin City, a contemporary text, there is a more prominent and 'active' role for females (for example the dominance of women in Old Town). However the film also draws upon the traditional and somewhat sexist use of women as sex objects and victims.

The target audience of many psycological thrillers are 15/18+. This is because they usually include a lot of violence and psycological issues which can be very disturbing for many younger viewers. There are usually warnings at the back of a dvd stating the reasons for the rating e.g. Violence, Drugs and Sexual scenes.


Films With a Similar Target Audience 
‘Vacancy’ directed by Nimrod Antal

• ‘Memento’ directed by Christopher Nolan

• ‘Fatal Attraction’ directed by Adrian Lyne

• ‘American Psycho’ directed by Mary Harron

• ‘Se7en’ directed by David Fincher

• ‘Rear Window’ directed by Alfred Hitchcock

• ‘Silence of the Lambs’ directed by Jonathon Demme

Filming Diary; Kudiwa Makarawu

We have finished filming, but we still have a lot to do with so little time. Next lesson we must spend editting the clips on live cut pro, and if possible we must try to get some sound into our title sequence. With so much to do, im am on my tip toes as to how our final product will turn out.

To do list;

• Titles including the main title
• Sound edits
• Voice overs for beginning

This week of 14th really needs a lot of time and focus which we must bring to the table; with this we can have a perfect product complete even before our deadline. I have faith that me and my group will do this.

Our deadline is Friday 25th March 3pm

Introduction to camera skills

In our lesson we where introductory to the cameras we would be working with during our Thriller filming. In this lesson we learnt the safety, and the correct ways in which to use the camera.

 inserting the memory card; We where given two memory cards which hold approx 2hours of filming, these are placed into slots A and B... both of them should be in both slots in case one runs out of memory it will automatically switch to the second slot.

  inserting the battery correctly; when inserting the battery, you must slide it into place towards the right of the camera

To put the camera on to the tripod; make sure it is securely on so it does not fall off during filming.

To adjust the tripod, release the locks on the foot and pull or push depending on the length you desire the securely lock into place.

 

Prelim Camera main shots/ Research

Camera shots

 Ecu-Extreme close up

You would normally need a specific reason to get this close. It is too close to show general reactions or emotion except in very dramatic scenes.

 

Two-shot

Two-shots are good for establishing a relationship between subjects.

A two-shot could also involve movement or action. It is a good way to follow the interaction between two people without getting distracted by their surroundings.

Over the Shoulder shot

This shot is framed from behind a person who is looking at the subject. The person facing the subject should usually occupy about 1/3 of the frame.

This shot helps to establish the position of each person, and get the feel of looking at one person from the other's point of view.

It's common to cut between these shots during a conversation, alternating the view between the different speakers

 Ms-Mid shot

The mid shot shows some part of the subject in more detail, whilst still showing enough for the audience to feel as if they were looking at the whole subject. In fact, this is an approximation of how you would see a person "in the flesh" if you were having a casual conversation. You wouldn't be paying any attention to their lower body, so that part of the picture is unnecessary.

Prelim film Evaluation

Prelim Evaluation

We made changes in the way that we Incorporated our brief, instead of using a room we used a lift as part of our mise en scene.

Our Prelim did not have any connection with our final film, but it gave us a chance to explore the different ways of creating an effective Thriller with minimal props,characters and mise en scene. This short film is about a girl who is waiting for a lift to the 4th floor, she is unaware that she is going to take a trip with a murderer who kills his victims if they are not to take a stop at the forth floor.
Filming our prelim was quite difficult because we filmed it in college where many students where around. This made is difficult to incorporate certain things in our film because we where not able to go to certain floor because too many students where there and this would have distracted our filming.
Although we have not used the same idea for our final title sequence, we have used the same sub genre which is Psychological thriller. We have played with the idea manipulating an everyday object/routine of using the lift into a thriller aspect.
Sound;
Our film did not have any Non diegetic sounds, this was mainly because of the time we had on our hands. This was both an advantage and a disadvantage because, without non diegetic sounds it is harder for us to set the mood of the film. The advantage of not using these is that our dialogue was clear. With more time to edit our film, our film would have had sound effects for certain sounds in the film e.g. Smoke puff, lift opening, the lift being opened. This would have been very effective because it would have given us the opportunity to amplify or distraught certain sounds to create an uneasy feeling.

Edit;
I would not say our editing is at its best, a lot of our shots cut suddenly and not smoothly. If we wanted to fix this we could use different transitions to fit with our clip. We effectively used Match cut to show a mid shot of one of the characters smoking into a close up of him inhaling the smoke. We used the flashback effect by rewinding the beginning so that our character is doing things backwards then this fades into our next shot. This makes is seem as though our character's life has been rewinded to show the events before he was smoking.

During the first part of the film we see a person smoking yet the way things happen in these two shots is backwards. This plays with the idea of making the normal abnormal, which is the main element we have stuck which in our final film.

Mise en scene;
We have used casual clothing, this represents that the characters each are following their own agenda of their daily routine. The casual clothing also show a representation of their age (teenagers) and period of time (21st century). The lighting in all of the shots is natural without edits, this was one of the areas of our film we where disappointed with. The natural lighting made different shot which where meant to link together not fit smoothly. The characters use different body language to reveal aspects of their character...

This character connotes someone very shy              

   or someone who is scared. This is shown                     

through their lack of eye contact.                               

This character connotes a happy person

or someone who is very confident shown;

 through his smile and eye contact.

Camera;
We used close ups to get the facial expressions of the characters in reaction to new surroundings and certain dialogue. Over the shoulder shot to show the two character's conversation, the main reason of doing this is we get to see how the character is being impacted by what is being said by the other. Low and high angle shots are used to show the status of the characters, also used to emphasise the fear one has towards the other. We use camera tilt to build suspense at the end of the film, the character talks down someone/ something not shown on the screen. A dead body is slowly revealed in a slow tilt down.

Camera,Edit, mise en scene and Sound all play a very big part in effectively creating suspense in our film. The mistakes and errors and also the skills and techniques used in our prelim will go on to be used in our final film.

PRODUCTION: Shoot photos

to b uploaded