GLOSSARY

GLOSSARY FOR THRILLER:

GENERAL TERMS CLOSE TO THRILLER

• scocophilia = sexual pleasure derived chiefly from watching others when they are naked or engaged in sexual activity; voyeurism.
• close-call = something nearly impacted
• close-shave = close to a shock
• shocker
• spine-chilling = fright
• narrow escape
• cliffhanger = ending of a chapter or story leaving more questions asked
• heart stopper
• hairbreadth escape
• near miss
• near go
• squeaker
• suspense
• agog
• uneasy
• anxious
• edgy = tense, nervous or irritable
• overwrought = in a state of nervous excitement or anxiety
• jittery = nerovus or unable to relax
• horror
• fright = fear and scare
• crime
• death
• demise = a person's death

AUDIENCE

• Target audience = the type of audience producers or film-makers are aiming at
• Niche audience = small selected group of people with a unique taste
• Mainstream audience = groups of people with similar tastes/trends.
• Audience research = investigating about our viewers and their wants
• Focus group = A focus group is a form of qualitative research in which a group of people are asked about their perceptions, opinions, beliefs, and attitudes towards a product, service, concept, advertisement, idea, or packaging.
• Quantitative research = data that's number based
• Qualitative research = results that are sentence based, often involve opinions

 

CONVENTIONS OF A THRILLER

"A FILM THAT THRILLS. THRILLERS CAUSE THE VIEWER TO EXPERIENCE AGITATION, EXCITEMENT, ANXIETY, SUSPENSE, OR FEAR."

Thriller?

A thriller usually consists of a battle between the protagonist character and the antagonist, when there is a disruption in the equilibrium. Then the story shows a chain of bad events building tension and suspense for the climax. The aim of the protagonist is to restore justice, while the antagonist seeks to destroy it.

Watching a thriller is often a physical as well as a psychological experience; they can be breathtaking and spine-chilling. Despite being one of the most popular categories of film there is dispute over whether it is a genre in it's own right. Instead, some critics argue that it is a mode that cuts across different genres.

Often a crime is central to the plot and the key characters are criminals, forces or law, victims and bystanders with action centered around one or more of those groups.

Common conventions of thrillers:

• the purpose of startling, shocking, scaring and surprising the audience
• narrative twists and turns 
• misleading the spectator
• manipulation of point of view, editing and offscreen space
• cliffhangers
• dark, gritty settings
• use of shadow
• hap tic visuality (a sense of physical and touching or being touched created by the emphasis on the image's material presence).

Conventions used withing scenes:

• low-key lighting 
• quick cuts
• shadows
• tension music
• changes in the angle of shots
• diegetic sound of breathing
• non-diegetic sound to implement the clueless remark of the characters; making the viewers feel ahead, thus creates excitement for what is to come.
• black and white shots
• montage of shots
• protagonist is in the mercy on the antagonist

Cinematography of a thriller:

There will be a lot of close-ups and extreme close ups of the protagonist character, this is often to show their emotions. The shots of the antagonistic character will be cut quickly and will aim to hide their identity, e.g. a shot of the back of them, a low key shot, the silhouette, or shadow of the character. This discomforts the viewers as they are uncertain of the figure, which makes them more dangerous and fearful, as the unknown is always more haunting than the known.

Editing of a thriller:

The director will incorporate lots of jump cuts because there will be drama happening that the audience is unaware of but is essential for the film to make sense. Cross cutting is a key point in editing as it is used to build suspense which is essential for a thriller. The 180* degree point of view puts the viewers to shame as they are restricted from their peripheral vision allowing them to only vision what the characters are viewing, To embody the character's emotions and tasks to the audience, to make them feel apart. Accompanied by other editing such as discomforting music to really put off the viewers; taking them on a emotional roller coaster, as they could be certain at one point and not at the next.

Music and Sound editing of a thriller:

Music and sound is an essential part that plays the on the viewer's emotions the most. It signifies the climax of a certain point in a movie, or the pivotal change that causes the chain of events in a film to differentiate. The sound editing can also symbolise one of the character's identity. For example when the antagonist appears there will specific sounds dropped in the scene to highlight their oncoming appearance; almost as though the director wants their viewers to feel prepared for what's to come.

Misce En Scene:

• the location is important for the film because it helps the audience establish the theme (often uses busy streets and environment of is usually urban or suburban areas).
• lighting is often low-key
• costumes - antagonist will in dark clothes. Protagonist the 'casual' look; allowing the viewers to relate to them.
• composition
• make up and hair styles
• acting
• film stoke (black and white, or colour, fine-grain or grainy)

CINEMATOGRAPHY

26/09/14

IL AS MEDIA STUDIES

· What is cinematography?

Cinematography is the art of capturing images during the creation of motion pictures. The main focus of cinematography is capturing images for movies that are both beautiful and powerful in the way they drive narrative. When it comes to the visual design of a film, the cinematographer is usually a close collaborator with the film's director, and is generally the second highest ranked person in most movie crews.

For example: Cinematographers use lighting to manipulate the audience's emotions. 

· How could you improve the cinematography in one still from your film?

For my group’s film intro, in my opinion I think that it’s necessary to change the lighting of our film it’s established in; by dimming the amount of light the camera receives. It gives a darker spectacle and thus employs a grittier atmosphere. The techniques in our camera angles as well should be increased to provide all points perspective of our character’s activities and engagements.

· Give an example of a film that won best cinematographer at the Oscars; agree? Or disagree?

GRAVITY (2013) Best Cinematography for Lubezki

Agree: in terms of visual effects and high-resolution picture of the surroundings the characters are in this film has definitely deserved its award for having the best cinematography. We as the viewers, throughout the film experience the different types of camera angles and shots, from close-up shots to enhance the actors/actresses expressions to tracking shots to make us as the audience follow their disfigurements through space. Some of the focus is one-point perspective, significant to this film as their setting is indeterminate due to the lack of life present in the scenes, thus by putting the viewers in the seats of the characters it brings up the haptic visual responsiveness.

Disagree: the environment is very contained, so there’s lack of colours and experience with the outside milieu. Most of the time the characters are either stranded in the middle of space, or confined in a space shuttle. It lacks creativity and thus may not receive the ‘best cinematography award.

• Find out about the 180 degree rule

In film making, the 180-degree rule is a basic guideline regarding the on-screen spatial relationship between a character and another character or object within a scene. The object that is being filmed must always remain in the center, while the camera must always face towards the object.

BLOG

MONDAY: 08/09/14

For the first day of our film production the group and i compiled our thoughts and ideas on what makes a great thriller movie. One of the ideas is that genres and emotions such as fear and suspense is what gives ‘Thriller’ it’s excitement. Some argue that ‘thriller’ is more of a sub-genre rather than a film genre, a controversial debate which inspired our film idea. To produce a horror based movie introduction with a ‘thrilling’ theme.

TUESDAY: 09/09/14

On the second day. We brainstormed our ideas, and began creating our production list; which involves detailing about our venue and casting. As a part of my group works in that department a partner and I decided to write up the plot (including character names and their personality). Also taking in consideration the setting the character’s must be in to stimulate the ‘thriller’ excitement and genre.

THURSDAY: 11/09/14

On the last day of our planning, our group decided to set up all the props and equipment we needed, including certain apparels; also making sure our venue is safe to film on with no obstruction (weather etc.). Finalizing our plot and character dialogues was our next move, understanding where the story is heading, and what intentions we hope to create to engage the audience. Being assigned to our camera number and memory card we started to film early. After arriving at our setting to fictionalize our film intro we found out that the memory card was full, and therefore weren't able to film. Due to the lack of time we had left, we decided instead to go through the script, and film another time where appropriate.

FRIDAY: 12/09/14

This was our final shooting day, with minimal time to shoot our film, we recorded as soon as possible. Luckily everything was set according to plan and no mistakes occurred during our filming time. We went back to class as soon as we can, and started the editing process. During this process we came across many issues with the editing programmes which lagged time. This happened many times throughout the period, although certain arrangements with the videos, and cutting the unnecessary scenes from our filming were made there wasn't enough time to complete, and thus we have to finish bits of it at home, in preparation for next week, in which we have to prepare for exhibition. 

FRIDAY: 19/09/14

Today was exhibition day. Struggling to put through our movie file to a shared document, we had to do the conversion process once more. Running out of time to go through our film, checking whether the audio and edits are in place, we decided to leave that step. In the last moments of our lesson time, the group and i panicked as we had no movie to display. When the conversion was completed, it was only then did we find out that the movie couldn't be found anywhere in the school's shared documents. Fortunately our teacher decided to spare us more time by letting the other groups go first in displaying their films. During this time, thankfully our video was recovered from the documents, and from there our film was exhibited. We were given a sheet of paper that was boxed and labelled in terms of the 'oscar's awards' to mock-up the film awards ceremony. We had to nominate the other groups and decide which of the awards category did they achieve (for example 'best picture') giving a reason why.