2. 1. In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media
products?
Our Horror thriller 'Till Death Do Us Part' incorporates
generic conventions of a real Thriller. Throughout the
two minutes of the beginning of our thriller film we
have tried to create tension and make the audience feel
like they are on the edge of their seat because they are
not sure what is going to happen throughout the rest of
the film. Our thriller film has followed conventions of
many Alfred Hitchcock thrillers such as '39 steps' and
'Notorious' where an innocent victim is placed into a
strange and life threatening situation due to mistaken
identity, misidentification or wrongful accusation. We
see this in our film when the woman is about to kill the
man and we hear 'No, No, I haven’t done anything to
you' this shows his innocence and that he has been
mistaken for someone else because she wants to kill
men that look like her ex lover until she finds him.
Our thriller challenges these conventions also as we decided
to make the woman the killer instead of the man which
challenges many thriller films as the woman is usually
always the weak victim trying to get away. However we
have made the woman a very strong and manipulative
character by presenting her in the colour red connoting
her as dangerous but also with the idea of lust and
seduction. The man is seen as a very weak character,
tied up and not being able to do anything to get away.
3. I think the location that we used to film the scenes when the
man and woman are together helps present the sub
genre as it is dark and isolated showing that she can hurt
him but no one will be able to hear or help him,
presenting a sinister atmosphere. It is quite rough and
dirty and looks like it has been abandoned, showing that
nobody goes there and makes the audience think about
how the characters have got there and why they are
there. Our shots have also been made quite quick which
helps to increase the tension and suspense as the fast
moving paste reinforces the sense of danger. The music I
think has also helped to indicate that our film is a horror
thriller as we used music which would bring a creepy
feeling to it such as the chopping waltz music that we
have used at the beginning and then the music at the end
of the two minutes has helped us present the danger and
the life threatening situation this victim is in due to this
woman.
I think the use of conventions that we have used would
indicate that our film is a Horror Thriller. This is
because we have tried to keep a few Horror conventions
to still keep it quite familiar to the audience but at the
same time something new and different. In the opening
of our film we have used quite a few close ups to help
the audience focus on the danger and make it come
across as more scary. We have also used quite a few mid
and long shots to help get across to the audience that
the victim is isolated and that no one can help him.
Presenting the feeling of tension and suspense. With
using these camera angles in the opening of our film I
think it will help to create danger and help the audience
know that it is a horror thriller film.
4. 2. How does your media product represent particular social groups?
In our film gender is not represented as stereotypical. This is
because we decided to go against the stereotypical idea
The social groups represented in the opening of our thriller that the man is the villain and the woman the victim and
film is a man and a woman which both look to be like make it so that the man is the victim and the woman is the
they are quite well off with the way in which they dress. villain. This is because we thought we should do it a bit
The woman is wearing a quite sexy but elegant red dress different and make the woman a strong and dominant
with high heels. We wanted her to look beautiful and character and the man the weak and passive character.
pristine to show that she would be able to lure men back We chose to do it this way because in our research we
to kill them. We also wanted her to look like this so that found that in most horror thrillers the woman was usually
it would come across that she doesn’t look like someone always a weak victim who had to try and get away and we
who would go round killing people, therefore no one felt that we wanted our audience to see something a bit
different to that conventional idea. Before we started
expecting her to be the one doing it. The way she dresses
filming , we thought about having our female villain as a
suggests that she usually dresses quite well inferring blonde woman. This is because we wanted to completely
that she has the money to look nice. The man also looks contrast with other thrillers where the blonde women were
like he has money with nice shirt and shoes, quite always the victims. However in the end we went with black
business like suggesting he too has money therefore in hair because I think she would come across as a much
quite a high social class. Their age both looks to be more dark and dominant character. This could link into the
around the same age which is quite young and they are target audience as young woman would watch it as it is not
both the same race. about a stereotypical woman trying to get away for once
and instead about a strong woman therefore could appeal
to women as our film makes women look strong unlike
many other films. However it would also appeal to men
due to the sexy antagonist as they would like it because
the main woman is dangerous but sexy, however they
might not because the man is a weak victim an they
wouldn’t want men to be presented in that way.
5. 3. What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?
I don’t think our film would be one that could be produced
by a major Hollywood studio because it is quite different
to existing horror thrillers that they have made. Our film
Scream: Right in the opening there is a
goes against the conventional man being the villain
blonde victim
women being the victim, therefore may be too different
for them to produce it. They have made films such as 'I
Know what you did last summer' and many Alfred
Hitchcock films such as 'Psycho' suggesting that they
would not go for a completely different storyline where
the woman is the villain and the man the victim.
Our film would probably be better produced as a TV movie
or an internet only release. This is because I think it may
be too different for it to become such a big film but is
still conventional enough that audiences will want to
watch it and get something out of it. In our film there is
not a high engagement with the character from the
beginning therefore maybe not being able to attract and
engage a global audience like Hollywood films do.
However with out film we thought the audience would
engage much more with the killer and her background as
the film went on and why she was doing all these
killings. Also it wouldn’t be an art house film because it Psycho: main female character is the blonde victim
doesn’t have a niche market it is for a much more broad trying to get away and the man is the villain.
audience.
6. Our film 'Till Death do us part' would be released because
I think it has a lot to offer. It would be a film which could The mise en scene in the beginning of our film has not really
attract both men and women that like scary films. It also shown anything that we could use if it came to making
could offer opportunities for franchises as the story could merchandise for it. Our film has no scary masks or face that
go on and have follow on films in her journey to finally would make people want to buy a mask for Halloween or
get to kill her ex lover. It could also offer opportunities anything. The only thing that it has is a knife that we could
for merchandising, although the villain in our film does use for t-shirts with the name on as well. But our main
not have a scary mask like other horror films such as character probably could not turn into a big franchise
Freddy Kruger, Scream or Saw which have made a hit as because it just looks like a normal woman and if you saw
audiences know exactly what it is when they see it. her on her own you wouldn’t think she was scary at all.
However, with our film we could still produce t-shirts Therefore no figures or anything could be made for our film.
that have been made for many horror thriller films that Costumes and T-shirts could though.
audiences could buy with a knife on it or something.
This is a T-shirt made for the film Psycho. With
our film we could make merchandise similar to
this with a knife due to that is what our main
character kills people with.
