The document discusses conventions and social issues represented in thriller movies and the OP's movie "The Caretaker". It describes how the movie incorporates thriller conventions like an isolated location, building suspense through unclear footage and sound, and focusing on the antagonist. It also represents common social stereotypes like portraying women as weak and reliant on men, while men are dominant. The movie shows the male antagonist murdering his wife for disobeying him, fulfilling the stereotype of aggressive masculinity. It also explores the portrayal of different age groups, showing an innocent child unaware of danger and a troubled teenager unable to understand the source of her distressing memories.

1. How does this product
use or challenge
conventions?
Thriller Movie Conventions…

2. What exactly are Conventions?
Conventions are basically rules and agreed practices that relates to a
particular genre of media projects. These are developed by audiences
experiences and expectations.
My product “THE CARETAKER”, is a movie that is associated with the
Thriller movie genre.
Thrillers are popular fiction for a reason. They combine the criminality
and suspense of a good detective story with the danger and pressure of a
scary horror story.
A thriller centers around a crime that’s about to happen, unless the
protagonist can stop it, of course. In a thriller, the viewers often knows
who the villain is from the beginning, sometimes watching over the
villain’s shoulders as he or she prepares to carry out the crime. The
Thriller genre are driven forward by the antagonist.

3. Beyond that, thrillers can have any tone or style, be set in any place or time, and have
various levels of danger or violence. They can include different subplots as long as the quest
to outsmart and stop the villain remains the main focus of the movie.
My product involves various conventions, for it to refer to the thriller genre. The location I
chose for my movie, looks like an abandoned area out in the woods and an area where there
is not a lot of people approaching. No one seems to pass by which means there is no one
around to have a look on what’s going on, which is quite relevant to my movie and also ticks
the convention of creating suspense by using an area that could result in many crimes and
no body’s going to know.
This location is a long narrow pathway that seems to leads no where. The way I created
suspense in my movie is by showing small and random clips of footsteps and two people
running on to a unknown pathway all covered up which is what enhances curiosity within
the audience to know what’s next.

4. Additionally, my movie has a great aspect of Thriller movies, in terms of how I created
tension and pressure from the very beginning, where the girl seems to not sleep peacefully
and then in a few seconds we know it is because of an absurd dream that made no sense to
where it is leading. The way random clips were merged and sequenced together along with
the location created the thrill my movie needed.The camera angles, shots and movements
were framed in a way that it created curiousness, disoriented angles to otherwise create
discomfort within the audience which is again what thriller is based on.
Moreover, mise en scene in thriller movies are usually dark, night time scenes that creates a
horrifying scenario for the viewers. Even though I had to shoot in the day time as I had
problems with lighting as I had no where to plug lights in at my location. I kept my aperture
and ISO quite low which lead less light in and thus, created a darker Image. Then with the
use of color correction I was able to distort and fade my dream sequence a little which really
helped build up a good mise en scene that was required.

5. The Antagonist as well as the Protagonist are all clothed in dark or black clothing in most Thriller movies
which I incorporated in my movie. My movie also includes how a protagonist is negotiating a complex
world, struggling at the limits of human experiences and triumphing the overwhelming strength of the
Antagonist. Another main aspect of the Thriller genre is how the Antagonist of the movie has no
limitations on how to hurt the antagonist for which I showed how murdering someone is so relatively easy
in this very genre, and that the Culprit least hesitated when using a gun. Moreover the Antagonist also is
shown to actively trap, look for clues and investigate newer ways to trigger the Victim, whom is a lot
weaker than the Antagonist. This is why I showed how the victim is running away hiding because there is
no limit to how she could be harmed.
Thriller movies often start with a slow paced sound and environment that adds up to the suspense to
fulfill which I used a peaceful audio of Crickets chirping and than shifted to a thrilling audio once the
dream sequence had started. This creates more interest and excitement within the viewers. I understood
that sound is the game changer when it comes to producing and editing a movie. A right sound track can
be one of the greatest reasons a Movie is successful.

6. How does it represent
social groups or
issues?
Social Issues….

7. What are social issues on media?
The content on media is a reflection of Real life events and how social groups have been
nurtured to us. How they are stereotyped and to what extent is it true and how often does
media portray against it.
One of the main Stereotypical social issue we see on media is the portrayal of gender.
Throughout the years media has shown women to be weak, inferior and dumb compared to
men. Men have always been the Mastermind, the breadwinners and the Heroes, and women
often serve their sexual interests. Women would also have to rely on men to save her from
the problems she faced. These were initially constructed and till now most of the movies use
these stereotypes as viewers are interested to see Genders portrayed like this.

8. Women are now shown stronger than ever but there is not much to deny the older
stereotypes, women are now shown to be a lot smarter and workaholic but they are
still shown inferior to men and there is not a lot of movies where men and women
get into physical fights. In my movie once again I fulfil the way women are
portrayed, they are weak and inferior to man. In my movie it is seen how man can
dominate the screen and how women are threatened by man. As the lady was
running away, she was tensed and all covered up so that she was unrecognizable.
She was looking around places to hide and was scared of someone following.
However, a way my movie challenges conventions is how the lady did not feel the
need to call or rely on a man to take the initiative to run away. She was shown
strong and determined and that she sure about her decision, which otherwise
challenges the stereotypes of how women always need men.

9. On the other hand, the men are shown superior, carefree and dominant and how they
would do anything if someone goes against them. In my movie the man is the Antagonist,
he is shown with great superiority with low angle shots, carrying a gun. He is shown smart
as he trapped the lady into coming to an underpopulated forest area where he was already
present. His footsteps, heavy and long showed how he had full power over the situation and
that everything was under his control. The way he took out the gun from the pocket also
reflected
that he has used it many times before and that he must be the reason his wife decided to
take his child and run away. Moreover, this movie also ticks the stereotypes of a typical
masculine figure. And how men are very aggressive and dislike it when someone goes
against them. In this movie the guy only murdered his wife because she was told not to
leave the house and she left it against his will which damaged his male ego for which she
was killed.

10. Age is another very important social issue that is identified in my movie. Different age
groups are differently stereotyped on media, younger children are shown as carefree and
very enthusiastic about life. Where as teenagers are shown as trouble makers and
aggressive. The adults are shown frustrated, always working and stressed. The elderly
are shown to be financially as well physically weak.
My movie represents how children when they are young are very innocent and they have
no idea on how cruel the world is. They see the good in everything and are fun loving. In
my movie the little girl running with her mother has no idea why her mother is taking
her away from her own father. She has no idea on how she lost her mother. She was
made to believe that her mother died in an accident and very innocent of her believe her
father, who himself murdered her mother. She has a very blur memory of how she lost
her and that reappears to her in a form of a dream. This means the children trust what
they are told by people, especially someone as close as a father.

11. On the other hand when she grew up in to a teenager that blur memory was a cause of distress for her.
That memory would trigger her and harm her mental health. She was not as aggressive as a teenager
normally portrayed, she was not causing harm to anyone and was a very loving girl. She loved her
father unconditionally and would hide how she is unable to sleep to avoid giving tension to her father.
Where as her father is the only reason of her trigger and she has no idea. This challenges how a normal
teenager would act, usually they are seen to trouble people and be a cause of trigger to others. Moreover
teenagers are also shown as smart and that they are clever enough to identify who is wrong. Which
again my movie challenges as this girl is not able to figure out why she has been not able to sleep why is
dream recurring and triggering her like that, but instead she tends remain determine on what she was
told by her father when she was young.
There are many different ways children are portrayed, they are seen as they are drug addict and
involved in a bad company which is leading to problems in their lives, whereas in my movie it is the
family that is reasoning the troubles