media

2. Thrillers ( Summary Edition)
Over the past few months while working on reaching the
brief objective by creating our opening sequence,
being able to have created our final project as a group
has resulted into various research into the Thriller
genre. Here is a few facts and a summary of what the
‘Thriller’ genre is all about.
• The Genre is a film, literature and TV production that
specialise in using tension, suspense and excitement as
its main aspects.
• There are many sub- genres of thriller but main ones
include, comedy, conspiracy, crime, erotic, legal,
political, psychological, horror, spy and supernatural.
• Thriller are mostly created to stimulate feelings from
the audience , such as giving them high levels of
anticipation, uncertainty , terror and surprise.
• The genre plot is mostly focused on the villain who
creates obstacles the protagonist tries to overcome.

3. Thrillers ( Summary Edition) Continued
• Literacy devices such as cliff hangers and plot twits are what mostly
create a thriller.
• Non diegetic music mostly includes orchestral music, mostly from the
string section who create high pitched and minor sounds which
create tense and gripping moods to the thriller scenes.
• Diegetic sounds include loads of ambient sounds such as rustling,
thunder, creaks and groans of objects. These sounds are used
especially during ‘Silent’ moments where characters are mostly alone
or trapped somewhere unknown.
• Technical codes are mostly presented through cinematography shots
which are vary but are mostly extreme close up shots of the
characters face as by catching the facial expression helps the
audience to engage more with the character through the feeling they
express such as fear or curiosity. Also lighting is normally low-key or
back lighting to create suspense or mystery.
• Mise- en-scen usually includes locations such as abandoned houses
or haunted areas or secluded areas. Make and props depending on
the particular sub genre relate to the character sand the theme for
example if it were a horror thriller, blood and dark clothing would be
used frequently.

4. Inspiration (Overall)
After gaining knowledge about the thriller genre, as a group we decided to merge
a few thriller sub genres to the creation of our opening sequence. We choose to
mix horror with mystery and crime and by looking at videos clips on YouTube,
got inspired by clips to create our plot for our opening sequence 'Dead End'.
The plot for our opening sequence simplified, is based on the idea of pranks
turned into harmful, dangerous reality. A specific prank we selected as a main
idea was the 'clown prank'. The prank centers around a clown who is caught
crushing a persons 'fake head' with a hammer then chases after the by standers
who caught him in the act. By looking this clip we were able to gather our own
ideas on a prank which could tie in all of our thriller sub-genres and be able to
produce the codes and conventions a thriller uses.

6. • To make sure our opening sequence matched the
techniques of how a ‘Thriller’ film is produced we
decide to include various extreme close ups and close
up’s of our characters, so that we were able to catch
each raw emotion of fear and confusion. Also mid shots
were used to the show the forest like surrounding (
location) and the characters as they interacted and
their body language as the action took place.
• We also used our editing skills to show the two
different points of view. One from our group walking
through the park ( victims) and the attacker ( the
villain). Here we were able to build suspense by cross
cutting from one view from the character Sarah and her
group of friends ,to the view of the unknown attacker
who was following them. The edits were also very fast
paced when it got closer to the attack, this linking to
the idea of anticipation increasing as the audience
watch to see if she will get attacked. Fade and blur
transitions were used as effects representing the
uneasy feeling of the characters. We included grey scale
effect to our opening sequence changing the colour the
original colour of our piece to a greyish haze. This
helped us create more of a tense feeling as the colour
was very gloomy and dull.

7. • For our sound elements we used both diegetic and non diegetic
sound. Ambient sounds included the rustling of the bushes and
leaves, light wind whispers and tweeting of birds. Our diegetic sounds
included laughter and dialogue between the group of friends. These
two sound aspects were however kept to a minimum as we more
focused on the non diegetic music that played in the background. The
music starts off very light and crescendos to the peak moment of
where Sarah screams and is taken away by the attacker. This helped
build up to the climax as the orchestral string and horn sound play in
minor keys and sound very distorted, adding a very eerie mysterious
vibe to the opening sequence.
• All these elements link to what a thriller film requires, however we
decided to add our own unique plot twist by having a news report at
the end who announces the disappearance and the fate of Sarah
instead of her friends who have escaped. Which leaves a mystery of
what happened to the friends, and if they all got away safely.