Evaluation

1. IN WHAT WAYS DOES YOUR MEDIA PRODUCT USE,
DEVELOP OR CHALLENGE FORMS AND CONVENTIONS OF
REAL MEDIA PRODUCTS?
Marcia Rumsey

2. Most sound in psychological thrillers seemed to be non-
diegetic. The music we used is disjointed and dramatic.
We also added sound effects which made our music similar
to the music used in the film Se7en. However we went
against the common convention of having a voice over
which is used in The Secret Window and The Prestige.
MUSIC

3. For our credits we used white font in the style of a
typewriter on a black background. We then added an
effect to make it shaky and thus adding tension. This
style is very similar to the credits in Se7en, the only
difference being the font used in Se7en is more like a
handwritten font.
TYPOGRAPHY
Credits in Se7en
Credits in our opening

4. Barthes theory stated that one narrative code used in
the media is hermeneutic codes. This means the audience
is presented with enigmas and ask questions. In all the
openings of psychological thrillers we looked at, a
common convention that occurred was the use of
hermeneutic codes. In our opening we have many
hermeneutic codes. The most obvious question being asked
is “Why are they playing Russian Roulette?”
NARRATIVE

5. A common convention is to not have a physical weapon, the idea
being the killers mind is the weapon. However in our piece we
had a gun which features heavily in our opening. Our set was a
dark room and the actually location was ambiguous. However in
the openings we looked at you can see the location although
they are dark still. For the costume of the male he was
wearing a suit which is similar to the costume of the
protagonist in Memento.
MISE EN SCÈNE

6. Our lighting is low key and sometimes chiaroscuro. At
most of the openings we looked at low key lighting was
used, especially in Se7en and The Secret Window.
Therefore most of our shots use low key lighting and
some contrast with bright light on the subject yet dark
light for the background.
LIGHTING

7. In our opening we added effects to make our piece more
distorted. For example we used a rewind effect or some
shots to disorientate the viewer. This is similar to the
opening of Memento which is all in reverse. We also
added an effect to make some shots bad quality and some
shots not in order. This is seen in many psychological
thrillers, the aim being to confuse the viewer.
EFFECTS