Thriller Evaluation

THRILLER EVAULATION

As part of our AS Media course, we were asked to create a short 2-minute thriller opening. The codes and conventions for a thriller are something that brings about tension and suspense and creates an expectation that something is going to happen but you are not sure when and what. The storyline usually imitates real life circumstances and are more often than not played by everyday characters. While planning for our thriller, we were required to watch a variety of thriller films. One of our focuses was ‘The Shining’ directed by Stanley Kubrick. After watching this film, I discovered many techniques, techniques such as mise en scene, camera angles, editing, sound and cliffhangers. The film had a great influence on my group due to the fact we used flashback in our thriller opening similar to ‘The Shining’. All the films that we watched and from background information on thrillers we made sure we pertained as much information as we got to create a really good thriller opening.
My group consisted of four member two boys and two girls from all different backgrounds, which I think was fair and equal balance because we all played an equal part to help one another. Our thriller opening was called ‘Once upon a kidnapper’ and we had a main character who witnessed her close friend being kidnapped at a young age and then being familiar with the villain years later. Our thriller represents young teenage friendships between 14-17 and ‘youths’ (boys) that are involved in crime and violence. The media portrays that young boys from ethnic origins are more involved in crime and violence than boys from a non-ethic origin. We used this as a stimulus for our thriller opening imitating the stereotype the media depicts for our advantage. Our thriller also represents a working class society because at the beginning of the thriller we are immediately introduced to a young black working class female adult getting on public transport, which suggest her status.
The media institutions that will distribute our thriller opening would be Channel 4. I suggest Channel 4 because they show many urban UK drama films for example, ‘Fall Out’ directed by Ian Rickson. Channel 4 is best known for showing the reality that young teenagers face in everyday life. Due to the fact we will have a low budget, we will use the internet as our source to distribution for our thriller. This would save us money because we will not have to pay distributers to sell our film.
The target audience for our thriller would be young teenagers, male and female aged between 14-19. For example an ideal person that would fit as our target audience would be; Daniel Small, aged 17, a black boy, lives in east London, works part time at schuh and attends college four times a week, loves spending quality time with his friends at the cinema and plays the drums at church. He is a Christian.
I would attract my target audience by posting posters at colleges, school. Youth clubs and having a street team to hand out flyers. I will also use networking sites such as Facebook, Myspace, Bebo, Hi5 and Twitter. To catch the attention of my target I will put images of the main characters on the posters and flyers to show the film is about teenagers so that the audience can relate to the characters and gain knowledge of what they should expect. There would also be a trailer on Channel 4 so our audience would be reminded of film and when it is released. A Myspace will be created so people can comment on how they personally feel the film was and if they have any inquires about the DVD; the trailer would be on the Myspace site. This would be effective for our audience who do not regularly watch TV and allowing a wider global audience to recognize our film.
In making any type of film, effectual technology is required to get the best quality possible. We used Cannon video cameras and Apple Mac computers to use final cut and pro to edit. I enjoyed filming in the beginning but as we progressed, it got quite tiring. We tried to be creative by thinking of different shots Editing was one of the easiest tasks, as long as we were taught the basics, we were able to try new things and include them to our editing process. We used effects like fade and match cut to have a fluidity in our thriller. Selecting the sound was quite difficult for our group because there was so many to pick from and individuals in our group were disagreeing on certain types of music so we concluded that the boys should take responsibility to create the music. Non-digetic music was used throughout our thriller. Playful and upbeat music was used to emphasise childhood while on the other hand sharp strings were used to illustrate danger. What I enjoyed most of all was being filmed. I found this part of the process quite fun and intriguing, expect for when we were told to film in the rain even though we were cold, wet and uncomfortable it created a visual mise en scene for our audience during the flashback. We used to internet to blog our progress each lesson. The internet has been very useful and has allowed us to get views and comments from other people. Our video was put on a website called ‘’Vimeo’’ which certified our video to be viewed by others, and allowed us to view other peoples videos. There is also another website called ‘’YouTube’’. This particular website allows any and everyone to view your thriller and lets them to write their comments underneath. Our video was not yet put on this site because none of us had a YouTube account. Watching our thriller in the cinema in angel was an exciting, yet scary experience. It was exciting because we were anxious to hear the view of others and it was scary because we were not sure if it we would be up to standards as the others. Overall, our feedback from out classmates and friends was positive, but we were told that we could have made our camera work shaper.
Looking back at my preliminary task, I believed it helped me a lot to prepare for my thriller opening. These tasks allow us to make mistakes and learn from them. We learnt a lot about ‘match cut’ in depth, which had an effect on our overall finished piece. I learnt that planning is key source to making any film successful but particularly with our thriller opening which we were successful in planning. We had a specific idea of our plot; setting and camera shot sequence, which made it easier for us to film, however during filming our thriller we came up with new ideas, which did not affect our storyline but added more effectively.
On the whole we all worked well together and helped one another out and I now have a insight into what filming is about and how uneasy it can be at times and also how much hard work is put in by the directors and producers not only the ’stars’ and main characters of the film but behind the scenes.