Treatment sheet

Story board

Mood Board

Survey analysis

For market research we made a survey on surveymonkey.com. We asked 8 questions and 7 people completed all 7 questions. the results for all 7 questions are as follows:
Q1. How old are you?
A1. 13-18=71.4%  41-60 = 28.6%
We should aim our thriller at 13-18 year olds.


Q2.What is your favourite type of thriller?
A2. Horror= 28.6% Conspiracy= 14.3% Psychological=28.6% Spy=14.3% Legal=14.3%
we should consider Horror and psychological thriller types as these were the top results for this question.


Q3. what times would you normally go to the cinema
A3. Afternoon=28.6%   Evening=57.1%  night=28.6%
Most people go to the cinema in the evening.


Q4.Who is your favourite actor?
A4. For this question we had 7 different actors/actresses. All had one vote each.


Q5.How often do you go to the cinema?
A5. 2 once a month, 3 couple times a year, 1 one every 2 months, 1 twice a month 
more people go to the cinema a couple time a year.


Q6. what is your worst fear?
A6. 1 Getting old, 1 baked beans, 1 dogs, 2 spiders, 1 moths, 1 clowns\
Spiders are the worst fear for the people who we surveyed. 


Q7. what was the last thriller you saw at the cinema?
A7. The top answer for this question was Mission impossible with 2 votes, others included source code, the iron lady and in time, all these got 1 vote.


Q8.What influenced you to go and see the last thriller you saw at the cinema?
A8. 3 the trailer looked good, 2 I was forced to, 1 the conservative government
most people liked the trailer and wanted to see the whole film.  

Survey monkey

Click here to take survey

Analysis of past student work

I looked at films of a past students. One film I looked at was filmed in black and white. After every scene there was a black screen with with titles on it. It has slow editing and has medium and long shots. The film is shot using a range of fixed and hand held camera shots.

Another film by past students that I watched called "when Summer ends" was filmed in colour with black and white scenes showing flash backs. The titles come up at the start of the film with the film starting after the titles. On one of the eye shots the screen goes red still being able to see the eyes, this shows anger.

Thriller openings

Memento

This film uses Conventions like, guns, blood flask backs, cars and protagonists. It uses slow camera movement and mid shots, with slow editing. It uses non-diagetic music and also diagetic sound affects and dialogue.







Brick

This film uses conventions like flash backs. it uses mid and close up shots and also goes in and out of focus with slow editing. There is non diagetic music and diagetic sound effects. 

Zodiac

This film uses conventions like enigmas and guns with long and mid shots. Back lighting is used to make the killer a silhouette. The editing is slow and uses non diagetic music and diagetic sound effects and dialogue. 

Opening credits

Seven
The titles in this film come up in white text which sometimes come up on the image and sometimes on a black screen. The v in Seven has been changed to a 7, Se7en.

Panic Room

The titles in Panic room seem 3D and look almost like they are real. The 3D titles come up as they camera shows shots of places around the city. The titles then end and the shots of the city become shots of one of the character.

Target Audience

The average age for people who go to the ciema are aged 16-24. There are diffent aspects that appeal to men and women. The aspects that women like about thrillers are psychological thrillers, the stars in the film, the type of characters and story. The aspects of thrillers that men like are action, fight and gun scenes and blood and gore.

Red Herrings

A Red Herring is the name given to a device which intends to divert the audience from the truth or an item of significance. Red Herrings can work with other device like enigmas to create suspense.

An example of a Red Herring is in Saw, two characters spend time imprisoned in a room in which a third character lies dead. Throughout the film, both characters appear to be guilty of murders, until it is discovered at the end that the third preson in the room is not actually dead but is, in fact, the killer.
Another example is in Source Code where people who we expect are the terrorists are not.

Cliffhangers

Cliffhangers are sometimes, although not always used in film. They often feature a main character in a precarious or difficult dilemma, or confronted with a shocking revelation. This can entice the audience to keep watching in order to see how the situation resolves itself.

A well known example of a cliffhanger is in the British film the Italian Job. At the end of this film it shows the characters face a dilemma of how to escape from the bus they are on with their gold while the bus is on the edge of a cliff.

Enigmas

Enigmas refer to a puzzle, something mysterious or inexplicable, a riddle or a difficult problem. In thrilles this is commonly something which the protagonist has to try to find out or solve before the narrative is resolved and the film finishes.

Continuity Editing

Clear establishment of 'cause and effect' plotting which establishes character motivations and helps tell an interesting story which proceeds logically and steadily.

MacGuffin

A MacGuffin is a plot device that motivates the characters and advances the story but has little other relevance to the story.
 "We have a name in the studio, and we call it the 'MacGuffin'. It is the mechanical element that usually crops up in the story. In crook stories it is always the necklace and in spy stories its always the papers." Alfred Hitchcock

Suspense and shock

An example of suspense is: Imagine a scene in a film similar to a classroom with teacher and student. The camera will reveal that there is a bomb under the table to the audience but the teacher and students are unaware of the bomb. The suspense will be will the teachers or students realise there is a bomb or will the bomb explode.

A film example of suspense is Sabotage by Alfred Hitchcock. In this film the camera reveals that there is a bomb which is carried by the young boy. From the time he starts his task "tick tock" sounds and repeated close ups of the bomb become more frequent. This represents the time running out before the bomb goes off. This creates suspense as we are awaiting the bomb to go off or someone to find it.

Another example of suspense is Rope by Alfred Hitchcock in 1948. Rope is a story of two young, wealthy men, Brandon and Philip who strangled and murdered a friend of theirs just to see if they would get away with it. They then invite other friends (including the murdered mans parents) to their apartment for a dinner party. Whilst hiding the body in a chest/box in their sitting room just to see if they could get away with it. the suspense is created by the body being in the box. It makes the audience think will the body and men be found out and brought to justice?

An example of shock is: Imagine the same setting as above but this time the camera does not reveal there is a bomb and the audience and characters are all unaware of the bomb.

A film example of shock is "Children of men"by Alfonso Cuaron in 2006. In the opening part of this film we see a building suddenly blow up. We the audience does not know there is a bomb. This is why this sequence is an example of shock.

Preliminary task

Manchurian Candidate

The Manchurian Candidate was written in 1959 by Richard Condon. it is a political thriller novel about a son of a prominent US political family who is brainwashed into being an unwritten assassin for the communist party.

This film is a Psychological thriller and a political thriller.

The 1962 version was filmed in black and white.
Director: John Frankenheimar
Staring:Frank Sinatra, Laurence harvey, Janet Leigh

This film is based in the US just after the Korean war. The men who were in the same unit in the korean war were brainwashed using a set of playing cards.

The 2004 version was filmed in colour and was based in the US after the Kuwait war. The men are brainwashed by using implants instead of a pack of cards.

Director: Jonathon Demme
Stars: Denzel Washington, Liev Schreiber, Meryl Streep, Kimberly Elise.

Aspects of the thriller Alfred Hitchcock

Hitchcock was known as the master of suspense whose films came to be the benchmark for psychological thrillers. "There is no terror in the bang, only in the anticipation of it." "the only way to get rid of my fears is to make films about them." "It is a good movie, the sound could go off and the audience would still have a perfectly clear idea of what was going on." "Always make the audience suffer as much as possible." "I am a typed director. If I was to make cinderella, the audience would immediately be looking for a body in the coach." Alfred Hitchcock

"under the strong influence of Alfred Hitchcock, thrillers often begin with a crime an the accusation of an innocent bystander. were the accused to contact the authorities, no doubt the case could be promptly solved but instead the poor bystander runs from the law thus further jeopardising life and limb."
"The thirty nine steps suspense films abandon both thrills and suspense when the falsely accused character finally reaches safety" Rick Altman
An example of this is the saboteur (1942)