My thriller used the conventions of real media products in terms of characters, props and editing. My thriller used the convention of beginning a thriller with the ending. This is known as the ‘favourite trick of Film Noir’. However we also challenged the conventions of a real thriller because you normally have some sort of stalker. Instead we just have two innocent characters with no villain. The only suspected villain is the character who wakes up and finds her friend dead. The only reason she is suspected is because she has blood on her hands. Before I made my thriller I watched a BBC documentary called ‘Film Openings which was presented by Thomas Sutcliffe. ’ The documentary said that ‘a good beginning must make the audience feel that it doesn’t know nearly enough yet, and at the same time make sure that it doesn’t know too little’. My thriller follows this convention because we give just the right amount of information. In addition, my thriller stuck to the genre of thrillers. This is because my thriller is quite mysterious.
My thriller opening consists of two main characters both of which are young women between the ages of 17-22. My film represents their social group as people who often go out partying. This is because within the flashbacks we see them walking and laughing. They are dressed up wearing heels etc so they are obviously going to some sort of event/occasion. This relates to them being victims because they are innocently going out to enjoy themselves.
The media institution that is most likely to distribute my movie would be a Hollywood blockbuster, which is located all around the world. This is because our movie has all the conventions and characteristics of an actual thriller. It wouldn’t be a DVD releaseonly, because I want to know whether or not the audience likethe film. In order to find this out it would be best for it to come out in cinema first and see how many people go to see it and find out whether or not people enjoyed it enough to go and buy it on DVD. Idonot think it should be made for TV because it does not fit under the category of documentary/short film.
The audience for my media project would be teenagers preferably from the age of 16 upwards. This is because they are the age group who will be able to relate to the film because they go partying and enjoy nights out. There is no particular race that the film is for, this is because all young women from every race tend to go clubbing. We decided that the thriller would be marked as 15+ because people from that age may be able to relate to the film e.g. partying. Also I think it is better because have a wider audience. The opening is not too gory and does not contain any inappropriate scenes so there is no need to mark it as an 18. In addition, the setting of my film hasn’t shown what race lives in that area. Regardless of the fact that both characters in the film are black, the audience the film will appeal to is mainstream. This is because of the clothes that the characters are wearing, they are quite nicely dressed.
In terms of advertising, I would advertise on buses because buses travel to many different areas so wherever we may not be able to go and advertise the bus can do it for us. However, uses a bus allows the film to be advertised in only a certain country e.g. London.
I would also advertise online with trailers i.e. on YouTube and face book. This is better than advertising on just buses because these sites will allow the film to be advertised globally.
I would advertise online because many people go on these sites so the film will be getting a lot of publicity. In addition, there will be posters posted in cinemas and in magazines, which will say coming soon. This is because we are telling the audience in advance. The film will also be in previews in the cinema.
Here is a poster I made for the film. This could be seen buses. magazines and newspapers.
The trailer for the movie would consist of some of the most exciting parts of the movie. Most trailers show the most exciting parts of the movie e.g. explosions car chases, and killings. This is because these bits engage the audience and attract them to want to watch the film. However, I would not put all of the exciting parts of the movie into the trailer because putting all of the exciting parts would leave the audience with nothing to look forward to. Here are some examples of thriller trailers.
The practice thriller influenced my thriller in terms of camera shots. In our practice thriller we did a lot of match cuts, which I thought, looked really good. This led us to creating match cuts in our actual thriller. Also I learnt that location mattered a lot. In our practice thriller we used a very open location where many people were, this taught us that the location for our actual thriller had to be somewhere that was not so open and somewhere where people didn’t go. This is because in order for us to film, our location has to look the same throughout. We can’t film one day with no cars on the road and film another day and have 3-4 cars in the same shot. Our practice thriller also taught us that we shouldn’t make our thriller to complicated because it takes a lot of time. E.g. trying to film a character across the road when there are cars passing by.
During the making of this film, I came across a lot of new technology. Some of which are:Final cut Pro-
This is what the professionals use. This programme is what we used to edit the film. When we had finished filming we loaded our filming onto Final cut Pro, logged, and captured it. Log and capturing is splitting your film up into bits so you can place certain clips anywhere you want. Final cut Pro is where most of the work is done. It has special effects such as fading in, out and sliding.
Final cut Pro is rather easy to use once you get the hang of it. Also, it is not too complicated.
Another programme we used was Live type:
This programme was mainly used for our credits Live type. Live type can be tricky at first but it is very useful. You can write your text onto a coloured background or you can write it onto you film.
My group decided to write our credits on a black background as it gives more of a thrilling effect. We also added faded white lines in the background to add a thrilling effect.
The animation that Live type provides was also very useful and there is a large range to choose from. Here are some of the animations available to use:
We decided to use the font cracked because it looked rather thrilling and it stood out well.
Along with the new technology I came across I also came across a lot of new equipment. The main equipment that was used were:
- Camcorders (Canon XM1)
- Tripods
- Batteries
- Lights
Looking back. I can say that I have learnt that the process of making a film requires a lot of time, effort and planning. I learnt that film writers must write a pitch before their film can be created. Their pitch must persuade filmmakers that their film is good enough to be created and also get money that is needed to make the film. I also learnt there are many different types of shots within a film and these shots make a big difference. Shots such as close-ups add so much detail to whatever is on screen.
Overall I thought my thriller was a success. We managed to stick to the concept that it was just an opening rather than a whole film. Also, I learnt a lot during the process. If I were to do it all over again some changes I would make are:
-My location because I would like to try something a bit more complicated
-The time we film, even though the first time we filmed in the dark didn't work out, I would like to try and make an attempt at it.
However I would keep the concept of my thriller because it leaves the audience with a lot to think of. Also, the concept of my thriller can be filmed in many different locations. I would keep the numbers of characters as 2 because it makes things a lot easier.
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