New Shot List: Opening to Thriller

• Longshot esablishing locations, scene and characters. This introduces the two characters to the film.
• Cut to a tracking shot of the girl walking towards the man, sat at a table.
• Cut to an over the shoulder shot of her approaching the man, and the man putting his newspaper down on the table.
• Cut to a high angle/Close up shot of the girl picking the empty mug up, close up (using the rule of thirds) showing the newspaper headline. (Relating to rape/murder)
• Cut to an extreme close up of the date, showing this part is in a flashback.
• Cut to a zoom out of close up into a high angle shot of the man and girl.
• Cut to a point of view shot of the girl walking away, using shot reverse shot between the girl and the man to connect them. Girl goes into the kitchen.
• Cut to a tracking shot of the mans feet as he gets up and starts to walk.
• Cut to a low angle shot of the man approaching the door.
• Cut to a worms eye of him opening and closing the door.
• Cut to an extreme closeup shot of him bolting the door.
• Cut to a panning shot of the man walking towards the counter and crouching, out of sight from the girl. The girl comes out of the kitchen, scans cafe and switches most of the lights off and walks towards the door.
• Cut to an over the shoulder shot of man walking towards the the girl whilst she's looking for her keys.
• Cut to a man standing directly behind her, cut to transition/panning shot of the girl to man, in a different scene/location.
• Cut to a transition shot continues to over the shoulder shot of the man attatching photo of the girl to a wall.
• Cut to a close up panning shot showing all the photos of different dead girls.

Further Development to our Thriller Idea

     As a group, we decided that our idea would be too complex just for an opening, as from our case studies we can see that a lot of Thriller films that conform to the genre have very simple openings with minimal changes to setting or characters. Therefore, we have taken our original idea of the cafe, but focus more on the interior of the cafe itself because a dark, ominous cafe will work very well in the Thriller genre. Also that if we keep to just one location, the audience will not be confused and it means that the audience can connect with a character more closely in one settings before it is changed - also just having one location will make it easier for us to maintain the 2 minutes we need.  

   

Developments:

• It will begin with the young girl working in the cafe, however the difference is that the man will be inside the cafe sat down having a drink, instead of being outside watching her.
• The man will be sat at a table reading a newspaper with 'murder/rape' headlines on it.
• The girl will go to collect his coffee and the camera will catch the headline of the newspaper - foreshadowing the rest of the plot.
• She will take the coffee from him and begin to close the cafe for that evening.
• The date on the newspaper will imply that the scene is a flashback once the audience has established the date later in the film.
• The girl will then return to the kitchen with the coffee cup - during this the man will approach the front door of the cafe, open and close the door to imply that he has left, leaving the girl to continue to lock up.
• An extreme close up of the bolt sliding across the door will be next - to show she has been locked inside the already small/claustraphobic space of the cafe.
• He will then walk to crouch behind the counter, so that the girl does not see him.
• Once returning from the kitchen, the girl will switch off all of the lights and slowly walk toward the door, searching for her key in her bag/pocket.
• We will show a shot of the man stood closely behind her, slowly closing in on her in a threatening way.
• We will then use a transition shot to conclude to the next scene - using the back of the girls head, fading into the back of the mans head. He will then place the girls picture on his wall of many other pictures of young girls.

We will have a shot of the man pinning up photos of girls and also the girl in the film, much like in the image (left) - portraying the man as a sadistic killer - the influence coming from 'The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo'. Thus the rest of the film will be an investigation into the murder/disapprence of the girl from the cafe and perhaps having the man as a very onmisent and enigmatic character in the film.

Overall - I think this idea is much simpler and will be able to fit into 2 minutes a lot easier as we have less to film rather than having to film a lot and then cram it into the time limit - which could confuse the audience because there is so much location change. Therefore, with only one location, possibly two if the man is filmed walking into the cafe at the beginning, the audience can see the narrative structure and characters much easier.

Thelma & Louise (1991) - Image Analysis

     Directed by Ridley Scott, this film was released on 12 July 1991. It was nominated for 6 Academy Awards (USA) - but only won 1 of the nominations for 'Best Writing'. It was also nominated for 8 BAFTA awards. 

     Ridley Scott utilises Thriller conventions in an interesting way to establish the genre, but he also mixes them with unusual conventions to challenge the genre and the social context at the time that the film was made. He achieves this by manipulating usual Thriller conventions and changing them to something unexpected; especially in the conformity and representation of gender. 

    One of the ways that Scott uses these Thriller conventions is through Location. The location of a car park behind a bar is perfect for a Thriller and is a typical convention of the thriller as it is an enclosed/claustrophobic space, but feels open because it is so large, although barriers are present when in a car park. This could be used to represent that Louise has enclosed the man to this point, in location and time, and therefore he has nowhere to go both literally and metaphorically - thus this is used to make the location and scene much more threatening towards the man. Another Thriller convention used here is the enigmatic white van behind the man - which could represent that the man himself is an enigma as he is unknown to the women in this film, but he is trying to become known to them - the same as a white van is used to create mystery and an eerie feel to a scene. 

Jackie Brown 1997

     The use of characters is another Thriller convention, but challenges the genre in the roles of these characters. Firstly, upon looking at facial expression we can see that the man teeth are gritted and his eyes are looking back towards Louise and her eye direction is directly towards him. This is used to establish a negative relationship and that she has a negative attitude towards him, but his eye direction is still quite sly and sadistic like he thinks he is still going to get away with it because he's a man and she's a woman. However, the audience can see that the woman is very dominant in the shot although there is a clear height difference. The difference in height is used to challenge gender conformity in that although she is significantly smaller than he is, Louise still is dominant and makes him show fear. Showing that just because someone is larger than you, it doesn't necessarily mean that they are stronger or more dominant, which challenges the social context for women at the time as the Femme Fatale and woman dominated men in film was unknown at the time. This reminds me of the scene in 'Jackie Brown'  (above) when she pulls a gun out against the dominant man in the scene - showing a reversal of gender roles and also challenging the representation of women. 



Heavenly Creatures 1994

       Furthermore, lighting is another Thriller convention used in this shot. It is non-ambient lighting, meaning that studio lighting has been used to increase the amount of light in the shot - we can see this from the lighting being a bright white lighting and evening lighting or ambient lighting from indoor lights would have a yellow tone to the light. A similar technique is used in 'Heavenly Creatures' (right) to add more light to the scene. This type of lighting is used to put the audience's focus onto the characters in the foreground of the scene. It also dulls the background even more to make sure the audience doesn't stray off from the action to a brighter object in the background, therefore the background is kept dark and unlit. This lighting puts a lot of focus onto the gun as it makes it the brightest part of the shot and a person's viewpoint will always go towards the brightest part of a shot before looking at the rest of it - therefore it establishes the situation very clearly and abruptly to the audience. Another use of camera and lighting is that a depth of field is used, meaning that the background is blurred/out of focus, as the foreground remains in focus. This technique is used in Photography a lot - shown by the ladybird (above) - as Photographers will want the audience to focus on a specific point before looking at the rest of the image. This is a concious decision as the background could be in focus in the photo (above) and the Ridley Scott's shot here. Therefore he chose to use the blur in this instance to make the audience focus very clearly on the situation and characters in the shot. 


     The use of camera angles is key to this shot/scene as it establishes the characters. This shot is a medium close up of the two main characters of this scene. In the shot as a whole, Louise is very much more dominant in the shot and her arm is stretched out, thus making the man have to stand straight and still, being less dominant in the shot. This is used to show her overall dominance in the situation and that she has the upper hand by having a gun pointed to his head. This camera angle is also used to make it much more limited in the use of space as not much of the background is used - meaning that the these two characters are very important and that they are the only two characters that matter in this shot. 

Essex Boys 2000

    Props are also used in this scene which have Thriller conventions. The gun is obviously the main conventional prop used here and is used to show violence and establish Louise as a 'Femme Fatale'. It also challenges the genre because it is not normally women who hold guns or shoot people in films or Thrillers even though the Femme Fatale in not uncommon, shown by Jackie holding the gun in 'Jackie Brown'. The clothes are a key prop as the man's shirt is white in colour which is a colour that connotes innocence and purity, however the colour is more of an off-white colour - showing that he is a not innocence or pure, but he is trying to appear to be. This is shown when he tries to 'kiss' Thelma as an innocent act, but then turns violent when the act is refused. The blue jacket that Louise is wearing is used to show a complete contrast between her and the man. The use of prop in film to represent a character is used a lot as it can compliment or contrast their character and personality, which reminds me of Jason in 'Essex Boys' as he is wearing a very loud, obnoxious shirt - which is used to reflect his obnoxious, selfish and vain personality. 

Key Thriller Conventions - Camera

Camera Angles - The use of strong and visually interesting camera angles is essential in encapsulating an audience and adding tension or mystery to a scene. I think we should utilise camera angles with utmost priority.

Examples of good use of camera angles:

Close up:

   The close up here in Witness is used to add to the tension and suspense of the atmosphere of the scene at this time and make the audience sympathise with the boy as he is struggling to close the door and could be killed if he doesn't - making the audience fear for his life. This is used to great effect and makes the audience feel more connected with the character of the boy.

   The close up used in Animal Kingdom is to make the audience directly associate with the main character, 'J'. As the film progresses, more and more close ups are used to directly associate the action with 'J' and to make the audience feel as if they are experiencing it from his perspective.




Long shots/Landscape shots (used to establish location):

    This long shot of the Australian landscape is used in Animal Kingdom. It is used to reflect the character in the scene as a morally corrupt, in that the landscape seems endless and limitless - reflecting that his morality, or lack of such, has no boundaries or limits and he will continue to do whatever he wants without consequences. Also the desolate wasteland that is shown in this image shows that his mind is in the wrong place and his judgement is wrong and he's gone insane with worry and anxiety. This kind of representational image could be used in our Thriller as we have the facility and idea to use a limitless landscape of the countryside.

 

This very barren landscape in Essex Boys is used to connote very similar meaning, in that the man is beating up a 'friend' as it is describe by the voiceover, although we can tell this is not true. The limitless landscapes reflects his limitless personality and morality in that he's just come out of a sentence in prison and the first thing he does is nearly kill the person who meant he went into prison. Although this is very graphic, the idea and connotations behind it are very strong and could be used in our thriller.

    Planning:

    In our Thriller I do think that we should focus very clearly on trying to use some of these generic camera shots as it would add more to the film rather than just having simple camera shots - as we only have 2 minutes so every shot and every detail must mean something, as I think that we should use clever narrative techniques, such as foreshadowing and connotations.

    The use of a long shot to establish a location could definitely be used as the girl is walking home as it would show her location, and it could be used again to show the man's house. We have already decided on using an establishing shot near the beginning of the film to show the girl in the café and establish the location and the whole café to the audience.

    As we develop our shot list further we will be able to establish which camera angles we are going to use and why we are going to use them. Such as a long shot to establish location or a high angle shot to show dominance in a scene.

Mainstream and Independent Film

Mainstream:

·      Target a mass audience for maximum profit

·      High budget – in studio

·      Profit oriented

·      Easy storyline to follow

·      Popular genre

·      A-list actors

·      CGI & SFX

Independent:

·      Have a specific target audience

·      Low budget

·      Plot oriented

·      Complex storyline

·      Specific genre – focus on cinematography

·      Unknown actors – give authentic feel

·      Sponsorship deals

·      Product endorsement

·      Distribution and TV deals

Cinema City: Independent

·         Own programme

·         Arthouse/Independent/Specific/Specialist

·         Elements of mainstream & independent

·         Part of the PictureHouse network

·         Funding from Europa Cinemas

·         Shows European films

PictureHouse:

·         Leading independent cinema operator in the UK

·         Network – not a chain

·         18 cinemas

·         City locations – university towns

·         Diverse programming

·         Blend of arthouse & mainstream

·         Encourages educational films/events

·         Offers Cinema City legal support

Europa Cinemas:

·         Network of cinemas over Europe

·         Gives subsidy to Cinema City – up to €16,000 p.a.

-       Only gets money if 35% of films are European and from at least 6 different countries. No more than 50% from one country.

·         Holds an archive of films

How was 'Animal Kingdom' a marketing success?

Animal Kingdom was an independent film, funded by the independent Australian based producers – Porchlight Films. The estimated budget was around $5,000,000 (AUD) – which is very low budget for a film, thus showing the fact that it is an independent film. The only mainstream aid to this film was the American distribution by Sony Pictures Classics which is an area of Sony Pictures that deals with independent film and producers. Although this could be seen as mainstream interference it does not take away the fact that this film was solely independent as the first screenings the theatrical release was done through Porchlight Films and Sony Pictures only interfered to help distribute the film the US audience. Another producer was Madmen who helped to fund the film. They are also well-known film producers so therefore people will know that they would only back a film that is worth seeing and a film that is going to make a profit. Another key aspect of the marketing was that the film has won the ‘Sundance’ Film Festival award – which is a reputable festival known across the world, meaning this would have been a key selling point for the producers to get across to the audience.

On the theatrical release, in Australia, it was only shown on 40 screens instead of the usual 160 screens that a mainstream film would show. This is because this is appropriate for a film of such a low budget, as there might not be many people going to see the film on the release date as there are no A-list actors used and the director is fairly unknown, therefore most people would not set out to see the film initially so the use of only 40 screens is used to make sure they don’t overestimate the popularity of the film. So far, as of 17 March 2011, Animal Kingdom has grossed $6,793,982 (Worldwide), which is staggering amount considering that only $5,000,000 was initially spent on it.

Animal Kingdom was a marketing success due to the viral marketing used. They aimed to encapsulate their audience by selling the film online via social media such as Facebook and Twitter. This is commonly used by independent films due to that fact that is very cheap to market a film online and you can create viral buzz if you have a good trailer and focus on the storyline as a selling point and this is just what they did with Animal Kingdom. The trailer focuses on the storyline and the genre to sell the film to the audience. It uses the ‘Sundance’ Film Festival logo to show that they won the award – meaning they are showing to the audience that this film is worth watching. The use of an Animalistic lexical field – words such as ‘Hunted’, ‘Survival’, ‘Weak’, ‘Strong’ and ‘Creatures’ – is used to reflect the title ‘Animal Kingdom’ and show that the meaning of the title is shown throughout the film. It also uses the reviews from L.A Times and the Independent UK to show a positive review of the film. As the L.A Times said it was “Immaculate” and the Independent said it was “remarkable”.

All of these marketing techniques together have resulted in the film being a marketing success. The utilisation of the social media was used to great effectiveness and was used mainly due to fact that it is very cheap marketing.

Words - 562

Thriller Planning

Changes to our Thriller Idea

We have had a change of ideas, but not a complete change just tweaking our initial idea to make it work much easier and to make the narrative be able to continue into a whole film rather than our old idea would have cut at 2 minutes and looked like a the whole film and then would've had nowhere to go onto the rest of the film. However, our new idea flows much easier into a whole film idea.

Our initial idea was to:

• Have a girl working in a café
• Soft music playing
• Shot of her initially so the audience can associate with the girl
• Shot of a name tag to show her name is 'Summer'
• Over the shoulder shot of a man watching her
• Flash of a shot of a wall covered in photos of the girl
• The man then follows the girl
• He follows her into her house*
• Shot of padlock on a gate unlocked
• Shot of man walking into gate
• Black screen showing title
• Girl scream on title screen
• Shot of man driving
• Shot of girl in back of truck in bin bag
• Close up of girl’s bare foot, twitching

*Changes to our idea (blue):

·  He stops and watches her walk into her house

• He then gets back into his car and drives home
• He gets home
• Hears a noise upstairs
• Music changes to more dramatic to add tension
• Girl in found dead on the floor in front of the wall of photos
• Flash of title 'Summer's End'
• Panning shot of man's face

            We wanted to do this because we thought that our first idea was not sufficient in that it had nowhere to go from the girl being abducted as the only two characters would have been used and there would be no mystery. However, if the girl dies it leaves the audience wondering why she was killed and by who.  Also it leaves the audience to figure out who the man was and why he was ‘stalking’ the girl.

            We have already thought about music and that we wouldn’t use any diegetic sound in the first scene apart from maybe a scream when the girl dies, but it would add to the tension if no diegetic sound was used for this part and only non-diegetic sound was used in the way of music to compliment or contrast the mood of the film. We thought of using calm, but quite eerie music to begin with – we thought maybe using something to do church bells. Then as the man walks up to the dead girl the music would turn a lot more dramatic to compliment the scene and also foreshadow the death. After the title shot is flashed up on the screen the music would turn back to calm to directly contrast the horrible mood.

            The use of the girl being called ‘Summer’ is because then we can make it relate to the title. If the title is ‘Summer’s End’ it shows a direct association between her and the film, meaning she is the main character. The word ‘End’ is used to show the final moment of something, in this case it’d be her life that would be ending.

Witness (1985) - Analysis

This film is about a young Amish boy who witnesses a murder whilst in a train station, in Philadelphia, with his Mother. The use of the title of the film is directly linked to the first scene of the film as his a 'Witness' of the murder. The estimated budget for this film was $12,000,000 and in total from the USA it grossed $65,500,000 on the box office. It was directed by Peter Weir and won 2 Oscars and was nominated for a further 6.

           The film starts with only non-diegetic sound - music playing over the film – used to make the audience first associate with the young Amish boy without being distracted by dialogue. The music is also quite angelic and compliments the camera shots used in the first part of the film. The first shot we see is of the young Amish boy in a slightly low angle close up of his face. This is used so that the audience can firstly make a connection with the boy before seeing any other characters. The use of the low angle is to perhaps make his hat look like a halo and show his innocence and importance in the overall storyline, which is complimented by the music playing. This is also confirmed further in the next shot. A low angle shot of a statue of an angle helping a man, the Angel of Mercy Statue or the Angel of the Resurrection in 30th Street Station, Philadelphia, is used to show foreshadowing in that the boy may be like an Angel when he helps to be a witness in the murder investigation. It is also used to show a direct contrast between Amish life and life in Western/modern society. The Amish are community oriented and have always been, keeping away from modern technology and/or society as much as possible, the original American dream, but we can see from the film that the real world is very the opposite of what the Amish believe to be the perfect life. This is shown by the corruption and brutal violence in this film. Yet, the Angel symbolises much more for the boy as it is his first time outside of the Amish community therefore this giant statue that many people pass every day is new and beautiful to him. It is a new culture and a new way of life, so it is a culture shock to him as they are so different. The low angle shows us the statue from his perspective as he is looking up to it in awe, we also are shown this from the use of shot-reverse-shot when it cut to the boy then back again to the statue to show how intently he is observing it.

Directly after the low angle of the statue we have a very high angle shot looking down at the boy. It could be said it is an over-the-shoulder shot because the shot is looking over the statue’s shoulder down to the boy. This is used to show his insignificance in the whole scheme of things and that his small community is very small compared to the larger Western society. It is also used to show his isolation as he is alone at that moment in time and doesn’t have anybody to protect him. As stated before, he is staring at the beauty of the statue and admiring the architecture, but from this angle we can many people walking past the statue and not paying any attention to it. This shows how people in today’s society are too busy to stop and appreciate beauty, but the Amish still retain this quality as it is not around them all the time because they live separately. The boy’s mother comes from behind him and pulls him away from in front of the statue – used to show that he wasn’t alone in the station and to remind the audience that he is a very small child and still needs his mother’s protection. It also reinforces the traditional values that the Amish have that women should be mothers and carers and look after the children.

It then cuts to a long shot of the boy and his mother sitting on a bench. This is used to establish a location and also to foreshadow an event. The use of a vanishing point is prominent in this shot as all of the lines in the shot are directional towards the door in the background, meaning that some kind of dramatic moment is going to happen behind the door. The young boy then asks his mother a question. This is a key moment in the film as it is the first diegetic sound in the film so far now that the music – non-diegetic sound – has stopped. As he walks towards the vanishing point, his mother stops him and calls him back because he has forgotten to wear his hat. This is used to show that his mother doesn’t want him to lose his innocence or ‘angel-like’ qualities as the hat represents a halo - seen in the first shot. The use of diegetic sound is also crucial to showing the direct contrast between lifestyles as the language they are speaking is not recognisably English, this shows the complete disassociation that the Amish have with modern American society.

It cuts to a medium close-up shot of a man and then to a similar shot of the boy. This is used to show them on an equal level and that neither of them is superior to one another as the shot is level on both occasions - not being at a high or low angle. It then cuts to a long shot to establish the location of the toilet and to show the contrast between the height of the man and the boy. The use of ambient lighting and low saturatio in this shot is used to create tension and a moody atmosphere. The boy then walks into a toilet cubicle and peers out of the cubicle to look at the man washing his face in the sink. It then cuts back to the man, but this time it is more of a close up shot. Another person walks in front of the camera, but the camera doesn’t move to show the audience who it was. This is used to create an enigma – the unknown – as we do not know who this man is or why the other man is staring at him. After staring at the ‘enigma’ the man continues to wash his face. As the camera pans up above the man washing his face we can see the back of a man, but we can only see that it is a black man in a suit standing at the urinal. After a short cut to the boy it cuts back to the black man standing at the urinal. He turns his head and nods.

It then cuts to a long shot which changes the viewpoint for the audience. This time we can see the man at the sink, the man at the urinal and also the ‘enigma’ standing in the foreground is one of the murders, but we don’t know who he is or even see his face. The ‘enigma’ man walks over, only showing his back to the audience, and he puts a jacket over the man at sink’s head. It then cuts to a close up of the black man’s hand as he now has a knife, then the black man comes over and slits the white man’s throat that is being strangled under the jacket by the other man. The colour of the jacket is significant because it is the colour red, which has many connotations – the main connotation in this scene would blood and death. The director has used the colour on purpose to reiterate the fact that the man is being killed. It then cuts to a shot of the boy looking through the door at the men killing the other man. The composition of this shot is so that the centre of this shot is the boy’s eye and it keeps the audience’s focus on that the boy just witnessed a brutal murder. The use of a black man as the killer is used to show the negative connotations with the colour black and that historically black people were always used as the bad guys in films and never the heroes as we have connotations of evil, death, darkness and brutality with the colour black.

It then cuts to the little boy and he backs into the cubicle and gasps, but the black man hears him, as we see in the next shot. The shot of the boy is a level shot, but it still shows his hat to be like a halo because he is still an innocent child. The shot of the black man shows him to question what he heard and get a gun out of his pocket – showing continues violet tendencies. He begins to kick open the toilet cubicle doors, looking for any people that may have been watching. The use of the toilet is crucial as it is a generic thriller convention because it is a very unglamorous location and reflects the situation of the murder. The boy then hears the man and acts fast to lock the door of the cubicle he is in, but he struggles as he gets nervous and a close up shot is used to show that he cannot lock the door. Then the man reaches the locked door and a close up of his hand and the gun is used to show that they are both struggling with the door, but because of each other. As the man kicks open the door, the boy slides under the cubicle into the previous one and dropping his hat in the meantime. Then it cuts to the boy and there’s a panning shot from the toilet up to his face as he is standing on the toilet. This is used to show that he has lost his innocence because he isn’t wearing his hat anymore, which represented his halo and him as the ‘angel’ – showing that he will never been the same now he has witnessed such a crime. The shot stays on the boy even as the black man walks out of the toilet.

It then cuts to a low angle shot of a policeman and people walking around. As the people disperse it shows the boy and his mother sitting on the bench again with her comforting him, but again he has no hat on. After this it cuts to a shot of a door with a blue colour behind the glass. It opens and a man walks in wearing a suit. He is shown in the light and with a blue background; this is used to represent him as a hero and show that he is going to be the hero in the whole film as the ‘villain’ was shown in dark, ambient lighting and also had dark skin.

Locations for Thriller

We could possibly utilise this old warehouse/farmhouse for a scene in our thriller to add to the tension of the killing scene.

Our group had the idea to use these big iron gates to add to the tension and mystery of the thriller. The direct contrast between the large gates and the small girl could represent the male dominance in society and the male dominance in our thriller as the man is appearing to stalk the girl.

This shot would be used when the girl is in the pick-up truck as the road is long and eerie.

We would use this shot when the girl is walking home from the café. The vanishing point towards the house shows that a dramatic moment is in the near future.

This is an eerie location and could also be used when the girl is walking home. We thought this could be used as the location for when the second girl finds the shoe of the victim.

Use of monochrome

We thought that the use of monochrome or black-and-white would be a good idea in our thriller due to the fact that the original 'noir' thrillers were in black-and-white, the term 'noir' coming from the French, meaning black. The use of black-and-white is to make the 'dark' ambiance of the more sinister and creepy, but also due to the fact that colour technology wasn’t yet invented in the 1940s when the ‘noir’ thriller was first utilised. However, I thought the use of black-and-white would add to the tension in our thriller and make the suspense more prominent if noir lighting was used also to create harsh shadows and silhouettes, meaning we can hide characters in the shadows and use light to concentrate the audience on one thing in particular.