Thriller Opening (Research): Textual Analysis - Se7en

We have decided to look at the thriller movie 'Se7en' in order to gain ideas on what to do in our thriller opening which we will be making later on in the year and are currently planning.

This thriller film stars Morgan Freeman and Brad Pitt, two famous actors and it follows them as they try to solves the mystery behind these murders that are occurring, relating back to the seven deadly sins.

In my opinion, after watching the entire movie after being shown the clip, I enjoyed it a lot and did indeed find this to be quite a good movie and was willing to sit through the whole thing. A lot of things that happened in the clip we were shown made me want to watch the full movie and hence, I did so.

Thriller Opening/Theory (Research): A Touch of Frost ~ Camera Shots

This post is about disability represented within "A Touch of Frost" and how it's represented through different camera shots. This could give us ideas on how to show disability in our thriller opening if we decide to do so, giving us ideas as well for shots we could use anyway.

In a clip I’ve watched from the series, A Touch of Frost, where I’m focusing on the character Billy and how disability can be represented in TV dramas, which seems odd yet they are portrayed in different ways for definite. I’ll be mostly looking at the camera angles used though within the clip I’ve seen in order to show how he is presented.  There seems to be a shot of Billy at the start, being tracked using a long shot which allows the audience to follow his trail as he dusts himself off during this scene. This could hint at something suspicious has happened. A couple of minutes later, there is then a close up of Billy’s face, showing a sense of fear upon it as though he is a deer caught in the headlights of a car, like he is a victim.

It is noticed that when the father and inspector enter the room Billy is in and they’re sat down, there is a two person shot of the father and Billy in the same scene, this can almost show that Billy needs someone with him as when it shows the inspector, he doesn’t have anyone else in his shot, almost showing that he doesn’t need anyone or any support. Yet looking back at Billy and his father, it almost appears like his father is babying him by being in this shot with him. A little later on, it shots Billy in a low angle shot, showing him as almost inferior to the inspector and being judged in a way, but it almost shows him as being vulnerable once more and can also hint at him having down syndrome.

Thriller Opening (Research): Conventions of a Thriller Film

In a thriller film, the producers do many different things to make sure that the audience knows that the film is indeed a thriller film. For example, they will dim lighting, making it quite low key, many quick cuts between scenes will make it so that the tension would rise as it would be quite snappy at showing things. Shadows give off a sense of darkness and can sometimes give the audience a sense of thrill, alongside music that slowly builds up, creating a sense of tension. Many conventions for thriller movies do raise the tension as it’s practically their job. There would be dramatic changes in the angle of shots, showing power at points for certain characters, them trying to think or doing a certain action which would set the scene and mood. Diegetic sounds of breathing can easily make a person tense up and is quite good for a dramatic effect and to make the audience sit at the edge of their seat.

Black and white shots alongside a mixture of montage shots show us of time passing by and can make things seem more dramatic, even a falling glass can be seen as a movement that would definitely be a part of a thriller film. There is also a lot of fast paced editing within certain scenes which can bring out the excitement of an audience or anxiety, or even make them a bit nervous though it depends on the scenes that are finishing.

Though the most cliché thing to happen in thriller movies is the scenes where protagonists are at the mercy at the antagonists, this can give the audience a sense of thrill as though hope is lost but obviously, the protagonist will triumph in the end, whether it means risking their life or sacrificing it, it shall be done in order to defeat the villain. A typical example of this would be Jaws, a thriller film of a man-eating shark but in the end, they do, of course, beat the shark, a thriller film which I have recently watched.

Depending on the genre type may vary on what is to be involved in a thriller movie as there are many different sub-genres in the world of thrillers which gives us a variation in movies and can make it so that we don’t know what to expect next.

According to a site known as MindMeister, there is five areas for conventions and codes within thriller films which are the feelings thrillers create within their target audience, thriller narratives, iconography, characters and of course, themes. These are important in the eyes of the people that post on this site as there are many types that fall under each category. For example, under ‘Feelings thrillers create’, they believe that thrillers should cause the audience to feel excitement, suspense, anticipation, anxiety, uncertainty and should be, of course, nerve wracking for the audience to watch at points where there is high tension.

 

Preliminary Task: Evaluation

In a small group of three; me, Lizzie Stafford and Millie Holmes, worked together to create a small video that was about two minutes long at max, we named it, La Penna Rosa Rojo, we had a change in the name sue to us not being able to find a pen that was actually pink like we had hoped to use within our video. Instead, we used a red pencil (even though it can't be seen so easily in the black and white video, so much time spent for nothing on trying to find the right coloured pencil part) but we still enjoyed spending time on this task. Lizzie did well with the filming as she took pretty much care of all the filming whilst me and Millie prepared rooms, well tried to, and also found out equipment that needed carrying, as well as acting in the video. Below is a link to the video as each of us had a specific job to do on this video and I think we worked well together.

We were then told to afterwards, create an evaluation of our finished work, analysing where we went wrong, what went well, how much time we spent, etc. In my opinion, I enjoyed it all.

 

Preliminary Task: Post Production in Utopia

The series Utopia is a sci-fi series which is one for thriller lovers, as they say in reviews, and includes hyper-real violence. They use quite bright colours in this series as I have noticed that it also has a comic book feel to it, mostly based around the fact that the series is based on a comic book which tells of a global conspiracy which turns out to be true.
They edited in the colours after shooting as they shoot the scenes in Britain and the blue skies in the scenes are seen, it would be obvious that they have edited in the blues skies, after all, Britain isn't really the place where blue skies are always present.
They use green screens a lot  which allows them to add on a background and make out the characters are in a complete different place to where they actually are, fooling the audience.

Preliminary Task: Storyboard



This here is a storyboard, created by Lizzie Stafford, a member of our small group, as the title at the time was 'La Penna Rosa'. I'm unsure if we changed it at any point as we switched to using a red pencil instead of the desired pink pen that we wanted for the video... yes... it's serious. Anyway, below is the storyboard we followed, most of the way, for the video. 

 

 

Preliminary Task/Theory: TV Drama Case Study

 

In our own time, we were told to produce a presentation that told us in depth about the series we decided to look at. In this case, I decided to look at the medical American TV drama called House as I enjoyed the series thoroughly. Below is the case study I had produced on the series:

When using slideshare though, the animations and gifs appear to not work along with some of the text being blurred which isn't intended and it wasn't in the original slideshow, but it is for some reason on this site.