Evaluation

Thriller Evaluation
By Can Gizem Arik

My thriller film is called ‘Capture’. It is about a psycho stalker who kidnaps and kills young women. Some thriller films that have influenced my ideas while creating my film opening were ‘Arlington Road’ and ‘Strangers’. They influenced me because they have the basic conventions of a thriller genre film, such as close-ups of faces with shocked/scared expressions, screaming, fast paced soundtracks, empty streets lined with houses, lonely victims and low key lighting.

I had watched a documentary about thriller films and it taught me that the first five minutes of a film are very important because it needs to grab the audience’s attention and interest. I also learned that the audience needs to know the nature of the film and that this can be achieved by establishing things such as plot and character. Another thing I found out was the “trick of Film Noir”, which is basically showing the ending of the film at the beginning to trick the audience to gain their attention and to create suspense.

Most of these conventions can be seen in my opening, for example, the fast paced, instrumental soundtrack which helps create and maintain tension. Close-ups of objects (mobile phone with a ‘withheld’ caller screen) and faces were used to show emotion or to make clear what the props are. We also filmed a scene in an empty street with houses and the lonely victim walking though because it’s an ‘everyday’ place and an ‘everyday’ situation but the audience knows that something will happen because of the typical conventions and because of the non-diegetic sounds of heavy breathing and a camera shutter.

A different location we filmed in was a park. We did this because parks have a connotation of being creepy and dangerous in thriller films. We filmed in the park when it was empty to go back to the convention of a lonely victim in an empty place.

Looking back at the preliminary task, I feel that I have learned a lot in the progression from it to the full product. For example, I have become familiar with the different shots and what they could connote, such as point-of-view shots put the audience in the characters place and it helps them feel involved in the story and it could help emphasise more with the characters. The storyboarding and planning was also very educative because it helped me understand that it’s better to be prepared and to know what stage I’m at than to make it up as I go.

We came up with the idea of our film as a group. We discussed what thriller storylines are popular, e.g. terrorism, murder etc and what other elements thriller films have, e.g. “the final girl”. I think our full product was successful because we followed the basic codes and conventions of a thriller genre. There were some problems while editing because the computer wasn’t working so it had probably lost us some time but we managed to keep up.

The audience for my media product would be men and women, aged 16 – 28. They could range from working-class to upper-class because it is a film about a bad situation, not class difference. The audience can be from any race and we tried to make the audience be able to relate to the film by using actors from different races. People living in the city would probably be able to relate more to the storyline and location in the film. A typical person who fits into my target audience could be: “Elizabeth; Liz, nineteen, lives in London. Works part-time in a retail shop such as ‘Next’ and goes college full-time. Hobbies are going cinema, shopping, hanging out with friends, reading and exercising. She likes listening to RnB and pop songs. She lives in a one bedroom apartment.”

I will attract my target audience by staring famous actors in the film, such as Keira Knightley, Anthony Hopkins and Robert Pattison. I will also attract them with the thriller genre of my film; action/crime thriller. It won’t be boring because there will be stunts and suspense, mystery and excitement. I will market my film via posters, billboards, travel (bus, train stations), internet, trailers and TV. Another good way to market and advertise is via virals on sites such as Facebook or Myspace. This type of advertising will be an advantage because it is free and spreads fast.

My film would be a big Hollywood blockbuster. The institution that might distribute my media product is Universal Studios. It is one of the six worldwide major American film studios. Having a known institute to distribute my film is an advantage because then the people will know it’s worth seeing and the fact that it’s an American institution helps attract more audiences around the world. However, the cast and crew and locations will be mainly British, therefore it will be a British film.

On a practical hands-on level, my experience of filming and using Final Cut Pro was very educational. I learned many different ways to film shots and how to achieve a certain feel with the shots used. I have also learned that technology is very important when constructing media products because without it we wouldn’t be able to do effects or advertise on the internet etc. The internet has widened the potential audience for my film. If we didn’t have technology, we wouldn’t be able to release ‘Capture’ on Vimeo or do the blogging.

Overall, I think we have been successful in creating an opening to a thriller genre film. If I compare ‘Capture’ to a real thriller film like ‘Arlington Road’ I will be able to find many similarities. For example, in ‘Arlington Road’ there was artificial lighting and in ‘Capture’ there was a black and white effect. In both openings, there were long shots, worms-eye-view, point-of-view, panning and more similar shots. There was a street with houses in both thrillers as well. I also think I’ve been effective in creating an opening that attracts my target audience because I had a live audience aged 16- 18 watch my film and this is some of the feedback I received: “Good establishing shots. Camera sound was effective. The use of black and white was effective and original. Good variety in the shots. Effective match-cuts. The ‘withheld’ caller on the phone works very well as it creates suspense.” Im a wasteman call me 07927384758