Prezi about our second group discussion - made by Haydon

What is a Thriller?

A thriller is a film that relentlessly pursues a single-minded goal - to provide thrills and keep the audience cliff- hanging at the edge of their seats' as the plot builds towards a climax. Thriller and suspense films promote intense excitement, a high level of anticipation, ultra- heightened expectation, uncertainty, anxiety and nerve-wracking tension. In these movies the tension usually rises when the main character is either put into a menacing situation, escaping or on a dangerous mission from which the audience see escape is probably not an option. There are many different varieties of thrillers such as action, adventure, sci-fi, crime-caper,western,film-noir and even romantic comedy thrillers exist. Horror is known to be closely-related to thrillers, as they are also designed to elicit tension and suspense, whilst taking the viewer through agony and fear.

One of the first psychological thrillers was Gaslight (1944). Paula's aunt, Alice Alquist, a famous entertainer, is murdered in her home. Paula, who lives with her aunt, finds the body. Police fail to find the killer, and Paula is sent away to school. Ten years later, Paula returns to London with her new husband. They take up residence in her aunt's house, which she has inherited. Paula is increasingly isolated by her husband but does come to the attention of an admirer of her aunt, Mr. Brian Cameron. Written by Sandra Douglass.

Safety Last (1923) was one of the first 'Thrillers' it was produced in the United States of America. The movie was black and white and was directed by Fred C. Newmeyer , Sam Taylor. The movie was a a mix between a romantic thriller and comedy.

Alfred Hitchcock is known to be 'The Master of Suspense Thrillers', not a single list of suspense or thriller films can be complete without mention of English filmmaker Hitchcock. He is was born in London, before he went into film he worked for a short time in engineering. He left for Hollywood at around 1939, Alfred started to work in the media by submitting short articles from an in-house publication. In his very first piece, he employed themes of false accusations,conflicted emotions and twisted endings. Hitchcock took his full time position at the Famous Players-Lasky Company designing title cards for silent films. In 1925, Alfred Hitchcock directed his first film and began making the "thrillers" for which he became known the world over. He explored the darker side of human nature through the different sexualities, voyeurism, guilt, punishment, paranoia and obsession.

Religious Thrillers - In many religious thrillers there are a lot of different themes incorporated into one, obviously the primary theme would be religion but it hits on different aspects of thrillers as well. It could include a gathering of a religious group, ceremonies, sentimental objects and lots more. For example, in some religious thrillers you might come across supernatural or out of body experiences, as well as lots of church images. Examples of these types of thrillers could be 'The Devil’s Advocate', 'The Ninth Gate' or 'The Da Vinci Code'.

Psychological Thrillers - Most psychological thrillers have drama, mystery and meaningful suspense.The protagonists in a psychological thriller must be reliant on their mental resources to solve the situation that they might be in, because of their nature; many psychological thrillers usually cross over into the horror genre. Some examples are 'Memento', 'Rear Window', 'Taxi Driver'.

Character list, Cast list and Locations

We have come down to two final ideas that we have decided to leave till we discuss with Matt and Luke. Both of our final ideas ended up being Ashen's ideas

Character List	Cast List	Locations
[MAIN CHARACTER] 16-17 years old, appears to be good looking, appears social extroverted, clean, average, not too tall, too small. Average build. White Caucasian, male, edgy, casual trendy clothing. •  Extras can wear there normal attire. •  [BUS DRIVER], is in bus driver uniform. In his mid 40s	•   Alec •  Ben Radcliffe •  [BUS DRIVER] Remi •  7 EXTRA	• Bus stop in Cranleigh •  In the bus moving on the way to school •  Generic state school, building block
Character List	Cast List	Locations
•  [MAIN CHARACTER] Early twenties, dark medium length, fairly tall,   stocky but not fat, clean cut, defined look, smart trendy clothes, suited up.		Izzy Maddox, mansion

Ashen's first idea - My first idea is a story of a young American boy who has struggled with his education. He sort of a class clown, a well-liked character. For example he looks for trouble, as he pressures his friend to take his Dad’s guns with him, but all they do is check them out, however our main character is seen to love the power. However this time he gets down to work, he spends hours and hours revising for his final exams. However he finds the more time he spends isolated and separate from society to study, the more and more introverted he becomes. After his exams his mother worries about his social awkwardness and his constant sadness, so she takes him to a doctor. He is prescribed Prozac, an antidepressant drug. However everything because becomes black and white, as he becomes sedated by the drug the more his empathy decreases. He is unable to relate to people. In his frustration he slips down a road of despair. He begins to identify with the columbine shooters and other school shooting Prozac victims. He begins modelling their behavior, he is new twisted negative whirlwind of an idea becomes his new hobby. He begins making cheap homemade bombs. Then he goes back to his dads pistols. The story is concluded by the boy walking into school armed with two semi-automatics.

Now the opening title sequences for this piece would be very similar to the style of Kyle Coopers opening to Se7en. The music/sound used throughout the piece would have to be very influential and unnerving. What the opening title sequence would show would be, video of excessive writing, then video of a young boy swallowing pills. There would be a lot of cuts, for example of the Prozac bottles, and then the swallowing of the pills. Then the googling of guns, the columbine shootings, and similar activities. Building interest and intrigue.

DEVELOPMENTS…This idea developed could start with him going to the school with the guns. And the rest of the film would show his Tyranny and act within the school lunch hall, while he gets flashbacks to what got him to that place. Every time he gets a flashback he takes another pill. So he begins to puke, and once the medication is out his system he can’t live within himself knowing what he has done. His humanity has come back. He regrets everything. He begins running through the canteen shouting ‘I am sorry… I’m sorry’ as tears stream down his face, he grabs one of the students as a hostages, and takes him outside with him, where he is confronted by the police. He throws her to the ground and pulls out his empty pistol as he is shot to death.

The opening sequence for this would consist of the boy, on his way to school, on the school bus. All the activity around him is ecstatic, however he sits calm and collected. He goes through his bag school bag and the audience gets glimpses of what looks like to be just some metal objects and some highlighted pieces of papers on the columbine shootings. He pulls out a tub of Prozac and pops a pill. Then there are a few pop shots of the pill being swallowed and then everything desaturates to a black and white. Everyone leaves the bus as he solemnly sits on the bus, he grabs his stuff in a controlled manner and walks towards the school. Cuts to titles.

The opening title sequence to this idea would be the CEO, narrating his daily lifestyle, him walking the audience through his experience every day. While he through out the statistics of people who die by care accidents, compared to the minority of people who die from drugs, however the government do not care to make vehicles more safe due to the corporations lobbying for the government. We finally end the title sequence with the CEO saying how he still wants more of this lavish lifestyle.

Ashen's second idea - My second idea is of a CEO for Ford, who indirectly kills thousands a year due to the greed for more profit. The basis of this story is how all who make up this corporation are aware of their damage upon the people, however they don't care to accept responsibility. He lives the high life, while thousands of deaths compensate for his own gain. However after a while his Ford goes under investigation, and he begins to loses his sh*t. The audience believes that at last he is going to get what he deserves. However at the last minute he gets to escape the system. And only needs to spend three months away in another country (pretty much go on holiday) and the authorities can’t get him

Written by Ashen Page

Splitting up into groups

A couple of lessons ago, my media class was split into groups for the opening title sequence for our thriller. This was done immediately after the last lesson that we had finished presenting our ideas to the class. Adam, our teacher took a note of each of our four ideas that we had presented, in order to understand briefly who's ideas would potentially struggle and who's ideas are strong and have room for development. The group selection was done by an app, this meant that it was completely random. Adam felt this was the best way to make sure that the groups were put together evenly and that this method would set us up for the 'real world', where we would have no say in our group division. I felt that this was a completely fair way of splitting our media class up. I got put into a group with Alen, Ashen and Hayden. Straight away, we all got together and started to reintroduce our ideas, one by one. This helped us comment and even eliminate a couple of ideas from the sixteen that we initially had.

Our first group production meeting went successfully, we continued to discuss the ideas for our opening sequences. We identified and eliminated the ideas that we psychically would not be able to produce. Even though this had helped us to cut down the amount, we were still left with about eight ideas. It was challenging for each group member to let go of their ideas, counting myself but throughout our hour discussion, we cut down two more ideas. Each time that we would go through the ideas that we were left with, each group member would have a creative way of developing each of the ideas.

In our most recent lesson we came down to three main ideas that we had decided to storyboard. By storyboarding, this enabled us to clarify on the scenes that we would want to include in each of the ideas. It also helped us understand what ideas would be difficult to carry out and what ideas would actually work. For example, we decided on storyboarding Ashen's idea, we found out from this process that his idea to have a 'gun' at the end of the opening sequence wouldn't work. Therefore, we adapted the idea to make the opening sequence seem a lot more realistic and simple. My group and I are working to develop our ideas further and to remake the storyboards to make them clearer and more detailed, in order to work with them later on in the project.

Thriller Ideas

Idea 1

He brushes their hair, feeling each strand within his fingers. He stares into their deep blue eyes thinking of her. Oh how he misses her. Back to reality though, it's time to get the kids and keep the wife happy, it’s funny how no one would ever suspect the kind, friendly neighbor from next door. Little do they know that if their daughter fits the criteria it will be her that will be lying in the attic floor.  

In the opening sequence we don’t see the main character, as this leaves a mystery for the audience. We see medium close ups of lots of different blonde haired, blue eyed girls of a young age. Some of them crying and some of them with a taped mouth. His hand strokes their hair and we can hear him smell their hair as the music gets more intense. Also, there is a clear sound of a heart beating really fast.  

Idea 2

My film idea is based upon how two identical twins or sisters are very important figures to a secret agency. The sisters find themselves in life/death situations that enable them to overcome their fears. According to the secret agency they are the key to a certain principle in humanity. Like in every movie, they are being hunted down by the ‘bad guys’ who would use their secret and kill them. This movie wouldn’t be based on a typical ‘Hollywood’ movie, it would be more alternative in the production and filming part.

The opening sequence will consist of a very abstract setting to the actual film's story line. It will be based in the surrey hills, So huge fields that create a very free feeling. We see how the two young girls play on the fields and run around. Also, there is a time lapse, as we see them having fun and the sun going down. The girls were supposed to return home before their the sun went down, but they didn’t. The sound in this sequence is very lively and we here naturalistic sounds such as birds, wind and crickets.

Idea 3

The whole movie is based on a murderer that is family friends with the family that lives down the block. They get closer and closer e.g invite him over for dinner. This guy is attractive, so the teenager is interested in the guy. They never find out much about this guy, but when he goes back home he has a whole plan set up to get this family murdered for a particular reason.

The opening sequence is based on three people sitting in three seats ( like in the voice ), but they are strained and trapped. There is a main guy who is telling them a really creepy story, or singing a riddle. We don’t see the guys face but at the end we see a glimpse of his back. It is obvious to the viewer that the three people are held under hostage. The whole background would be black with spotlights, as if they are sitting in an abandoned house. We do not get a full shot of the three people together, as this was done at different times. These people end up being related and are of different ages. We see loads of different emotions but all the viewer could see is a voice over of the guy singing and the sound of sharpening knifes.

Idea 4

The movie is going to be about how a really messed up middle aged guy has been looking for a person for about three years, this made him go a bit psycho. The movie is seen from his perspective and how he views the world. He tries to prove to people that it is infact possible to find this person that murdered his family.

The opening sequence would consist of many different angled shots and close ups that would show his findings and all the papers. The setting would be a junky old apartment that hasn’t been clean in ages. There are dirty dishes, clothes laying around everywhere but this guy is always committed to his computer and all the papers on his desk. He is an average middle ages man who isn’t very successful and through all of these troubles, this makes him mentally unstable.

Preliminary Task

Actual coursework task defined

Video

Preliminary exercise: Continuity task involving filming and editing a character opening a door, crossing a room and sitting down in a chair opposite another character, with whom she/he then exchanges a couple of lines of dialogue. This task should demonstrate match on action, shot/reverse shot and the 180-degree rule.

Main task: the titles and opening of a new fiction film, to last a maximum of two minutes.

All video and audio material must be original, produced by the candidate(s), with the exception of music or audio effects from a copyright-free source. Both preliminary and main tasks may be done individually or as a group. Maximum four members to a group.