Thriller Research

As our final piece is a social realistic thriller I have collected some research on Thrillers and what is expected to be in thrillers, so mainly i have researched the codes and conventions in typical thrillers as well as iconic ones.

For a thriller the audience will be expecting many similarities within the genre and without these thing a movie could be doomed for example a thriller must contain some form of mystery or drama, have a amount of action within it, parts may contain some tension and keep the viewer on the edge of there seat. A thriller will also be expected to contain a twist and constantly make the viewer think or question the plot, locations should be dark and gloomy to build suspense when foreshadowing and the ending should be unexpected as well as thought provoking.

The main aim for any thrillers is to keep the audience alert, on the edge of their seats and constantly thinking about the plot. On average in most thrillers the main character is set against a problem or task for example they might have to escape for somewhere or solve a mystery of some sort. During a good thriller they would be expected to show drama or tension by enhancing facial expressions to show fear or worry during key scenes within a film as without that a thriller wouldn't be nearly as attention grabbing and viewers would not be able to connected with the characters fully. Thrillers normally use quick, fast and sudden changes in emotions to drive the viewer to a constant state of alertness and keep them on the edge of a seat.

Mise-En-Scene

Within a thriller there are often no real specific Mise-en-scene as it all depends on the plot or sub category, in a period thriller the clothes, make-up, plot, etc would be completely different to a SC-FI thriller.

But as a key role often the mise-en-scene is used more to show the characters rather than a genre when i comes to thrillers, I feel that is mainly because thrillers range some much. Where as horrors you expect blood and black to be clear and in actions you expect good open locations with lighter tones, in thrillers it is not so simple, yeah blood is often expected but with out it people don't automatically resent the film, in fact often gore and blood is missing from thrillers to challenge the genres ideals.

Sounds

Thrillers have a huge range of iconic sounds mainly depending on sub genre but all contain a memorable tone and are used in a haunting or heart pumping style this is because almost every thriller is designed to trigger set emotions depending on the scene or genre. A lot of thrillers use very distinct noises in the films as a way to target the audience as anyone of them could use these sounds to recognizes both genre and theme of the film.

many thrillers use a very distinct technique when starting to use sounds in there films, they use a loud and powerful sound like thunder or door slams to trigger a piece of music, as well as the starting of there music they also use quick and sudden sound effects or tempo changes to break up what could be classed as a low pitched and drawn out noise.

A classic example of these techniques is clear in the all time classic thriller "JAWS".
I took this clip from you tube as its a great example of the classic thriller sounds it has a constant and repeated deep, drawn out tune with tempo changes and sudden volume changes. They have used these techniques as a way to a drama and suspense in direct lead to a killing and as it sets every killing it is also a iconic sound in its self and can instantly be used to tell the film.

Another set of iconic thrillers are the Jurassic park trilogy which are some of the most well known thriller trilogies and like jaws also uses many similar, noticeable techniques within there films which can make there film recognized by just sound and music sequences used within the films.
 Here is the opening sound track form the original 1993 film

Lighting

For thrillers the lighting typically varies a lot from scene to scene and character to character, this is because each person is represented differently. The bad guys or those against the protagonists are often shown in low key lighting and even sometimes are just shown as silhouettes this is show the audience don't relate or get attached to them, where as the good guys or those with the protagonists are shown in high key lighting and often have their faces lit up to show them off and make it easier for the viewers to relate.