Thriller Film Typeface

It was important when producing our thriller film opening to find an appropriate font that fits with our film and genre. To discover what fonts were appropriate to use we researched other thriller films to see what kind of fonts are appropriate, we came across 'Inception' and we liked the bold block letters so we thought we could use this as an influence in the production of ours. We feel that the bold letters match the connotations of an action thriller film that we wish to capture.

Thriller Film Soundtrack

When constructing our thriller opening a key factor to take into consideration was the soundtrack, although when we made a final decision we didnt have any music that carried on but a short piece of music everytime a flashback was shown. When the flashback began a sudden sharp high pitched noise that lasts a couple of seconds can breifly be heard, this symbolizes to the audience that the flashback has begun after that a short piece of eerie music is played throughout the duration of the flashback, this is to give the impression that the protagonist's past may be consumed in sinister goings on.


When researching for a sound effect for the begining of the flashbacks we decided we wanted something like the sound effects heard in the opening of 'Se7en' a sort of sharp metallic grinding noise. Then when we were looking for music to play during the flashbacks we wanted an eerie sort of echo noise that sort of came in waves, suggesting that it was calm yet mysterious aswell.

Thriller Film Character Casting

The Protagonist:
The requirements for our protagonist were that they were a tall male that was able to film at short notice and preferably had experience in acting. Me and Jamil decided in the end that for practicality it was best that one of us was cast as the protagonist and because I was the closest to our descrption, so I was cast as the protagonist.

The Antagonist:
When we began searching for someone to play the antagonist we had to bare in mind that only the back of the actor would be seen so we only had some basc requirments which were: shorter than the protagonist and were also able to film at short notice. After looking for potentials, we finally cast my friend David as the Antagonist because he matched our description and was able to film when we needed to.

Thriller Film Characters

The Protagonist:
Our Protagonist is a caucasian male in his early thirties, when we first see him he is waking up in the middle of nowhere injured with a gunshot wound that 'apparently' killed him. He wakes up and has no recollection of where he is or who he is and the only way he can piece together his past is his memory slowly recovering shown in the forms of flashbacks.


The Antagonist:
The antagonist is an mysterious man in his early forties, at the begining of the story not much is known about him only that he is invoved with the protagonist's past and may hold the key to unlocking it.

Thriller Film Costumes, Props and Objects

Costumes, Props and Objects

The protagonist wears a basic grey t-shirt that has a bullet hole on the chest and a blood patch around the hole. We choose the colour grey to represent the protagonist's moral ambiguity.

The Protagonist is also wearing dark blue jeans, this suggests that he is seemingly in the eyes of the public an 'average guy'.

 Over the grey T-shirt, our protagonist wears a leather jacket, but only in the flashbacks of him getting ready. We choose a male leather jacket because it suggests masculinity and gives the audience the chance to make their own assumtions of the protagonist.

The Protagonist wears a pair of white trainers, we choose white trainers because he wears a grey T-shirt to represent moral ambiguity, the black jacket to suggest a dark side to him and the white trainers to represent purity, that he is a good guy so the audience can identify with him.

The antagonist wears a military style trench coat, this represents a man of action but has a sinister feel about him. The dark coat represnets evil so the audience can recognize immediately that he is a bad guy.

In our opening scene we only have two props, both of which are two handguns. Both the protagonist and Antagonist have guns, this shows that both characters are involved in crime and both are dangerous.

Thriller Film Locations

Thriller film locations

When deciding locations to film our project we needed to find a run down urban location for our scenes outside, for this we used The Hewett School. On the schools grounds we found an open space that would be ideal for the scene when the protagonist wakes up and has no idea where he is. For the shots when we see the protagonist running we used different areas of The Hewett School and different shots to show the intensity of the story, for example we filmed a low angle looking up at the protagonist running down some stone stairs, showing that it was an urban location.

For the scenes inside we filmed in my bedroom because of various reasons such as; practicality and I have venetian blinds in my room, which is a common convention in thriller films, with this in mind we decided to include them into our thriller film to give the audience that familiarity when they watch it.

Evaluation question 6

Evaluation question 6

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Evaluation Question 7

Question 7: Looking back at your prelimary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product?

The prelimary task was so that we could develop our skills with the cameras and to introduce us to the film making elements. The main task was for us to film a scene in which a character walks and meets another character, the two characters would then exchange some dialogue, but we had to include different camera shots such as shot reverse shot and zooming in, we also had to gain our confidence with using the camera and tripod together. The prelimary task which helped us develop our skills with cameras and editing software in preparation for our thriller film project.

Before production of our thriller films began we had to do a lot of research and planning, this differed from the planning that we had to do for our prelimary task, for example we had to draw up storyboards to show the action we would be filming in each box, next to each box was the name of the camera shot and a short summary of what would be occurring in the shot. These were useful skills that we learnt and then applied when production of our thriller films began.

At the start of prelimary task production we were not as informed and aware of the technologies and techniques we would have to use but as we progressed through the production we learnt the skills required to produce the full product and then later on apply to our thriller films

Confirmed Dead - Thriller film opening

Evaluation Question 1

Question 1: In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products.

The Thriller opening that we chose to create was based upon an ‘Action Thriller’ genre. The film starts with a man waking up in the street to discover he has what would appear to be a fatal gunshot wound on his, he has no recollection of who he is or how he sustained his injury. As the story unfolds the protagonist is chased by a group of dangerous individuals trying to hunt him down whilst also trying to discover the dark secrets of his past.

One of the thriller films that had an influence on the production of our thriller opening was ‘The Bourne Ultimatum’. We utilized this film’s conventions for example the way in which we edited having shots on screen for a little amount then moving onto the next, this convention was used to give the effect that the audience were fully immersed in the action as it was taking place, it also speeds up the pace of our opening which is very similar to the opening of ‘The Bourne Ultimatum’.

 Another influence was ‘Memento’ this is because in our film we have a series of flashbacks which helps explain the narrative of our film. These flashbacks are shown in ‘black in white’ to help the audience recognise the transition from the main story and the flashbacks which led up to what we first see; this was also used in ‘Memento’. Another convention that we have developed is similar to ‘The Bourne Ultimatum’ in which we distorted the shot during a flashback to give the impression that the audience and protagonist are both recalling an event crucial to the story, this also helped the audience to identify with the protagonist, they are experiencing it as the character on screen. The Television show ‘Misfits’ had an influence in the way we edited our product, this is because misfits is shown as gritty with a dark atmosphere and this is done by altering the saturation and contrast of the shots, we developed this into our own product to give a similar gritty impression.

An influence on our cinematography and the way in which the film was shot was ‘The Blair Witch Project’ this was because of the ‘shakey cam’ technique, we developed this into our product because of the mysterious and sinister atmosphere it gives in ‘The Blair Witch Project’ this was the impression we wanted the audience to experience when watching our product. When constructing our characters, especially our protagonist, we decided to research other protagonists, ultimately our protagonist was influenced by the character of ‘Clark Kent’ on the Television show ‘Smallville’ in the season 10 premiere when an injured ‘Clark Kent’ awakens after a battle.