Thriller – An overview

1. The genre Thriller can become very complex at times due to its complicated narratives and other aspects. Thriller – An overview Sub-genre – Smaller categories within a genre. • Some examples include: • Crime – e.g. Inception • Medical – e.g. Coma • Disaster - e.g. The Day after Tomorrow • Romance /Stalker – e.g. Fatal Attraction • Serial Killer – e.g. Se7en • Psychological – e.g. Silence of the Lambs • Spy – e.g. Mission Impossible • Action – e.g. Die Hard

2. History of Thriller • Director Alfred Hitchcock is recognised as playing a major role in shaping the modern day thrillers the audience have become used to. • His first film was created in 1926 and was called The Lodger, a story in which a serial killer is being hunted down in London. Hitchcock continued his work further and in 1960 he made his greatest known film to date – Psycho. Made famous for its ‘shower scene’ • George Cukor, a lessor known director during the Hitchcock era, made a film called Laura in 1944 which featured the first use of film noir – a low lighted, generally black and white scene. A technique still being used in modern film, for example The Dark Knight features it. Example of Film Noir.

3. Todorov’s Theory Almost all Thriller films consist of the same narrative structure, and Todorov’s Theory explains this style: • Firstly, a state of equilibrium – where everything appears to be normal. • Then a disruption of it, normally something that was previously running smoothly. • Next, there is some form of conflict – a recognition that equilibrium has been disrupted. • Penultimately, an effort takes place to restore equlibrium. • Lastly, eqlibrium returns to normal, or has been improved. • Example: Phone Booth • Stewart is going about his everyday job, making phone calls to business colleagues. • Then a phone box starts ringing, something Stewart has never seen before. • He then realises he has been targeted to answer the phone, the authorities arrive at the scene as a civilian has been shot and Stewart has been blamed for it. • He attempts to convince the man on the other end of the phone to not kill anyone else; Stewart comes out of the phone booth but is then shot. • The police don’t convict Stewart and he continues to live.

4. Narratives • A narrative of a film creates a world within, known as the Diegesis. For example, when Los Angeles is cut off from the mainland in Escape from L.A. • Unrestricted Narrative – where the storyline of a film has no limits, and the audience is surprised when a particular event happens. • Restricted Narrative – where minimal information is portrayed to the audience, thus making it unclear on what will happen later on in the film. • Subjective character identification – the viewer is given unique access to more than one character, and are then aware of certain things characters might or might not do. • Objective character identification – the audience are given access to only one character, therefore they only know what this character knows.

5. Characters • Antagonists – “The baddie” Examples: an ex jail convict, a stalker, a serial killer, an assassin. This character often has there identity hidden until later on in the film to create suspense and mystery. For example: Jack from The Shining • Protagonists – “The good guy?” e.g. an innocent victim of a crime, perhaps with a mysterious past or a former law enforcer. • For example: Jack Starks from The Jacket The protagonist usually has a fatal flaw which leads them into danger, and this then creates the tension of the film, therefore giving it a thrill.

6. Mise-en-Scene • Everything that is seen within a scene, including: location, props, lighting, the use of colour (if any). A typical MES of a thriller film would be one where familiar landmarks are visible and ordinary people in normal situations are effected by events. For example, in The Day after Tomorrow, everyone is affected one way or another and the statue of Liberty can be seen covered in ice and show.

7. Editing • The most common example of editing is Continuity Editing – where the transition between scenes runs smoothly and is seemingly invisible to the viewer. An example of this: Rolo • Graphic Match – where this is a familiar relationship between two different shots to make it flow. For example, once more in: Rolo • Graphic Contrast – when the next shot is on obvious contrast to the previous shot to create an uncomfortable effect e.g. in Texas Chainsaw when the girl is screaming and the man is laughing.

8. Audience Expectations • Audiences of thriller films are always kept interested as a plot of a film builds towards its climax. This is because much suspense, excitement and anxiety is created. • For example in the final scene of Se7en much tension is built as to what is in the box.

9. Target Audience • The target audience of Thriller films can be very flexible. Generally speaking though, the target audience for Thriller films is considered to be males aged 18-30. • However, they are some films such as The Sixth Sense and Signs that are a Thriller/Horror hybrid. And the general target audience for horror films is considered to be teenage girls. • Additionally, crime thrillers that perhaps involve a killer of some kind attract a more mature, older audience. As they require quite a bit of abstract thinking, as well as just watching the events unfold in the film.

10. Bibliography • http://uk.answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20081103150523AAo21gB • YouTube videos • IMDB trailer videos