Wednesday, 30 December 2009

General research

hey guys. Ollie here, reporting from the apple store in Sheffield. i seem to do all my posts from random locations.

i watched terminator salvation last night and although it is an action film and not strictly a thriller film i still felt that it contained some useful aspects that maybe we could incorporate into our coursework...special effects permitting. namely the combination of music and suspense at certain points to draw the viewer in. because thriller is such a broad genre that includes many contrasting themes and convections i think that it could be an idea to take positive aspects from all appropriate/similar genres in order to gain a wider understanding of the genre on the whole.

just a thought for the time being,

Also...nobody (including myself) has posted anything over christmas...Chris..Nikki if your reading this we need more stuff up here..granted its christmas but i don't want to fall behind. All three of us have been slacking...oh and chris...I love you..

HAPPY NEW YEAR

Tuesday, 15 December 2009

Sound ideas.

Hey guys! Ollie posting here from the UN Delegation hall
we're on a break from the debates right now which has given me a chance to think about the dynamics of sound within the genre of a thriller.
For the most part there is usually modernistic style music that is used to give energy to the film
this is almost always non-diagetic.
however when aspects of horror merge with the thriller genre (e.g. 2nd scene of se7en) then the modernistic music is often substituted for much creepier music. e.g. classical violins.
As far as diagetic sound goes this could be anything from police sirens to smashing glass etc.
Because we cannot include copyrighted music without the consent of it's author i tried experimenting with possibilities on my kaossilator (pocket synth). It provided some pretty interesting sounds that i will run by Nikki and Chris when i return from Geneva.

Ollie out.
(p.s. Iceland rules...)

Monday, 14 December 2009

Location scouting

Me and Nikki google mapped our respective areas and couldn't think of any suitable areas for potential filming .
However we haven't decided on what we are going to do for our opening, so we don't really know what we're looking for.
Once Ollie has returned to us we can discuss our ideas and come up with something so that we can check out some locations properly.
So no concrete decisions on location yet, but we should have some ideas after Ollie returns :)

Conventions of a thriller

Chris and Nikki in media :)
Missing ollie great amounts and his input, but the show must go on

Most thrillers play on the ideas of voyeurism, which is the idea of watching, or being watched.
Most openings of thrillers utilize dark, dim lit interiors, also playing on the idea of building suspense
The sound tends to be quite eerie, dramatic, high pitched, suspense building
There is little if any dialogue but they often use sounds over the top of the music like a metronome in se7en, or related sounds like a shutter of a camera in one hour photo
The editing involves a lot of cross cutting in shots so as to build tension and keep the viewer on edge, because you're being overwhelmed by perspectives
Some thrillers like to use flashbacks as an opening scene, and cross cutting from happy scenes to sad, intending to throw the viewer
Quite often the main plot of a thriller is involving murder, so they use a key event such as a death to set the movie in motion, and it is often the person you would least suspect
They go for the psychological impact and sometimes focuses on why and how, as opposed to finding out who the killer is, if we know from the start.

Sunday, 13 December 2009

Se7en Title Sequence

Its Nikki Again
Ollie analysed Se7en earlier but i wanted to just show this clip its the title sequence for Se7en and as we have to create the title sequence an the first few minutes of a thriller i thought it was pretty vital to analyse this bit aswell.
i think this is one of the best title sequences ive seen so far all the camera angles are closeups of the books and photos and the hands we dont know who's doing this or what exactly there doing but it all looks rather sinister the music an sound that goes along with it really sets the mood it has a simple rymthm but has creepy noises over the top almost like some thing creaking or maybe a typewritter type sound its all quite erie and makes you wonder what exactly there doing.
it flicks between lots of different things in a short amount of time it starts with a book and then you see whoever it is developing photos sticking things down sewing up the edge of the pages it uses limited colours that are all quite darks like blacks and red wich make it seem quite dark i paticularly like this begining however i cant write much more now ill come back to it later

Hey Guys its Nikki
i had a few ideas of things we could incorporate into our intro i watched a film called Unknown (i dont know if you heard of it but its not that bad)its a thriller about these 4-5 guys who wake up in a warehouse and 2 of them are kidnappers the others are hostages, but they dont remember who is who as the were all knocked out by this gas. Unknown Pictures, Images and Photos
In the begining theres a bit which i paticularly liked where the camera goes through the warehouse showing different rooms and setting the scene but it follows the pipes through the walls from one room to another untill it gets to the main room where the men are all unconcious. ones tied to a chair another laying next to a bloody shovel one handcuffed over the rails and another just laying there and this gave me the idea for the setup being inside some form of building or house going from room to room but you see it through the key holes of the doors. everything would seem normal theres 2 people in the house one just carrying on with everyday life completly normal and then in the last room you'd just see the other person lying there dead.
However after reading chris idea i think thats pretty cool aswell it creates suspense and leaves the audience with unanswered question and if we did it right it would make people carry on watching to find out what happens :)

Architectural ideas.

Ollie here posting from Geneva :D wow talk about commitment
the architecture here is fairly inspirational. we visited a gothic/roman styled castle today and although we can't shoot our intro all the way over here in Geneva i still managed to come up with a bunch of idea's. yeah cant talk for long, will get some more content up shortly though, maybe even some pictures so everyone can see what i mean :D.