In this post I am going to explain how our film, uses, develops and challenges thriller conventions.
First off our film follows the conventions by imitating existing idents, the ident our film opening imitates is Spyglass, it imitates how the ident is set on a black background. earlier in my blog I researched film idents, they are used to give credit to the film studios.
First off our film follows the conventions by imitating existing idents, the ident our film opening imitates is Spyglass, it imitates how the ident is set on a black background. earlier in my blog I researched film idents, they are used to give credit to the film studios.
Above are the image and video of the ident that was imitated. The main difference between the two idents is that our ident grows onto the screen as if coming towards the camera, which is a simple animation, whereas the animation for Spyglass is more drawn out and more professional.
Once again referring to my blog, I researched conventions of thrillers, this is what audiences expect to see when they watch a certain genre. to make this simpler I'm going to keep referring to my previous work, it would be easier to follow along if you have read it. It was the last post created in November.
Our film follows these conventions by creating suspense when Luke starts to breath heavily and pull at his hair, it makes the audience wonder what is going to happen. The heavy breathing is also used in thrillers. We also use camerawork such as, fast changes in our shots, an example of when we use this would be when Luke is stopping time, it keeps flicking between him and the clock. Another convention of the camerawork we use would be the close ups we do of Luke and Mr Grayham, the most noticeable is when there is an extreme close up of Luke just as he stops time, this is actually one of my favorite shots because of the build up to it, it worked really well. here is an example of extreme close up's used in Psycho's famous shower scene:
Another convention that we used is our cliffhanger, this is used in a lot of thriller films, the first film that comes to mind that does this in it's opening is sixth sense.
To develop the thriller conventions, our film gives our main character an ability that no one else has, the ability to stop time, however this has negative effects, it causes people to become violent towards him, this is clearly shown in our opening. This develops it because in most thrillers the protagonist has powers that don't have an effect on themselves, for example, in the film Push, the main characters have abilities that do not affect them, certain characters have these certain abilities, like they can move objects or see the future or make people believe in things that aren't real. However, I can think of one film that does affect the characters in some way, the film is called chronicle, it is where a group of teenagers get abilities from a meteor, this allows them to fly and move objects, however a consequence of this is that if they try to do something before they are strong enough, their noses start to bleed like it's causing too much pressure in their head.
Our film has also challenged thriller conventions, it has done this by using a school student as the protagonist, whereas in other thrillers the protagonist is usually a group of people or someone older. another way we have challenged it is by the student being victimized by the teacher from the very beginning, an accepted convention is that teachers are usually kind but strict when they have to be, but in our film the teacher is openly violent to Luke as he slams his hand on the desk close to where Luke is sitting.
So that is how our film, uses, develops and challenges thriller conventions, hope you like it.
