Genre - Thriller or Horror

The Thriller Genre conventions:

• Action packed
• Tense Music
• Crime based
• Battle between Antagonist and Protagonist
• Shadows
• Low key lighting
• Various angle shots
• Black and White shots
• Fights or car chases

Our trailer was originally aimed to fit the thriller genre. However after considering the look and feel of our trailer carefully, we decided that our trailer and concept was more suited to the horror genre, specifically a psychological horror sub genre. 

History of the Horror genre

1890's-1920's

• First depictions of supernatural events- e.g- by Georges Melies in the late 1890's
• In 1898, Japan made two horror films - 'Bake Jizo' and 'Shinin no Sosei'
• In 1922, first ever vampire film made - 'Nosferatu'

1930's-1940's

• Universal pictures began creating successful horror films- e.g- 'Dracula' in 1931
• Shortly after, 'Frankenstein' was released in 1931
• In 1932, Tom Browning made controversial film 'Freaks' about a group of circus freaks

1950's-1960's

• Advances in technology meant the emergence of two sub genres: Armageddon films and Demonic films
• During late 1950's, Great Britain became main producer of horror films-e.g- Alfred Hitchcocks 'Psycho'(1960) was first 'slasher' film
• In 1968, 'Night of the living dead' was released by George A Romero - very influential 

1970's- 1980's

• More films released with Occult theme - e.g- 'The Exorcist' in 1973
• The idea's of the 1960's had began to influence films such as ' The Hills Have Eyes'
• in 1978- John Carpenter created 'Hallowen'
• 1980's- emergence of gore - e.g- Sam Raimi's Evil dead films

1990's

• Due to amount of slasher's being released in 1980's, horror genre was in decline but classic horrors like 'Silence of the lambs' were still being created
• To reconnect with audience the genre became more parodic and self-mocking
• Wes Cravens 'Scream' films began in the 2990's
• As well as films such as 'I know what you did last summer' 

History of the Thriller genre

1920's-1930's

• Alfred Hitchcock promoted thriller genre through silent film 'The Lodger'
• He was influenced by expressionist techniques in Germany

1940's

• This is when sub genres started to emerge
• In 1944, George Cukor created psychological thriller 'Gaslight'

1950's

• Alfred Hitchcock added 'technicolour' to his thrillers
• He also made 'Strangers on a train' in 1951

1960's

• In 1962, J. Lee Thompson directed 'Cape Fear'
• Michael Powell directed intense thriller 'Peeping Tom'

1970's

• Thriller films became increasingly violent
• For example, in 1972, Alfred Hitchcock released film 'Frenzy' which was given an R rating

1980's

• Phillip Noyce directed film 'Dead Calm' in 1989 which influenced a number of thrillers in following years

1990's

• One of the most famous thriller's released in this decade was Jonathon Demme's crime thriller ' The silence of the lambs' released in 1991

Casting ideas

To gain a rough idea of the kind of actors we want to cast, we created a rough character profile for each main character:

The girlfriends mum

• Brunette
• Similar look to daughter (the girlfriend)
• Needed for limited acting
• Attractive
• A younger mum (around 35-40 years old)

The girlfriend

• Innocent
• Brunette
• Sweet
• Needed for a lot of acting
• Pretty
• Young (around 17-20 years old)
• Kind
• Someone who could look vulnerable - e.g- short or thin

The boyfriend (stalker)

• Attractive
• Young (around 17-20 years old)
• Someone who can look intimidating but is mainly innocent
• Main acting role - must be able to act
• Tall
• Dark hair

Narrative ideas evaluation

The presentation above displays some of the advantages and disadvantages of our 3 narrative ideas. We thought of some of these factors and the class gave us feedback on what they felt were the pros and cons.

We considered these very carefully whilst deciding which narrative to focus on creating our promotional package around

Narrative ideas

Plot Synopsis

Narrative 1: Con artist

• Crime/thriller

• Begins with a guy who is clearly very rich and materialistic 

• Guy appears genuine and audience begin to warm to him

• Before the guy got wealthy, he was a con artist, which is revealed in the middle of the narrative

• His ex victims seek revenge and hold him hostage

Narrative 2: Time Travel 

• Drama/fantasy

• Teenage girl told on her 18th birthday that she has the power to time travel

• But every time she uses her power, someone in the world dies

• Film displays battle between her giving up her powers to prevent anymore deaths

Narrative 3: Girl stuck in the other world

• Mystery/Thriller/Supernatural

• Girl murdered by ex boyfriend because she cheated on him

• She comes back as a ghost but no one else is aware

• She tries to leave her family clues to help them solve her murder as no one else knows it was him

• Family eventually discover it was him and he gets convicted for it