As you can see from the above comparison grids, our media product uses, develops and challenges forms and conventions of real media products in the way that;
- Our film uses red titles in order to introduce our 'bloody' theme for the plot and so gives an insight that the audience is about to see a thriller film, instead of a frilly, girly chick flick for instance. It is also a very dramatic introduction and so will grab the audience's attention. I think the title is intriguing in itself because it leaves the reader in suspense as to what the 'copy cat' is and why it has been given the name; 'the bloody copy cat.' The font in which our title is done in goes along with our theme very effectively as they are in red and also look very blood like; as if they have got blood dripping off them, which is highly appropriate for the happenings in our film. Examples to support our use of titles for a thriller film can be found in Sorority Row and Drag me to Hell. This is as in Sorority Row; red is used to underline the titles and in Drag me to Hell the titles have got an effect on them which give the effect of blood being almost 'dragged' out of the letters. Both of these are incorporated into our film titles in slightly different ways, ensuring our titles are highly appropriate for a thriller film and that they give the desired suspenseful introduction. A very close example of the titles to our film are from 'Blood Simple,' which are in bold red and look as if some of the corners of the letters have blood dripping off them.
- A further convention we have incorporated is the claustrophobic setting, which was one of the ideas suggested to us through our evaluation. Our peers suggested we could use close-up shots to intensify the claustrophobic setting in our film.
Enhancing the feeling of a claustrophobic setting means that it highlights the fact that it is a likely to be a highly dangerous situation to be in.The extreme close up shot of the young hostage girl in our film also emphasises that she is distressed and unknowing; supported by the fact that she is tied up and blindfolded. There is an example of a claustrophobic setting in the film 'Curiosity.' This example shows a man walking through a tight, narrow, corridor, enclosed by a door at the end; this enhances the feeling of no escaping whatever happenings are to come; likewise with our film as the young girl is completely helpless.
- Another convention which follows on from our setting is the location; being a dark room and there is also an example of this in the film 'Curiosity.' Having a purposeful lack of light ensures the feeling of dark, gloominess associated with something bad to come; very gothically. Darkness also represents the unknown as you cannot see everything in the dark and so it relates to the saying 'being kept in the dark;' meaning you do not know everything and this is true for our film too, because the young girl is completely innocent to the upcoming events in our film.
- Usually, you would expect to find the murderer as a male character, dominantly, however, in our film we have challenged this typical convention by using a female actress to play the part of a murderer. An example from a film which supports that the murderer is often a male in thrillers is in 'Blood Simple.' In Blood Simple, a rich but jealous man hires a private investigator to kill his cheating wife and her new man; it is always the man shown digging the grave and holding the gun for instance. However, for our film we wanted to challenge this to put a twist on the plot; making it more interesting; like in the film 'Monster' (2003) where a female character turned out to be a serial killer.
- The significance of the red and white clothing we chose, being; red for the murderer and white for the victim is that white is essentially associated with being pure and innocent, very much like a victim. On the other hand, red symbolises blood, murderous and danger etc. There is an example of a victim in white in the film 'Se7en' where a female is lay on a white bed in white clothing; as innocent as you will find.
- Similarly, the film Curiosity also uses a knife as part of its plot, as like our film. I think a knife is a good choice for a thriller film because it could just very well be an ordinary kitchen knife which would be harmlessly used for food, however, can also come in very useful for use as a murderous weapon. We have also used a 'scrap book' of dead bodies in our film and so to emphasise this, i splattered red paint all over the white pages as if to show the blood from the bodies after being murdered with the knife. This has similarities to 'Curiosity' where a man in a white top is carrying an axe and the top is splattered with red 'blood.' Having the blood splattered on top of white shows that it was once pure but is now associated with danger, solely due to having the blood on it.
- Many films incorporate an ident at the start of their film and so we decided to take this typical convention and put one into our film to make it seem more professional. One of countless examples of where this is used is in 'Drag Me To Hell.'
- What makes films different to each other, except from the plot for instance, is what effects they use. For example, a chick flick wouldn't be likely to use a flash of colour and then fade back into the picture so that they don't have to show a brutal murder. Whereas in our thriller film and in Blood Simple, we have both used a build up to a flash of colour over the whole screen and then faded back to the happenings in the film. In our film, we used a white flash because we wanted a camera flash effect for the picture she continues to stick into the book of the dead body and in Blood Simple they use a red flash after holding a gun up, indicating a death.
- The introduction of our film, i personally think introduces it fairly well; as the audience is able to read some main headlines about the plot, giving them a very slight insight, and also the fact that we use a soundtrack at the same time, which puts a constant 'creepy feeling' thought at the back of the audiences mind throughout the piece. I also feel it builds up anxiety as to who the paper cuttings are about and where it is located because it doesn't immediately give anything away. Many films use great sound editing and one example of this where i found a very dramatic effect was in Sleepy Hollow, which is similar to what our film uses towards the end when the murderer sticks the picture in the book; a build up of tension into a sudden loud noise, causing the audience to jump a little.
In this clip of Sleepy Hollow one can hear the use of soundtracks in order to build up suspense in the film for example. It also incorporates the many other devices such as; idents at the beginning of the film, effective transitions between shots, purposeful lighting, white, innocent clothing on the female; and these are all aspects we have used within our film in order to enhance the thriller effect.
No comments:
Post a Comment