Our Thriller Target Audience

By Joseph Cocklin

Our thriller opening is a psychological thriller, this type of movie would attract a certain type of audience. From researching other psychological thrillers such as:

Seven

This thriller portrays the exploits of a deranged serial-killer. His twisted agenda involves choosing seven victims who represent egregious examples of transgressions of each of the Seven Deadly Sins. He then views himself as akin to the Sword of God, handing out horrific punishment to these sinners. Two cops, an experienced veteran of the streets who is about to retire and the ambitious young homicide detective hired to replace him, team up to capture the perpetrator of these gruesome killings. Unfortunately, they too become ensnared in his diabolical plan.

Memento

Memento chronicles two separate stories of Leonard, an ex-insurance investigator who can no longer build new memories, as he attempts to find the murderer of his wife, which is the last thing he remembers. One story line movies forward in time while the other tells the story backwards revealing more each time.

Silence of the lambs

Clarice Starling, a young intelligent FBI trainee, has been sent to the Batlimore state hospital for the Criminally insane to interview an inmate Dr. Hannibal – the cannibal – Lecter. A brilliant and renowned psychiatrist turned serial killer. She must match wits with Lecter to gain clues in the search for “Buffalo Bill” – an unknown psychopathic serial killer.

All of these following three films have certificates of fifteen to eighteen. Seeing as our thriller movie has content of a young girl being stalked by a older man, and content which is not suitable for young children, I would say our certificate would be round about the same as the other movies fifteen to eighteen. I would see adults watching this type of movie as it has mature themes and will be testing the audience's intelligence with the plot and they will have to have a open mind watching the movie.

Props List

Written by Holly

Below is a list of the props that we need to film our opening sequence-

GIRL'S BEDROOM
-radio
-hair dryer
-makeup bag (lipstick, mascara, eyeliner etc)
-wine glass
-photo frame
-hairbrush
-purse

KITCHEN
-clock~ preferably an analogue clock
-white latex gloves
-large kitchen knife
-grapefruit (several, to allow for practice and retakes)

Production Schedule

Production Schedule: Written by Laura

Filming: We will be filming on Wednesday the 2nd of December from 6-10 pm, and on Sunday 6th December from 5 - 11. We've chosen to film then because we need it to be dark and the people acting in our opening are only available on those days.

Actors: We will be using Joe's sister Lauren for the girl in our piece, and our friend Ollie to play the stalker.

Transport: We will be going from Selhurst station to East Croydon, to London Bridge, then to Welling.

Location: 44 Kenmere Road (Joe's House)

Phone Numbers: Holly - 07751822111

Joe - 07859103083

Laura - 07847552897

Character Profiles

Character Profiles:
Written by Laura.

The Stalker: We wanted the stalker to be really creepy. Someone which would raise the hairs on the back of your neck. We also didn't want him to be stereotypically creepy though, we decided that he'd have a job, dress well and always be neat. But perhaps, a little too neat. We knew straight away that we wanted him to be very OCD. This would become obvious within our thriller opening as you see him straighten and clean things. We wanted him to always be calm and collected. When you hear the girl re-enter her home, his face stays the same. He doesn't panic, or rush, or run. He always has a plan in his head and can think extremely quickly. This would add to the creepy feeling that he was always one step ahead of you. We wanted him to be tall and in his thirties.

The Girl: We wanted her to be/look about twenty. We imagined her to be pretty, slim and completely normal. This is so that the beginning of our opening with just her would put the audience at ease, and create more tension when we introduced the stalker. We wanted her to be quite the opposite of him; messy, bubbly and cheerful. We definitely wanted her to seem sweet and nice so that the audience would like her character, and therefore feel threatened and worried for her safety when she came back into the house and nearly found the stalker.

Shot list

SHOT LIST- THRILLER FILM OPENING SEQUENCE

We worked on this altogether as a group.

1. CU radio (hear static noise at first, fades to music playing)

2. MS young woman drying her hair

3. MS of the dressing table, pan to show her putting on lipstick

4. Multiple on-screen shot-
*left half of screen~ woman standing in front of her wardrobe, opens it
*top right of screen~ CU of glass of wine
*bottom right of screen~ MS of her makeup scattered on the table

5. Bird's eye shot- woman getting her shoes on

6. Worm's eye shot- of her feet, leaving the room from the gap in her door (she goes out of shot, light turns off, door slams)

7. CU of clock ticking

8. ECU of scattered makeup

9. LS of kitchen, hear the tap dripping, see the flash of car lights going past window

10. Low angle shot from the banister at bottom of stairs (hear scratching, the door opens, shadow of man is seen)

11. ECU light switch, light comes on

12. MS (from doorway, looking at the man's back) man walks to kitchen

13. LS establishing the kitchen

14. MCU him putting gloves on

15. CU of him dragging his finger along the worktop

16. POV checking his fingers for dirt

17. MS (side on) opens fridge, slowly reaches in

18. (cut to) Over the shoulder shot, him reaching into the drawer for knife

19. MS (side on) him lifting up the knife- it shines slightly in the light

20. Bird's eye shot of the knife cutting grapefruit, he puts his fingers in the juice, lifts hand to mouth

21. ECU (slow motion) wiping the juice from his mouth

22. MS he throws the gloves into the bin

23. Low angle MLS- his legs are seen as he goes up the stairs

24. MS from the gap in her bedroom door, stillness and silence, his face suddenly appears in the gap

25. Worm's eye shot- door slowly opening and he comes into the room (see his feet)

26. LS from behind photo frame. He is out of focus. His head turns, he comes into focus. He rushes towards the photo

27. POV, he lifts up the photo

28. ECU of his eyes, he stares intensely

29. Over the shoulder shot (but slightly further away than the shoulder) he puts the picture down gently. Sudden turn of his head, half of his face is seen

30. Low angle MS slowly reaches for the hairbrush on the table, holds it still and pulls a hair from it. begins to wrap it around his little finger lovingly. Hear her come in, see his reaction. Stillness as he waits for her, we hear her coming up the stairs on the phone, getting nearer. He looks up at the door

31. LS of door from the bed where her purse is, door swings open, she enters the room. Moment of stillness, grabs the purse, turns to go and notices ensuite light is on. She goes to the door

32. CU of her hand on the door handle

33. Two Shot- the door splits the screen, he is stood hidden behind the door and she is on the other side, she reaches for the light switch

34. black screen END SCENE

Our thriller idea

Originally, Holly, Joe and I wanted to start with a man running through London, possibly Chinatown. We really liked the idea of just him being in colour, and everything else around him being black and white. We began working a story line around this idea, and thought of having a girl murdered in her flat. We thought it would be interesting if the sequence switched from past to present throughout, going back to when the girl is alive then forward to the murderer running away.

This later on evolved into the idea of having the girls clips running backwards to create a more psychologically messed up effect. When we thought about this in more detail we realised that this wouldn't really make sense at all, and that we needed her clips to end with her opening the door to the murderer. We couldn't do this if she was going backwards. We then decided that the idea was relatively basic and wouldn't create enough tension for the sort of thriller we wanted.

We re-looked at our ideas, and decided to make it about a stalker. We got a lot of inspiration from the film 'One Hour Photograph', particularly Robin Williams' character. We thought of having the stalker looking at photographs of the girl. This would look normal at first, but then you'd realise that it wasn't him in the photos with her, it was another man. We decided this would be a bit boring and not tense enough.

Instead of having the girl and the stalker in two separate time lines, we decided to make one continuous piece of footage. We thought of the idea of the girl getting ready to go out, loud music blaring, creating a really energetic and good atmosphere. Then as she'd leave she'd switch the music and lights off, so that when the stalker entered her home, it would be completely silent and dark. We wanted to have him sniffing her clothes, and pulling hair out of her hairbrush, doing genuinely creepy things that would make the audience shudder. When we presented the idea, the class seemed to like it which boosted our confidence.

2nd Prelim task: Editing

Editing our piece was reasonably simple, with the exception that we realised we'd made several big mistakes when filming. The room we'd chosen to film in turned out to have really dodgy lighting, as we'd filmed facing a window. This took all of the brightness out of the shots and made them dark and hard to make out. To solve this, we experimented with colours, changing the footage into black and white so that we could then add a glow effect and lighten the shots. This worked quite well, and also suited the genre of a our piece and made the overall sequence more effective.

We had a problem with continuity at one point (which was my fault). When filming, I'd put my hand down on the table when I said the line 'You got the stuff?' However, the over the shoulder shot of Percy nodding showed me putting my hand down as well. We hadn't realised this when we were filming, but agreed that it was a good learning experience for our thriller openings. Other than that, our continuity editing was quite good - The footage of me pushing down the door handle and then the clip of me walking through the door was smooth and believable.

Before we started, once again me and Paige had some basic skills when editing with Final Cut Pro due to GCSE. This task definitely enhanced our skills as a group and got us comfortable with loading footage and experimenting with colours and music. We decided not to add music because it took away from what was going on in the clip. The overall prelim project was really useful, giving us a taste of who we wanted to work with and how to use the cameras and editing equipment. Here is the finished product: