Evaluation Q4 – In what ways does your media product use, develop,

or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

Title of the film

After much conversation, we went for the title; ‘The Blood Game’. Original ideas for names were ‘Shikari’ and ‘Infenso’.

We did some research and found that, on average, thrillers have three words in the title, whilst Horror films usually only have one word titles. We went for a title with 3 words to fit the convention.• Examples of thrillers • Examples of horrors

Setting / Location

For our film opening, we used two locations.• The first location is Hanworth Park. We used

this as it never gets very busy so it was unlikely for people to be in the background. This would lead to the audience concentrating solely on the main character, and they would feel that it is just them with the character, creating a sense of isolation. The lack of noise also makes the audience wary as they are not getting many clues about the character.

• The second location is our friend’s house. We used this because It was also possible to completely block out the natural light. This helped with the convention of the thriller that the audience are now trapped with the character, and with the uncertainty of his actions, it creates the tension that is a common convention in thriller openings.

Costume / Props

Our costume and props go against convention

• The Costume the character is wearing is not often seen in other thriller films, this is because he is wearing clothes worn by teenagers, who are not usually the main protagonist in thriller films. It is usually a middle aged man who usually will wear a suit. He is wearing normal, everyday clothes because we wanted to get across that one side of him is a normal teenager, and makes the other side of him a shock to the audience.

• Photos have been used in lots of thrillers as they capture memories and can show an emotive reason for the actions of the protagonist. Knifes are also often used because they are much more easily obtainable than other weapons, such as guns. This links to the idea that most protagonists in thrillers are normal people, which makes them relatable, creating a sense of nervousness within the audience.

• However, smartphones are rarely used in thriller films. Yet again this is due to the conventional protagonist being a middle aged man, whilst ours is a teenager. Using a smartphone as a prop also makes the character more relatable to our target audience. (15-24).

(left:)Our character’s costume, (right:) Malcolm Crowe, the protagonist in ‘The Sixth Sense’ (Shyamalan, 1999)

(left:)Our character’s knife prop (right:) knife fight seen in Kill Bill.

Camerawork / Edit

We used similar techniques to classic thrillers.• Camerawork wise, we made sure we had lots of close ups and

extreme close-ups on the main character. We feel this makes the audience feel uncomfortable, and keep them unsettled. These are conventions used in lots of real thriller films.

• A similar example to what we used is ‘Batman: The Dark Knight’. The main antagonist, the Joker, has lots of close ups of his face, and this highlights the fact that he is psychologically unstable. This is very similar to what we wanted for our character, as he has the multiple personalities, the normal teenager, and the killer.

• When we thought about editing, we wanted to make some shots slightly longer than normal. This makes the audience question a lot, and try to figure out what could possibly be going on, and make themselves uncomfortable while watching it, which is extremely common in thriller films. A real world example is in ‘Donnie Darko’, where some shots, especially close ups, are longer than needed to create an unnerving feel.

Above- Close up of our characterRight- Close ups of the Joker Left- Donnie Darko, Right- Character in our film

Title font / Style

The font we used was ‘Trajan Pro’.We knew that we wanted a serif font because it would look a lot more professional, as most films use serif fonts in their titles. We have stuck to the conventions with this. Some newer thrillers containing teenagers used more stylistic sans fonts, but we wanted to use a serif font as we feel that our thriller film would stay true to the conventional, classic thrillers.

We used these fonts the entire way through the credits, to keep the house style. Most real films of the thriller genre do not switch between multiple fonts.

We put all the text on their own screen, and did not put text on top of footage, as we felt that with the lack of sound and text, the audience will not feel comfortable watching it. Putting text on footage is very unprofessional and is rarely used in the industry.

Storyline

We do not want to give away too much about the film in the first 2 minutes, but you want to give the audience clues so they can understand what is going on.

• “Our film is about a man who has had his closest friends, including his girlfriend killed. This has caused him to develop a second, much darker personality who goes out to kill in revenge of his lost friends. He kills multiple people, but does not feel remorse as he feels it as just a game, hence the title – The Blood Game.”

Conventional thrillers partly explain the plot of the film, but do not want it give it all away otherwise the audience will not want to watch the rest of the film. Our opening does not completely explain what is happening, and has he audience asking questions. We found this out in our audience feedback when we asked people to explain the plot, and they could sort of understand, but were not 100% sure.

We feel our opening does not limit the rest of the film down one route. There are many possibilities as to where the plot could go. There is also enough openness for a huge plot twist, which are very regularly used in Thriller Films. Director M. Night Shyamalan is known for making thriller films with huge plot twists.

To sum up, we have given the audience enough information in the first few minutes to understand what is going on, but not enough that they can figure out the entire plot after watching the first two minutes. Our opening leaves the audience on edge and asking questions, which is what a conventional good thriller film does.

Genre

Our Film is solely a thriller, although most conventional thrillers cross over into a second genre.

Our film opening mainly sticks to the conventions of the thriller genre, bar one or two details where we have purposefully and effectively defied the conventions of the genre to differentiate our film from the thousands of films in the wide genre.

Our opening suggests that our film is a thriller as there is a build-up in tension, which is the prime aspect needed in any thriller film or it does not fit the genre. To make sure we did not accidently slip into the horror genre, we made sure there were no jump scares. The only fast paced change that could possibly slightly shock the audience is the part where the title fades out, and the door unexpectedly slams open. This is very unexpected, but it is not scary, therefore it is not possible to consider it horror.

It could also be considered as a thriller as it makes the audience ask themselves multiple questions, and create a sense of unknown. Leaving the audience on the edge of their seat as they will not know what is in store for the character. One of the main questions that could be asked in our opening is “why does he get up after the jogger goes past?” this is the only question answered in the opening when he looks at the photo on his phone, but for the minute between the two scenes, the audience can be kept in a slight sense of wonder.

Characters

We are only introduced to one main character in the opening. This adds to the sense that he is alone, which further explains why he hasn’t coped that he couldn’t recover psychologically due to the murder of his friends, because he has been left by himself.

• The only character introduced is the character that would commit the murders throughout the film. We only had one main character as it is a convention of a psychological thriller that the person is lonely, and has no one that they are close to. This ultimately gives them a motive for why they carry out their crimes.

• Our character has two personalities. The first is a normal teenager, and this personality is introduced in the park scene. However the second personality is a revenge - crazed murderer, and we are introduced to this character in the second scene, where he is carrying the bloody knife

Lighting

Lighting is crucial to perfect in most film genres, especially thriller.

In our first scene, only natural light is used. This is used to create contrast with the second scene, which is very dark. This is done to show the darker side of the main character that was not previously seen. The silhouette created by not using a key light or fill light also creates unease within the audience, as it is unexpected, as it is the first shot after the park scene.