In what ways does your media project use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

We decided we needed to keep with some of the conventions of the psychological thriller genre. With this we created a repertoire of elements from the template of Nick Lacey. We saw that most thrillers had a hero, villain, and a victim. We felt that these are necessary to keep to the genre. We also decided to keep to the elements of hero saving his damsel and kidnapping rather than the heist or robbery as we felt it may be too difficult to create a professional looking final piece. The busy streets and abandoned warehouse were also elements we chose to shy away from as we felt the busy street would be very hard to get the shot we wanted as the people on the busy street may not comply. Therefore we felt the sub-urban setting was more apt. The iconography we decided to use was suits, guns and weapons. We decided to move from the flashy cars, money and other such iconography because we felt we could have the desired effect with the more affordable and practical icons of thriller.

Our Film

Taken 3

Our Film

The Town

Stock charactersHero, Villain, Henchmen, ‘Women in distress’, Donor, Police men, Victim, Hero’s sidekick,    (A strong example of ‘Heroes’, ‘villains’ and ‘women in distress’ is from the kidnap/revenge thriller ‘Taken’: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0936501/) 

Stock narrativeRevenge, Retiring hero’s last journey/mission, Hero going to save his true love, Kidnapping, Serial murder/crime, Heist/robbery (A good example of a revenge plotline is from the thriller ‘Law abiding citizen’ in which Gerard Butler attempts to avenge his wife’s murder: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1197624/)

Stock settingBusy city, Abandoned Factories/warehouse, Mansion/Large house, Suburban streets, Aeroplanes/Boats etc.  (An example of great settings, including a large mansion surrounded by desert land and mountains is in the psychological thriller ‘I Melt With You’ starring Jeremy Piven: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1691920/)

IconographyGuns, Suits, Sunglasses, Money, Weapons, Fast cars, Gadgets, Police/FBI uniform(An example of a thriller that has inspired our group through it’s use of iconography such as guns, fast cars, police uniform and money is ‘The Town’: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0840361/)

Repertoire of elements for the thriller genre

There are several ways in which we tried to challenge the repertoire. We felt that the larger settings used in most psychological thrillers is unnecessary. Instead we thought that it may be more appropriate to use a more closed space to make the audience feel slightly closer to the victim so we see the emotion of the character. This means that the audience is more involved with the film. We planned on having less death in the film than average as we felt that this would add depth. With it we could follow the back story of several characters which means more of the audience can relate. We also decided against using any police or detectives in our piece firstly because it doesn’t fit with our story line of a man who owes money to some gangsters. Also this means that the costs are kept down and that the story line is fairly dark and there appears to be no rules for the gangsters or the man.