QUESTION 7LOOKING BACK AT YOUR PRELIMINARY TASK, WHAT DO YOU FEEL YOU HAVE LEARNT IN THE PROGRESSION FROM IT TO THE FULL PRODUCT?

By Alice Childerhouse-Boulter

When we did our preliminary task it was the first time I had properly used a camera to film something important. Instead of concentrating on the storyline and action we decided to fit in as much of a variety of shot as we could because it would give us practice for using them in later work. Our task was to create a short clip of someone walking into a room, sitting down, exchanging a few sentences which will become dramatic, leading to the character leaving the room. We planned this well, as we knew what was going to happen, but when it came to filming we added more shots in as we thought it would be more effective for our film. When we filmed the conversation which was between me and Robin we made sure we used the 180 degree rule or else the audience would have gotten confused. We applied that in our thriller opening as Robin is only ever filmed from one angle in the bathroom.I feel that I have learnt a lot over the course and especially since making my preliminary task as I’ve learnt what is needed to make a good thriller opening. Even something as simple as the length of my preliminary task which is 2:05 and my thriller which is 1:27. Below is a link to my preliminary task film:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-nv8lio1o20&feature=plcp&context=C4c4894eVDvjVQa1PpcFMwgnFtukXXSHLeRSqyN5iqEaQkQgeXJCA%3D

Planning for our thriller was quite difficult and went through a lot of storyboards before we decided on one that everyone liked. We wanted to have some classic thriller conventions but also have some of our own ideas in the opening. We decided to use mise-en-scene, lighting and camera shots as things we could change and alter to fit the storyline, for example the bracelet and mobile. We used a wide range of camera shots which we learnt about and practiced during the preliminary task to make our film more unique and interesting.However the costume in our film is inspired from case studies we’ve seen and generic thriller conventions so that it’s clear to our audience that it’s the opening to a thriller. The location was inspired from a film called ‘Fargo’ which is a thriller set in Dakota, a very cold and snowy part of the USA. We filmed our thriller in the snow as it’s a creepy setting anyway, and also connects with other thrillers set in similar locations.Our characters are another aspect of our thriller that’s typical of many thrillers I’ve seen, which really helped our film to appeal to more people.

Planning for this was difficult for the first film because we were unsure of what would make our thriller generic. After the first attempt we had done more case studies and were more aware of what was considered an opening to a thriller and how we could apply that to our own work. To do this we had generic character such as the suggested killer who is played by Jono, who has his hood up and looks very suspicious and shady as a person. His actions of pulling a dead looking girl through the snow is even more mysterious as it brings up many questions as to whether or not he killed her, if he’s hiding the body for someone else, if the girl is even dead or just seriously injured. I think for an opening it’s very important to bring up questions about some aspects of the film, because it entices the audience and makes them want to find out more about the story and action. In a lot of the case studies I’ve looked at of thriller films the openings have always been intriguing as it’s not made clear what exactly is going on. This is important when making a thriller because that’s all part of the conventions.

When it came to thinking of a title for my thriller I wanted to chose something that represented the characters in a metaphorical sense. I didn’t want the title to relate to the action as I thought that might be too obvious, and would give away too much about the film. I chose ‘Dark Angel’ because it represents the character as being two very different things, the words dark and angel mean very different things so it holds a lot of contrast within it. Robin’s character is very torn, as the story is based around the idea that Robin has two sides to his personality, very much like in the story of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde. In reality Robin is suffering from schizophrenia, and this is slightly suggested in the title in the way that he has two sides to him, good and evil, a classic convention of thrillers.I didn’t use much of a soundtrack because I wanted the audio to be very realistic and the visual to be blurry and unsure of itself. To do this I used the sound of Lyndsey being dragged through the snow throughout the opening to keep the audience focused on what was happening to her. I did use some music at the very end when Robin draws the shower curtain as it puts emphasis on the moment and also contrast with the rest of the soundtrack. Having to work in such a small amount of time was really difficult and put a lot of pressure on the group. However when we split up to do our own editing things became a lot easier as we could make our own decisions about what we wanted the film to look like. It was difficult to manage editing the film and doing coursework but overall the outcome was positive and made our work better.