PowerPoint Presentation

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

Setting in a forest

Our opening sequence is set in a forest. This conforms to a typical murder scene location in the thriller genre. This is a secluded area, which makes our audience feel like they are isolated. When the murder scene occurs, this adds to the sense of helplessness when she is being chased as there is nobody around to help her. This relates to Barthes enigma code, which means the audience are wondering what is out there in the forest, like who the girl is running from.

This is similar to in silence of the lambs when they use a dark forest. It is very dark and foreboding, which adds tension. Therefore it helps create the thriller genre.

Male antagonist

In our opening sequence there is a murder scene, which is committed by a man. This is often a convention in the crime genre as it is stereotypically watched by a male audience. Also men are often considered more aggressive and threatening, whereas women are viewed to be innocent. This could be related to the idea of vulgarism, where people (stereotypically men) gain pleasure from watching someone being tortured.

This is similar to Sweeny Todd where both the protagonist Sweeny Todd, who is a serial killer, and the antagonist, who is a rapist, are men.

Bright lighting

In this instance, we challenged the convention of crime and thriller films which often use low-key lighting to create mystery and tension. In our opening the whole thing was shot with bright, natural lighting. This was to help introduce our main character as a good, innocent person. This links into Propps Character archetypes, which makes the protagonist appear to be a typical Prince type character.

This is a contrast to in Silence of the Lambs when they use low-key lighting to build the audiences tension, which is a main feature of the thriller genre.

Introductory Sequence

In our opening sequence theres no dialogue as the camera follows the protagonist as he rides his bike through a forest. This helps give the audience an insight into his character, while still not giving much away. This gives us a slight insight into his character, while also providing some sense of mystery to keep the audience interested.

Similar to Donnie Darko. In this scene he wakes up on a road beside his bike in his pyjamas. He gets up and rides his bike home. This gives us a slight insight into his character, while also providing some sense of enigma to keep the audience interested. This relates to Barthes enigma code, where the audience will want to know more about the character.

Old-Style Filters

We used filters on our film like Sepia and Projector to make it look like old film. This conforms to the conventions of a historical thriller, as it relates to the old movies like Psycho and the first Sherlock Holmes movies. By using these filters they make the audience feel a sense of foreboding due to the dark tones made by the sepia. The projector filter is used to make the audience feel uneasy as the footage is jumpy and grainy in places.

This relates back to old crime thrillers such as The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes. Therefore through Cultural Codes the audience are aware that this filter indicates that these scene are set in the past.