(Evaluation Task 5)
TRANSCRIPT:
Pleasures your target audience can take from your thriller
Genre
Our Thriller is a subgenre of thriller, it is an Action Thriller which means that along with the basic thriller conventions which is that the film has an exciting plot, typically involving crime or espionage, it additional and mainly uses action to create tension and suspense, including things like fighting, big stunts, car chases etc. All this to make the audience feel on the edge and thinking that something bad could happen to the protagonist during these action scenes. Our Film is a Action thriller because it has an exciting plot which involves crime, but it also mostly focuses on action and makes the audience feel like the main protagonist might get hurt, as like in our thriller opening sequence where our protagonist gets into a physical altercation with somebody a lot stronger than her meaning that she is at risk which creates tension and makes the audience feel on the edge, as an Action Thriller should.
Films that have influenced our thriller opening sequence are such films as Lucy, Lara Croft: Tomb Raider, Salt, Kill Bill Parts 1 & 2, and Charlie's Angels; These films have influenced our opening sequence because they depict a female in a position of strength and power like, like the protagonist in our opening sequence rather than being weak like females stereotypically are in thrillers and action thrillers; Films like Lucy are the type of film which influenced our opening sequence the most because it shows how the female is at first in a state of weakness in comparison to a male but as the film progresses she begins to over power the male and ends up being the opposite of what she was at the beginning of the film meaning that now it is the male is a position of vulnerability and the female in a position of power and control, this is what takes place in our opening sequence.
Setting
I think that the setting of our opening sequence would be appealing to our target audience, for the simple reason that it feels relatable, it is filmed in the house hold of a normal family, so there is a chance that a large percent of members of our target audience grew up in a house like this one; This makes the whole film more realistic in the eyes of our audience because if they see it happening in a house which is similar to the house they grew up in or live in then it makes the plot more of an actual possibility that could happen in their minds, rather than a film where the white house is invaded by terrorists because to the viewer it feels like it is less likely to happen and therefor makes the film less realistic in their eyes.
Narrative
Our thriller opening sequence is appealing to an audience because it is so intriguing and really makes the audience want to watch the rest of the film because they have so many questions unanswered, which is really the point of an opening sequence, to make the audience want to find out more. in our opening sequence we leave the audience with a few questions which we believe will leave them interested and wanting more, firstly, who’s the man on the board and how does he relate to the man breaking in (if at all)? secondly, why did someone break into the house? what is the assignment that the agent (the female protagonist) is working on? What is she hiding in the computer and/or the hard-drive? How come she can fight so well (has she been trained? Why is the intruder so well trained and why does he have a gun in England? These questions which are immediately left on the audiences mind within the first 3 minutes of the film will make the audience interested in the films narrative and keep them watching it.
As for the two characters which are seen in our opening sequence, there is a few reasons the audience would take pleasure out of seeing them, firstly with the male intruder, at the beginning we don't show his face and how he looks like, which sparks curiosity within the audience, also his dark coloured clothing, the gun in his hand and his sneakiness when breaking into the house makes the audience feel apprehensive, all this within the character brings out feelings in the audience. As for the female character she looks like she could be anyone just at home, and the audience are able to relate to her at the beginning because someone broke into her house and she is scared and the audience can relate to that because it is what people hear about in the news often and they feel like it could happen to them, and that is why they begging to feel fear and they feel scared for the female character. By the end of the opening sequence the female character becomes someone which the audience can rally behind, she has defeated the intruder and she has also overcome the stereotypes of a female character in an action/thriller and the audience like that.
Music
Our audience can take pleasure from our sound track because what it does is enhance the feeling they feel when watching the opening sequence. For example when there is the fight sequence in our opening sequence, rather then it just being fighting which could get boring, we added fast paced music to make everything feel faster and more intense. When they're is the shot of our female character passing the intruder in the upstairs corridor, instead of it just being her running past him we added music which gets louder right as she passes him to show that this part is important and it adds intensity for the audience, which begins to question weather she will make it past him undetected or not. Another example of when we used music to enhance a scene in our opening sequence is when the protagonist and the intruder meet downstairs for the fight, when the camera is looking at the male the music is one note of a low pitch to represent the male but when the camera turns and you can see our female protagonist in the shot, another higher pitched note representing the female is added on top of the male note, and it is also a lot lower showing that the female is overpowering the male character. So yes I think that the audience does take pleasure from the soundtrack because if it amplifies the emotions of the audience and if there was no music then the film would just be boring.
Titles
In our titles we give the audience the basic information concerning the creation of the thriller, such as the production company in charge of the film which we named OxCliff Productions, we also show the company which also worked on the film, which includes Black Line Films and Pura Vida Studios, we have these titles at the beginning of the opening sequence to show the importance of them to the audience, it is the first thing one sees when watching the film, this is especially evident with the first title (the production company) which is simply the name on a black background so that is the only thing the audience see’s when watching that. Later on in the opening sequence the names of the Main Actors in the film, which include, Michael Nailand, Cressida Hope, Kerry Jackson and Tyler Smith, we give the names of these actors because they would be the names of the characters one see’s the most in the movie and also the names of the most famous actors in the movie, these titles can please the audiences because they might be excited to see their favourite actor. Another title which is shown in our opening sequence is that of the producer, in this case the producer of the film is Ryan Washington, and after that we show the director title, which says that the film was directed by Ian Daniels, these two title are the last titles shown before the film name because they are very important, traditionally the name of the films producer and director are put last to show their importance and that is what we did, the title of the director can bring pleasure to the audience because maybe they like films he has directed before this one and are their for excited to watch this one in hopes that it is a shod as some of the directors past creations. Finally the last title we put in the opening sequence is the film title which in our case is called Vengeance, it is the last title in the opening sequence so that it is the last title the audience will see and it will stick in their minds so that the audience can hopefully tell their friends about the film, it is also the title which is is the largest in size and it is placed in the centre of the screen as oppose to the other titles which are either to the left or to the right so that it sticks out more to the audience and it shows its importance, it is also placed over a black background so that it is the only thing the audience is looking at. In the title vengeance we give a bit of information about the film, vengeance means “punishment inflicted or retribution exacted for an injury or wrong” meaning that there will probably be action in the film and probably violence, so that a punishment is inflicted, the audience does not know who the punishment will be inflicted upon in order to leave a certain level of enigma in the audiences mind, they know that it is going to happen, they just do not know to who.
Editing / Filmstyle
I think that our opening sequences editing techniques and film styles would be appealing to our audience for several reasons, firstly our opening sequences include quite a few fast jump cuts which adds to the intensity of the scene and makes everything a lot more intense, which does a good job of drawing in the audience because if everything was slow paced and not much was happening than the audience would get board but since it is very fast paced and filled with action it is more appealing to the audience, especially the male percent of the audience because stereotypically, males like action films, and fast cuts are one of the conventions of an action movie so it appeals heavily to a male audience. One of the film styles we used in our thriller opening sequence is equally appealing to an audience, the film style in question is the type of filming we did during the fight scene, it involved a lot of quick movements and small zooms on moments of impact, for example when the female protagonist punches the intruder in the neck the camera shakes and slightly zooms in then out quickly. The effect that this film style has on the audience is that it enhances the action feel of the film, the films style makes the scene look like it has a lot more movement in it and it increases the feeling of the impact, all this making the fight look a lot more intense than it really is. Another film style which we believe is appealing to our audience is the close ups and extreme close ups on the main female protagonist’s face, we added quite a few of these shots in the opening sequence to show the audience her facial expressions, in order to show how she feels in that moment so that the audience relates with her and knows how she feels, this helps us show how she was scared at the beginning of the scene but grew courage through out the scene and by the end, fought her fear and fought the intruder and won. Another editing technique which we used in our opening sequence and which could bring pleasure to our audience is the way in which through out the opening sequence we show where the female protagonist is in the house and then we next show where the male intruder is situated in the house and we keep this process going through out the sequence until it culminates in the two characters meeting downstairs and fighting. I believe this is a editing technique that the audience enjoys because it updates them on where the characters are situated in the house throughout the sequence and it makes the audience feel like they know more than the characters. This technique also creates tension because by showing where the characters are, the audience can slowly see them get closer and closer to each other and they begin to anticipate that something might happen as they see the characters get closer.
Codes and Conventions of Genre
In our thriller opening sequence we both abided by some of the conventions of an Action/Thriller but also challenged some conventions. One of the conventions which we have followed is with the soundtrack we used, when there was moments of action we used faster paced music to add to the effect that things are happening fast and that it is intense, this can be seen and heard in the scene where the female protagonist is hiding all her equipment. We also slowed the pace of the music down when there were moments of tension rather than action as to accentuate the feeling the shot is supposed to give off, which is that the audience is meant to believe that some sort of action for example a fight will happen, not that it is happening at that moment, this can be seen and heard in the shot where the intruder is making his way up the stairs. One case where the conventions of an Action/Thriller were at first followed but later on challenged is with the way the Intruder and the female protagonist are portrayed, at first the male intruder seemed to be smart and strong and the audience had it in there mind that he was going to attack the female protagonist and win because stereotypically in thrillers the intruder is the one in power and his victim is his prey. Also following the conventions, our female character at the beginning of the opening sequence was portrayed as weak, scared and vulnerable when she found out that someone had broken into her house and this follows the conventions of an action/thriller because females are stereotypically in those films, week and scared and most of the time need to be saved by a man because they cannot save them selves, an obvious example of this though it isn't a thriller is Superman, the female is the victim and cannot save her self and the male (superman) comes in and saves her. At the end of the opening sequence the conventions of an action/thriller are challenged because both characters are portrayed in a different light, the intruder gets over powered by the female and gets punched to the floor then knocked out with a bottle which shows that the male character wasn't as strong and as capable as the audience believed him to be at the beginning of the opening sequence. The way the female protagonist is portrayed at the end of the opening sequence is also challenging the conventions of an Action/Thriller because instead of being scared and vulnerable as she was at the beginning of the film she turns out to be very well trained and sneaks up of the intruder and attacks him from behind and quickly disarms him and follows to knock him out, all this happening very quickly which shows that she is not weak and vulnerable but that she is actually in control of the situation and is well trained, and it shows that she doesn't need someone to save her or that she will killed, which is what stereotypically happens in action/thriller.
