Pitch draft

Here is my groups brief summary of our film, made a few changes to the storyline by using a few of our old ideas we came up with earlier in the planning process. We still haven't come up with a title yet. As you can see our thriller falls into different kind of thriller categories

Genre: Crime, Drama, Mystery, Thriller
Rating: 15
Storyline: College student Mandy is attacked by an mysterious figure while on her way home from school. A week later when Mandy recovers from her attack she receives a letter in the post and opens it to find a note covered in soil which had a pic of a heart which read "its no fun if your hearts not in it".....

Initial Storyboard

After a fair amount of research and planning my group finally done our storyboard for our film, we think it's up to scratch, all we need to do is add a few things to it such as timing of each shot, camera angles etc and we'll be ready for filming.

Bare in mind the timing of the shots won't exactly be the same length of the timing i have written when we actually film. It'll roughly be in that region.

Frame 1: Establishing shot of a police station

Duration: 3-5 seconds

Audio: N/A

Dialogue/action: N/A

Frame 2: Rotational shot/ mid shot

Duration: 8-10seconds

Audio: N/A

Dialogue/action: rotational shot of room and detective and a mid shot of the detective looking at articles


Frame 3: Extreme close up (ECU)
Duration: 10 seconds
Audio: N/A
Dialogue/action: Extreme close up of articles


Frame 4: Zoom shot saying "3 days earlier"
Duration: 3 seconds
Audio: N/A
Dialogue/action: N/A


Frame 5:  Establishing shot/Long shot
Duration: 6-10 seconds
Audio: N/A
Dialogue/action: Establishing of park. Long shot of girl walking down the pathway listening to music with a distant figure behind her.


Frame 6: High angle shot/ Medium close up
Duration: 6-10 seconds
Audio: N/A
Dialogue/action: high angle shot of man following the girl. Medium close up shot of from behind the man.


Frame 7: Handheld shot
Duration: 5 seconds
Audio: N/A
Dialogue/action: Handheld shot of the girl running so it adds realism and adds to the thrill.


Frame 8: Handheld shot
Duration: 5 seconds
Audio: N/A
Dialogue/action: handheld shot of man chasing the girl to add realism


Frame 9: Long shot
Duration: 6 seconds
Audio: N/A
Dialogue/action: Long shot of girl lying on the floor and the man standing over her


Frame 10: Low angle shot
Duration: 2-4seconds
Audio: N/A
Dialogue/action: Low angle shot of the man standing over the girl to show the power he has over her.


Frame 11: Medium close up/ High angle shot
Duration: 8-10 seconds
Audio: N/A
Dialogue/action: High angle shot of man looking down on the girl while she lays vulnerable. it then switches to a medium close up of girl looking up at the man but we only see the legs of the man to keep identity hidden.


Frame 12: Title and credits
Duration: 6 seconds
Audio: N/A
Dialogue/action: N/A

previous plan ideas...

1. Before we came up with our final idea we were going to do a psychological thriller like the film 'Muholland Drive' and 'Final Destination' because they're films which have a twist and create suspense and excitement. Our story would involve a girl having an encounter with a man while walking down the street and then she recognises something specific on his shoe. Immediately has a flashback of her being attacked and the last thing she saw was the specific thing on his shoe before she blacked out...

2. Our other idea was similar to the first one but she would have a dream about being attacked and then next day see the guy when shes walking through the city and then the flashback happens..


3. we also thought about flipping the stereotype, and instead of having the man as the villain maybe he could be the victim and the girl could be the villain for a change.

Opening scene to 'Wanted'

Wanted is an action crime thriller so its not surprising that it would immediately start off with some sort of fight scene, in particular a medium shot of a bullet going straight through a woman's head. This turns into a shallow focus image of the bullet hole which pierced the glass window which shows the gunman himself with the use of long shot. 

There's a lot of fast paced edits accompanied by fast paced non-diegetic sounds which add to the thrill of the action. We also hear diegetic sounds of police sirens which adds realism to the shot. in The final scene the audience think Mr X has won until he answers the phone and the the person on the other end say's "bye Mr X". we then see a high angle shot of the man standing on an X, this shortly turns into a Extreme close up shot of his head which shows a bullet pierce his forehead. The scene pauses and with an extreme close up the bullet reverses back to where it came from showing us the assassin who killed Mr X.

The audience is left with a sense of suspense and excitement as we aim to find out why the man was killed which is what an opening to a thriller should have in order to engage the audience and keep them at the edge of their seats until the end.



Analysis of past student work

• At (0:17) , the title of the thriller appears. It's called 'Pulse' and is written in a bold red font which is very effective because it stands out. The red symbolises blood which the heart pumps around the body, and your pulse is something used to check the rate of your heartbeat. So already the audience is getting the idea that something bad will happen that will affect the pulse rate.

• In the next scene, a close up shot is used on the newspaper, meaning it has some sort of significance in the plot. Also a newspaper carries information, therefore it must hold some sort of information which has relevance to the plot etc. We then get a long shot of a girl running, whose feet touches the newspaper. This tells us that they'll be linked together somehow.

• The camera then zooms in for an extreme close up of an article inside the newspaper which said 'Police release image of schoolgirl attacker' so know we know who the antagonist is. This gives us a hint that the antagonist is around and the protagonist might be his next victim due to previous scenes. It also tells us what kind of person the antagonist is, so we're aware of his actions.

• Following on from that scene, a medium long shot is used again at (1:11) showing the antagonist on the swings in the park, which connotes that he has a thing for young children. He might be a paedophile but the audience aren't certain. At (1:08) there's a medium long shot of the park name, giving us the location.

• And looking in the background, you can see a forest area which looks scary. The audience know something bad will happen because the area is isolated as shown at (1:46), & low key lighting is used to make the location seem unsafe and the antagonist who's following close behind look untrustworthy.

Sound

• Diegetic- protagoinist' *gasp* when she saw the antagonist in the park
• Diegetic- Leaves crunching, footsteps (running), hear kids playing/shouting in the park (adds a sense of realism)
• Non-Diegetic- eerie music when the newspapers is shown or when they show the antagonist

Mise-en-scene

• Protagonist- Wearing a pink jumper- vulnerability, innocence
• Antagonist- Dark clothing- bad, shady, danger

Lighting

• High key lighting when she was jogging around the area - made it look safe
• Low key lighting when they entered the forest area- made it seem unsafe

Camera shots

• POV- when she was jogging by the park, let us know she saw the antagonist
• One or two quick edits during the short chase scene- he's always one step ahead of her

Comments: I feel this is a good piece due to the variety of shots used and the music went in time with everything, not much fault in it except for the ending scene which i would say they should of let fade out to black, not cut off.

First shot is an establishing shot of a house (verisimilitude). In the next scene we get a medium close up of the characters exchanging a few lines (diegetic sound), there's also the diegetic sound of the T.V and music playing from a system (adds realism). In the next few scenes when she goes in the bedroom and sees the antagonist, a close up shot is used to show the antagonist face and the protagonist' facial expressions.

Finally at the end the title comes up in bold red font and it's called ' Behind the Mask'. The red as we know, symbolises blood, danger, death etc and because two people died we know it's definitely symbolising death.

There's some high key lighting used on the protagonist as she walks out the living room to go upstairs. This makes the house look like a safe location to be and she obviously feels that it is. On the other hand there is use of Low key lighting on the characters while they're in the living room. Maybe it's trying to show that the house is not safe, but personally i think they didn't get a good shot for that scene because the dim light in the living room.

Comments: Over all i didn't feel this thriller was good at all, it seemed rushed and not enough thought and planning went into it.

Thrillers we looked at in class

We looked at a few thrillers in class such as Muholland Drive, Panic Room and Bourne Identity, it really helped in seeing what kind of thrillers we might do for our film.

Panic Room Sequence & Dolly shot

Mulholland drive

The Bourne Identity fight scene

BBFC classification The '15' category

The majority of thrillers are have an age rating of '15' which is who are target audience will be. My groups film will appeal to young adults aswell as older adults and below are a few requirements of a 15 rated movie. The following information is taken from the bbfc (British board of film classification).

What does the ‘15’ symbol mean?

 This means no-one under 15 is allowed to see a ‘15’ film at the cinema or buy/rent a ‘15’ rated DVD or video game. Parents are warned that ‘15’ rated works are not suitable for children under 15 years of age.

Is a ‘15’ certificate on a video game the same as a ‘15’ for a film or DVD?

Yes, if a video game is rated ‘15’ it is not suitable for players who are under 15. Parents should not assume that because something is a game it is unlikely to contain the same sort of material as a ‘15’ rated film or DVD. If the BBFC has rated a game ‘15’ it is because it does contain the same sort of material as a ‘15’ rated film or DVD.
The ‘15’ rating has nothing to do with the difficulty of a game or the amount of skill required to play it.

What sort of issues might I find in a ‘15’ film, DVD or video game?

‘15’ works are stronger than '12' or ‘12A’ rated works and could include any of the following:
• strong violence
• frequent strong language (eg 'f***').
• portrayals of sexual activity
• strong verbal references to sex
• sexual nudity
• brief scenes of sexual violence or verbal references to sexual violence
• discriminatory language or behaviour
• drug taking

Most of the issues which are presented above will not appear in my groups opening scene.