Jonah - Evaluation Question 1

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

• Most thrillers aim to create an enigma or mystery to keep the audience guessing throughout the film, although this is not true for all thrillers. One way thrillers keep the audience engaged and guessing is to reveal the ending of the story first, starting with the/a climax of the film e.g. character dying. Which is what my thriller does, it makes the audience ask questions like who died? why did they die?  what lead up to this character dying? This narrative technique is common among thrillers as it begins with the Disruption/Disequilibrium of the story, captivating the audience and "Thrilling them" as the story progresses to reveal the enigma of the climax.

[Made using paint]

• Other then narrative techniques, Editing, Sound, Camera and Mise en scene come together to make a thriller what it is. Cross-cutting editing is used in thrillers to create suspense, in my thriller i tried to create this effect by starting with longer shots and slowly cutting done to shorter and shorter shots leading to the climax, of the female character being murdered, although the two location never actually meet the technique of cross cutting is still used. In this example my thriller follows conventional thriller technique as cross cutting is used throughout real thrillers to build unto a climax, and this technique is used in many other genres such as action/ adventure. An example of cross cutting is in the beginning of the The Dark Knight  the bank robbery scene. The scene is edited so it cuts between the two groups of robbers, as the cuts get more frequent, creating suspense it builds to the climax of the Joker revealing his face to the banker. Effectively creating the suspense needed to thrill the audience and create an enigma of this creepy character. 

• Another way my thriller follows traditional conventions of thrillers is the use of hard and low key lighting. Low key lighting is nearly always used in real thriller films as it creates a enigmatic atmosphere by hiding some of the scene, and quite possibly restricting the narrative, creating tension as some of the plot is hidden from the audience 

• Starting from the top left frame in the 9 frame sequence i will analysis each frame taken from my thriller. The Antagonist is the male character in a casual work uniform, from the clothes he is wearing it  is easy to assume this character is up to no as he has a body and spade in his car. This immediately creates an enigma around this character to why and what he is doing, which follows normal conventions of thriller as it creates tension and a knowing that something is not right.

• The next frame uses camera and lighting techniques well. As the camera pans right and tilts up as the male character walks by it reveals the church making it clear where he is going and creates a thrilling mood as churches normally represent peace, healing, tranquility not first degree murder. The lighting is natural and the church is lit up by a fog light changing the churches iconography and  giving it an eerie presence on screen , which i used to my advantage in the next frame. In the far most right frame on the top row a silhouetted shadow is cast onto the church and the shadow is distorted which reflects the horror and disruption in this male character. 

[comparing lighting to real headlights] 

• On the second row, farthermost left, i used hard lighting to almost recreate car headlights as they cast huge distorted shadows from the hard high key lighting making the scene more intense and important as the whole frame is visible. The next frame along to the right has the shot focused on the female characters arm and out of focus in the mirror which suggests she is blurred out of the scene and just oblivious to the murder. Lastly on the far right the male antagonist is in shadow as the hard light beats down on him. The bottom row are three frames from the end of the thriller which switch between a POV of the female protagonist and POV of the male antagonist, these shots bring out the character of the antagonist as he kills the female with only slight hesitation. The Hard light creates shadows across both characters faces hiding some expressions but creating tension.