Wallander (firewall, BBC)

When watching Wallander we had to right down all the conventions of a thriller in just t6he opening scene. we then had to edit it in as much detail as we could.

• Eerie music creates tension and suspence, this makes you feel wary and nervous as you dont know what is going to happen.
• Black screen makes you feel uncomfortable as you dont know what is going to happen. The audience is expecting to see something bad ir sad, this also makes the audience feel very uneasy.
• The camera then goes to a crain shot of water this makes the audience wonder why there is a shot of it, this also makes them more suspicious and wary of what is about to happen.
• A sound wind effect is then introduced.
• The camera is then shown going past fields, this makes audience ask even more questions about what is going on. This also makes audience feel unsettled and uncomfortable as they are unware of what is going on.
• The sound then gets faster as the camera moves on, this creates tension for the audience as it then gets even louder, till it stops dead at two girls this makes the audience even confused as to what is going on in this short sequance.
• Close up of girls who are very isolated and in the middle of no where. this makes the audeince ask another question which is why they are in the middle of no where and what they are doing, this also makes them more aware and open.
• A shot is then cut of a van with blood on window screen, this suggests an accident might have happened but makes audeince wonder exactly what accident, even though it is something they dont want to see.
• The girls look very dirty and rebellious. Girl on forground looks like the main character she looks very serious, and the girl in the backgorund is blurred looks very scared.
• More questions are asked such as, What crime has happened?, Who done it?, Could it be the girls?
• Close up of girls faces show audience their expressions, the main girl looks angry, but the other girl looks very worried and once again scared. The deep breathing from both girls which is a hyberbolic sound as it is very exaggerated suggests they are out of breath, this makes the audeince feel very on edge and worried for them.
• dead man in van shows he has been attacked, makes you think why and how. maybe he attacked them but they fault back. a card in the van shows he is a taxi driver but why would he drive to the middle of nowhere. this changes the audeince views straight away on what has happened.
• A shot is then cut to of a close up of the mans face. You can then see the mans eye flicker, this shows the attack had just happened as he is just loosing unconsciness.
• Close up of girls hand dropping a knife, this suggests she stabbed him. makes audience feel again incomfortable, and they ask more questions such as why she had a knife? and what has happened? the noise of the knife is a chingy noise this also creates tension.

Cape Fear, 1962

During a cover lesson for Miss Lynch we had to look up the opening scene for Cape fear from 1962 . We had to find 5 questions the audeince would ask, the convention and then analyse it using the camera work.



*Cape Fear 1962, Opening Scene



5 qustions the audience would ask while watching this was:

• Who is he?



• Where is he going?



• Why does he look back?



• Who is he looking for?



• Why is he looking for him?

The conventions i found when looking at this openig scene are:

• Eerie music, this sets the scene of uneasyness and leaves the audeince wonderign why?



• Supense, makes the audeince ask even more questions



• Tension, this is caused by the Eerie music and the way he is acting.

How the camera is used:

• Long shot showing man walking and his surrounding, this gives the audeince an idea of where he is.



• panning, this follows him round to where he is walking. this looks as if someone is following his every move.



• long shot of him walking across the road the camera then cuts to a close up of him crossed the road abd walking upo the stairs, leaves audience asking why.



• Cuts to a close up of him in building, looking around.



• Extreme close up as he walks away.



• Mid shot of him walking up the stairs, walking striaght past a lady who dropped a book, he doesn't help up. this gives the audeince an idea of the sort of person he is.



• mis shot of both men looking back at each other, this creates tension.



• long shot of man talking to cleaner who is in a close up asking where someone is.

Brick (Johnson, 2005, US)

when watching brick you can see clearly that it is an opening scene as it shows many close ups and unaswered questions the viewers have to answer themselves. This also fits into the genre of a thriller as it shows bits and pieces of whats happening instead of the whole things. this leaves the audience wondering what is happening, why it is, who the characters are and so on.

the opening scene consists of many conventions and close ups withc make up this type of genre these are:

• Extreme close up of eyes, this autamatically makes the audience start asking questions ( who is he?, what is he doing?) this also draws in the attention of the audience by making them watch even more to see what is happening, This shot is very strong as it doesn't give away to much information to early.


• long shot showing him and a women laying on floor, ( has he done this?, whats happening?) This shot creates a lot of tension and confusion as you are still trying to figure out who the first character is then another character gets introduced.


• close up of shoes, shows how he is standing i.e the position, this extreme close up is showing his shoes and every detail of them, this could lead to a clue later on in the film as it is not often you have shots like this, it makes you remeber these shows clearly instead of them being a shit were you can hardly see them.


• close up of girls legs (is she dead?), this close up eaves many unaswered questions as te audience wants to know what happened to her and if she is dead or alive, this creates a great amount of tension.


• cuts back to close up of him


• close up of her hair showing part of her face


• close up of him again


• close up of her braclets ( why are they showing that?, isit some sort of clue?)

by having all these close ups at the begining doesn't give away much as it is only showing certain bits, by doing it like this makes the audeince ask so mnay questions witch fit in the conventions of a thriller and tells you it is a thriller by how it is set out.

The Sixth Sense

It is obvious from the opening scene taht sixth sense is a thriller by the many conventions used. The Eerie music at the begining sets a uneasy and spooky atmosphere, by having this right at the beginning sets the mood staright away and makes the audience wonder what is going to happen, already they are asking questions. During the opening scene a women goes into her basement, the camera work it hand held, this makes the audience think she is being watching. By having the camera work like this makes the audience feel uncomfortable and unsettled, they want to know whats going to happen but dont want to watch it. when you look at the basement it is very old and dusty/dirty. This is very contrasting to upstiars as it is very birght and comforting. by hvaing this contrast sets the mood of a thriller genre in terms of how it gets the mood across to teh audiences and teh questions they are asking.

Memento (Nolan, 2000, US)

Memento is a very good opening sequance for a thriller as it includes many conventions which show it is a Thriller Genre such as eerie music, supense and tension, unexpected, loud scream. by hvaing all these in such a short sequence adds to the effect all together, it makes the audience want to watch more and answer the answered questions they have. This opening sequance doesn't start from the beginning but from the middle, its as if it is starting with a flashback, this is really good as it gives the audience more questions to ask as to what is going on. To have an opening sequance like this sets the scene of a Thriller well and shows to the audience it is a thriller genre by how it is produced.

Memento (Nolan, 2000, US)

Memento shows it is a Thriller by the amount of conventions it uses and the camera work. while editing Memento i looked at cinematography, sound, mise en scene, editing as you can see from below.
Opening Scene:

• Just as the film begins and starts to get introduced music starts to play. the music is very slow and dramatic, this creates tension in the film as well as to the audience. by hvaing this Eerie music makes the audience feel very uncomfortable as they are wondering what is going to happen and when, it is very uneasy music.
• A close up is then introduced showing a hand developing a photo, it then fades before it cuts into a mid shot showing when he took the photo, by having the photo fading instead of development shows a confusion as it is reversed. This shot is framed to a slight angle but so the picture is still in the centre.
• a shot is then introduced of teh camera zooming out and down showing half a man putting a picture back in the camera and re taking it. by having all this leaves the audience feeling very confused and leaving them asking them selfs many questions which they are then left to answer themselves.
• The film then cuts into a close up of the wall he took a picture of, this gives the audience more to think about as they ahve to piece together what they think is hapopenign and why, this is when the stroy starts to unfold.
• A character is then introduced but the audience does not know anything about them or what they look like, this makes you want to follow the story even more.
• By having so many close ups only shows the audience what is in the shot it doesn't show you what is going on in the background. By doing this makes you wonder what you can't see not what you can, this also leaves the audience asking more questions as they want to see more.

While watching this the audeince asks many questions such as:

• Why he has that photo?
• What is it for?
• Is this a flashback?
• Whats going on?
• Evidence?

Brief of task set.

Brief: The titles and opening sequance of a new thriller genre film, this has to last a maximum of two minutes.

For this task i will be working with Emma Martin and Nathan Kent. We will be planning our short film, recoring what we we be doing and filming it all together as a group but then we will all edit our sequance on our own and how we want it to be.

What We Learnt Today!

In todays lesson we learnt what we was going to do over the next few weeks. This was to produce a new fiction film of our choosen genre and produce the titles and opening scene. we then went on to talk about thrillers this is what we will be looking at over the next two weeks. we learnt about the conventions of a thriller genre these are,

• Dark/Nightmare


• Make you jump


• Unexpected


• Suspense


• Shock


• Police


• Split personality


• Tension


• Ask questions etc.

when learning about a thriller many people got confused about the difference between a Thriller and a Horror as they thought they bothed linked in but they dont. A Thriller is moovie the auydience has to be really involved in, answering many questions they have to work out what is going on, instead of the film just following easily. A Horror shows more crime and murders which are shwon very clearly but also very exaggerated. Horrors are much more scary.

After we had this discussion and made sure we all knew the difference between the two genres we went on to watch Memento (Nolan, 200, US), we had to write down the conevntions we saw while watching this.

WWW & EBI

www: For this continuity task I think our group worked well together and came up with a good storyboard after changing it a few times. Half way through our filming a member of our group was absent so we had to film again, even with such a short amount of time we managed to do it, it came out better then we expected. We all participated in this task evenly whether it was to film, edit or make sure everything was included such as the continuity techniques and what we needed to include in this short sequance. I think overall our filmed sequance came out good and shows a good understanding of what continuity is.

ebi: Although i feel our task went well and showed a good understanding of what we needed to do i also feel there are some parts that could have been improved and made better, for example in the middle of our sequance we could have put another clip in to make it flow that extra bit more. we could have also made it a bit more exciting then just having the basics we needed to include. It would have been better if we had stuck to our original plan but we changed it as we thought it wasn't as successful by doing this means we had less time to film and edit it so we had to workk very quickly to make sure it got completed.

Preliminary Task

Reflections on editing

When it came to editing the work we had filmed we went back through what we had to include and talked about how we was going to do this as a group. Once we imported all our footage we made sure we had all the shots we needed before we strated to cut and edit them. we then cut all the clips so they all flowed easily and naturally. Before doing this we made sure we had included all the continuity editing techniques before we went any further. I think that as a group we done this very well and made sure we followed the rules, we done this by alwasy checking over what we had done and talking about it together, we also maintained continuity as we worked together to get the shots right and in the correct place in terms of how we was positioned at the ned of each shot ready for the next one.

Reflections on filming

Before we even started filming we had to make sure our setting we chose was free for filming in this case we had a bit of difficulty as the setting we originally picked was inavailble so we had to re think of another suitable place to film that fitted in with our storyboard. We decided to film in a school as our dialogue fitted in with it as it was about a teacher and a student having a converstaion about homework. For our props we used natural teaching stuff such as school books, we done this so it sets the atmopsphere even more as to where it was and what was going on. When it came to the filming, trying to use continuity editing was quite difficult as we had to make sure it was perfect and nothing was out of place, we had to make sure we stayed in the position so the next shot fitted in when we cut it. When doing this we had to re film shots a number of times to get it just right and to make sure it looked like a continuity edited sequance, it took a lot of practise but i think it worked well in the end, we made sure we followed the rules of continuity editing by keep going back to our storyboard and seeing what else we need to do and include in terms of the techniques and whats needs to be included during this sequance.

Reflection on planning

To start of with each individual had to do a storyboard on thier own ideas, we then got put into groups of three and each person shared there ideas with the rest of us. we then had to re think a new idea but including an idea from each of our group members storyboard. It took us a while to think of an idea we all agreed on and thought would work, we had to make sure all the aspects of continuity editing was included for example match on action, eyeline match, 180 degree rule and shot reverse shot. When including this into our planning we found it quite easy as there was many shots where each technique could be used.

Preliminary Task

For our Preliminary task we had to produce a short filmed and edited sequance correctly using continuity editing and showing our uinderstanding of it. This short sequance had to include:
Openign a door
Crossing a room
Sitting down in a chair (opposite eachother)
Enagaging in some dialogue

Continuity Editing

Continuity editing is used to make the edits between shots as unobtrusiv (unseen) as possible, this is why we do not notice the editing in programme as it seems natural the shots flow from one to another.
the basic techniques of continuity editing are:
Mastershot (establishing shot) - this sets up the patial relationship between characters. it shows you where each of them are in the room or location and the audience can use this information when watching rest of scene.
180 degree rule - An imaginary line is drawn between them, the camera must stay on the same side of imaginary line, but it can move anywhere within 180 degrees. we use this so viewers do not get confuised and the shots flow easily.
Match on action -this is where a character carries out an action, the first shot of it may be from one shot type/angle and the second from another. The editer can then cut on this action to hide the cut and make the edit seamless.
Shot reverse shot - usually used to show conversation, the camera will switch between mcu/cu of characters as they speak to eachother, showing response and reaction.
eyeline match - this is a cut between a character looking off screen to the item that they are looking at.

During our media lessons last week we got into groups of three to start our preliminary task. We had to plan a storyboard so we new what we was going to do for this task and how we was going to do it. We then started to film which wasn't going as well as we hoped as our shots wern't lining up and we then had to change our location as the setting we chose was taken. In our next lesson we had to start again as a member of our group was not here. this was difficult but we managed to do it and complete our filming ready for editing.