Thriller Questionnaire

Thriller questionnaire updated from EmelineSerex


This questionnaire has helped me understand what people are looking for in a thriller film and what will make an impression on them, therefore taking these answers into consideration I will use Barthes Narrative Codes to keep the audience interested. Also, the titles will have to have colours that stand out against the background and have a motion, or be infiltrating into the scene, to keep all audience members entertained.
The opening sequence has to give many options as to where the story is leading, to satisfy different types of peoples' interests. Thus I have decided to change some of my previous ideas on the shots used and locations. Now I will make sure there are many close ups on the meaningful props, in order accomplish this as it will not reveal too much and the viewer will have to find out the meaning of each object as the film goes on, unless they can connect the clues beforehand. There shall not be as many locations to make it clearer to the audience where they are so they may focus more on the storyline. Any adjustments will be to improve viewers experience when watching this thriller.

Target Audience Profile

Examples of target audience from EmelineSerex

Mood Boards

These were the first ideas I had for my Thriller Opening. The victim was going to be a teenage girl, while the villain was going to be an elderly man who had previously lost his wife and wished to replace her with the young girl. However, after further consideration I decided to change the plot as it seemed too predictable. Therefore I moved on to the idea of the victim and villain being friends, making it more psychological as you would not expect it to be someone so close to you. To help I will be sticking to the phrase "keep your friends close but your enemies closer".

The first mood board I created was based around my second idea about the friends being the victim and villain, combined with some ideas from the previous idea.

Mood board on thriller idea from EmelineSerex

After completing my questionnaire I decided to change a few of my ideas. For instance, I was going to have middle and long shots of the characters in the opening sequence to introduce them all. However after further reflection, I have come to the conclusion that it would be more effective to have over the shoulder shots of the characters as well as close ups on significant items, to create a snare and enigmas for the viewers to resolve throughout the film.
Also, I took away any obvious religious signs as the villain is not influenced by a God or Devil, what makes the friend do these actions is just an obsession that has gotten out of hand. Instead, more props were added, such as the red make-up and the props with the main characters hair or lipstick marks to emphasis how far this obsession has gone.

Music Analysis

Silent Hill

In the opening of the film ‘Silent Hill’, there is no music at all, only sounds such as the distant calling of someone’s name or the cars driving over the bridge. As the scene plays out there are more diegetic sounds: the sound of the water flowing rapidly in the river, the honking of cars, every branch or twigs breaking beneath the woman’s heavy footsteps slamming against the forest floor, and so on. These are all put into place to create suspense and tension among the audience as they try to understand what is occurring. Additionally, as the woman is shouting out for ‘Sharon’, we assume that something bad has happened, this is reinforced by the sounds of the rushing water and driving cars as they are a connotation of danger as your mind wanders on, believing that the child may have been run over, may be drowning or about to jump off the cliff.

However, after a few minutes of only diegetic sounds, a voice is introduced into the background of someone nearly wailing, as if they were chanting a spell or conjuring something from a different world, and then the sound of someone’s deep and elongated exhale is also heard, giving the audience the impression that something immoral is going to happen.

The Sixth Sense

Violins, piano, cello and drums all play a part in the opening scene of ‘The Sixth Sense’. When we hear the music at the beginning it creates an atmosphere of suspense by dragging out the violin sounds and having stings makes the audience jumpy. This plays throughout the title sequence then fades out as the light from the first scene comes into focus, creating a sound bridge. However the sounds have completely faded out by the time the first character is presented, leaving the viewers extra aware of the protagonist’s actions and expecting anything to happen at any moment.

Thriller Proposal

Proposal of thriller 1 from EmelineSerex