Cinematography - Miss miller

Introduction:

Cinematography - This is a a range of different camera angles/shots that are used in films. Cinematography is often used in thriller films as these different shots help to create suspense. For example a typical camera shot used in a thriller would be a close up of the victim as they are being murdered by the antagonist. This is to try to get the audience to build a relationship for the characters.


The Conjuring: 

High angle: A high angle is where the camera is positioned above the object. When the victims enter there house, the doll is lying on the floor at an high angle, emphasising the doll as that it the only thing you can see in the shot, making the doll look smaller then it actually is. This creates suspense as its trying to trick the audience, making it seem sweet and innocent when really it is the villain in this sequence. 

Zooming in: Zooming in is where the camera moves into an object to create importance and draw the audience in. At one point the camera zooms into the dolls face quite rapidly, i think this is to show the audience the importance of the doll as it is out to cause destruction. It also keeps the audience interested and draws you in as it is shocking and intense.This makes the audience worry for the victims lives.

Mid - shot: A mi-shot is a view of the actors waist up. As the victim enters the bedroom slowly, he sees what the doll had done, scratching the pictures of him and the graffiti on the wll, it shows him positioned mid shot so the audience can see his facial expressions as he is shocked, this creates suspense as the door behind him is in the background and you can hear it creaking open, making the audience wonder if the doll is going enter the bedroom or not. And if it did we would not know as the victim is not in a long shot.

Established shot: An established shot defines the location and gives the audience an insight as to what is about to happen, it defines the thriller genre. At the beginning of the film, as the victims enter the house we know straight away that this film is a thriller. It was dark, all you could hear was the front door opening slowly and in the middle of the hall way, Annabelle the doll is sitting there staring at the victims. This gives the audience a perspective of what is about to follow as the doll looks as if it is possessed, it dosen't look innocent.

Summary:

This will help me to create the opening sequence to my film as i now have an understanding of how changing the shots and angles of the camera can really help to create tension and suspense in a thriller film. It is good to have a mixture of different angles and shots and it keeps the audience engaged with the film. Its taught me that if my whole sequence was filmed in the same angle, the audience would not find it scary or making the audience think what is going to happen next as nothing else is changing. In my thriller sequence i want to try and use as much Cinematography as possible as i want it to be as scary as i could possibly make it.

History of a Thriller - Miss Georgiou

Definition: (wikipedia)

Thriller is a genre of literature, film, and television programming that uses suspense, tension, and excitement as its main elements. Thrillers heavily stimulate the viewer's moods, giving them a high level of anticipation, uncertainty, surprise, anxiety and terror.

Task 1:

Timeline

1945- 

- An architect senses impending doom as his half-remembered recurring dream turns into reality. The guests at the country house encourage him to stay as they take turns telling supernatural tale.  
                                                                                                                                - It won the award for the most interesting screenplay in 1946, and was nominated for the best DVD classic film release.

- I think that it was the most popular thriller in the 1940's because it was the most scariest film of that time

A sequence from Dead of night:

I can tell straight away that this is a thriller film due to the eerie music that is playing in the background though out the sequence, as it got the middle, also the colours that are used are mainly dark and dull, this is an example an typical convention the audience would expect to see in the thriller genre. Towards the middle of the sequence it shows a man staring at a person in through their house, this tells me that possibly this man is an antagonist or possibly he knows the victim. After it shows this man entering the house, slowly creeping towards the woman, not being able to see his face and only showing the shadow of his body, this is conventional to a thinner film as it is typical to have a male antagonist and a female victim. The eerie music is also getting louder as the antagonist is getting closer to his victim, this builds tension upon the audience as we worry for the girl. The is how i know that this film is a thriller. 

Director: Bob Clark

1960-

- Isabella, a young model is murdered by a mysterious masked figure at a boarding house. When Isabella's boyfriend is suspected of the killing, her diary, which has incriminating evidence linking her to the killer, dissapears, the masked killer begins killing off all the models in and around the house to find the diary.

                                                                                                                               - In 2004, one of its sequences was voted No. 85 in "The 100 Scariest Movie Moments" by the Bravo TV network.

- I think that it was the most popular thriller in the 1960's because of the murderers having a hidden identity and the intensity the film brings, not knowing whats going to happen next makes it frightening.

A sequence from Blood and Blacklace:

From the beginning of thus sequence, it shows me evidence to suggest that this film is a thriller from the Font style the film title, it gives me an impression of something i would expect to see in a thriller as the title looks as if is dripping, to me it makes me think of blood, you can also her non-diegetic sound in the background of eerie music. Towards the middle an actor then walks into a female victim dead of the floor, covered in blood, clearly telling the audience that the victim was murdered. It then shows a female and a male fighting, telling me that the male is an antagonist trying to prey on his next victim, which is conventional as all of the victims are female. It shows the female struggling for her life as she is screaming for help. Finally the antagonist is shown but has a hidden identity, this is a typical convention the audience expect to see from a thriller, it creates suspense as the audience are left wondering who and what the antagonist looks like. 

Director: Mario Bava

1984-

- On Elm Street, Nancy Thompson and a group of her friends are being tormented by a clawed killer in their dreams named Freddy Krueger. Nancy must think quickly, as Freddy tries to pick off his victims one by one. 

- This film was popular because it was nothing that anyone had ever seen before in that time, swell as it being a thriller i would class it as a horror aswell. The film is very intense and their are many parts that make you jump, this is my favourite thriller I've seen in the 19th century.

A sequence from A Nightmare on Elm Street:

The first thing i notice to tell me that this film is a thriller is that is it's a female victim alone in her house, this is what us as an audience would expect to see in a typical thriller film. You can then hear creepy diegetic sound of someone calling her name, with eerie music playing in the background, this is the most common element used to create suspense in a thriller, as she goes outside into her garden, the antagonist is them shown but his identity is hard to make out because of how dark it is, i then noticed that he has knifes as fingers on his hands, knifes are the mot common part of iconography that are used for victims to be murdered and it shows blood which is a common convention to show in a thriller to make it more realistic for the audience. The antagonist then chases her to her death, which shows her being ripped open, covering herself in blood. 

Director: Wes Craven

2000-

- Patrick Bateman, a young, well to do man working on wall street at his father's company kills for no reason at all. As his life progresses his hatred for the world becomes more and more intense. 

-This fim i think was a popular thriller because of how random it is. How a normal working man by day turns into a crazed serial killer at night.

A sequence from American Psycho:

At the start of this sequence, it seems as though a man is helping a homeless person sleeping in a dark alley, but then twists as the man may seem as though he is helping, but is in fact there to murder the homeless man, stabbing him to death. The first 10 seconds of this sequence gives away the fact its a thriller film. After this it shows the antagonist relaxing in the spa, this is not typical of what you'd expect the antagonist to be doing, coming across as a normal human being but in reality is a kurupt serial killer. 
Director: Mary Harron

2014-

- New York police officer Ralph Sarchie investigates a series of crimes. He joins forces with an unconventional priest, schooled in the rites of exorcism, to combat the possessions that are terrorizing their city.

-This film was released late August, i thought that this was one of the scariest thrillers that I've ever seen. What makes it a good thriller is that it has murder, possessive activity and thrill all at the same time, i found it very intense and powerful. 

This film informs me that this is highly likely to be a thriller as the titles give it away, this makes me think that the film could be demonic as it shows a priest holding a cross up. As i watch the trailer, it shows a women who ends up killing her child as a demonic character has entered her body, also most of this film is filed in the dark, with eerie music playing in the background quite often. The title 'Evil' is repeated quite a few times throughout the sequence, with a police officer and priest on the hunt to find the demonic charcter and set out to kill it. The director of this film is also the director of sinister which is another thriller film. By the end they perform an exorcism which ends up killing the demon before it could get to the police officers family.



Director: Scott Derickson


Task 2:

I think that The Purge made more money because it was much popular than the Snow piercer, so therefore they didn't sell no where near as many tickets as The Purge did.

It also dosent tell us the theatrical distributor of Snow piercer so I'm guessing it isn't a well known one whereas the purge is Univeral

Also the reason why i don't think the audience rated the snow piercer highly is because i didn't feel that it is a typical thriller film it is quite unusual, i feel that the audience loved The Purge as it was a typical thriller with masked men, guns, knifes and murder took place.

The Purge was rated 6.6/10 by the audience where as Snowpiercer was rated 7/10 by the audience which surprises me as The Purge made over $65 million dollars more selling's over 8 million more tickets.

Research of Mise-En-Scene - Miss Georgiou

A Nightmare on Elm Street

Mise - en - scene


It is made up of 5 elements:

• Settings & Iconography
• Costume, hair & makeup
• Facial expressions & body language
• Lighting and colour
• Positioning of characters/objects within the frame

The settings and the iconography is the background and the extra elements such as the objects that are scene in the film, for example this scene is taking place in a classroom so the iconography is the tables, chairs and boards. This isn't your typical thriller setting, normally a thriller scene would be set somewhere dark, maybe an abandoned place with the victim being all along however, in this particular scene the victim is surrounded by many other people in a school classroom, i think that this is a good thing as it makes this thriller unique and different to what you would expect to see and it shocks you how she's in that setting, so you aren't expecting anything bad to happen and all of a sudden as she falls asleep it changes to her being by herself in the classroom, dark and all the iconography you could see was a few desks, this is as she meets her killer.
The costume, hair and makeup is what the character is wearing and how they are looking, for example in this sequence it is filmed in the characters high school so she's wearing quite plain clothing such as jeans and a jumper with quite natural makeup and hair to show off her innocence in some way, this gives us an understanding of the film as her killer knew her from when she was a little girl so to him she's still shown to be that innocent child she was when she was at the primary school with him.
The facial expressions and body language presents how the character is feeling weather she is scared or happy, this gives us an understanding of how the character is feeling in certain parts of the film, for example at one point of the film she is sleeping so to everyone in the room she seems relaxed by her body language and then she sharply wakes up screaming and you can tell by her facial expressions how scared the character is, as she falls asleep and comes into contact with her killer, you can tell by her facial expressions how scared she is, with her body straight and upright with her shoulders back showing that she's in shock, she also frequently is gasping for air showing she's struggling to breath and her voice starts to tremble as she speaks this is evidence that the victim is very afraid and quite nervous.

The lighting and colour is quite important especially in this film, it gives us an idea about what could happen in the film, for example in this film the girl had fallen asleep in class and the lighting and colour started off bright and bold which senses to me she is in an safe environment, but as she fell asleep and started dreaming the lights fade dramatically and the colour turns dull and dark, most of the iconography had disappeared giving us an idea that something bad is about to happen, and theres nothing and no one left to protect the victim.

The positioning of the characters / objects within the frame is where the characters are positioned within the frame, weather their in the middle of the shot or are in the back. For example, in this film the main character in the sequence was filmed in the middle, this is because she is the most important character in the scene, if she was in the back of the shot she would be quite hidden and you wouldn't have a clear understanding of what is happening in this particular sequence, with all the extra people on either side of her. The way she is positioned when her killer is approaching shows us his empowerment as she's sitting on her desk, he is standing over her whilst confronting her, showing her lack of protection and her vulnerability.

Summary

This research will help me plan the production of my thriller sequence as its given me an insight as to what kind of iconography and background i should use to make my sequence different and unique to everyone else's, it's also helped me understand how my victims body language and facial expressions can really help to create something real and interesting to watch, this is one of the most important elements as if the audience dosen't feel the victim is very afraid then it will not create as much of an impact on the audience.

Research into the BBFC - Miss Miller

Introduction

Who is the BBFC?  

The bbfc is founded by the film industry in 1912 and are responsible for the national classification and censorship of films within the UK. Its requirement is to classify videos, DVDs and some video games.

What do they do?

In order to protect children from unsuitable content such as swearing and violence in films and videos and to give the audience information they might need about a film or video before deciding whether or not to view it.

They watch films and videos all the way through and award an age rating and use their own opinions for each one. 

Main

Age Classification-

U- The U symbol stands for Universal. A U film should be suitable for audiences aged four years and over. A U rated film cannot contain any signs of violence, bad language or sexual references.

PG- PG stands for Parental Guidance. This means a film is suitable for children if they are accompanied by an adult, but some scenes may be unsuitable for young children. A PG is allowed to contain mild bad language, a mild use of violence but no sexual references or drug use.

12/12A-  No one younger than 12 may see a 12A film in a cinema unless accompanied by an adult. A 12 can contain bad language, sexual references and violence but cannot contain drug use.

15- No-one under 15 is allowed to see a 15 film at the cinema or buy/rent a 15 rated film. A 15 rated film is allowed to contain sexual scenes, violence, bad language and drug use.

18- Films rated 18 are for adults. No 18 rated films are suitable for children. An 18 rated movie can contain strong gore / violence, drugs, inappropriate language and explicit scenes.

 A U Rated Film-

Happy Feet

This film falls into the U category as there is no evidence of their being any bad language or sexual behaviour and no violence or threat is permitted in this film. The film is also animated making it kid-friendly and the way the poster is designed tells me this film is aimed to please children roughly below the age of 10.

A PG Rated film 

Elf

This film falls into the PG category, this is because of the mild bad language and the mild use of violence and threat in this film. However, there is no sign of drug use or sexual references in this film making it exceptable for children under the age of 12 if their accompanied by an adult.




A 12 Rated film

Mean Girls

This film falls into the 12 category. Parents need to know this movie has some mature material for a 12, including crude humor, sexual references, underage drinking, and comic violence. 





A 15 Rated film

Ted

This film falls into the 15 category. This film is filled wall-to-wall with strong language, racial and ethnic jokes, sexual innuendo and references, some nudity and partly shown sex, and a violent fight scene. Characters drink beer and smoke pot regularly, and even try cocaine.



An 18 Rated film

Saw II

This film falls into the 18 category.  It features gruesome violence, with detailed, explicit imagery of bodies penetrated by sharp implements, shot, burned up, slammed, smashed, punched, kicked, sawed, cut, and dismembered. Characters bleed (lots), vomit, and cough blood. Characters smoke and curse relentlessly; in flashback, one character injects drugs, to demonstrate her addiction. 



Conclusion

BBFC's importance:

• to protect children and adults from potentially harmful and unsuitable content

• This will help me to decide what category my film will fall into weather it is an 15 or a 18. If i use a heavy amount of gore, bad language and sexual references I would need to be careful on weather i feel it is an 18 or can in fact fall into the 15 category for example.