Genre Research - Thriller

A movie in the thriller genre is often characterized as having immense conflict, tension, and unexpected twists. This genre is extremely intriguing to us because of its conventions. We are very interested in the prospect of creating a film that would have a very intense or powerful meaning. Common CAMS in this genre include close up shots, tilted angles, handheld shots, and high angle shots. These shots are key to a genre like this because it gives the audience a heightened sense of anxiety. For example, close up shots convey especially intense emotion and tilted angles make the scene appear more daunting and confusing. Common sounds in this genre may include footsteps, gun shots, car engines, or banging. Oftentimes, thrillers will include car revving or scared whispering to convey something stressful and that the characters are somewhere they are not supposed to be. Common mis-en-scene in this genre could be guns, clocks, and harsher lighting. There are often elements of “time running out”, or something that threatens the well-being of the characters, so the use of clocks, televisions, or guns would be appropriate. Common editing in this genre includes shot-reverse-shots, eyeline matches, cross cutting, and cut away shots. These shots provide very quick connections to be shown throughout the films. These elements of editing are very helpful to creating a thriller film. Including a split screen or cut away shots allow the audience to track a fast-paced storyline, which is very common in a thriller film. Example films in the thriller genre are “Get Out” and “Bird Box”. The common elements of thriller movies that we like are the fast pace, the emotional behavior of the characters, and the more chaotic/suspenseful filming style. Our idea directly coincides with these common elements. We would like to use shots and angles like the ones listed above to illustrate the high stakes that the characters are in. The elements of the genre that do not appeal to us as much are the very complex story lines because we do not have the ability to do that in such a short film. We must make our film concise enough to fit in a five-minute time frame, so we would like to implement the mood and feelings of a thriller movie, but not the complicated and long progression of the plot. We believe we can make our plot follow these conventions to illustrate our vision.