By definition a Genre is a group or class of artistic field which have a particular conformity and/or technique.
As well as this there are also Sub-Genres which are lesser forms of a genre. These Sub-Genres could fall under two seperate Genres (A Hybrid) and so form their own group, techniques and conformities.
Thrillers are a genre of Film, Televison or Literature which "thrill" their actual audiences through the elaborate use of tension, suspence and excitement.
There are many Genres and Sub-Genres of Thrillers.
These include:
- Mystery Thriller
- Crime Thriller
- Psychological Thriller
- Political Thriller
- Paranoid Thriller
- Conspiracy Thriller
- Disaster Thriller
- Erotic Thriller
- Legal Thriller
- Medical Thriller
- Religious Thriller
- Supernatural Thriller
- Techno Thriller
The story line to a Thriller often contains two seperate views, One of the heroic lead and one of the Evil Villain. These view points are generally very similar or complete opposite to one another. The Villains view is usually a result of a twisted and dark background resulting in him having a hatred for the hero or an aspect of the hero's life. In contrast to this the view on the hero is that of a sympathetic one, thus making the audience side with him.
When choosing and designing characters in thrillers one must take great thought into how they appear to the audience. Depending on the type of thriller you may be producing you will most likely have different looking heroes and villains or in fact very similar ones. For example in The Godfather, because it is based around the story of a Mafia rivalry, both "good" characters and "bad" characters are wearing neat looking suits. On the other hand if we look at Black Swan, the psychological thriller, we see each character wears a different costume. Nina being the white swan it could symbolise good in her and with Lily being the black swan it could show darkness, but instead there is a twist in the story in which it is the bright Nina finding darkness in herself.
Turning to setting's of thrillers i have found that many settings are usually in the extreme. For example in a crime thriller then the area may be New York as its large, tightly packed urban landscape would suit that of a crime thriller. In contrast to this a thriller involving strange disappearances or supernatural goings on would most like be set in "the middle of nowhere" or more sub-urban areas.
This links me nicely to the convention of sound in thrillers. If the story is based out in the country then the music is most likely to be slow paced and soft but also be very eerie and thought provoking at times giving the effect something is going to happen but in the silence we dont know when. On the other hand as with an urban area the music would be again a complete opposite. It would be very fast paced and heavy toned to give the effect of the bustling city flying past you. This also has an effect of tension and suspense when watching as it makes things almost too fast for the audience to see and so when something happens it "thrills" them because they were caught off-guard watching what else was happening.
Before i conclude this post i would like to look at the audience. For the Genre of Thriller i believe that the audience can be very wide to a certain extent. I feel that Thrillers would not be aimed at very young or very old people and instead are more aimed at the ages inbetween. Film makers do not intend to show young children or the older generation a film such as Inception or The Matrix. It is common sense, The younger generation would struggle to grasp the events of a Thriller and probably cry during the process while the older generation would most likely find it boring and not quite to their tastes. From this i believe it can be counted on that our target audience for our final piece will be those between the ages of 16 and 30.
There have been many famous thrillers produced over the years from a number of different directors, After searching IMDb i have found many examples of well known Thrillers from different times.
The Top Rated List of Thrillers from IMDb includes famous Titles such as:
- The Godfather (Parts 1 and 2)
- Inception
- Psycho
- The Silence of the Lambs
- Vertigo
I have an accurate definition of, Genres, Sub-Genres and Thrillers.
I now understand that many films cannot be defined under one single genre as most are hybrids of a number of different genres in one.
The names of Thriller Genres and Sub-Genres.
And lastly,The conventions of said genres and how they vary between them.
What I have learnt that will make me a better film-maker?
When deciding on what genre of film i will produce i need to take into account what Genres and Sub-Genres i utilise as later on these will effect who my target audience will be and more to the point, the amount of those people who will actually go and watch my film.
How will what I've learnt make my final film better?
Now i have looked into the conventions of Thrillers, as a group, we can decide on which of those conventions we are going to use, develop and challenge in our final piece.
To explore the conventions of Thrillers i chose three of the above and watched an extract of them in order to spot any conventions there may be. My choices were, Inception, Psycho and Vertigo.
