Narrative

14th October 2013

Narrative

Omniscient- audience knows everything about the character e.g. silence of the lambs

Restricted- know what the characters know e.g. sixth sense, shutter island

Linear- clear beginning middle and end

Non-linear- flash backs throw audience of track

Enigma code- most commonly used narrative in the thriller genre, audience are left to discover things throughout the film creating suspense and drama

Sub genres-

Conspiracy thriller- powerful organisations, story unravelling, investigators who are the hero/heroine

Crime thriller- most suspense, focuses on criminals, emphasise action

Disaster thriller- natural disasters that end the world, conflict of nature following a group of people’s survival

Mystery thriller- relates to crime thrillers, focuses on efforts of detective, follows protagonist to understand clues

Political thriller- stability of government

Physiological thriller- reflects main characters conflicts

Religious thriller- good and bad points about religion, looking at how the good over comes the bad

Supernatural thriller- mixed with tension and defence, characters have supernatural powers to help them over come the problem

Techno thriller- based on science fiction trend

Films

Crank- omniscient, physiological thriller

The usual suspect- mystery thriller,

Memento – non-linear, physiological thriller

Vertigo- crime thriller, linear

The Bourne identity- political thriller, restricted 

Thriller MindMap

Thriller- Mood Board

Napoleon Dynamite Remake
http://youtu.be/tU1BtB5PZbk 

Spoiler Reviews 

Fright night

The main character of the film, Charley Brewster, is certain that his neighbor, Jerry, is behind the disappearance and killing of many students and people in his neighborhood. Charley decides to take things into his own hands and investigate Jerry’s house himself, he finds a cellar full of blood sucking vampires that then assures him that Jerry is a vampire and is responsible for all his friends going missing. The film is very fast paced and has a lot of action and violence in, which sets it up to be a great thriller movie. Living in Las Vegas is the perfect hide away for Jerry as no questions are asked about his blacked out windows because local people just assume he works nights and sleeps days. But once Charley finds out his secret he puts himself, his mother and his girlfriend in danger and has to call the help of a vampire killer. It involves a lot of suspense wondering if Charley will be able to save his friends and family from Jerry and leaves the audience very uncertain about the final outcome. Of course by the end of the movie he is able to save them all and still live a normal life. Jerry is killed and the vampires are turned back into humans with no recollection of the previous events. Jerry bites Charley’s girlfriend, Amy, and this makes the audience anxious and excited because we want to know what Charley is going to do about this. It results in the death of the villain in the movie, which leaves the audience excited and happy with the final outcome.

Shutter Island

Andrew, the main character of the film is a mental patient at Shutter Island. There is tension and suspense as the film goes on further because he believes himself to be a police officer looking for a missing patient on the island. He assaults staff and other members of the institution and considered a delusional and dangerous inmate. The staff let him carry out his fantasy, letting him interview other inmates and staff that play along with his imagination in hope they can make a break through and not have to perform a operation on him. The reason he has been admitted to the institution is because he killed his wife in a fire and couldn’t deal with it. By the end of the movie he knows about what he has done and the doctors have made a break through letting him play his imaginary role and finding out what had happened but he chooses to not accept what he has done because he still cannot deal with the fact he killed his wife and so the doctors perform the operation on him although he is no longer delusional. There are very dark and tense scenes within the film and the use of slow, low music adds to the tension. There is a storm and this also helps to identify it is a thriller as they become trapped in the outside of the institution with no way of getting back safely and there is uncertainty whether they are safe.

 

Minority report

Pre-cogs see the future and these three characters can see crimes that are to be committed. They’re used to fight crime before it has even happened. There can be a minority report that is where one of the pre-cogs sees events differently to the others. Meaning that they could be wrong. The beginning of the film opens with a man being arrested before he has committed the crime; this makes the audience uncertain and surprised because they are unaware of if the crime will actually happen. Anderton the main character works as a police officer for the pre-cogs visions and states that there is no way there would be a fault in the system. He then discovers that he is to kill a man and the pre-cogs in vision it. This makes the audience surprised and gets their adrenaline rushing as the police try and chase him. The story turns as Anderton ends up not killing the man responsible for the death of his son. Crow kills himself using Andertons gun. Meaning that the pre-cogs have predicted a wrong assumption meaning there whole justice system is a lie. Pre-crime is shut down as the founder also killed someone and had to choose between killing Anderton and suffering the consequences of not killing him and facing the fact he has proven the pre-cogs wrong. He kills himself and the three pre-cogs are aloud to live in peace with pre-crime being abandoned. Anderton isn’t punished for the mistake of crow killing himself and is set free. This is an upbeat exciting film that stimulates the audience it is very face paced and portrays anticipation for justice and uncertainty if the final result will end in justice.