LOCATION

These are some images taken as examples for sets and places to shoot the video. The pictures are taken at night with all of our group looking around various places for appropriate sets for a thriller film, the pictures being in a dark alley way at night creates a good effect of a good thriller.

Research Map

TODOROV AND PROPP'S THEORY AND INFORMATION ON SOUL BASS

Todorov's theory: Todorov proposed a basic structure for all narratives. He stated that films and programmes begin with an equilibrium, a calm period. Then agents of disruption cause disequilibrium, a period of un-settlement and disquiet. This is then followed by a renewed state of peace and harmony for the protagonists and a new equilibrium brings the chaos to an end. The simplest form of narrative (sometimes referred to as ‘Classic’ or ‘Hollywood’ narrative).

Propp's theory: Vladimir Propp’s theory was formed in the early twentieth Century. He studies Russian fairytales and discovered that in stories there were always 8 types of characters evident. These are: the hero, the villain, the donor, the dispatcher, the false hero, the helper, the princess and her father. He did not state these characters were all separate people e.g. the provider could also be the helper. There are only 8 different character types and only 31 things they ever do. Once you have identified the character type (e.g., the hero) it’s easy to guess what they will do (save the maiden, defeat the villain, marry the maiden or whatever) because each character has a SPHERE OF ACTION. This is easily relatable to films and programmes today

Soul Bass: Saul Bass born on May 8th 1920 was an Academy Award-winning filmmaker, but he is best known for his design on animated sequences. In his 40-year career he worked for some of Hollywood's greatest filmmakers, these included Hitchcock, Stanley and Martin Scorsese For Alfred Hitchcock, Bass provided effective, title sequences, employing kinetic typography, working with John Whitney, and Psycho. It was this kind of innovative, revolutionary works that made Bass the film maker he was. His later work with Martin Scorsese saw him move away from the optical techniques that he had managed to begin and move into computerized titles.
Moving on Bas had helped in the directing the highlight scene of Psycho, the hugely edited shower-murder sequence, he used his initiative mind to direct such a scene making it perfect to every second that was shot.
On the whole Saul Bass was a character who brings a change in the American film making scene, not only affecting film making of the time, but for many years to come. One of the famous quotes used by Saul Bass were "Design is thinking made visual’’, in other words he was a follower of his imagination and techniques. Who knew that he could make the difference in the film making world today.

DISCUSSIONS

On the 4th of feb 2010 me (Usman), Amar, Mohit and Humzah (our group) sat down together and made a brainstorm of what to research and who's going to reasearch what. We also discussed about how we will obtain this information, later on we all jumped on the Imac's and were searching the web for information on target audience, trailers, sound etc.

Background on Thriller Entertainment

Conventions of a thriller

Thrillers are essentially about the battle of justice vs. injustice where often there is a price to be paid for the conclusion of the story. A thriller is a film of suspense with a plot structure that reinforces the elements of gamesmanship and the chase. Thrillers can be spy based, tales of geopolitical crisis, legal thrillers, medical thrillers, techno thrillers or domestic thrillers. Commonly thrillers progress with a growing sense of threat or danger and the excitement of pursuit.Relating to iconography the Setting Can be urban, isolated surbuban settings, cities or quiet country villages. Mise-en-scene includes Normally dim lighting hiding parts to a character, large threatening weapons for props e.g. large knives, guns etc. Camera shots are normally point of view shots, frames within frames, or close ups. Often there is also a lot of camera movement. Colours are also used to signify different emotions like red connates blood or danger, blue cold mystery or death. Also thrillers always revolve around a crime of some kind where the protagonist will have a weakness the the antagonist will take advantage of, slowly this will cause the suspense to build up causing the protagonist to feel isolated at least once during the film.

What is a MacGuffin

MacGuffin was created by Alfred Hitchcock it can be referred as a hidden catalyst which moves the plot on to create scene or ending with a twist. It can also be referred as the engine that sets the story in motion. It can be anything or nothing at all. In The 39 Steps, it is "secrets vital to your air defence"; in Number Seventeen it is a valuable piece of jewellery, while in The Lady Vanishes it is, in the most perfectly abstract of all Hitchcock's MacGuffins, a coded message contained in a piece of music. Examples of these are in the films such as:

• The top secret plans in The 39 Steps (1935).
• The eponymous statuette in The Maltese Falcon (1941)
• The letters of transit in Casablanca (1942)
• The uranium in Notorious (1946)
• The case with glowing contents in Kiss Me Deadly (1955)
• The "government secrets" in North by Northwest (1959)
• The stolen $40,000 in Psycho (1960).
• The stamps in Charade (1963)
• The Death Star plans in Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope (1977)
• The Ark of the Covenant in the first Indiana Jones film, Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981)
• The unknown, glowing contents of the briefcase in Pulp Fiction (1994).
• The Rabbit's Foot in Mission: Impossible III (2006)
• The chest in Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest (2006).
• The Allspark in Transformers (2007).
• The Russian painting in RocknRolla (2008).
• The sculpted head from Ponte Santa Trinita in Miracle at St. Anna (2008)
• The silver briefcase in Jack Said (2009)
• The unobtanium in Avatar (2009)

What is a thriller?

In most thrillers the heroes tend to be accustomed to danger: law enforcement officers, spies, soldiers etc. However, they may also be ordinary citizens drawn into danger by accident. While such heroes have traditionally been men, women lead characters have become increasingly common for example films like Tomb raider. Also in a thriller the film will always circulate around crime and slowly the suspense is built up to cause an unexpected bang at the end. Thrillers often overlap with mystery stories, but are separated by the structure of their plots. Thrillers are often hybrid, mixed with other genres. These are called sub genre such as:

1) Action thriller: James Bond films, The Transporter.
2) Conspiracy thriller: Three Days of the Condor, Capricorn One, and JFK
3) Crime thriller: The Killing, Seven, Reservoir Dogs, Inside Man, and The Asphalt Jungle
4) Disaster thriller: Stormy Weather and the 1974 film Earthquake.
5) Drama thriller: The Illusionist, The Interpreter and The Prestige
6) Erotic thriller: Basic Instinct, Dressed to Kill, Color of Night, Eyes Wide Shut, Fatal Attraction, Looking for Mr. Goodbar, Obsessed, and In the Cut.
7) Legal thriller: The Innocent Man
8) Medical thriller: Awake
9) Political thriller: Agency.
10) Psychological thriller: Suspicion, Shadow of a Doubt, and Strangers on a Train
11) Spy thriller: The Bourne Identity
12) Techno-thriller: The Hunt for Red October
13) Religious thriller: The Da Vinci Code.

Directors of Thrillers