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History Of Thrillers:

Andrew

Thriller is normally a novel, play or a film that has an interesting plot, which sometimes contains crime and has a lot of suspense added to it. Thriller is a genre of literature, film, video game stories and television programming that uses suspense, tension and excitement as it main elements. My two minute opening to my thriller film will include some tension, some comedy, but mostly contain suspense. The storyline will be designed so the audience will think it can happen to them, so it becomes even more scary. The history of thriller films began when Sir Alfred Hitchcock created his own thriller called 'the lodger', a successful Jack the Ripper film, which portrayed the different themes used such as suspense, tension and crime. After that movie was made, other movies followed after it and became very popular. Hitchcock continued to perfect his recognisable brand of suspense-thriller, directing Foreign Correspondent (1940). The movie 'safety last' was the first ever thriller made in April 1823. It was directed by Fred C. Newmeyer and Sam Taylor.

 

Conventions of a thriller film:

  • Low key lighting

  • Quick cuts (Timing of shots)

  • Shadows

  • Tense music

  • Changes in angle of shots

  • Diegetic sound of breathing

  • Black and White shots

  • Montage of shots

 

Ten films that would fit into this genre:

  • The dark knight

  • Seven

  • X-Men- Days of future past

  • Taken

  • World War Z

  • Jurassic World

  • Run all night

  • A walk among the tombstones

  • Ant-Man

  • Furious 7

What is the Thriller/Suspense Genre?

 

The Thriller/Suspense Genre is a Genre of literature, videogames, and films. It is based around the ideas of anticipation suspense, It aims to keep audiences constantly on edge and in suspense. In the genre and all sub-genres it aims to portray and emphasize the problem that the protagonist goes through and the tension is always built upon throughout the film. It stimulates anticipation, suspense, expectance, uncertainty and is designed to do this. It is based on reality rather than fiction therefore providing a more phsycologically interactive experience. 

 

Conventions of Thriller Films:

 

  • Low key lighting

  • Quick cuts

  • Shadows

  • Tension Music

  • Changes in Angle of Shots

  • Diegetic Sound of breathing

  • Black and white shots

  • Montage shots

  • Antagonist puts protagonist in their mercy

     

Thriller movies

 

  • Gone Girl

  • Taken

  • Nightcrawler

  • Transcendance

  • 12 monkeys

  • Jaws

  • Prometheus

  • Jurassic Park

  • Non-Stop

  • Blade Runner

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

 

Maxwell

 

A thriller is a film genre that aims to increase the levels of tension and excitement a viewer feels when watching. This is done by making a film unpredictable and having a mysterious but entertaining nature. Emotions are often manipulated in these types of films to gain a heightened sense of anticipation with almost anxiety and fear as to what will occur next.

Thrillers have been around for over 90+ years and began with a man named alfred Hitchcock who led and produced many thriller films around the 1920’s, 30’s and 40’s. Many other notable British directors followed in Hitchcock’s footsteps leading to many primarily crime based thrillers such as the lead up to the James Bond series during this period of time.

Many thrillers continue to have the same style and similar storylines. Often a feud between a protagonist and antagonist ensues with layers of suspense built up before a massive climax. Dark settings commonly used with more dull tones and unannounced sounds. The protagonist often appears at the will of the antagonist in thriller films as it is a common and traditional technique of building tension.

Thrillers are often overlapped with mystery stories as the genres can be so similar. However thriller is often quite different to the mystery genre, especially due to a large percentage of thriller films being based on hostage situations with a ransom wanted or something very similar.

Joshua

History of Thriller - Juriz

 

The Thriller genre are based on stories, games or even films. This genre uses the elements of excitement, suspense and tension as they are the main elements of this genre. The Thriller genre aims to make the audience subconsciously think and makes them ask a variety of questions. Thriller films are mainly chasing and fast paced actions.

 

Nevertheless, the first Thriller film to be ever made was called The Lodgers by a man named Alfred Hitchcock in 1927. This film is mainly based on Jack The Ripper story and it was a silent film. A serial killer called the Avenger has been killing blonde women in London. A new lodger called Jonathan Drew has moved in with extraordinary habits; going out during foggy days and has pictures of blond women in his room. Jonathan flirts with Daisy (who is engaged to Joe, a detective) and Joe gets jealous. He then suspects he was the Avenger. In this film, it uses all the main elements and used crime/jealousy as the theme.

Evaluation:

 

Doing research into the history of thrillers was very beneficial as a starting point to understand and gather examples of what thrillers are. Alongside watching thrillers as requested, We also did further background research into the psychological effect of thrillers and found why they are one if not the most popular but challengings films to produce. From our research we gathered information that thrillers are very varied and do not just stick to hostage situations as commonly seen. An example of this is Inception by Christopher Nolan. This film really opened the doors to us as to what a thriller can consist of and helped provide insight into what type of thriller opening I want my group to create.

 

Aside from the actual variety of thrillers my research led us to the actual physical effect of them, which helped to enlighten us as to why they were really so popular. Similar to good romantic and horror films, all thrillers are designed and use similar techniques so as to spark an internal reaction within a person, almost like an adrenalin rush. These reactions differ often between excitement and nervousness from a positive or unique climax or from a great build up of tension before these climax. These reactions cause a miniscule release of endorphins from the great sense of excitement and climactic pressure. This pressure also helps put thrillers as the 2nd genre that burns the most calories watching. We have done the task to broaden our understanding of the thriller genre and grant us further insight to better our final piece of production.

 

Maxwell St Hill



 

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