Rope (1948) Opening scene

This is the opening scene to Alfred Hitchcock's film, Rope, which I have been looking at this week. I wanted to show the opening scene of the film, as it is very different to most psychological thrillers that I have watched. This is because most psychological thrillers build up the story and tension in the film, before the situation takes place, in this case, the murder takes place of their friend David Kentley. The film starts with Opening credits, like many old films do; it allows us to establish the location of the film and where it will be held (New York). After the finishing of the Opening credits, the music changes in the background and makes the audience feel tension build, when the camera changes to zoom in on a window, from which it cuts and you see two men strangling a man. They make note of the equipment used (a thick rope), which is being used to murder to male victim. This is different to the conventional psychological thriller, as most conventional psychological thrillers, build up the story and the tension before the main plot of the story takes place.

Link for opening scene: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BZ872FSDyns

Rope - Alfred Hitchcock Trailer

                                 

This is the official trailer to Alfred Hitchcock's Film, Rope, which I am going to watch this week. I will look at the conventions of Psychological thrillers and how they compare in this film.

Link to trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=--T65WxZqR4

Production Diary - Week 3

This week I spent time researching on codes and conventions that link and define what makes a psychological thriller. As well as this, I looked at a range of different movies and books, that a range of different directors made and novelist wrote. This made me aware of the psychological thrillers that I want to focus on, which will also help me for analysing films later on.

6 posters of relevant Psychological thriller books

6 Posters of relevant psychological thrillers

Codes and Conventions

Production Diary - Week 2

This week we have looked at some theorist in class to prepare us for our analysis we will be writing about a film of our choice. This week my teacher gave me 3 different sources to look at; the first was an article written by Edward Buscombe 'The idea of genre in the American Cinema'; the second article was written by Andre Bazin 'What is Cinema?'; and the last source was to watch the film Rope directed by Alfred Hitchcock. I will be writing a short analysis on what I have learnt in each of these, as well as later on link them all together.

Short Films Research

For this task, I have researched short films, looking at psychological thrillers. I have chosen 3 examples to chose from and will be explaining why I have chosen each. For this task, I am using a website called Short Of The Week (www.shortoftheweek.com), as it has a selection of different lengths short films.

THE OFFERING:

The offering is a 7 Minute film about a father and son driving along a dark country road, when you soon catch on by their actions and the speech that they are up to something, but are unclear to what is happening. The two are headed into the deep woods, but have forgotten a crucial element for what they're up to. 

The reason I have chosen this film first of all, is due to the timescale. The short film is 7 minutes long, which is a similar length to the length of film I will be production for my final production (3-5 minutes long). The Offering is a good example of an old country-style thriller, using conventions of the old truck, the dark country road, the cold weather and the dark woods. The lighting used in the film focusing on the characters, making the surroundings very dark and the features of the men darker too. This made me like the film more, as it focuses on how the genre is meant to be, making the audience feel different emotions. Overall, I think this was a good example to use, as it fitted with the genre well, meeting with the conventions required, as well being a good, intense thriller for the same length of time it was, being the unknown at the end, which makes a good psychological thriller. 

http://www.shortoftheweek.com/2014/09/05/the-offering/

INSIDE:

Similarly to the first film above, this short film is 8 minutes long, another beneficial short film which is linked to how my final production will be like - its an advantage to see how you can get so much into so little time, rather than looking at a 20-30minute short movie. This film looks at more of the psychological part, where the short film revolves around a doctor working in a asylum and dealing with a patient who hears many different voice in his head. The film shows how the patient is dealing with many psychological issues; this is shown through the camera angles used - many high angle shots to make him look vulnerable and out of control in his life. As well as this, they use mise-en-scene, which gives the film a real psychological feel, showing the patient in a white-pillowed room, wearing a white red robe. The body language and actions of the patient reflect well on how a psychological patient in an asylum is known to be like (stereotype), making the short film interested and well scripted. Through the film, you see the patient and how he is dealing with his psychological issues, such as the way he changes his voice and action to suit the different people stuck inside his head and controlling him. This short film was good to look at, as I was able to look at the psychological perspective of a psychological thriller. 

http://www.shortoftheweek.com/2007/10/28/inside/

PICNIC:

This thriller is a few minutes longer than the other two short films, of 12 minutes long. Although this short film is a lot longer than the planned time I am going to be doing, I thought it would be a good idea to look at a longer length film of around this time. This enabled me to see the different ideas that come up, the pace of the short film and how much they managed to do before their time was up. I thought this film was interesting as it looked at a family who went to the woods where the wife used to go as a child, with her parents. I was attracted to this film, as it was much lighter than the other two short films. The other movies were set in a dark location or at night, whereas this movie was set in the day, with the sun shining and a family being happy together. This brings out a happy emotion to the audience, opposed to the intense feeling achieved from the beginning in the first two. When watching, this film felt different as it has a narrator opposed to the family speaking all the time. The narrator is telling the audience about what the family do not know, giving a contrasting feel from the voice, to the scene of sunshine and happiness to the family. This doesn't prepare the audience for the story that can come from this. This film is also a Spanish film, so I am able to get a contrast between what different countries thrillers are like, opposed to just looking at UK and USA films. 

http://www.shortoftheweek.com/2013/06/25/picnic/ 

These 3 examples of short films were picked out of many I researched about, as they each were under 12 minutes long, which was beneficial to see how I would be able to produce a good short film in a small amount of time, in order to succeed and grab my audiences' attention in the way these 3 examples do. 

Introduction to A2

My A2 coursework will be focusing on Film, where I will be producing a film of approximately 3 minutes long. I personally enjoy psychological thrillers, so I will be focusing on this as my chosen genre, as feel as surrounding all my research around this genre. The reason why I have chosen this genre is because it is very interesting, bringing many different emotions from the audience, as well as the story lines being very captivating, which look at a variety of different ideas.

Production Diary - Week 1

This week was the beginning of getting organised into A2 and finding out what we was going to do for this year's course. This year we will be creating our own short films which will be approximately 5 minutes long (maximum time). For my coursework I will be focusing on psychological thrillers and will be researching films based on this genre, before creating my own.