Evaluation - Looking back.

Looking back at my Preliminary task, i feel that i have learnt a wide range of terminology, conventions, iconography, software material and technologies in the period of making our Thriller film. I feel that i have capitalised personally on the minor mistakes that i made when my Preliminary task was completed at the beginning of the year, which i have taken note of in order to improve the quality of our Thriller opening.

I recommend using questionnaires for audience feedback and showing particular audience members your film before taking note of their review on the quality of it. I think that the importance of planning is key when making  a film opening, as planning using mind maps and bullet points helped me sufficiently when making my Thriller opening. Ultimately we tried to both challenge and adapt conventions of the Thriller genre when making our film opening, i feel that the certain aspects such as micro-features used help to back up that statement, and also help to make our film a higher quality Thriller opening.

A final screenshot of our film name "The Abduction" which was finalised as we finished the Thriller opening.

Evaluation - Technologies.

We have used many different software's and technologies when making our Thriller opening, and personally i feel that i have learnt to use a lot more software's and technologies then i had before hand. Firstly making our Thriller opening was the first time that i used an Apple Mac. Before making the film i had no idea how to use a Mac, i would even struggle to learn how to turn it on. However, now that we have come to the final stages of making our Thriller opening, i feel that i have become a Mac expert, i feel very comfortable when using one and  am very confident when it comes down to figuring out how certain aspects of a Mac works.

A software within the Mac's in Sixth Form that we used to edit our film known as Final Cut is also another software that i am now very comfortable at using due to the making of our film. When first using Final Cut, i thought that all of the controls on how to edit were jumbled every and i did not know how to work the programme as previously i had used Windows Movie Maker. I soon got a grip of Final Cut though, and editing our opening for me soon became a lot easier as i knew what i was doing. My skills of the programme were constantly developing as time went along and i feel that i am more than confident when using the programme now.

A shot of Final Cut, which i had difficulty adjusting to at first.

Evaluation - The target audience.

The age group mainly targeted for our film is between the ages of 15-40. We feel that the age group is very wide and the Thriller opening that we have produced suits the age group well. We feel that due to the micro-features that we have included which ultimately makes the Thriller opening more tense for audiences that the age group that we have targeted will enjoy the opening. Although females will enjoy our Thriller opening, we have targeted the male genre a lot more. We feel that through our questionnaires that we conducted, our target audience and general knowledge that males prefer Thriller films a lot more than females due, which was our reasoning behind targeting males for our opening.

We have also taken into account more subtleties about the audience that we are targeting and who would be more interested in watching our Thriller opening. Audiences who live in more rural areas may be more tempted into watching our Thriller opening due to the park scene where the kidnapping takes place being fairly rural. Film interests gave us an indication as to who our target audience for our Thriller opening is, audiences who prefer Horror and Thriller films are going to enjoy our film a lot more than audiences who favour Romance or Comedy films, due to our opening being more suited to the first two genres.

The screenshot above shows the park that will filmed at along with the person kidnapped in view. The park was quite a creepy setting which suited the Thriller genre and which ultimately would attract an audience who enjoys Thriller films.

Evaluation - Media institution.

The media institution behind the making of our film would be Film4. As the film company that our film would be signed up to is not a major company such as Warner., our film will be an independent film, without the huge budget of Hollywood movies like we see today. Our film would also be Lottery funded, which would ultimately make the budget of our film no more than £6 million. We think that the £6 million mark suits our film as our film does not need the special effects that most movies acquire in the film industry. Lottery funded films have also been a success, an example would be the critically acclaimed Thriller film starring Michael Caine known as "Harry Brown".

The media institution that will be behind our film.

The logo for the Lottery fund which we are using for our Thriller opening.

Evaluation - Representation of social groups.

In relation to social groups, the main message of our film is vulnerability. Our Thriller opening portrays how vulnerable typical teenagers can be while on their own in the streets. Age was key in the making of our film, a teenage boy is a lot more likely to be kidnapped than a middle aged man, that is how the vulnerability factor comes in. On top of that, we purposely chose a teenage boy to play the lead role as opposed to a teenage girl. Teenage girls are a lot more typical in all genres of film to be kidnapped than teenage boys, so the fact that we chose a boy as a lead role in itself challenges the expectations of the audience when viewing our Thriller opening.

The screenshot above portrays the vulnerability of the teenage boy that we used in our film. We tried to challenge the conventions of a Thriller by using a boy instead of girl to be kidnapped.

We used a male as the kidnapper in our Thriller film. We felt that using a male would ultimately make our film more sinister and more frightening as using a female would have been quite cheesy. By using a male as the lead, we could include the Zippo that he constantly flicked which made for a slightly more eerie and scary feel. Stalkers normally are of the male genre also, so using a male as the kidnapper was a convention to the Thriller genre that we adapted to our production. The fact that we had the kidnapper dressed fully in dark clothes (mise-en scene) also helped to give out a more scary feel, this is due to the fact that traditionally not only in Thriller films but in all films the villain would wear dark and black colours. The face of the kidnapper is also never conveyed, which builds the tension for the audience as they do not know the kidnapper as the person kidnapped doesn't, although the audience is omniscient at the park when the person kidnapped is being stalked.

Evaluation - Attracting the audience.

We used different micro-features and techniques to attract the audience into watching and liking out Thriller opening. The Mise-en scene was key in our opening, the settings of a dark room and a park are suited to the Thriller genre due to places where heroes are vulnerable, which would ultimately attract an audience who enjoy Thriller films. Props also were suited to the genre and helped to attract the audience, the Zippo used be the kidnapper was added in to give a more sinister and mysterious feel while watching the opening, and the Lamp used at the beginning of the clip gives out a similar tense feeling. The casual costumes used of the characters were used to convey realism, and the lighting in the room was often very dark with the Lamp used for natural light to suit the genre. Below is a use of a Zippo in darkness which shows how it can make a scene more sinister and frightening.

The certificate of our film is 15. We felt that this certificate is appropriate due to the theme of fear being key in the Thriller opening. Most Thriller films are either a 15 or 18 certificate and we felt that a 15 certificate was appropriate as a slightly more wider audience could be attracted. We added elements of Horror into our Thriller opening which helps to attract an extra audience who may prefer the Horror genre as opposed to the Thriller genre. The screenshot below conveys the beginning of our film and the font that we included.

The audience feedback that we got back from our Thriller film was very positive. A lot of feedback that we got was about the way the the opening sets out very well for a feature length film, and that they personally would watch the feature length film in the Cinemas. I quote my own brother Callum Bolland, who said "the opening made me feel frightened at times, which was a pleasurable feeling that i expected from a film of the Thriller genre".

Evaluation - Forms and Conventions.

Our film opening is similar to certain Thriller films, elements like the titles are similar to the opening titles to that of the critically acclaimed Thriller film "Seven", of which i mentioned the titles earlier in the blog. The titles to our opening are under the font "cracked" and are in the corner of the screen which are the same to that of "Seven. Our own style has been added however, with the font not being an exact copy to that of "Seven" but just similar, and the "cracked" font being our own picked style. The image below conveys that.

We have gone against certain Thriller conventions, the scene at the park is done during the day where as a common Thriller convention is having scenes shot at times of darkness. Certain conventions of the Thriller genre we have adopted though, such as an antagonist who is stalking the main protagonist of the opening. There are two kinds of music played in the duration of our film opening. During the scene where the titles are displayed and the confrontation between the kidnapper and the person kidnapped takes place, the music is of a piano and it is very creepy styled. In the scene of the flashback, the music is a lot more eerie and suited towards the scene of someone being stalked.

The narrative structure is a contrast to that of Todorov's equilibrium theory. Our Thriller opening begins off with the kidnapping already taken place, and then goes into a flashback. We felt that our opening would challenge the audience's minds and contrast the typical conventions of a Thriller film. As for the characters in our film, the face of the villain is not portrayed to give out a very suspenseful feeling and the main character us shown to be very vulnerable due to his actions in the opening.