Animatic

This is our animatic for the Thriller incorprating our preliminry ideas on what images will be within the opening scene, and the time they are on screen for.

Sound

The opening scene of our thriller is to introduce the main themes of the film and introduce the protaganist, and her life, while keeping the antagonist in the shadows. As with all good thrillers, the antagonist is always there, something your always aware of, but, just as in jaws, if you keep the threat in mystery, it can become a lot more intimidating when its an idea, rather than a rubber model...


To do this we wanted to try and keep the mood quite melodramatic, with a sense of irony within its soundtrack, as we found that sound is fundemental in creating the atmosphere required for a thriller.

As a past example, the film silent hill made fantastic use of Johhny Cash's ring of fire, and so did Blue veltet (title of the film and soundtrack), in creating a contradictory effect, while remaining quite eery, as most songs of this era and style seem to have.

After deciding on this style of music we wanted, we searched google and you tube for popular songs of the 50s and came across the songs by elvis presely- 'Love me Tender', and 'And I Cant Help Falling in Love'


Love me Tender



And I Cant Help Falling In Love


Desicion

After much thought we decided that 'Love me Tender' would create a much more eerie atmosphere and would contrast more with the clips we had behind it. Also, it shows that he wants the girl that he is stalking to love him.

Ideas

We had a few different ideas. The first idea we had was about filming on a train and on the tube. We thought that a train would be effective as there is no escape and no way to get away. However, this would be difficult to film, and we would have to limit what we shot. There may interruptions from the public which would disrupt our filming.

Another idea we had was to do with stalking someone. We could take pictures of one of us and cover a wall with pictures of that person. We could also you newspaper clippings and letters, etc. To make this more eerie we could write the persons name in blood to show the extent of the stalking. We would use short,fast, abstract clips to make this more edgy and confusing. We could also leave props around such as scissors, and a leaking fountain pen, and screwed up paper from the letters. We could photograph the girl with a man, but the face of the man is scribbled out to show the stalkers jealously. Also we would use shadows crossing the picture to add to the atmosphere. We could also have the persons name scribbled over and over again. The idea is that the stalker is obsessed with the girl and wants to get rid of everyone close to her.

We also had an idea of using a old record/vinyl player, and focus on the needle skipping.


This is from the film Sea of Love. We like how it crackles at the beginning, also its a nice record, you associate it with happy images, so if we put disturbing images with the record playing throughout the opening sequence and cut the clips so they flicker back and forth to the pictures and the record it would make it very disturbing.


We also had an idea of photographing the girl with friends, family members, her boyfriend etc, and scribbling out their faces and then writing the date of their death above them. Some of the dates will be in the future and others in the past, this will suggest that the stalker is killing off everyone close to her.

Analysis

Work that we liked...



This opening Scene although being an opening for a film festival has helped give us some ideas for our thriller. Forinstance, you can create a story in a more abstact manner, that could be represented in a way more artistically appropriate to the subject of the film.


Opening Sequence of Se7en-Analysed



The opening music enters dramatically, coming from silence.
The opening credits are appropriate to the feeling they want to create, being scribbled and flashing, adds a sense of vice to the film, and relates it back into him writing like a scrap book of his life. This is enforced by the clips being out of focus as it may give an insight into the mind of the character.
The cuts come quickly, and are fast, with close ups on the body testing,
Lighting is also effective, allowing you to only see what they want you to see, and leaving a sense of mystery to the characters.


Previous Student work-Analysed



In this students' opening sequence we liked how in the opening credits the number 36 flickers and flashes across the screen. We also like how there is a close up on the eye as you can hear the heart beating. We found this very effective. However, we did think that the heart beat could of been more effective by speeding it up. Also the music did not fit the genre, and the beginning was more like a romance than a thriller. It didn't really leave you asking questions, as all parts of the back story seemed answered.

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