Research On 'Thriller' Movies

The main objective of a typical thriller is to create supense and tension through the action based on the themes included in a thriller. The themes commonly revolve around robberys, crimes, murder etc. Atmosphere is created with the use of the following micro-elements:

• EDITING - often fast-paced and complex - editors may use this particular technique, perhaps in a fight-scene, which may make the audience feel as if they are involved in what us happening as everything on the screen is happening to fast.
• CAMERAWORK - lots of variation
• LIGHTING - to form a dark and dim setting - an example of this is in 2007's movie 'I Am Legend' - in the image below there is unnatural light as we know it is night time - here the lighting spotlights the man and his dog as the only ones around, as the surrounding area is in shadow. This shows that using lighting in different scenes and in different ways, you can create an atmosphere, like this lonesome atmosphere in this picture.

• MUSIC - primarily to add suspense, tension and intensify moments of significance. Also, micro elements used together can create very important atmosphere and details in a movie - in the the clip from 'I Am Legend' above, there are non-diegetic sounds from outside, the effect of this is to make the audience feel the danger and intensity of the film. In this example this/these micro element/s creates empathy towards the characters.
• COSTUME - to indentify character e.g police officer, detective in uniform

Despite the fact that thriller can be confused with horror themes, there is a small dissimilarity. The conventions of a horror involved a lot of gory moments usually revolving around deaths. However, a thriller has more reasoning behind its narrative as it often focuses on crimes or murders.

Typically, a thriller opening gives clues of the narrative, but never explicitly demonstrates the storyline. The protagnistic and antagonistic characters are introduced at this point. Female characters are normally included who are identified as a having a vulnerable manner and/or protrayed to be sexually attractive to add appeal.