Patson's pitch

Mini Pitch Idea - Michael Currie

Audience Research: Interviews

Audience Research - Questionnaire

Research - Questionnaire

1: What's your favourite genre of film?

Male:       Action= 20%
               Comedy= 40%

               Thriller = 40%
Female:   Rom/Com= 40%
               Horror= 40% 
               Thriller= 20%

2: What was the Last film you watched?

Male:  Fast and Furious 7, This is the end, American Sniper, Wolf of Wall Street, American             Pie.
Female: The Conjuring, Woman in Black, Bridesmaid, American Sniper, Love Actually.

3: How Often do you go to the cinema?

Male: Once a month= 40%
         Twice a month= 20%

         3+ a month = 0% 

         Never = 40%

Female:  Once a month = 60%

              Twice a month= 20%

              3+ a month = 0% 

              Never = 20%

4: Would you go to the cinema to watch a thriller?

Male: Yes= 80%

           No= 20%

Female: Yes= 80%

              No= 20%

5. Why do you choose to go see a thriller?

Male: Sound: 0%

         Storyline: 40%

         Characters: 0%

         Action: 60%

Female: Sound = 0%

             Storyline = 40%

             Characters = 40%
             Action = 20%

Audience Research: IMDb

IMDb Box Office Figures

Psycho (1960, Hitchcock)

Inception (2010, Nolan)

Se7en (1995, Fincher)

3 plots of thriller films

SILENCE OF THE LAMBS (1991)

1. Young FBI agent Clarice Starling is assigned to help find a missing woman to save her from a psychopathic serial killer who skins his victims. Clarice attempts to gain a better insight into the twisted mind of the killer by talking to another psychopath Hannibal Lecter, who used to be a respected psychiatrist. FBI agent Jack Crawford believes that Lecter, who is also a very powerful and clever mind manipulator, has the answers to their questions and can help locate the killer. However, Clarice must first gain Lecter's confidence before the inmate will give away any information.

TAXI DRIVER (1976)

2. Travis Bickle is an ex-Marine and Vietnam War veteran living in New York City. As he suffers from insomnia, he spends his time working as a taxi driver at night, watching porn movies at seedy cinemas during the day, or thinking about how the world, New York in particular, has deteriorated into a cesspool. He's a loner who has strong opinions about what is right and wrong with mankind. For him, the one bright spot in New York humanity is Betsy, a worker on the presidential nomination campaign of Senator Charles Palantine. He becomes obsessed with her. After an incident with her, he believes he has to do whatever he needs to make the world a better place in his opinion. One of his priorities is to be the savior for Iris, a twelve-year-old runaway and prostitute who he believes wants out of the profession and under the thumb of her pimp and lover Matthew. 

THE SIXTH SENSE (1999)

3. Malcom Crowe is a child psychologist who receives an award on the same night that he is visited by a very unhappy ex-patient. After this encounter, Crowe takes on the task of curing a young boy with the same ills as the ex-patient. This boy "sees dead people". Crowe spends a lot of time with the boy (Cole) much to the dismay of his wife. Cole's mom is at her wit's end with what to do about her son's increasing problems. Crowe is the boy's only hope.

Thriller opening - 'Silence of the lambs'

Mini Pitch Idea - Shane Farrell

Thriller Opening Mini Pitch

Mini Pitch Idea - Sound Clip - (Shane)

Thriller Plot Summaries - Michael Currie

Research: Plot of 3 Films (Shane)

3 Film Plots

The Sixth Sense - Plot

Malcom Crowe is a child psychologist who receives an award on the same night that he is visited by a very unhappy ex-patient. After this encounter, Crowe takes on the task of curing a young boy with the same ills as the ex-patient. This boy "sees dead people". Crowe spends a lot of time with the boy (Cole) much to the dismay of his wife. Cole's mom is at her wit's end with what to do about her son's increasing problems. Crowe is the boy's only hope.

Inception - Plot

Dom Cobb is a skilled thief, the absolute best in the dangerous art of extraction, stealing valuable secrets from deep within the subconscious during the dream state, when the mind is at its most vulnerable. Cobb's rare ability has made him a coveted player in this treacherous new world of corporate espionage, but it has also made him an international fugitive and cost him everything he has ever loved. Now Cobb is being offered a chance at redemption. One last job could give him his life back but only if he can accomplish the impossible-inception. Instead of the perfect heist, Cobb and his team of specialists have to pull off the reverse: their task is not to steal an idea but to plant one. If they succeed, it could be the perfect crime. But no amount of careful planning or expertise can prepare the team for the dangerous enemy that seems to predict their every move. An enemy that only Cobb could have seen coming.

Reservoir Dogs - Plot

Six criminals, who are strangers to each other, are hired by a crime boss, Joe Cabot, to carry out a diamond robbery. Right at the outset, they are given false names with the intention that they won't get too close and will concentrate on the job instead. They are completely sure that the robbery is going to be a success. But, when the police show up right at the time and the site of the robbery, panic spreads amongst the group members, and one of them is killed in the subsequent shootout, along with a few policemen and civilians. When the remaining people assemble at the premeditated rendezvous point (a warehouse), they begin to suspect that one of them is an undercover cop.

Thriller Plot Research (Tony Egan)

Preliminary task evaluation (Patson Travers)

Preliminary task evaluation (Patson Travers)

I think that Shane, Dylan and I were successful in meeting our own aim and meeting the criteria for the task. Our aim was to mislead the audience into believing that our clip was a thriller. We did this by editing in uneasy music, and as I was walking down the corridors in the first scene it was very dark and sinister, I also acted worried and nervous as if something horrible awaited me. 

Me walking down a dark and sinister hallway

However, our clip really turns out to become a comedy, and our twist was both humorous and effective. We did a number of things well, this includes continuity editing. We made our film look smooth and like one clip. Another thing we did well was using sound effects, eg we included a pulsating drone at the beginning to create an eery atmosphere, this makes the audience believe that our video is more thriller-like than comedy like.

Thriller Plot Research - Inception (Shane)

Research: Film Openings - Thriller Conventions (Shane)

Thriller films typically have a 15 or 18 certificate.
Our certificate will be 18.

Audience Research: Film Listings

Thrillers in Cinema

There are a number of films out in cinemas today and the genre seeming to take up a fair chunk of what's out in multiplexes is Thriller. 40% of films being shown this week in the odeon uxbridge being some form of a thriller.

Odeon Multiplex (Uxbridge)

Birdman                                 (15) -  Comedy - Drama

Mordecai                                (12a) - Comedy

The Gambler                         (15) - Drama - Thriller

American Sniper                  (15) - Action - Drama

Ex Machina                           (15) - Sci fi - Thriller

Into The Woods                    (PG) - Adventure

Paddington                           (PG) - Comedy

Taken 3                                 (12a) - Thriller

The Imitation Game             (12a) - Drama - Thriller

The Theory of Everything   (12a) - Drama - Romance

In the multiplex listed above we see a lot more films for starters. The films released in the multiplexes are all big releases with heavy marketing campaigns so the audience knows about them before or during the release. None of the films are 18 rated and all but 2 are 12a or 15, this shows that the main target audience for the films currently out would be the age bracket 12-17. 

Watermans Independent Cinema (Brentford)

The Theory of Everything   (12a) - Drama - Romance

Big Eyes                                (12a) - Biography - Drama

Annie                                     (PG) - Comedy
Testament Of Youth            (12A) - Biography - Drama
Wild                                       (15) - Biography - Drama

We see a stark contrast with the independent cinema. The independent shows less films and has films that multiplexes don't show either because they have a smaller release or they are older films being replayed for a week. The audience for an independent cinema would be a lot different to a multiplex. You would mostly be receiving a wide range of ages but everyone going would have a passion for film.

The Art of the Title - The Avengers

This is the nine frames which are in the opening title sequence of The Avengers











This is my timeline of the opening of The Avengers. On this timeline you can see what the audience reads and what they hear at what times. The top horizontal line is everything that the audience reads, you can see the producer's name and the exact time that their name appears on the screen for example.

The bottom horizontal line shows what kind of sound is playing during the opening sequence. It also shows the duration of each sound.