Research - Thriller Films - (Locations, Costumes, Props, Music)

Research into Thriller Films

Locations

Certain atmospheres of menace or sudden violence, such as crime or murderous intent, characterise Thriller films. These not only can be conveyed through the props and makeup of a character, but also the setting and location. Thriller movies utilise a wide variety of locations, such as abandoned houses, dark forests and dark outside areas.

Abandoned Houses

Abandoned houses are generally used in thriller films because the audience have no clue what could potentially be inside the house, as it's completely abandoned. This creates the feeling of tension in a thriller film because nobody knows what could possibly occur. In many thrillers, abandoned houses are seen to be haunted which creates a sense of mystery to the audience because they're completely in the dark and don't know what to expect.

Dark Forests

Dark forests are also quite commonly used in thriller movies. This is due to the fact that they create a strong feeling of tension and mystery because you have no idea what could be lurking in the forest and could potentially attack you at any time. The fact that forests seem to never end and that your stuck in the dark and dense area, gives the audience the feeling that there is no escape and to expect  that something bad is going to happen to the characters.

Normal Home Environment

Some thrillers are based in a normal home environment. This gives the connotations of being safe and secure so that when something bad happens, it gives the audience a scare and potentially make them feel like it could happen to them too.


There are many outside locations for thriller films such as ally ways, country side and even people's own personal space. These settings make it very obvious to the audience that something thrilling and mysterious is going to happen.

Some areas that are used in thrillers usually seem to be in the middle of nowhere. These setting create an eerie feeling as they know absolutely nothing about the area. This then creates an effect on the audience to feel as if something is about to happen. Its the unknown that gives the mysterious feeling.










Costumes

Like the other conventions of a thriller film, the costumes vary on the various sub-genres within a thriller such as; crime, missions, mystery, supernatural, detective skills, psychological, kidnap, etc. Within a film the various costumes are determined by the setting and the characters within the film.

The various costumes of certain characters within genres allow the audience to identify the characters roles within the film, whether it be an antagonist or protagonist.

Supernatural

There many relations between supernatural films, one of the main things being the costumes used to display the antagonist or protagonist. The main theme is that the antagonist characters tend to mainly wear forms of dark clothing such as dresses or suits. This is evident in movies like;

The Nun (2018) and Mama (2013)

Within the two films the antagonist characters both associate with the dark theme and both wear dress like attire. Naturally, this helps to evoke a greater sense of fear from the audience and match the aspect of the film being related to the supernatural theme. From seeing this in the film, we can identify them from everybody else more easily, but we see them less than the protagonist's, therefore when they come into a scene or maybe even do a 'jump-scare', its more horrifying due to the certain conventions of the character.






Props

Just like costumes, the props vary depending on the genre of thriller, crime, missions, mystery, supernatural, detective skills, psychological, kidnap, etc. The props define the characters within the genre of the film and allow us to identify the types of characters, creating the atmosphere of the film.

Missions

Many 21st Century mission thrillers are based around modern day technology and certain advances in technology. This specifically refers to technology that cannot be currently be achieved in today's society, in which the film talks about things that yet don't successfully exist but they do in the film. An example of mission thrillers that revolve around this theme is the Mission Impossible Franchise. The franchise is based around Missions that must be completed in order to prevent a catastrophic event, in doing so the characters use advanced technology to complete their missions.

The images show Ethan Hunt played by Tom Cruise, using gadgets that are practically revolutionary. Such as sticky gloves that can support a whole person's body weight and a contact lens that acts as a camera. All these props are used to convey the fact that they are advanced people and have a certain skill-set, not only

this, but the props keep the audience interested because if we can't have it in real life, then the audience at least want to see what the gadget does. Props are a key aspect not only for defining characters and creating atmosphere, but also keeping the audience intrigued. 



Music

Music plays an absolutely crucial part in films and is an essential element in thriller films. The use of music in parallel with the on screen images assists to create the atmosphere for the moving images, without it the audience would have to watch the images with ambient sound in the background, which would be extremely boring and would not have the same effect as music does in films. However, obviously not all music is the same as it varies between the variety of genres within the thriller theme. For example, a large battle scene may contain massive orchestral and epic music, whereas a sad scene may contain simply one instrument like a piano to convey the emptiness and sadness. The music simply cannot be thrown in, it must work in parallel with the images to support them and create a certain mood, whether it be joyful and happy or sinister and sad. Not only does music create the atmosphere but it also may introduce characters via things like theme tunes that match certain personalities of characters. Today, there are many composers that have written very popular scores that many people love such as Hans Zimmer, John Williams, Steve Jablonksy and more.

Orchestral Music

These scores are just a few out of the multitude of incredible scores that the composers (above) have created. These scores mainly fall under the more orchestral and epic category, as these songs are fit for large and powerful films or series's.

The score for Jurassic Park written by John Williams is not only an amazing score but is also a very popular theme used in every Jurassic Park film and is a very memorable theme that lots of people know.

Steve Jablonsky is another very talented composer who has composed for film, television and video games, however he is most popular for his score on transformers, called 'Arrival To Earth'.

Amongst these composer generally the most popular one is Hans Zimmer who has been known for composing a plethora of incredible scores such as 'Inception', 'The Lion King', 'Pirates of the Caribbean', 'The Dark Knight' and many more. However amongst these one of his most popular scores is interstellar.

Horror Music

Music typically used in supernatural-thriller films is quite different than that of action-thriller films. Compared to the large and epic sound of orchestral music, super-natural thrillers use much less instruments in their music, or may not even use music at all, or only play in short bursts. This is to reinforce the supernatural theme of the film and exacerbate certain events in the film, mainly tension building.

This scene from IT (2017) uses a variety of music, such as ambient sound, monophonic sound and polyphonic sound (a small scale orchestra), to create atmosphere within the certain events throughout the scene.

The following scene from the Woman in Black (2012) has a much more specific use of the 'shorts bursts' of sound. This is repeatedly used throughout supernatural-thrillers to build tension and to notify the audience that something is going to happen.

Sources:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thriller_(genre) (Visited 16/09/18)
http://windsorgirls.weebly.com/estrella-studios/typical-locations-for-thriller-genre# (Visited 16/09/18)
https://prezi.com/xqww5xskgjqh/conventions-of-the-thrillergenre (Visited 16/09/18)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steve_Jablonsky (Visited 16/09/18)