Codes & Conventions:

I suspect that the following are the forms and conventions of thriller genre. These forms and conventions of which are clearly shown on-camera for the viewer to identify:

 1 - Guns -

2 - Cars/vehicles -

Guns hold the ability to instantly kill off characters and raise suspense. Cars/vehciles are also potentially deathly when in the hands of dangerous drivers. These make the audience hope that the characters they have identified themselves with do not die.

3 - Suits/uniforms -

4 - Photographic evidence -

Photographic images and mirrors raise suspense even further because they reveal the hidden intentions and dark truths of specific characters to the audience; dramatic irony. The antagonists are most often the ones who's secrets are revealed.

5 - Mirrors -

6 - Shadow/lighting -

Suits/uniforms and shadows mask these hidden truths and intentions to surpise the audience at the best times. It keeps the antagonistic characters from revealing their true evil identities to society and exposing themselves wide out in the open.

Members of our group can openly discuss whether we want to follow or challenge particular codes and conventions and say why.

However, choosing whether to follow or challenge these forms and conventions depends on what the expectiations of our target audience will be before viewing the film.

It is both important for our audience to identify our product as a thriller and to experiment with new ideas to see if they thrill our audience, which could involve challenging these forms and conventions.

Thriller Trailer Investigation:

After we chose the top 10 thriller titles of all time, according to the IMDB link, we searched the trailers for them on YouTube and began to deconstruct them. http://www.imdb.com/chart/thriller

Although there is a difference between trailers and teaser trailers in terms of length, they both share the same purpose as advertising tools. We could not find any teaser trailers based on these films but because normal trailers are not a lot diffferent to teasers, I did not see this as a particularly big problem.

Throughout my research I focused particularly on any patterns that I could identify in each trailer. From this I would be able to learn the forms and conventions of thrillers especially how they are used to thrill the audience.

 1 - Pulp Fiction (1994) -

2 - The Dark Knight (2008) -

3 - Inception (2010) -

4 - Goodfellas (1990) -

5 - Rear Window (1954) -

6 - Psycho (1960) -

7 - The Usual Suspects (1995) -

 8 - Leon (1994) -

9- Vertigo (1958) -

10 - The Lives of Others (2006) -

We decided to keep the trailer short, just under one minute in length, where we would use face-paced sound and editing. It just depends on the genre. The purpose of a thriller teaser trailer is to thrill the audience and make them want to see the film for themselves.

These trailers have given me a clear understanding of what thriller trailers involve. It has also given me an insight into how people decode and subvert these trailers in terms of genre, codes, conventions, iconography, context and narrative.

Audiences will be expecting thrillers to give them thrilling sensations. It is the purpose of the thriller genre to do so. Watching sample thriller trailers has been beneficial to our group for inspiring us to challenge and subvert the forms and conventions to create new inventive ways of thrilling our target audience.

Thriller Genre + C.S.S. Productions:

We chose thriller as the genre for our teaser trailer to place its commercial value into thrilling our audience. Thrills are sensations that people enjoy to feel naturally - it links with anxiety and fear of the unknown. Humans naturally want to experience thrills especially when watching a film so they will feel pleasure after and will return to the cinema or watch another film to experience the thrilling sensation again.

There have been many successful thriller titles so this will allow our group to cover a lot of ground with research.

Thriller Definition [Noun] -
1. A novel, play or movie with an exciting plot, typically involving crime or espionage.
2.A person, thing or experience that thrills.

We decided to call our production company "C.S.S. Productions" (C.S.S. is an acronym which stands for Chris, Scott and Scott. It takes the first letter from each of the group member's names, uniting us and making us feel more like we are a team).

Chris designed the logo, which will be shown near the beginning of our teaser trailer. It is a simple design that effectively stands out because of its shape and positioning of the text.