Thriller - 'The Forgotten'

'The Forgotten'.

[music: Everything is Broken - Bob Dylan, Cthlu Thlu - Caravan, Secret - Maroon 5]

This is our finished media product. Our piece, set in a rural area, provides a earthy feel to the 'thriller genre'. We wanted to create a piece reminiscent of the rustic aesthetic present throughout 'No Country for Old Men'. To do so, we filmed at Cannock Chase, an area of woodland as we wanted our backdrop to be as neutral as possible. Our attempt to create a piece, difficult to place in any one era, translated also to the costume and the overall mis - en - scene. For example our victim is wearing jeans, converse and a black jacket, any one of which could be placed in a number of different times in modern history.

I feel our film challenges a number of conventions within the Thriller genre. We conformed to concealing the killer's identity through use of camera angles which only exposed the hands of the attacker. This technique is commonplace in most thrillers as it adds to the tension and allows the film to build in suspense, whereas there are very few where the audience is made aware of the killer at the very beginning. However where our film differs is through our contrast of the initial slow voiceover and a change to a significant action sequence. We used this to ease the audience in to a false sense of security as, despite a casual hint towards a notable amount of disappearances, the bright music coupled with the shots of scenery provide a visually relaxed opening. We then used our action sequence to further establish an identity for the town mentioned. For example the voice over suggests that 'beyond the town is Morse Woods, i figure if you were going to be found, you'd be found in there.' Hence the action sequence showing a teenage girl being murdered in an area of woodland, supposedly 'Morse Woods'.

One of our prominent aims in creating our thriller was to be able to respond to and manipulate the audience. for example our piece starts slowly, and is quickly contrasted with a murder sequence to build tension, then similarly we aimed to settle the audience back in to a false sense of security with the discovery of the body. In theory we would then shock the audience back into recognition to maintain an underlying level of suspense that is native to that of the Thriller genre.

I feel our piece works well in representing various social groups that our audience would respond to. For example the initial voiceover talks from the perspective of a young woman, however the words spoken suggest that of someone, perhaps old before their time, or weathered by the level of disappearances in her town. Similarly she talks of a population of 'hardworking, honest and religious' folk, which ultimately carries with it a lot of irony. We liked, however, the idea that our piece could be set in a slow moving town, with an ageing population and the disappearances of young people being the only thing suggest any different. In theory, the murders could be the ultimate thing to breath life in to the town considered 'dead'. Thus our thriller covers many aspects of society, for example a younger generation who feel stuck in a dead end town, and the consequences of such disappearances.

I think our piece would most likely be distributed by a media institution that is responsive to the psyche of a younger audience. For example Film4, as I feel it is a large distributor of media product and its accessibility attracts a younger audience. Also it is a British company, and has, in the past, been responsible for the distribution of such gritty dramas as 'This is England'. Therefore I think it would be a good distributor for a film such as ours which aims to provide a suspenseful look into the mysterious disappearances whilst also, to an extent, satirising small town life. As the younger generation become one of the largest consumers of media I think our film would be aimed at an audience of late teens. We approach a mature enough topic to justify aiming it an audience where any patronising approach is not greatly appreciated whilst providing enough action and grit to assure an interested audience. Also if our film was moderated by the BBFC, i feel it would most likely be classified a '15' which, although decreases the potential volume of the audience, would also increase its enjoyment factor as it would reach our target audience.

Through constructing our thriller I have learnt a great deal about the technology behind producing a film. Although I was aware that a lot of editing went in to the process, I thought that the main body of the film relied more on camera work to create tension. However through producing this piece, I am very aware of how much work goes into editing a piece to bring the suspense to a peak, and that without such technique the effects would not be so shocking. Also through research conducted I have increased my level of knowledge on how films respond to the internet and technological advances. I have developed this knowledge via burning our thriller to disc and uploading it to Youtube, both of which were done momentarily, which really gave me an idea of how much pirated films must impact on production.

Finally, I feel my personal skills have developed immensely between producing our preliminary task and 'The Forgotten'. Not only have my editing skills improved, I also feel I have a greater sense of how to capture the attention of the audience and how to manipulate the camera to emphasise and detract. My initial basic knowledge of the production process has improved greatly, even just through expanding my understanding of technology, such as how to extract files and convert music files to mp3 to apply to our piece.