Research Task Cristina Figueira-Carrillo

What is a thriller?

Alfred Hitchock Master of suspense?

Films i've chosen:

The Lost Boys 1987

El laberinto del fauno/ Pans Labyrinth 2006

Donnie Darko 2001

Pulp Fiction 1994

The Godfather 1972

The lost boys:

In the first minute of the thriller we see a wide shot of the ocean and its ripples we also see on the left side the reflection of the moon this also emphasises the isolation of the ocean at night. It is a high angle shot which gives you the impression of a bird haunting its prey. Within the same minute we also see an establishing shot of the fair (boardwalk) which set’s the scene and location of the opening.

We get to see the fair during the day and night which still gives off the creepy atmosphere because of all the props used to create this affect for example there is missing children’s posters and signs symbolising a unnatural happening which no one is aware of as such.


The off screen diegetic sound at the begging is of children laughing and whispering which set’s the scene of the unnatural world which humans are unaware of.

El laberinto del fauno/Pans Labyrinth:

It starts off with a canted angle of a girl which zooms closer revealing blood going back into her nose, throughout the whole shot we hear her panting very loudly but with no life left inside of her the whole shot is not in chronological order as it has started at the end and it’s working its way backwards. Also in this scene the camera is zoomed into her eye which dissolves from the black of her eye to another world.

There is a narrator explaining the ‘fairytale’ between both of the worlds the lighting in the world we see through the girls eyes is dark and mystical when is not like fairytales at all on the other hand when there is another dissolve from the low angle of the sun leading to the ‘real world’ it is very light and peaceful but we know the audience know this is not true and in reality the ‘fairytale’ world is where the character is happiest.

Near the end of the scene there you can see the rule of thirds where the car is positioned to be shown but also a close up of a mythical creature again showing the two different worlds.


 
 
 
 
Donnie Darko:

There is an establishing shot of a person lying in the middle of the road the diegetic sound is peaceful which confuses the audience as you don’t know why he is in the middle of the road.

From this scene the atmoshpere you get is peace and afamily life as there are parts which are slowed down to show the relationships with each character.

There are alot of pan’s and zooms in this opening sequence mainly on the man we find at the beginning in the middle of the road this enables the audience to understand he is the main protagonist.

 
 
 
 
 
 
Pulp Fiction:
 

The beginning mainly consists of a two shot between a couple in a cafe the mise en scene suggests that they are neither upper or working class as they are talking about robbing banks. There are alot of shot reverse shots and also by there body langauge especially the female characters you can see she is madly in love and doesn’t care about anything as she is very calm and interested in the crimes he’s speaking about which shows she is crazy. This is then shwon again at the end of the opening as they are about to rob the cafe.

 

 

 

 

 

 

The GodFather:

 

It starts off with a eyeline close up of a man which then very slowing starts to zoom out whilst he is talking, this leaves the audience puzzled as you can not see the location where he is until quite later on in the shot.

It then reveals he is talking to someone else behind a desk there is a over the shoulder shot not revealing to much of the other character but enough to see he is important. Also there is no sound only that of the dialog between the two characters shwoing the conversation is very important.