Evaluation - Question 1

'In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?'

1) Flashbacks
  Our thriller takes aspects and conventions from this thriller film Sin City. Throughout the story it has a narration over it, we chose to incorporate the narration in our product with the flashback a slow motion of things. This adds a sense of depth to our product and helps the audience to understand what is going on, whilst creating a non linear narrative for the audience follows. The flashbacks show Scarlett's and Emma's previous relationship and the tree where the story is based around. This also helps to create an enigma code of location and death, this is because they do not know why they always meet at the tree, until the end of the flashbacks and since the camera swaps from Scarlett to Emma you also do not know who is going to die.











2) Violence against women
Violence against women is a common theme seen throughout the thriller genre according to the genre convention theory like "The girl on the train" which makes this prominent by also making the protagonist female similarly to what was decided for our opening. However, unlike the film we chose to have homosexual relationships rather than heterosexual which challenges most conventions today. This also adds a sense of hyper-reality as the threat against women is the stalker and that has been in the news and word of mouth for a while and adds a 'real' sense to it which can also allow the audience to connect to it more since it's more realistic.












3) Heterosexual male
Unlike "Sin City" and many other films, we chose not to have the protagonist as a heterosexual male but instead subvert this and have a homosexual female teenager lead, as the male is also usually of age to be called a man. One has done this as we and our qualitative data collected had shown that more would like to see women empowered in film, hence we did that in our opening - we went down a more Jodie Foster route.












4) Typography
The typography used looks like and old font that screams creepy and danger, almost paranormal feel. Our typography uses the style serif its simple yet respectable and gives a calming feel which is a binary opposite when the non diegetic music starts which plays on the enigma code.
5) Generic Setting
Many horror thrillers use the conventional stereotype setting of woods/forest such as "wolf creek" and "Cabin Fever" just to name a few. These films often have a common place that the characters feel safe and secure that eventually turns into a dangerous place. Similarly, in our opening the tree symbolizes this place that the two know very well and is safe and secure to them, and as the opening progresses it turns a dangerous place when Scarlett is killed by a crazy stalker.
6) Lighting
My lighting is unconventional of mainstream films, but conventional films as it uses lots of natural lighting to give it a normal feel, and make it seem like daily life rather than with mainstream films how they use lots of high key lighting to make everything seem happy - I just wanted the film to have a everyday standard feel. Otherwise, it's like glamourizing death and it doesn't make the film feel right.

Editing my opening

Throughout my opening there are many techniques used. Firstly, at the start I wanted to set the scene with a non linear narrative, I did this by using flashbacks, this further generates an enigma code of location as the viewer will then want to know why the protagonists meet at the tree. The flashbacks also show the significance of the tree "a meeting spot" for the protagonists.
I further used parallel editing techniques to show the two traveling and what is going on at the same time showing elements of being stalked for one of the main protagonists, whilst the other is unaware that this might be the last time she'd see her lover. This allows the viewers to empathize  at the protagonists situation as one dies and the other will never know what had happened leaving her clueless, alone and heart-broken.
I further then used a few fast cuts when the death was coming near, this was to build tension, and show that some action was going on at the time. I ended it with a shot of the main protagonists hand which creates another enigma code of how she died, as you don't see any blood or the state of her body viewers are left to wonder how she died, or if she's even dead at all.
I was also able to follow the 180 degree rule as both characters came from two different points in the forest so I had to ensure I wither showed me crossing the line or stay on the right side of it until I was ready to cross it.

I also used the fade effects by going into the effects panel and video transitions then selected the fade I wanted then dragged it to the timeline where a cut icon would appear and then bam a fade. I did the same for the slow motion which was also in the effects tab. I was taught I could do it by remapping but I think that removes or alters the audio too and since I had a voice over along with it this means that it would be altered in a way that didn't flow with the film.