My film, “Hectic Minds”, is set in London, United Kingdom in the 21st century and this was represented within my trailer through the images of where I shot in the United Kingdom and the clothing that my characters wore that depicted the fashion of the 21st century.
My film tells the story of a girl who is led to believe that she has murdered her boyfriend after an altercation at a party and follows the storyline of her discovering the actual events and her best friend’s involvement in the death of her boyfriend.
To ensure that I was able to effectively create a trailer for a thriller film that had a teenage audience, I was required to engage in the research of a number of different factors: the conventions of the thriller genre, the conventions of a trailer and the conventions of a thriller trailer, most specifically.
For example, one of the trailers that I studied was “Snowtown (2011)”, an Australian thriller film, which introduced me to the convention of cold colour tones and low-key lighting to connote the genre and mood of the film. This is something I made sure was evident within my production, colour grading my clips to ensure that they adopted cold, blue midtones and that they displayed low-key lighting. I also portrayed this within my storyboard by using cold, dark tones and colours.
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Likewise, tension is built throughout the narrative as the editing speed and music tempo increases. This is another convention that signifies the thriller genre and one that I attempted to replicate within my trailer. I decided on using the song “Deep Horrors” by Kevin MacLeod, a royalty free piece of music available for commercial and personal use, as the music effectively created mood and tension by increasing in volume and tempo as the song progressed. I also considered using the music “Awkward Meeting - Supernatural Haunting” by Kevin MacLeod and “Scraping The Sewer” by Doug Maxwell/Media Right Production as they conveyed a similar mood. However, I opted to use “Deep Horrors” as I thought it best fit the conventions of the music in other thriller trailers and was also considerably longer and a better fit to the conventional time of a trailer.
In regards to my pre-production, I planned my production using two pre-production artifacts: a script for the opening scene of the film and a story board, incorporating my proposed scenes - including details as to the camera shots and cinematographic details such as the lighting and colours used.
In regards to my pre-production, I planned my production using two pre-production artifacts: a script for the opening scene of the film and a story board, incorporating my proposed scenes - including details as to the camera shots and cinematographic details such as the lighting and colours used.
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| From my storyboard, I used low-key lighting to connote the genre and mood of this scene. |
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| This close-up was used within my storyboard, with the blue midtones, to ensure that the emotion of the character was clearly shown. |
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| This extreme close-up was also used in my storyboard to show emotion. |
My trailer was 2 minutes 5 seconds in total, which is close to the average length of a thriller trailer: generally ranging between two and three minutes. For example, I found that the trailer for “What Richard Did (2012)” was just 1 minute 53 seconds, the trailer for “Inception (2010)” was 2 minutes 23 seconds and the trailer for “Kill Your Darlings (2013)” was 2 minutes 2 seconds.
The institutional logo that is displayed at the beginning of my trailer is Universal, as they are a company known for creating many thrillers such as “Psycho (1960)” and “Fear (1996)”. Since Universal is an American company, I included the film rating certificate within my trailer that is seen in many American trailers but few British trailers.
Throughout many of the thriller trailers that I looked at, the trailers contained voice overs from the diegetic sound throughout the film. For example, in the trailer for “Side Effects (2013)”. I attempted to incorporate that within my own trailer although I feel as though I did not enough voice overs.
Many of the thriller trailers that I studied also contain a number of fade to black transitions and text overlays on black backgrounds. The purpose of this is to provide the audience with sufficient information.
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Within my research, I also compiled a Pinterest board (https://uk.pinterest.com/sjcareysj/media-coursework-inspiration/) to collect a sample of other thriller trailers and posters so that I could effectively see the conventions that all of the materials shared. I also created a Prezi, which can be found on my Media blog (http://sophiacareycoulsdonmedia.blogspot.co.uk/2015/11/media-as-coursework.html) to describe the details of my film idea, including my basic plot, the themes of my film, my main antagonist and protagonist profiles, my trailer plan and how my narrative relates to the theory of Equilibrium.
In order to target a teenage audience (specifically from the ages of thirteen to nineteen), I made the decision to centre my narrative around characters of the same age as the target audience. This relates to the theory of Uses and Gratifications and identification; the audience can relate to the characters they are being shown and therefore are more likely to be interested in them. I also attracted this audience by certificating my trailer as a “PG-13” and tailoring the narrative of my film to the guidelines: “some disturbing thematic material, violence, sexuality and brief drug use”.
I also incorporated Todorov’s theory of equilibrium within the narrative of my trailer. For example, the trailer begins with scenes of the character’s normal lives: at college, spending time with friends. The middle section displays scenes of fighting and death, creating a disequilibrium, and the final section of the narrative includes an establishing shot of the scenes from the beginning of the film, reverting to the original equilibrium. This, of course, does not follow the traditional structure of the theory in which there is a new equilibrium a a trailer is a summarised account of the film’s narrative that rarely features the resolution, yet the narrative of the film does contain a new equilibrium and an attempt to restore the equilibrium, therefore still fitting to Todorov’s theory.
I used a series of clips in a non-chronological order that did not tell enough about the story for the audience to understand the whole film yet enough to create an enigma. Although I think that I created an enigma, I think I could have also included more information about the story to entice the audience.
The name of my film, “Hectic Minds”, is a name derived from the narrative and represented within the hectic imagery - such as in my title, created in Adobe After Effects, which creates a hectic mood by displaying text with an erratic movement.
Within my final trailer, I feel as though I effectively conveyed the genre of my film with the use of tension building music and cinematographic elements such as low-key lighting and cold midtones.
I intended on also building a tense atmosphere through the use of my camera work. For example, I tried to create an eerie atmosphere in some of the beginning scenes through the use of shaky hand-held camera work, however I feel as though this did not have the desired outcome.
I feel as though the use of text, particularly within the title, effectively conveys the mood and genre of my trailer although I also feel as though it is too long a clip and therefore reduces the tension intended within the trailer and creates the potential loss of the audience’s interest. I feel similarly in regard to a few of the other clips within my trailer.
Overall, I believe that my production fits the conventions of the intended thriller genre as well as the conventions of a film trailer, using relatable actors to attract a teenaged audience.
