Film studies evaluation

As the director of my short film opening I created a hybrid genre of a drama-thriller. Influenced by films such as Kidulthood,5..4..3..2..1 and teeth I was inspired by the narrative of a drama as well as the uncomfortable response from a thriller. Trying to incorporate and marry two contradictory genres was done by making the drama the main genre whilst the thriller would be the sub-genre.

The narrative is similar to kidulthood as my protagonist ‘Montana’ is a normal teenager raised in a working class environment on a rough estate trying to find a way out. The twist to create the thriller effect is that she is a secret assassin, (her alter ego) as she kills for money so that her and her family may eventually escape from the lifestyle they are living at the moment and be free.

I used various camerawork, sound effects and editing to enable a shocked response from my audience. I decided that there should be no sound for the credits as I wanted to build suspense and tension from the audience. The use of slow fades as the title and credits came in also complimented the thriller like effect. The first image is of an alarm on a mobile phone. Mobile phones are an iconic stereotype of teenagers, however the alarm alerts danger as time represents a count down to a specific effect. Through mise-en-scene the protagonist is introduced as a normal teenager going through normal day-to-day activities such as getting dressed.

The use of trunk shots and point of view shots enable the audience to interact with the film and feel apart of it as though they are inside the film. The type of music I used was a funky house song as my target audience would be able to relate to the music and also has an upbeat happy tempo. The song ‘Hey Hey’ by Denis Ferrer is the consistent song played throughout the whole bedroom scene as Montana begins her routine of getting dressed. The change from diegetic to non-diegetic was used to distinct the different change in moods the protagonist is going through and was also synchronic with the atmosphere. In order to change the mood and theme to emphasise to the audience that the film is also a thriller I created quick flashes of murderous weapons being

inserted into Montana’s bag. The last frame close up shot of Montana’s sinister smile

represents a spooky like character introducing her alter ego which is a factor from the conventions of a thriller. At this frame the music funky house music fades away gradually introducing the thriller synthesiser instrumental to inform the audience what the film will consist of as the title of the film is then introduced.

Trying to create a storyline that could suit both drama and thriller together was a hindrance especially trying to incorporate a waking up scene. Trying to find the correct lighting and making it clear was also hard as the location was inside and needed extra lighting to get the best quality and effect.

My original plan was to have a normal wake up scene where the main character wakes up and gets dressed to music. Her only trouble would be finding the right suitable clothing for that today. The feedback I gained from classmates and others was that they wanted to see more and more should happen. The genre was supposed to me a drama/comedy, however as I began making changes to the character the narrative changed as did the genre also thus changing it into a drama-thriller. After changing my short film opening the reviews from viewers was much better as satisfied their needs.