Genre Iconography Mood Board

This is the thriller iconography collage I created of pictures that best show and define what a thriller film is.  All pictures come under a category of:                                    

·         Props & set design

·         Locations & Settings

·         Lighting & Colours

·         Characters

·         Typical Scenes

 
The reason why I have done this task is to be able to fully recognize the characteristics of a thriller,
which will help us later when we make our own 2 minute thriller opening.

Regarding props and set design a common theme was the use of guns along with a dark setting. This is because of the guns adding to the mystery of thrillers - will the character get shot or escape? Also there are a lot of crime thrillers made which guns are a major prop used. The dark set design involved in thrillers are a representation of the mood represented in a scene of a thriller film.Generally some form of weapon whether it be the mind, a gun or fists tends to be used.

Looking at locations and settings, thrillers seem to often be set in busy metropolitan cities, and around the adult world, (children rarely play a huge part in a thriller). Settings can be broad when referring to a thriller taking place, but they have to be linked in with the busy city it is set in. For example a car park can be used for a thriller, but the woods cannot, as they are not find in cities.

Lighting and colours used in thrillers seem to be dark and if light is used it it to highlight the characters facial expression, show emotion/mood or to draw attention to something significant in the film. Light colours are also used to highlight appearance like scars. Depending on whether a mystery is to be revealed or not either light or dark colour will be used for the scene.

From the collage I created above various thrillers seem to have common characters. A protagonist(s) and antagonist(s) are always involved with some conflict and especially in psychological thrillers a mentally unstable character is involved. Although saying this, thrillers seem to have a character that has some form of crazy characteristic about themselves, (for example a hitman who has no remorse in a crime thriller).

Through evidence gathered from the thriller collage, typical scenes in thrillers are suspenseful and mysterious, fast paced action whether it be physical or mental is also involved.