Evaluation Q1

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

Our sequence is a psychological thriller. Usually, thrillers focus on plot over character, and emphasize the intense, physical action over the character's psyche. Psychological thrillers tend to reverse this formula to a certain degree, emphasizing the characters just as much, if not more so, than the plot.

The suspense created by psychological thrillers often comes from one or more characters playing with one another's minds, either by playing illusionary games with the other or by slowly trying to destroy the other's mental state. This was effective in our thriller because the main character had been experiencing weird things such as the phone ringing at a specific time every day, letters saying ‘I know what you did’, writings on the mirror saying ‘you’re next’ and loud noises such as a glass breaking.

Sometimes the suspense comes from within one isolated character where characters must resolve conflicts with their own minds. Usually, this conflict is a struggle to understand something that has happened to them. These struggles are made more dramatic with physical expressions of the conflict in the means of physical appearance or events that occur during the thriller.

'' • Psychological – Elements that are related to the mind or processes of the mind; they are mental rather than physical in nature.
• Thriller – A genre of fiction that attempts to "thrill" its audience by placing characters at great risk. This constant unease throughout the story makes the narrative suspenseful to the reader by creating a tense atmosphere.
• Psychological + Thriller – By combining these two terms, the definition changes to a narrative that makes the characters exposed to danger on a mental level rather than a physical one. Characters are no longer reliant on physical strength to overcome their brutish enemies (which is often the case in typical action-thrillers), but rather are reliant on their mental resources, whether it be by battling wits with a formidable opponent or by battling for equilibrium in the character's own mind. ''

There are specific uses of sound and editing which follows the code and conventions of a psychological thriller. The sound we used was a mysterious noise which was continuous and had an almost creepy feel to it.

Also, the editing followed the codes and conventions of a psychological thriller. The titles were created in a way to emphasize the creepiness and give the audience a feeling they want to know what the film is about.