Target Audience

Our target audience is aimed towards older teenagers. The rating for our thriller will be a 15, which means only those 15 and over will hypothetically be able to view it. Being a 15 rating means the film can include use of bad language, drug use and other adult themes. The reason we chose 15 is because our thriller includes drug use so we believed this would be suitable as 18 would be too high as our thriller doesn't include extreme nudity, sex scenes or drug use.

  The reason we decided to target our thriller at teenagers is because we believe teenagers are usually most likely to go to cinemas or watch films as they have the most time. We believe teenagers could relate to our film, with themes such as stalking, harassment, obsessions and suicide. All of the cast in our film are teenagers as well, which we believed would be more appealing. Being teenagers ourselves we believed it would be easier to aim our thriller at those our age, as we can relate and understand what teenagers would find appealing.

Film Title.

When discussing the title of our film we knew we wanted one word as we believe that it much more memorable than a longer title. We came up with obsessed but as it is already the name of a previous film then we decided to go down a similar path. After much consideration and thinking we narrowed it down to the titles

• Infatuation
• Consumed 

We decided that Infatuation has the most potential to be remember and liked by our audience and overall we think that will make an effective title.

Film idea/pitch.

After watching numerous thrillers we both agree to make a opening along the lines of a stalker type thriller as we believe we can make the most effective 2 minute opening with the resources we have available. We want for our credit scene something similar to the opening of Se7en, namely the use of the unknown character and the way that they have something that they are doing in secret. We will be making a collage of photos of our victim which along with the photos will have our cast's names, director and producer, to make this effective we would like to have the names in different magazine and newspaper letters like the image below.

The credit scene will show our stalker admiring and adding to their collection of images, which have been tamper with such as the words 'forever' and 'mine' written in black pen. Hopefully this will create the feeling of uneasiness on the audience as they will fear for the unnamed girl.

The actual opening of the film we would like to produce something similar to a scene we saw in the film seven pounds, which includes a suicide scene. This scene will show the final scene of the film yet we are hoping to put it at the begin so that it is out of chronological order which we believe will entice the audience to watch on as they will want to find out what has happened to cause the suicide. 

The film will gradually progress with many twist in to who is actually the stalker and their motives behind it and will lead to a climax at the end of the film.

Se7en analysis

We looked at the opening of the crime thriller se7en as we thought that the credit scene was extremely effective and we thought the use of the unknown male was an intriguing option as through out the opening the audience never see the males face only his hands.

The films starts with a close up on an opening book, the book itself was a thick older looking book with the words 'new line cinema presents' are shown in the bottom left hand corner. The font is a white and very Gothic looking giving the credits as almost unhinged and unnatural feel. Through out the credits when ever any writing appears two fonts are predominantly used; one is the font mentioned above and the second is also white but looks more like it was wrote by someone as it is smaller and much more scrawl-like, this is used when the cast and production teams names appear also accompanied by a black background making them the central point.

The main shots used are the close up, birds-eye view and extreme close ups. The birds-eye view shots are used when the unknown male character is looking at, collecting or writing in his books, these shots make the audience feel like they are getting a sort of sneak peak at what the male is doing. The close ups and extreme close ups are majorly on his hands as he is preforming some action for example there is a close up used when he is taking the ends of his fingertips off with the razor. The shots are used as a way of seeing directly what he is doing but leaves the audience wondering why.

The Title 'Se7en' is shown on a black background in the 1st Gothic font but as the image flickers it appears much bigger only then to reduce in size to the original. This is used so that at the beginning it remains the same as the previous but the change in the size is not only to enforce the importance of the word but also to make sure that it is the main focal point of the audience.

The editing used is very quick and is full of cuts; the main transitions between each shots. This gives the illusion that the audience is seeing more information that they actually are, it also gives the pace of the opening a quick, almost immediate feel to it. Another editing technique used is the red filter effect, the shot is of a picture which looks to be developing, this could relate to that fact that when developing images sometimes a red light is used to help the photo develop, but in this case the colour red could connote anger, blood and violence.

The mise-en-scene is very hard to pinpoint as not a lot of the actual setting is scene but the interpretation is that it is somewhere he feels safe enough to make his books and collages , somewhere like his home, where he knows he won't be disturbed. The props used such as the book could be linked with his intelligence but also with the fact that what ever he is doing he has had plenty of time to think it through and plan as we see numerous books through out the opening. A link to violence and crime is the prop of the razor blade as we see him quite clearly remove the skin off his fingertips, this is associated with someone who does not want to leave a trace. 

Throughout the opening no diagetic music/sounds are present only the non diagetic soundtrack. The song is Closer by nine inch nails although it has been distorted and remixed to fit in with the opening. The use of distorting the song adds to the uneasiness that the shots bring, it creates tension. The only line that is actual sung is the lyrics ' You bring me closer to God', this is accompanied by the image of the male cutting out the word god, this could be foreshadowing that religion may have something to do with the plot line.

Overall, we believe that this opening is a great example of how just the credits can create an effective opening and we will be taking some things into consideration when filming and editing our thriller.  

Steve Shill- Director of Obsessed.

Steve Shill is a British director from London. He graduated from Leeds university in fine arts, he was apart of Impact Theater Co-operative but they disbanded in 1986 which pushed him into making theater work under his own name. He began his directing career by television dramas such as Eastenders and Casualty. He has direct many major successful television dramas such as Dexter, Criminal minds, The wire and Law and order. On top of that he directed the film Obsessed staring Beyonce Knowles, this is our main reason that influenced us to look at his work. As our films have a similar narrative it made sense to watch his work and see how he uses camera shots and other media techniques to create an effective thriller.

 After watching the opening to obsessed the main techniques that stuck out to me were the font of the credits, the location and the music. The font of the credits is a very curvaceous which adds a feminine touch which later ties in with the film. The soundtrack is very modern and happy which contrasts with the genre and the location has picked is a new house possible indicating a fresh start. His use of close ups through out the film helps the audience get a clear indication of the emotion of the chosen characters face.

All in all we thought Steve Shill's use of lulling the audience in to a false sense of security was an effective was the opening for the thriller he created.