Evaluation Question 1

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

When looking for inspiration with the plot line of our opening sequence we all looked at other thrillers that did well to their target audience and overall why this was the case for this thriller. With comparison of the plot and characterisation of our thriller it is similarly compared to the thriller 'The Lincoln lawyer' as both of the films are not only thriller but they are a hybrid genre of a legal thriller as they both represent the main characters which is a man trying to solve a case that is represented as the key point in the narrative of the film. The plot in the Lincoln lawyer suffers victimisation towards the female characters as in our thriller the girl is killed and in another women are killed by a murderous killer, which is also a man. The only main contrasting difference of this is that in our thriller the father is also the villain and murderer as well as the lawyer that has 'gone down the wrong path' leading to his alcoholic issues.

This can be shown through these two screen shots showing that the main characters working profile is a lawyer or in our thriller's case, used to be a lawyer before the loss of his daughter, son and his sanity. As in the smaller picture on the right from our thriller there are the props that are stacks of papers scattered around the room, showing the destruction of his old life and his responsibility of his last or non-existant past case as a lawyer, where as in the photograph on the left the main character played by Matthew McCaunahay is a lawyer providing support for the other character who is shown to be in jail or being sentenced due to the use of costumes and mise-en-scene. 

This contrasts to the female characters presumed as the victims in both thrillers. The female in the licoln lawyer is older and her story is different as she is not murdered, in fact she is the reason the killer is admitted and sentenced to jail as he has done the same attack on her as he has on others. This of course is different to our female character as she is younger and is hurt and held captive and eventually killed due to her being the reason the father's son died, as the father is gaining retribution from this murder. Although they are different characters and target a different audience, ours being younger and the other being older, both victims are females and are made out to be weak therefore they clearly represent an adherence to female stereotypes always being dominated or weakened by a male character.

This is shown in these two pictures with vast differences between the way we have sown our female character and the way they have shown theirs.

 In the first photograph we chose not to reveal the girl as a POV shot makes the tension and suspense in the thriller more apparent. If we were to show her face it would reveal a younger age and more of a dominance of the male power over the females. Where as in the bottom photograph the female victim in The lincoln lawyer completely adheres to the stereotypes of a worthless women in a provocative line of work being weak as she has easily led herself to be targeted.

Similar props and the meaning behind these props is shown within both thrillers as both of the male leading characters of the films have alcoholic issues so props such as; bottles, alcohol and cigarettes are exemplified throughout the opening sequence of ours and the lincoln lawyer.

As shown in both of these screenshots alcohol is a theme carried on throughout these films as it represents the depression and the issues that both characters similarly face, giving them negative connotations as it represents them in a negative light. They have both turned to alcohol for different reason but alcohol in this case definitely adheres to the negative stereotypes of a murderer or a carless male character.







Costumes used in both thrillers are also similar as we used a suit in ours and so did they for both of the male characters. We chose to dress the father in a black suit as the colour black clearly gives negative connotations of darkness, representing him as the villain in the plot of our thriller. The suit also shows the importance of both of the male characters. This is because a suit gives the character authority and a role of importance that the audience can easily associate with, this being a lawyer. However with costume it almost looks old, worn and subverting the role of importance that a stereotypical lawyer carries, this is because we wanted to show his past and his present lifestyle, showing that his past life as a lawyer has been tainted and that he no longer has the authority that Matthew McCaunaghay has.

In both of these screenshots the characters are shown to be wearing suits which is actually one of the main or only outfits that both of the actors wear throughout the films. In the lincoln lawyer Mccaugnahay is wearing blue, which may have something to do with the natural association that the colour blue has with the male perspective but in our thriller he is more f a dominating male character wearing black to represent him in a negative way, to show the vast differences between these two characters, as one is a killer, the other, a lawyer fighting for the justice that is executed on to people or characters like ours in our opening sequence.



The lighting in both thrillers varies, especially in the lincoln lawyer but because ours was shot in the daytime using natural light it was brighter but we actually wanted to use darker lighting which is also used in the lincoln lawyer.

 In both of these screen shots lighting is used effectively to represent the tension built up in the thrillers. Darker lighting is used in both of these thriller, as dark lighting tends to represent the thriller genre as for the audience members to be in complete darkness in the cinema allows them to fully emerge themselves in to the tense moments in these thrillers. Lighter and brighter lighting has the opposite effects of innocence, purity and positive connotations.

However in this particular scene of shown in the picture on the right, they are using darker lighting to create a sensual mood and show the romance blossoming between the two main characters of the film.

The camera work in both thrillers in some scenes can be similar but can convey different meanings or used for different representation aspects. 

 For example in both of these pictures they both use the same prop but the prop is shown to be conveyed in a different due to the differences of the shot. The first screen shot is more casual and doesn't focus on the meaning of alcohol as much as our thriller this is obvious due to the fact that the shot is 'side on' and is a close up, meaning that they are showing the looks and details of the character but that him having the role of drinking isn't an important feature in this scene. Where as in the bottom screen shot of our thriller the father is revealed in an extreme closeup as this invites the audience in, showing them a vital issue with this character drinking, showing his alcoholic issues as well as creating suspense due to the fact that the audience are invited and allowed to be so close to and intimidated by a killer.

Within the role of comparing fonts within the process of editing these two thrillers use different fonts because they want to infer a different meaning to the audience members. For instance with our thriller we

 In our thriller we used Gotham bold font as it stands out, is bold and definitely easy to read and we wanted to go more with a horror or darker type of thriller genre for our title to show the inner insanity of our main character and to make the audience feel like the victims and left with a bold and hard hitting headline to the end of this opening sequence. We then blurred the font whilst it was still moving, to create this ghostly or supernatural taunting suspense, so that they audience members are tested.

Where as in the lincoln lawyer they used a more contemporary take on classic character showing a higher maturity within context and narrative of this thriller, clearly showing the advanced skills of solving a crime and complimenting the working theme of a lawyer shown throughout this thriller.

The difference between Blanched and the lincoln lawyer is that blanched is more about murders and the perspective of the murderer rather then the perspective of the lawyer trying to hunt down and find out more details about the murderer, this is because our thriller fits within a more advanced and tension building thriller, with its main aims being to scare the audience members. Where as the lincoln lawyer wants to involve the audience in the murder case carried throughout the film so that they have the opportunity to figure out the killer and be apart of the legal team themselves.