Editing in Psychological Thrillers

Editing in psychological thrillers from kjr84

Camera Movement/Shots for a Psychological Thriller

The most common shots used in a psychological thriller are; the mid shot and the close up. These shots are used as they help the audience to relate to the characters because they can see their facial expressions, allowing the audience to understand how the character is feeling. This creates a realistic feeling which is a common theme throughout psychological thrillers as the more realistic a film is, the scarier it is. Another shot used more commonly is a extreme long shot/establishing shot. This is used because it gives the audience a sense of location so they can understand the diegesis and what sort of troubles the character could come into. The "12 Monkeys" trailer is a good example of these shots being used.

Sound In Psychological Thriller

During psychological thrillers there will more than likely be non-diegetic sound during a scene that accompany the images. The non-diegetic sound is usually tense music or eerie sounds, this is important because it reinforces the relationship between the characters and the setting.

The Girl on the Train is a psychological thriller and in the trailer is a good example of tense music being used.

Psychological Thriller Setting Ideas

Within a psychological thriller the setting is very important and the two most common settings used are a city or inside a building. These are good settings to use as they provide realism. Using inside a single building, for example a house or restaurant, could be good to use because I am limited to a maximum of 3 locations so it would make it easier. It would also allow me to film the entire scene in one day or maybe 2 which would give me more time to edit. Using a city setting would be good because it would give me a wide variety of choices for different shots however it would be difficult to get find places without many people who would interrupt filming. 

The Girl on the Train

On Thursday I went to see The Girl on the train. This film is a psychological thriller which is what one of the briefs for my course work wants me to produce so to get ideas on how to make a successful psychological thriller. Whilst watching the film I felt uneasy and was constantly thinking about what was going to happen. This is something I must make sure I can do so I can grip my audience to my film. There was also a lot of enigmas that left me wondering about something was happening. If I can leave the audience watching my film ask questions about what is going on in my film it will be a success.

Colour In Film

Colour is used in film to show emotion and can often represent genre in a film. A good example of colour used in film is Wes Anderson's Moonrise Kingdom. The uses of green, yellow and brown mean the colours do not contrast each other creating it to be pleasing to look at. He used this because it is calming and it suits the film.

On the other hand colours that are on the opposite end of the spectrum will compliment each other as they balance out the image and the flow of colour won't be disrupted. Films like Amelie use this complimentary style colour scheme which creates the atmosphere of the film.

Sound Terminology