Research: What is a thriller ? - Ms Begum

What is Thriller?

A thriller is a genre which is created to keep the audience on edge with suspenseful action. Thriller is also being produced in television programs, radio, theatre productions and other types of media.

Thriller genre is a group of productions which affect the audiences emotions by raising their the level of anticipation, uncertainty and surprise. Thriller films or books intend to be unexpected & interesting which helps to engage the audience attention to find out the actions in movies or stories.

What are Genres?

Genres are categories in which a film belongs to. it is important for the audience to know about genres because of the age certificates and also different genres have different narratives and conventions so some audiences are interested in and other audiences are not.

'Texas Chainsaw' (2013) is a remake of the original production 'Texas Chainsaw Massacre'. The story of this film is supposedly based on a true story of a group of friends visit an old home in which contains a 'legend' of a serial killer, the main antagonist. The group of friends who visit this old home little do they know about still visit this place to find out they will be living with a serial killer. in the 2013 remake of this film a young woman travels with a group of her friends to Texas to collect inheritance but little does she know that an encounter with a chainsaw-wielding killer.

Sub-genre of Thrillers:

 

Horror/Thriller




Crime/Thriller

 

Drama/Mystery/Thriller

Common themes in thriller:

The common themes in a thriller are topics such as death, obsession, revenge, mystery, rivalry etc.
These common themes allow the audience to identify them by the actions in the film. For example; death would become a them in a film if death was shown or if a funeral was shown then this would connote death. Another example would be if the antagonist in a thriller is killing and committing crimes throughout the film, but his appearance of his face has not been shown to the viewers. What this does is hides the antagonist identity creating a build up of mystery to when the antagonist is finally revealed.
Themes in thriller send off different messages to a viewer allowing them to think and connote different ideas from the film.

General audience for thrillers.

The general audience for thrillers are usually for more of a mature audience so young adults or people that are 18 and over. The youngest a thriller allows are 15 because it creates a wider audience and also younger people are more interested in thrillers. Their are many reactions from different audiences when watching a thriller. Most audiences feel disturbed and frightened from the actions in a film as they mainly contain explicit and disturbing images to put off the audience. Some viewers may have strong political views on thrillers as some are easily viewable by under 15's in which by law they are not aloud to watch thrillers as their age ratings are mainly either 15 or 18. People may have these type of views because they are concerned about protecting and preventing things such as trauma to a child. Others may enjoy watching thrillers as it gives them excitement and shocking feeling which makes them want to watch more.

Conclusion:
This has helped et a better understanding of the thriller genre, I am also able to  speak about the key conventional features which  are typical to the thriller genre. Through my research I am able to  gain experience and an understanding of  the audiences response within the thriller genre and how they are meant to react  to certain specific scene within a thriller film.