This sub-genre of thrillers appealed to us when researching the top thrillers trailers and openings. Here are some we found:
The Usual Suspects is a 1995 American neo-noir film written by Christopher McQuarrie and directed by Bryan Singer. It stars Stephen Baldwin, Gabriel Byrne, Benicio del Toro, Chazz Palminteri, Kevin Pollak, Kevin Spacey and Pete Postlethwaite.
The film follows the interrogation of Roger "Verbal" Kint, a small-time con man who is one of only two survivors of a massacre and fire on a ship docked at the Port of Los Angeles. He tells an interrogator a convoluted story about events that led him and four other criminals to the boat, and of a mysterious mob boss known as Keyser Söze who commissioned their work. Using flashback and narration, Kint's story becomes increasingly complex. The establishing shot is an Extreme close up of a book of matches struck alight, the fire already portraying danger to the audiennce. We are then introduced to the first character, who is smoking a cigarette. The audience are yet to learn his name, but from this shot we can see he is being held captive. The camera is focused on the character, with fire in the background out of focus. As the first character alights the strip, it makes the audience wonder that this fire is going to kill him and anyone else on the ship. The strip is then put out by another character, dressed dark and mysteriously with a black coat and something covering his face. this then makes the audience uncomfortable because they ask the question that is this the person keeping the hostage character captive. When the mysterious character is introduced, music is played to show that this charcter is dangerous. The camera is low, looking up at the villain character (portrayed as a villain because he is in shadow and cant make out any features) giving him a sense of power of the captive victim. The camera tracks the villain down the stairs and the music gets louder and faster, like it is building up to something big. The villain then speaks to the victim, with a low, croaky voice, almost taunting the victim.
'How you doing keith'
This is said by the victim to show that he is in control and has power over his victim. The camera is looking down on the victim, showing he is in trouble. A gun is then shown which makes the audience even more uncomfortable, with the music still loud in the background. Suspense is created when the gun is changed to his left hand, and two shots are fired. Just before these shots, the time is asked by keith who is told it is '12:30' when these shots are fired, the last words spoken are remembered to the audience as a time of death manipulating them.
The Butterfly Effect is a 2004 American sci-fi psychological thriller film that is written and directed by Eric Bress and J. Mackye Gruber and starring Ashton Kutcher and Amy Smart. The title refers to the metaphorical butterfly effect, a popular principle in chaos theory which states that in any dynamic system, small initial differences may, over time, lead to large unforeseen consequences.
Kutcher plays 20-year-old student Evan Treborn, with Smart as his childhood sweetheart Kayleigh Miller. He finds he has the ability to travel back in time to inhabit his former self and change the present. Having been the victim of several childhood traumas aggravated by stress-induced memory losses, he attempts to set things right for himself and his friends, but there are unintended consequences for all. The film draws heavily on flashbacks of the cast's lives at ages 7 and 13, and presents several alternate present-day outcomes as Evan attempts to change the past, before settling
on a final outcome.
The film begins with sound effect leading straight to mystery. The frist shot is a man walking behind some blinds, very quickly, making you curious to know who he is. The screechy faded sounds portray tension for the audience and clash with the notes that creates an irritant sound. As soon as the necessary titles have been shown on top of this scene behind the blinds, the music breaks out into a louder, sudden noise while this main character breaks open the door in a rush and starts jumbling things around in a room which looks like it is in a hospital or public area – all because of his clothing which looks like a hospital gown, and the fact there is a public water machine with sofas and paperwork around. The audience is intrigued to watch more because its not clear what this man is trying to gain from jumbling objects and lying under a desk.
Shutter Island is a 2010 American psychological thriller film directed by Martin Scorsese. The film is based on Dennis Lehane's 2003 novel of the same name. Production started in March 2008. Leonardo DiCaprio stars as U.S. Marshal Edward "Teddy" Daniels, who is investigating a psychiatric facility located on the island named in the title. The film grossed over $128 million in its initial domestic theater release.
The Shutter Island trailer starts firstly with a ship approaching the camera through a dense mist, The boat appears through a thick dark mist and prevails as the light object, this perhaps suggesting that the boats occupants are the ‘good guys’, the camera then quickly jumps to a shot of the boats desitination, which is also overlaped by some dialogue which points out that the boats destination is a mental institution, a place which is percieved to be evil. The shots used in this first part of the trailer are all very jumpy and quick, tense music is also used. The music almost instantly goes from quite a nervy feeling to a very loud and screeching noise, these two things put together are very conventional of the horror/thriller genre.
The shot of the gates opening is an attempt to invite the audience into the film and to try and make them a part of the narrative, once the gates open and we enter, the music very quickly changes producing tension for the audience.
We then see a shot of the two men talking on the boat and then very quickly after we see a shot of a man inside the institute in a prison cell, this could be an example of, good vs evil, light vs dark, innocence vs violence and so on.
When the prison officer says “you are hereby required to surrender your firearms” it gives the marshal and the audience a great sense of unease as the weapon is the marshals last line of protection.
Inception is a 2010 science fiction action heist film which was written, co-produced, and directed by Christopher Nolan. The film features an international ensemble cast including Leonardo DiCaprio, Ken Watanabe, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Marion Cotillard, Ellen Page, Tom Hardy, Cillian Murphy, Dileep Rao, Tom Berenger, and Michael Caine. DiCaprio plays Dom Cobb, a specialised corporate spy and thief whose work consists of secretly extracting valuable commercial information from the unconscious minds of his targets while they dream. Wanted for murder and unable to visit his children, Cobb is offered a chance to regain his old life as payment for a task considered to be impossible: "Inception", the implantation of an original idea into a target's subconscious.
The film the immediately cuts to the protagonist lying face down on the shore but before hand having a strong establishing shots of the rough and noisy sea. The first close up of the protagonists face is shown and is a canted angle shot. In the distance there are small children playing in the sand, this creates confusion for the viewer as the two things don’t go together, they are then shown running off in the distance. The Protagonist then blacks out and the scene then continues to show a random unknown character finding him on the beach. The Protagonist is shown in dull and trampy looking clothes in contrast to the high class soldier looking character. A low angle shot is evident to show to the viewers that the soldier has a higher status. The scene is then cut showing the protagonist being dragged into the room, this creates stress for the viewers as they still don’t actually know who or what the protagonist is trying to do or his aim. The location is also a mystery so this allows the viewers to ask questions and slowly feel further and further dragged into the storyline. The dramatic low level non diegetic bassy music is still being played while the close up of the protagonist eating supper. The character is hunched over the bowl as though he has not had food for awhile, which also leads to more unanswered questions. The room in which the protagonist and the new and another unknown character is released, is dull but beautiful at the same time. Low lighting with a huge table in the middle, this shows that who ever owns the house is a much higher class than the protagonist. There is then a close up of the spinning top, which builds tension as the viewers are waiting for the moment in which it topples over, but never does so. The next scene takes place, and it shows the protagonist in another scene but the same location. He is with two new completely different characters, and all the characters in this scene are wearing smart suits all showing they are they same status. The protagonist then starts to talk, and the cuts and speed of the cuts quicken. Over the shoulder and conversation shots are used effectively to make the viewers feel more comfortable which also makes it more natural to watch, A high angle shot is also used in this scene to show that the protagonist is more in control than any other character in the scene.
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