Film Research - Similar films and examples

Genre of film: Psychological Thriller/horror

Typical Psychological Thriller/Horror
a psychological thriller is usually a fictional story that emphasises the psychology of its characters and their unstable emotional states to build tension. They usually have elements of mystery, drama, horror etc. The fear is usually created within the mind of the character and it has an impact on the audience.

Similar Film genre:

• The Shining
• The Ring
• The Sixth Sense
• Black Swan
• The Changeling

Similar Story lines:

• Thirteen
• Pulp Fiction
• The Conjuring

A psychological/thriller example:

Black Swan:

Storyline: A ballet dancer has just won the lead in the play "Swan Lake" as a delicate White Swan but she slowly loses her mind as she becomes more and more like the Black Swan.

Characters: The film consists of an upcoming ballet dancer Nina (Natalie Portman) who still lives with her mother, the other main character is Lily (Mila Kunis) who plays another dancer who is quite the opposite to Nina.





Nina (Natalie Portman)

(Mila Kunis)

Storyline

Evan Treborn grows up in a small town with his single, working mother and his friends. He suffers from memory blackouts where he suddenly finds himself somewhere else, confused. Evan's friends and mother hardly believe him, thinking he makes it up just to get out of trouble. As Evan grows up he has fewer of these blackouts until he seems to have recovered. Since the age of seven he has written a diary of his blackout moments so he can remember what happens. One day at college he starts to read one of his old diaries, and suddenly a flashback hits him like a brick.

Characters

The film includes the main character (Evan Treborn played by Ashton Kutcher) at 3 stages in his life, at seven, thirteen and in adulthood. He is shown more in his adulthood looking back at his younger years as he suffers from flashbacks and memory loss and when he finds his diary he tries to change the past and what happened but his retains his mind in the present. Before he tried to change his past, he is smart, studying psychology at college. He is the main character throughout. The other main character is his love interest from a very young age, we see her as a different type of character in each flashback and age due to what has previously happened. However as a young child/teenager she was seen as shy and timid however she had a rebellious side to her, she doesn't wear make up often and has a natural look to her.

The typical psychological/horror film:
Characters:
Usually in a psychological/horror film, the main characters are usually younger people who have just hit adulthood. They are usually suffering from their own personal problems: maybe alcoholism, anxiety, being lonely etc. The characters emotions/fears are played with in the film, to the extent where they can go insane. Either the character finds out the problem and over comes it or they are defeated.




Mise-en-scene:
Setting: The location of most of these films are usually in a small, lonely surbubian area with no sense of community, most of the people in the area are oblivious to what is happening or they make out they don't know. The setting usually is dark and has an eerie vibe to it. Everyone in the community is usually not aware what is happening and carrying their lives on as usual.  
Lighting: Most of the lighting in these typical genres are dark and mostly greyscale, they usually give a dark atmosphere so it looks eerier and more mysterious however they have to have a normal/daylight for the parts where everything is normal and nobody knows whats happening.  
Make-up: Usually the protagonist are pale-faced and have dark eyes or they wear minimal make-up to show how weak and tired they actually are.
Costume: Usually the characters are wearing everyday uniforms or clothes because it's meant to be psychological rather than obvious to the world. More dark colours are warn by the main characters.
Props: Most films of this genre use props which are used in everyday life as they are thrown about or have a meaning.









Iconography:
This genre uses a lot of iconography in different ways. In most films of this genre, dark corners and dead ends are used, this lets the audiences own imagination run wild as you can't really see whats happening so they have to imagine themselves also usually they can run away no further. In horrors which are mostly gory, a lot of weapons are used such as: knifes, guns, axes, chainsaws etc and you instantly, as the audience, think murder and death. In the films, a lot of blood can be used to give the feel or danger, harm or murder. It has a lot of interpretations. Depending on the film itself, different techniques and strategies are used to link to psychological horrors. For example, mirrors might be used which scares the audience for it's own personal experience, it usually represents the characters inner self. This is done in Black Swan. Moreover, innocent children are after used when it is a family based setting who are the ones who usually spot whats going on first but have no idea.

Individual Film Study

Individual Film Study

Genre: psychological horror

Similar Films To Our Own..

Shutter Island

U.S. marshal Teddy Daniels is assigned to investigate the disappearance of a patient from Boston's Shutter Island Mental Hospital/Prison. He's been pushing for an assignment on the island for personal reasons, but before long, he begins to wonder whether he hasn't been brought there as part of a twisted plot by hospital doctors whose radical treatments range from unethical and illegal to downright sinister. Teddy's forward investigating skills soon provide a promising lead, but the hospital refuses him access to records he suspects would break the case wide open. As a hurricane cuts off communication with the mainland, more dangerous criminals "escape" in the confusion, and the puzzling, improbable clues multiply, Teddy begins to doubt everything - his memory, his partner, even his own sanity.

This film is similar to ours in the sense that an individual is drove insane by self torment and question his own sanity, the film also reaches a peak of realization at the end just as our own film does.

Things the film does to display its genre:
the films color scheme stays mainly grey and black colors making sure the lighting is dull and also using reds to highlight important information or key points, the film also uses flashbacks to great effect but showing them not as the audience remembers them, this is used to make the audience question their own minds and make them feel uneasy about not remembering what just happened

Case 39:

Social worker Emily Jenkins is assigned to investigate the family of ten year-old Lilith Sullivan as her grades have declined and an emotional rift with her parents has emerged. Emily suspects that the parents have been mistreating Lilith. Emily's fears are confirmed when Lilith’s parents try to kill her by roasting her in the oven at home. Emily saves Lilith with the help of Detective Mike Barron. Lilith is originally sent to a children's home, but she begs Emily to look after her instead. With the agreement of the board, Emily is assigned to take care of Lilith until a suitable foster family comes along. In the meantime, Lilith’s parents, Edward and Margaret are placed in a mental institution.

Not too long after Lilith moves in, strange things begin to happen around Emily. Two weeks later, another of Emily's cases, a boy named Diego suddenly murders his parents, and Barron informs Emily that somebody phoned Diego from her house the night before the crime. As she is suspected of involvement in the incident, Lilith undergoes a psychiatric evaluation by Emily's best friend, Douglas J. Ames. During the session, however, Lilith turns the evaluation around, asking Douglas what his fears are and subtly threatening him. That night, Douglas receives a strange phone call and is panicked by a mass of hornets coming out of his body; in hysteria, he kills himself in his bathroom. The film continues with the torment of each character until once again as typical with this genre a climax is reached.

  

Film Ideas 2

One minute they was sat watching television and the next they were inside the television and the game became real life. Or was it? One way or another they have to get out in this reality game show which somebody was hosting who was a serial killer. They had to do a series of challenges to get home however they weren't ordinary challenges, it involved Electric shocks... Pain... Emotional pain... Blood... 5 people start and only one gets out but who?

Film Ideas

Genre: Psychological/Thriller

Setting: Bedroom

Whilst her daughter was upstairs in her room (studying, that's what she thought) she was making tea for the two of them as her husband was never around. As she was shouting her daughter, there was no answer and she thought it was because her music was playing really loud but as she crept upstairs, beginning to raise her voice. She entered her daughters room who was passed out on the floor, cold as ice with blue lips. Looking around they're was no sign of forced entry or anybody's presence being in the room, her mother was going insane, the next minute her daughter was sat on the bed but she was still dead, she was going completely insane and didn't know what yo do, she wwanted to know what caused this so she set out a plan, an investigation and would not stop until she found out who had killed her daughter and how it happened...

Individual Film Idea 2

Genre: Thriller/horror

Setting: Home, Court flashbacks

A girl arrives home after testifying against a man for the murder of her brother, of which she was a witness. Sudden flashbacks of the murder and trial occupy her mind. She seems relieved that her ordeal is over yet still haunted about the events. She proceeds to make herself comfortable at home and enters her bedroom where she finds a letter. She picks it up and it reads "if you want to see your mother again, do exactly as I say". As she reads, an anonymous character gabs her and covers her mouth.

Final Group Idea

Genre - Horror/Thriller

Setting - Party, house, a quiet town

 

The film opens in a dream sequence featuring two girls. One girl convinces her friend to try drugs however she is reacts very badly to them. She throws up and subsequently passes out.

The first girl awakes from the nightmare to face a relatively normal day. However, the sense of reality diminishes when sees the ghostly figure of her friend with blood running from her nose.
 

Throughout the film, her nightmares and ghostly visits become predominantly more vivid and terrifying. However, she does not tell anyone about what happened that night as she maintains that she only found her friend and she had nothing to do with her death. Police have ruled that the death included no foul play and she died of a cocaine and alcohol overdose. Her friend's reputation is tarnished and family is distraught by her death. The dawning realisation of what she did and saw that night becomes more and more intense.

She distances herself from everybody, even her closest relatives and family. She analyses every small detail of the death. It consumes her. She becomes a complete recluse. Her personal relationships become incredibly strained. The steady progression into madness leads the people around her to think that she was involved with her friend’s passing. She is sent for questioning by her worried parents and friends.  However after asking her numerous questions about the night, the police believe that it is not suitable to interrogate her anymore as she does not seem at all responsible and suffering from anxiety.

One night though, she has the most intense nightmare about that night. It is a clear flashback of the events of that night. She wakes up and hallucinates that her friend is hanging over her, demanding that she tell everyone.

After maintaining her innocence for so long, she admits to friends and family exactly what she knows.


Inspiration taken from: Skins, Pretty Little Liars,

Individual Film Idea 1 - Heroin and Heroes

Genre - Mystery/Thriller

Setting - Party, home, a quiet town

The film begins at a busy house party. It is a typical party full of teenagers drinking and meeting people. Everything seems perfectly normal until the main character, in an incredibly drunken state, walks into a quiet back room. In front of her, her innocent friend is lying dead on the floor. No one seemingly knows how or when she died but she is sure someone is to blame.

Police have ruled that the death included no foul play and she died of a heroin and alcohol overdose. She refuses to believe it eve though everyone else accepts it and try to continue with life. Her obsession with her friend’s death begins privately but progresses beyond her imagination.

She suspects everybody, even her closest relatives and family. She analyses every small detail of the death. She has frequent nightmares about the night, which become increasingly more vivid. It consumes her. She becomes a complete recluse. Her personal relationships become incredibly strained. The steady progression into madness leads the people around her to think that she was involved with her friend’s passing. She is sent for questioning by her worried parents and friends.  However after asking her numerous questions about the night, the police believe that it is not suitable to interrogate her anymore as she does not seem at all responsible and suffering from anxiety.

One night though, she has the most intense nightmare about that night. It is a clear flashback of the real events of the night. She sees her friend in that back room. They seem to just be having a regular drunken conversation but it gets more and more aggressive. Her friend taunts the girl about her boyfriend but apologises immediately afterwards. The girl seems to accept. Afterwards, she comes back to her friend and offers to share a bag of cocaine with her from which she accepts. The girl lets her friend try it first. It is revealed that the cocaine is actually powdered heroin, which the girl knew. This leads her friend to die of an overdose.  

Inspiration taken from: Pulp Fiction, Skins

Idea 1 - Sharings Caring

Cameron Farrell

Genre : Thriller

Setting – Home

A man wakes up one evening and goes to his kitchen to get a glass of water, he arrives to find the fridge wide open and a bottle spinning on the floor (room only illuminated by the fridge light) he shuts the fridge door and suspects a fox of getting into his house through the open window in the kitchen, he shuts the window, cleans up begins to head back upstairs (black shadow crosses landing as he rubs his eyes, this is only visible to the camera) Goes to bed and clock goes from 2am then fades out then in to 9am.

            He gets up next day gets dressed for work and the camera fades to black (time passes) shows the man arriving home to a front door that is wide open and is house is a mess, he begins cleaning and starts thinking of a solution. Due to thinking burglars are to blame he goes to his garage to find a walkie talkie and sets it up with celotape and puts it around the button of the one in the kitchen, he then takes a torch and a knife and keeps it next to his bed….

            (Skipping to middle of the night)… woken up by screaming in the house, he grabs the knife and torch, runs into kitchen to find fridge open again and a small knife on the floor covered in blood, he then hears footsteps running up stairs, he follows them to the entrance of the attic and catches the hatch to the attic shutting just as he gets to the landing, he gets of a step ladder from a cupboard and knife in hand but torch switched off, makes his way up the ladder into complete darkness and is met by a horrible smell,  he switches the torch on to find a man living in his attic surrounded by empty food packets, bottles or urine and bleeding from knife wound made in the kitchen,  the man he finds smiles at camera (flashes to black)