Evaluation Question One - In what way does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media productions?

QUESTION ONE: In what way does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media productions?

 

There are many conventions that are used within a real media production. These can include things such as a MacGuffin, Suspense, a twist, fast pacing, slow pacing, Fem Fatale, Red Herring, Cliff hangers etc.

 

Throughout the making of our film we came up with many ideas to use different types of conventions in our film however felt that using a Cliff Hanger, a MacGuffin and suspense would benefit us most with the type of film we chose. We also chose to include other typical thriller conventions such as a point of view shot(POV), close up shots(CU) and high angle shots(HA).

 

MacGuffin:

A MacGuffin is usaually an object that the Antagonist wish to obtain. The MacGuffin in our opening film is a CD named "File 45-7". We chose to use a MacGuffin for many reasons when making our film. One of the reasons being that it would interlink with the name of our film, this showing continuity throughout the making of our film and secondly we needed an object that the antagonist (kidnappers) would go after & cause chaos. The use of the MacGuffin helped support the idea of our film being a archetypal thriller.

 

Suspence:

Suspense it typically known to be a key convention within the thriller genre and real media productions. When talking about suspense i refer to the idea of the build up of an atmosphere in a film that normally leaves viewers wanting to know more and clinging to the edge of their seats. Throughout our film there is a large build up of suspense. For example, when the two boys are walking into the park and arguing  there is a point of view shot which creates suspense as the viewers are then able to get into the role of the kidnapper. Another example of suspense in our film would be when one of the boys gets kidnapped as the suspense and tensions builds up quickly and is very mysterious and the viewers are very keen to find out what is going on and who is behind the mask.

 

Cliff Hanger:

A cliff hanger is a dramatic or exciting ending to a scene of piece of filming leaving the audience/viewer in suspense and creating tension to make the viewer want to see more. Cliff hangers are usually used at the end of scene in a film as they are more effective towards the audience/viewer. In our thriller there are many cliff hangers, we chose to do this as we feel that it will have a big effect on our audience as they are going to have loads of questions about what is going to happen to the characters in the scene. However the kidnapping scene in our film would have to be the biggest cliff hanger as it for one is right in the middle of our opening and secondly is where the main storyline lies.