Thriller Genre All information is from either Google or IMDB.

Reflections Films of the thriller genre often use reflections to introduce their main character, so that it doesn’t just show them completely head on and it makes it more mysterious. For example here in ‘Seven’,(1995)David Fincher, we can see the reflection of the character and only the bottom of his face.

Poor lighting Thriller films also use poor lighting sometimes to introduce a character for the same reason as using reflections. It means we are not just seeing them head on in perfect light and therefore makes it mysterious. An example of this is in ‘Bullet Boy’(2004)Saul Dibb, where you can barely see the character’s face because it is so dark. The fact that the character is in a dark space is emphasised by the fact that he is using a torch too.

Extreme close-ups The use of extreme close-ups in thriller films is often to try and show only the character’s expressions/emotions so that we can begin to understand how they are feeling without seeing anything else like their body language or the location they are in. A good example of this is in ‘Arlington Road’(1999)Mark Pellington, where there is an extreme close-up of the character’s right side of their face, and we can see that there is something wrong possibly as he is sweating and his eyes are red, but we have no idea why he’s in this condition or where he is.

High angles (Looking down on a character) High angles are used in Thrillers to show that the character may be intimidated or weak or scared by making the spectator feel subliminally empowered as they are looking down on the character. An example of this is in ‘Brick’(2005)Rian Johnson where the camera is pointing down on the character and he is looking up at it, making him seem weak and helpless, which could show he might be scared of something.