Openings

Done some more research into the Psychological Thriller openings, by doing this I found out quite a fair bit about what the typical elements of these openings are, I looked at a few openings:

The Sixth Sense
We Need To Talk About Kevin
Seven
The Butterfly Effect 3: Revelations
American Psycho
Donnie Darko 
Saw 

I looked at 4 out of the 7 in greater detail because these were the ones that had the most gripping and interesting openings and used key elements like creation of enigma, pace and rhythm, really well:

                                             The Sixth Sense

                                  We Need To Talk about Kevin

                            The Butterfly Effect 3: Revelations 

                                             American Psycho

                            

Psychological Thriller Films: Quick Analysis

Some Quick Analysis...

The Sixth Sense is a great example of a psychological thriller due to a plot twist that is not expected at the end, an outcasted child, councillor and misunderstanding parent is used as the typical stock characters to help move the story along and produce some good twists and story lines.It also uses some stock settings like a church and a bedroom where they go for safety and sanctuary. It mainly involves supernatural elements, e.g. a gift of being able to see the dead. This film messes with your mind due to the plot twist and the suspense of not fully knowing what is wrong with the child.

The Sience of the Lambs, there is a lot of use of the stock characters of police/investigators and is based around a serial killer whom does unspeakable things and leads to the idea that he has mental issues.

Seven, a psychological thriller about a typical stock character of a serial killer and two detectives/investigators trying to figure out why he is killing and what his killings mean. This has an ending which could be expected or not expected with some viewers also we are having to go on this investigation along with the two investigators and find out information at the same time as them and find ourselves trying to work out this mystery as well as the investigators.

Donnie Darko, has the typical stock characters especially the troubled teenager and therapist/councillor. He has an imaginary friend whom he can only see and tells him to do things. This is a good example due to having majority of stock characters and even has that little bit of supernatural element to it to make it even more intense, intriguing and psychological. 

Others...

Questionnaire & Survey Monkey

We did a questionnaire so that we can find out more about what people want to see in our film genre, so that when it comes to making our opening scene, it will be what people expect in a way and will have a positive outcome and we will have much more clearer understanding of what we are doing and know we are along the right tracks. We did a draft first and then made it on a website (www.surveymonkey.com) we have emailed it many people to fill in so we can get results. The website link for the questionnaire is: https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/Q3QS6Q7 

We have chosen to include open and closed questions due to then being able to collect both quantitative data (from the use of closed questions like yes/no, so that way we get a percentage or figure) and qualitative data (from the use of open questions so we can see what people think themselves and there is a full in depth description) This questionnaire goes towards primary research. We will also do a focus group and show them some openings and discuss them soon, so that we get more of an idea and more primary research.

                                                                       

This is the questionnaire up on Survey Monkey

Draft Questionnaire 

Draft of Questionnaire

Researching Into the Chosen Genre...

 Psychological Thriller, Codes and Conventions

Inside Booklet

Expansion of Booklet so Includes Textual Evidence

This is the start of the main body of research, one of the main aspects: The Genre, without knowing the genre it is much harder progressing research into audience etc... Looked at the typical themes, stock characters, plots, stock settings and narrative of a psychological thriller. *Iconography - 'Drawings'*

First Brainstorm

First brainstorm done to help produce later research... What do I need to research and why?

Started off by writing and drawing out a table of the 3 W's, 'What', 'Where' and 'Why' and put down ideas for what needs to be researched, this helps to put everything into perspective so it is easier for when it comes to the main body of research, it helps to show what will be primary and secondary research and when it comes to the main body of research I can look back at this table to see how I can get my research and remind myself as to why I need to research it.