Suspense notes

Suspense and thriller films are to promote intense excitement, a high level of anticipation suspense, ultra-heightened expectation, anxiety, uncertainty, and nerve-wracking tension. Suspense films are very popular at the moment, with films such as Angels and Demons, Drag Me To Hell, The Perfect Getaway, Friday the 13th, The Saw films, Halloween II and many more. Not all of these films are thrillers or involve any gore as my trailer should do but they have increasing amounts of suspense throughout the film. The Perfect Getaway has a very good twist of a story with suspense and unexplained happenings throughout, leading up to the end when a sudden and very important detail is revealed with immense amounts of suspense to follow. It has you on the edge of your seat as so many things are happening following such a shocking piece of information about the characters in the film.
As Youtube is blocked (along with practically the whole of the internet) at school, I can't look at the trailer now but when I get home I will be able to. I can then have a quick look at timings and suspense within the trailer!

In class, Mr Delaney allowed us to look at two films to observe the suspension within scenes and how they were constructed and put across. We watched Psycho first which was a remake and homage to the original by Alfred Hitchcock. This film has the classic and iconic shower-murder scene where the murderer creeps up on the protagonist (comes into shot on a slow pan) and you can see a moving outline of them through the shower curtain while the girl still showers unaware. The curtain is ripped back and there is a loud scream. The music over head is the iconic 'eee-eee-eee-eee' of violins while the woman is stabbed and dies dramatically in her own blood running down the drain. The suspense leading up to the killing is immense as the audience can see the killer approaching slowly and her vulnerability is enhanced by standing in the shower with nowhere to run. The only way would be forward and that is where the killer is. The running of the shower over her and the different shots changing with a medium-pace take time increases excitement and anticipation. You want to keep watching the murderer as you know he is there but changing the shots makes us feel vulnerable also. Below is a video of both the 1998 and the 1960 shower scenes in Psycho next to one another. This is a good thing, it helps me compare techniques of suspense and a change in styles of shooting a scene.