NARRATIVE ESSAY

NARRATIVE ESSAY!!!

The production of the Thriller opening sequence I created is the perfect production to relate to the concept of Narrative. When producing the narrative I had to consider a range of theorists so that the opening I created would intrigue a large audience.

O’sullivan states that ‘all media texts tell us some kind of story’ by this he means that media texts have a way of tell stories about ourselves. In order for the story to engage the audience it must have a Verisimilitude (quality of appearing to be real or true) creating a diegetic effect as it gives the audience more of a meaning to watch it. I created this effect by creating a storyline that has the tendency to be of a real life story where a young female is being followed and taken because she has vital information on the follower yet the audience would not be aware of the reason until further on the film. The audience may even feel a personal _____ towards the female character because she appears to be vulnerable.

However, this supports Barthes concept of Enigma codes (sense of mystery) which was very symbolic in my sequence as the audience are not given the full story or any clues as to what will happen further on the film therefore keeping the audience watching, it also gives the audience the opportunity to start questioning their own ideas and the characters involved. The way in which I managed to create the sense of mystery was through supporting the narrative through the way in which the sequence was filmed and edited, with the use of the soundtrack and a mixture fast paced and a variety of close up and long shots.

Todorov’s theory regarding Equilibrium is a theory I used as the sequence started with a close up shot of a characters eyes following a character who appears to be innocent. At first we are not aware that these two characters have any relation to each other until the last few seconds of the sequence where the female character is taken. This disruption of event is called disequilibrium followed by new equilibrium which is the restoration of the equilibrium. This whole idea is the sense of the five stages that a narrative will go through; basically the narrative will involve a Beginning, Middle and End.

Levi-Strauss has the idea of Binary Opposites which are heavily presented in my thriller opening where I have used a male who has the appearance of someone who you would signify as ‘evil’ or ‘villain’ then you have a female character who has the opposite appearance who gives off the impression of someone who is ‘good’, ‘vulnerable’. This relates to the narrative because without these opposites the characters would be hard to distinguish also the narrative would have no meaning.

Lastly Propp says that narratives always have certain character types who perform certain actions. When it comes to my thriller this is not completely obvious through the sequence I created as I only included small amounts of dialogue however, the audience do get the sense of the type of characters through appearance, choice of camera shots and techniques. Further on in the film the audience would get a better understand of the character types and will eventually be able to define the character type as they would see more action as the female gradually becomes the ‘hero’ figure whereas the male still appears to be the ‘villain’. The certain actions in which they perform that are evident in my opening are when the male actor the ‘villain’ is seen following the female actor and is later on seen taking her. However, when it comes to the female actor her actions give her the sense that she is in a vulnerable state and automatically the audience get the feel that something will happen to her.

Overall, I aimed to use as many theorists in the production of my work to ensure that I would be meeting the concept of a thriller as the audience in which the thriller was aimed would need to have an interest and would watch the thriller as a sense of satisfaction as they know what they would expect. I achieved this well through the use of the mis-en-scene, soundtrack and choice of characters.