The document discusses conventions used in the filmmaker's psychological thriller film "Ignis Fatuus". It summarizes how the film challenges some conventions through its use of costume, editing techniques, ambiguous ending, and daylight filming. It also discusses how the film's poster and radio trailer adhere to typical genre conventions through elements like the protagonist image, tagline, and narration/sound effects.

1. Ngoc Nguyen 13A5

2. THE FILM

3. Film Title and Tagline
 “Ignis Fatuus”
 “Something that misleads or deludes and illusion”
 Both the title and tagline, I thought, is very
catchy, intriguing and somewhat clever as it pulls
the audience into watching our film as there is a
sense of mysteriousness which is exciting for the
audience.

4. Costume and Props
This is a feature that all films have. Costumes and
props help give an overall appearance of a character
and the atmosphere.
Example – In our film, the wife is seen wearing a red
satin gown.
In most films, red can be used to portray a character
being playful or aggressive. However, the meaning of
red in our film reflects herself as she is the victim of
her husbands abuse. Also, it foreshadows a coming
event. Therefore, we developed the use of red in films
by giving it more meaning.

5. Editing
 We challenged the conventions of trimming cuts
in films by adding transitions, split screens and
motion blur.
 Example – In the end scenes of our film we
added transitions and a split screen to enhance
the atmosphere of the scene. We also used
motion blur in the running scene to create
suspense and excitement as most running
scenes are usually fast paced, we decided to blur
the scene and decrease the speed to maintain
the suspense and excitement.

6. Using Conventions
Psychological thriller is a genre that focuses heavily
on a character. Certain themes in a psychological
thriller include mind, identity and reality. It usually
contain elements of mystery with horror.
Our film focuses heavily on a male protagonist who
has a conflict within himself (mental stability v
mental illness). However, the audience does not know
this until the very end of our film. Therefore, there are
certain elements in our film which creates
suspense, but we see this through his expressions and
his actions.

7. Developing Conventions
In most Psychological thrillers, there is always a
character surrounded by conflict, and this would be
within itself or the outside forces.
In our film , we developed the conventions of a
psychological thriller of characters being in conflict,
by adding an argument between the husband and
wife in the opening scenes of our films. By doing this,
there is already heavy tension between characters at
the very beginning of our film.

8. Challenging conventions of Thriller
 The thriller genre usually consists of dark
lighting and lurking shadows to create
mysteriousness. However, our film didn’t include
these typical lighting. Instead we filmed in
daylight using natural outside lighting and still
successfully we managed to create the tense
mood and atmosphere we aimed for.

9. Challenging conventions of Thriller
Most conventional Psychological thrillers end with a
solved problem or situation. Films such as Memento
is a good example of this as it ends with a twisted
puzzle.
The way in which our film has challenged conventions
is by leaving the ending unsolved and in a confused
manner for the audience. We leave the story In our
film with the protagonist knowing of his situation but
walking away from it. This allows the audience to
think about their own ending and whether he gets
help or not.

10. THE FILM POSTER

11. The Poster – Typical Features
Film
Company
name
Picture of
protagonist Date of release
Film Title
Rating of
the film.
Tagline

12. Using the conventions towards our film poster
Title of film is the largest font.
There is a single dominant image in the
centre of the main protagonist.
The dark and eerie colour in the
background is a typical colour for our
genre - thriller
It clearly defines the films genre

13. RADIO TRAILER

14. Radio Trailer – Typical Features
Our radio trailer includes the following:
Film title
Name of cast
Production company
Tagline
A male voiceover narrating the story
Music and sound effects

15. Challenging conventions of a Radio Trailer
Creating a radio trailer could be seen as difficult as
the audience can only be reeled in by what they hear.
We used a deep and loud male voiceover as it would
be more exciting and thrilling for the audience.
Music and sound effects played an important role as
it not only creates excitement for the audience but
you can have a sense of what type of film it is. For
example, fast paced music could suggest an action
film.