Research Tasks - "Joyride" - Hannah Sell

Joy Ride

1. Thriller/horror genre - it is set at night time, near woods which are typical conventions of the horror/ thriller genre. The music is faced paced to build tension. The themes adreed in this film are mainly violence and crime.

2. Something that is unique to this film is that it uses elements of both horror and thriller together most of it is filmed in the boot of the car and sound and props are used to help the audience to identify what is happening out side the car. When the car is pulled over by the police we do not see what happens but we do see the two men holding axes and we do hear screaming and blood drips onto the guy in the boot of the car suggesting to the audience that the two police officers have been killed. The line 'your next' also indicate to the audience that they have been killed. The film leads us to think that he will die but then he comes away from this terrifying ordeal alive but then we are lead to think that he does die from the spark on the electricity pylon but do not see him die so we cannot be sure.

3. The advantages of this format are that the film is mostly filmed in the boot of the car meaning less needs to be shown and filmed but the noises associated with what is going help the audience to imagine what is happening and to put together the sequence of events themselves. like when the car crashes we do not see it crash but we hear noises to indicate a crash and see then car wrapped around a tree at the end making the audience assumptions right. Advantages for this are less has to be filmed but the effect is still the same as if we had seen everything and the film was longer.

4. What i find interesting about the use of sound is lots of non diagetic sound has been used rather than dialouge. This helps with the tension of the film and also makes it shorter as less talking has been used. The dialogue that is used helps to set the scene and gives a break to the music. However the use of music is very effective as it creates suspense but also leaves the focus on what is happening in the film itself.

5. The film seems to be about a man being kidnapped by two men. you seem to think that there must be a reason as to why it is him being locked in the boot as they do not kill him. however at the end you find out that they are just joy riders when the kidnapper wants the police car. you also think that the man being held is very lucky because they do not kill him but the very thing that started it all kills him. The two kidnappers seem very stereotypical they have a weapon, smoke and are dressed in dark colours all of which happens in most films. However the person in distress in this type of film you would think would be a woman alone in a wooded area at night is very stereotypical for a woman to be kidnapped. but instead they have used a man.

Hannah Sell