Unknown 2011

I have just finished watching "Unknown", this is a really good thriller. This is a typical thriller because it has all the components needed for a thriller such as a McGuffin, fast paced editing, and non-stop action. 

"Unknown" is about a man awakens from a coma, only to discover that someone has taken on his identity and that no one, (not even his wife), believes him. With the help of a young woman, he sets out to prove who he is. in unknown there is a big twist at the end where we find out that the person whose identity is taken is actually apart of a group of assassins and he was on an undercover mission where he hit his head in the accident and he believed he was the cover he had took on to kill the Prince.

One of my favorite scenes in "unknown" is the car chase scene, this scene is very fast paced and exciting. there are a lot of moments in this scene where you think they had escaped but the person who was chasing them reappears. 

In the scene where she is trying to defuse the bomb, you expect her to diffuse the bomb but in this film she doesn't and the bomb blows up which helps the main character remembers all of his past and remembers how to fight killing the last person in the groups of assassins.


This picture shows the Main character in the middle of the poster, with the background in the middle is different to the rest of the background, where it shows the person who helps him take back his life and his life on the right.  The colours in the background also give off an effect of mystery and darkness within the film.

Haribo Media Prelim Task

The Preliminary task is to show continuity editing.
We had to show; Match on action, shot/reverse shot, 180 degree rule, eye line match.

 In this task we was asked to create a short film where person A walks into a room and goes and talks with person B in this scenario we had Person A talking to two people. After they had a conversation person A had to leave the room.

When we was filming the hardest part was trying to film the match on match action, this was hard because we had to make it look like it was all done without changing positions of the camera and doing it in two takes. When we filmed the conversation I had to move the camera into different angles so it didn't get boring in the same angle and kept the audience entertained.

There was some mistakes when we was filming for example the mic was it on and we had finished filming so we had to re film the whole film again. this was annoying but i feel the second time recording the clips would have been better than the first lot of clips anyway so if anything it was a positive.

The editing was the hardest and longest part of this process because it took long to find the correct clips and put them together, there are a few mistakes in the editing but this was because it was one of the first films we had edited, but overall i think it came out good and better than i expected it to.

Psycho (1960)

Phoenix office worker Marion Crane is fed up with the way life has treated her. She has to meet her lover Sam in lunch breaks and they cannot get married because Sam has to give most of his money away in alimony.One Friday Marion is trusted to bank $40,000 by her employer. Seeing the opportunity to take the money and start a new life, Marion leaves town and heads towards Sam's California store. Tired after the long drive and caught in a storm, she gets off the main highway and pulls into The Bates Motel.The motel is managed by a quiet young man called Norman who seems to be dominated by his mother. That night Marion gets killed in the shower of the hotel room, which is called the best scene ever shot, after that Norman the owner comes running in looking sad and angry at someone at this time the audience feels that it was his mother who had killed Marion because Norman wanted invite her into the house. But at the end we realize that Normans mother had died many years ago and he had a split personality and he was killing the women.

The main character dying so quick into the film is odd because traditionally the main character is normally ion the film for the whole film or most of it.

The money that Marion stolen was a Maguffin, a Maguffin is when something happens to carry the film forward. So the money she stolen helps carry the film forward because she ends up at the hotel where she dies because of the money she has stolen.

        This is the story board of the shower scene, this is classed as one of the best ever scenes shot, this is due to the editing, music and the suspense that is created while she was showering. 

        The editing was very good on this scene because it helps create tension and the inevitability that she is going to get hurt or that something is not right.

        The music when Marion gets stabbed is a perfect choice in music because it emphasizes the fact she is getting stabbed and it is out of the ordinary.

That scene was one of the many fast paced action in the film, other scenes are the scene where Norman is sinking the car in the swamp and it looks like it will not sink so it starts to get tense, the next is when the investigator gets killed on the stairs. These scenes are the type of scenes that are normally found in thrillers.

But unusually there is not a hero in thriller which is uncommon of a thriller movie, this makes Psycho stand out and make it a very good film. if you was going to say there is a hero, i would personally say that it was Marion's lover who saved her sister from Norman when he tries to kill her.

Throughout this movie Hitchcock used many cliffhangers, suspense, and red herrings. Just after Marion dies you expect it was Norman who killed her, then you think it is his mother when he runs in and cleans up the mess. Then finally at the end when Marion's sister finds the skeleton we realize it was Norman, acting as his mother, who killed her.

North By Northwest (1959)

I have watched the film 'North by Northwest' this film was very enjoyable and exciting. The film is about a ‘innocent’ New York advertising executive is mistaken for a government agent by a group of foreign spies, and is pursued across the country while he looks for a way to survive. 

'North by Northwest' was directed by the legendary Alfred Hitchcock, and written by Ernest Lehman. The main stars of the film are Cary Grant, Eva Marie Saint, and James Manson. 

This is an archetypal thriller because it has fast past frequent      action which is needed when making a thriller. The most entertaining part of 'North by Northwest' is the plane scene.   This scene is about the main character thinking he is       meeting up with the government agent he has been        mistaken for, but it is actually the spies who try to hit him         with a plan but end up failing and crashing the plane into a  truck.  

Alfred also implements a red herring which is the lady who he meets on the train, this because when we are first introduced to her you feel that she is going to be able to help the main character, but then we find out she is actually working for the spies, later on in the film we realize she is actually a undercover agent for the government and is a good person.