Psychological thrillers research

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Psychological Thrillers  


Black Swan, Aronofsky (2010) 


  • Psychological thriller is a genre combining the thriller and psychological fiction genres.
  • It is commonly used to describe films that deal with psychological narratives in a thriller or thrilling setting.

 

Conventions:

  • Mystery 
  • Morality 
  • Mental illness
  • Substance abuse (drug abuse, alcohol abuse, etc.)
  • Multiple realities (alternate/dissolving sense)
  • Suspense 
  • Political conspiracy 
  • Pursuit
  • Murder 
  • Serial killings 

 

Typical characters:

  • Criminals, stalkers, assassins, private investigators, serial killers, murderers with motive, psychotic individuals (mental illness), sociopaths, secret agents, terrorists, and cops 

 

Themes: crimes

  • Ransoms
  • Captivities 
  • Heists 
  • Revenge 
  • Kidnappings
  • Dirty investigators/cops 
  • Spies

Themes: General

• insanity vs. reality 
• deviation vs. reality 

 

Narrative:

 

  • Action is suppressed and the 'thrill' factors are provided instead via investigations of the psychologies of the principal characters.
  • Emphasises the unstable psychological states of its characters. The conflict takes place primarily in the mind of the protagonist. The audience need to vicariously (when the audience know more than the characters) see the world through the eyes of the main character. 



Key elements of psychological thrillers: 

1. Major plot twists: much of the excitement is based on the unexpected twists
 
2. Unreliable narrator: revealing the narrator, or another important character to be unreliable can also create lots of suspense and tension as the audience have to figure out who is trustworthy. Paranoia and flawed memories are also common aspects of the genre. 

3. Familiar settings: usually thrillers take place in unrevealing/unexpected settings, such as, homes, but  possibly in abandoned/isolated areas, hence giving it the ‘thrill’ aspect. 
 

 

Psychological thriller movies:


  • Ma 
  • Fractured 
  • Zodiac 
  • Mrs. Serial Killer 
  • Black Christmas 
  • Taking Lives 


How psychological thrillers draw us in:

• Let us feel fear in a controlled way by slowly reeling us by deliberately building suspense. 
• The audience also struggles to figure out what’s actually happening, and take us through the perspective of ambiguous characters as directors create moods of anxiety, fury and confusion. 
• The audience experiences the different thoughts and motives of the characters, by allowing us to see it solely from their perspective. 
• The audience identify with the characters because we have experienced similar emotions to them. 
• Approaching the character’s pursuit of their goal from an emotional basis will allow for more audience connection with the characters. This is most commonly shown through vulnerability and externalising the main character’s internal struggle/major flaw. 

• In order to create a good psychological thriller, an external weakness/vulnerability is created for the characters, therefore visually showing how a problem affects the main character will help create empathy from the audience. 
This is best shown in Shutter Island (2010), which features an escapist of a mental asylum, who turns out to be a detective, investigating his escape. From the initial opening scene, the audience are able to already identify his weaknesses, and are therefore able to understand his emotions better/to a greater depth. 

• Psychological thrillers also tend to downplay the characters, as they’re not the typical superheroes, but instead, an ordinary person in an every-day setting. This allows for the audience to further identity with the characters, as we imagine ourselves in the same position, and ask, “If I was in this situation, what would I do?”. 
• By taking an ordinary person from an evert-day setting and plugging them into situations that test their mental capacity. Therein lies the psychological aspect.  

• Characters in a psychological thriller often function as a detective. They are frequently depicted carrying out some form of an investigation. “The Truth will set you free”. The characters have a problem, identify/acknowledge it, then take action and accept it.
• However, often the characters suppress guilt or regret their actions through the acceptance process, and therefore, create a subconscious. 
These characters subconscious minds create an identity; a person/mask that the character presents to the world, in order to feel safe. This is often the characters survival tactic. 

• The characters also often withhold crucial information, which gets your audience asking questions - curious questions. 
• Seeing characters react to situations in an abnormal or extreme manner can provide the audience with tension. By withholding information, the characters remain suspicious and have questions lingering in their minds - these questions will be answered at a later point. 

• Foreshadowing is yet another technique used, as it will not only allow for the plot twists to make logical sense, it will also enhance the story’s themes. 

• The characters also often have an ‘epiphany moment’, in which they discover love, a lost love, faith or anything that allows them to have a moment of great realisation..”and suddenly everything became clear to him”.

• Keeping with the psychological thriller, the main character experiences a sense of dissolving reality - what they witness, is not the actual reality. This is mostly represented through lies, anxiety, deception, paranoia, hallucinations, mysterious characters, and moral conflict (what’s right and what’s wrong). The characters relationships become distorted or complex. 

• Having an unreliable narrator is another common technique used, in which using the device of an unreliable narrator can increase the audience’s anxiety and interest. They will attempt to solve the mystery and try to determine which characters are trustworthy. 

• In the psychological thriller world, the character’s perception of the world is distorted and their sense of reality is indifferent. Therefore, anything could happen as everything may not be as it seems. 

• The character may also be put in a position that involves them being face-to-face with their fears. But they must be able to make a choice, therefore building suspense and tension. The choice will either lead to them achieving a goal, or failing at the goal, as the decision will not be easy, therefore allowing for the audience to keep following the storyline. 


° This is best shown by the Netflix Movie, “Fractured”, (2017). The movie follows the theme of insanity vs. reality, whilst capturing insanity after an event (occurred the insanity), before, the pure reality is shown. 


squid-game-font

• Close-ups on main character’s faces
• Hand-held/shaky cam 
• Tracking shot
• Dolly Zoom 
• silhouettes 
• dim-lit/lowkey lighting 
• Extreme close-ups 
• Dutch tilt - foreshadowing 
• Creepy dialogue 
• Classical music 





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