Conventions of a Psychological Thriller Opening

Black Swan

Within a thriller opening there are four different conventions that are featured. They are storylines, titles, music and camera angles. Within the different types of thrillers, they will be adapted to suit the type of thriller that is being featured. Within this blog I will be talking about the conventions of a psychological thriller opening within the film 'Black Swan'.

The first convention of storyline is rather simple within this opening title. It shows what seems to be a woman's hand using charcoal to draw a picture. The dark colour of the charcoal foreshadows the fact that the drawing is going to be of a black swan. The fact that it is also a woman's hand that looks very feminine, foreshadows that the main character in the film is a female ballet dancer that aims to dance the famous swan lake performance. This opening scene also links to the genre of it being a psychological thriller. This being the look of the hand drawing is rather hypnotic and entrancing. The idea of hypnosis is very common within psychotic treatments.

 

Another convention of a thriller opening is titles. Within this opening scene titles are very subtle but also rather effective. They begin to appear at the very beginning of the scene on a black background with a bold font but light colour. The font all being in capital letters foreshadows how bold that the film may be. As the first set of titles fade away letter by letter rather quickly, the charcoal in hand appears. Whilst the charcoal is in the woman's hand, more titles appear and then disappear the same way as the previous did. This then continues until the end of the title sequence, repeating each time, the appearance and disappearance of the titles. At the end of the titles, when the music becomes very loud and startling, the words 'Black Swan' appear on the screen in the same font and colour as previously used with the other titles. This then attracts the audience into watching the film because it builds and creates suspense. The use of the harsh font also foreshadows the theme and feel of the rest of the film.

Camera angles is another convention of a thriller opening. This is used within this opening as a close up for the whole scene. The close up of the hand drawing with charcoal doesn't yet reveal the identity of the person drawing but leave a lot to the imagination, by using a feminine hand with dainty fingers. This then foreshadows the fact that there is going to be a ballet dancer as the main character and the dainty finger also contrasts to the sorts of things that the character will be facing within the film.

The final convention of a thriller opening is music. This plays a very big part within this scene as it is used with the sound track of swan lake. This then foreshadows that the film is going to be based around the ballet production of swan lake. The music starts off very subtle at the beginning, playing a good role along side the feminine hand within the scene. The music then begins to speed up, as does the hand. This then leads to the thickness of the charcoal increasing and the gentle strokes of the hand becoming more aggressive. The music runs parallel to this theme by becoming louder, stronger and again, more aggressive. This can be seen in the picture above this. you can see the charcoal is very thick and has indeed snapped due to the force that has been used. This can then insinuate that the female character within this film is also going to 'snap' due to the pressure she is being put under; just like the charcoal. At the end of the scene, the music becomes very bold, loud and even

scary when the titles 'Black Swan' is being shown. This the juxtaposes the way that a swan is usually seen and ballet is usually portrayed.