Research Tasks - 1 - Keira

'Joyride' - Jim Gillespie - 1995.

• Genre = Thriller. Used iconography such as night time setting, rain, blood, cigarette, electricity (signifies danger). Mise-en-scene encorporated dark colours and the lighting was bleak, only hilighting specific things. (For example, when protagonist is in the boot of the car, there's an extreme close up where only his face is shown). Because it's intention is to be realistic, all lighting appeared natural as though it came from an on screen source (e.g. car headlights, moon, electricity pylon explosion). Costume and makeup are realistic to what each character would wear - police in uniforms, protagonist in high visability jacket, antagonists in everyday clothes. Helps the audience establish who's who. Traditional thriller convention with protagonist wearing white t-shirt and antagonists wearing black clothes - suggests contrast between good and bad. The music (non-diegetic) is eerie, mostly simple piano in a repetitive pattern that helps to build tension and create feeling of unease.
• It was interesting that it is almost a dark comedy in the ending, and the policeman saying 'You won't be wanting the cigarette I was going to offer you then'. Little of the violent parts were shown (the police being killed and the man dying at the end) which in a way made it more scary as we were left to imagine what was happening ourselves. I liked the extreme close ups of the man in the boot of the car, as I think they helped communicate a sense of claustraphobia and made the viewers identify with the character more.
• The short story narrative was useful as it was the perfect length to show the events (it may have become boring if any longer and difficult to understand if any was cut out). It allowed a short period in which the protagonist was established, but doesn't let the audience get attached enough to be genuinelly upset by his death at the end (as this would have detracted from the dark humour of the situation also). The choices of opening and ending were clever as the story came full circle and the character says 'This is exactly where I started when all this began.' There is a shot from the same place (high angle with the electricity pylon in the foreground and the man below in the background) which signifies the ironic ending of the plot. If possible I would like to be able to incorporate a similar ending into our advanced portfolio (although I'd rather it wasn't dark comedy).
• As mentioned earlier, the simple piano music sets the scene perfectly for the thriller genre and acts as a backdrop to the action; it gets louder and faster as the tension increases and signifies points of importance in the story. As is typical in thrillers, the diegetic sounds (both on and off screen) which are particularly horrific - e.g. a woman screaming or the man being hit over the head - are emphasised and made louder in order to shock the audience (this also makes up for the fact that we can't see alot of it). Other diegetic sounds are there to create realism (e.g. the radio in the car, the sound of rain etc) and these may have been added as foleys in post-production. After the police are killed the music becomes more synthesised and electronic which connotes an urgency and desperation, to fit with the protagonist's mood. At the end the music returns to the original eerie simple piano from the start, which once again helps to bring the story full circle. The attention to detail in Joyride's sound was something I've learned from in particular, and would like to construct music for our own film that so closely fits the action.
• The protagonist appears like an average working class man (this is suggested by his clothes, job and cigarette smoking). Although the audience are supposed to identify with him to a certain extent, there is also a sense of mocking in his fate - the fact that if he'd fixed the pylon earlier he wouldn't have died seems to condemn his lazy attitude. The antagonists have Scottish accents but do not depict typical Scottish stereotypes; we are supposed to be positioned against them (due to the acts they carry out in the plot, and the fact that the camera predominently focusses on the protagonist). The representation of the police officers is quite unsympathetic as they prove useless in controlling the situation at any point in the plot.

By Keira Smalley