Planning mise-en-scene - Miss Georgiou

why is mise en scene important within a thriller film?

What is the mise-en-scene of your thriller and why? include images
Include the 5 different elements.

How is the mise-en-scene conventional to a thriller film?

How can your thriller build a relationship with your target audience?

Mise-en-scene is an important factor when making a thriller film because it provides the audience with different perspectives on certain points, and makes them familiar with the thriller genre. We decided accordingly to our narrative idea, the certain aspects of mise-en-scene that will be used. Mise en scene encompasses the most recognisable attributes of a film the setting and the actors; it includes costumes and make-up, props, and all the other natural and artificial details that characterise the spaces filmed. The term is borrowed from a French theatrical expression, meaning roughly “put into the scene”.

The mise-en-scene of our thriller film is a combination of 5 elements; Setting  that creates both a sense of place and a mood and it may also reflect a character’s emotional state of mind, lighting which is an arrangement of key, fill, and back light provides even illumination of the scene and, as a result, is the most commonly used lighting scheme in typical narrative cinema. Furthermore lighting is used to create suspense and tension amongst the audience as it can make the whole scene more dramatic. Costume,hair and make up is also a element which falls within the mise-en-scene category, this involves the adjustment of their appearances. Furthermore facial expressions and body language is a typical feature of mise-en-scene because it provides the audience with the typical conventions of a thriller for example it could create suspense because the audience could be informed about an event which has taken place that resulted in a bad ending.  Finally the positioning of objects or people within the frame is an example of mise-en-scene.


In our thriller clip we will use all of the 5 elements of mise-en-scene as we believe it will provide the audience with the best viewing experience. We are going to be using the setting of an haunted house, as we believe it will add to the whole suspense of our clip. The idea of the house being far from ordinary would juxtapose the whole idea of the women being crazy. At the beginning of our thriller clip the two children would be walking down a quiet street, but when they enter the house there will be lead into various different rooms. The fact that there will be many different rooms within the clip would add to the shock and surprise element because the audience will suspect what is within all of the other rooms.

We will also use the lighting element of mise-en-scene in our clip, low key lighting will be used throughout because it creates a lot of tension and suspense because it restricts the line of sight for the audience. Our group came to the conclusion that the dark lighting would add to the idea of the narrative because the whole clip evolves around the idea of mystery so the fact that the lighting will be very vague and dismal will emphasise the narrative well.

Furthermore costume, hair and make up will be used towards the end when the young girl is getting ready to go out she will be applying make up in order to emphasise her innocence and normality. Hair and make up are always evident in thrillers as they create different emotions and tonal effects. We used the evidence of make up being applied to help build a relationship between the audience and the characters as they're gain feeling for the girl and therefore get more attached to the girl as she shows her vulnerable side.

In our thriller we are aiming to use props quite frequently as we believe it will emphasise the narrative. The first prop that we will use is a hair brush mainly because it adds stress to her innocence because the audience are reminded of her young age. It will also help build a relationship between both the characters and the audience as they feel more sorry for her as she has a prospectus life ahead of her. Another prop that will be used is TV, which will be reffered to throughout the play as the flickering sound will be evident as it will add tension and suspense to the narrative. The props we use will be conventional to a thriller as they create suspense amongst the audience.

Finally facial expressions and body language will be used throughout our clip to contradict certain ideas and to amalgamate certain ideas together. We plan for the girl at the start of the scene to look serious and optimistic as she is getting ready to go out, facial expressions play a pivotal role in films because they create different emotions and feelings amongst the audience. The fact that there is a serious atmosphere would add to the typical conventions of a thriller because it creates tension and suspense.

Mise-en-scene is conventional to a thriller film as it provides the audience with a sense of suspense as there being introduced to different characters/objects within the scene, as the different affects of the lighting could add to the emotions that the audience will be experiencing ultimately it will add to the suspense. All of the combined areas of mise-en-scene can help contribute to building a relationship between the characters on screen and the target audience, because they will propose several new ideas to the audience. Our clip will be conventional to a thriller film so therefore will entail all of the typical emotions that an audience would experience when watching a thriller film. In conjunction with relationships the fact that we have chose to use young victims would add to the suspense of the audience as they may get emotionally attached to the characters.