While thinking up a loose idea of the story, I'm also trying to land on a genre. The film is going to primarily follow an individual with no inherent personality that relies on the media they consume to convey any semblance of one. The concept can be understood through Erik Erikson's stage of Identity vs. Confusion.
In looking up characteristics of Psychological Thrillers, I found What Is A Psychological Thriller? In talking about characters, they are often used to explore the darkest corners of the human mind. Often characters are shown to be obsessed with attaining a goal or with some kind of internal struggle. Some stories are lead by unreliable narrators that provide a source for the manipulation that may be evident in the narrative. All these factors lead to the viewer developing a sense of tension from the uncertainty of plot elements and how a story will unfold
The Black Hole - Directed by Phil Sampson and Olly Williams
This film follows an office worker who stumbles upon a piece of paper that allows objects to pass through other objects. While initially weirded out, the office worker begins to push the limits of the paper black hole by sticking it against a wending machine and grabbing a bag of chips. This act of curiosity than spirals into a descent into greed as the office worker sticks the paper up against a safe and begins to take money out as he becomes more animalistic in behavior. His greed reaches a breaking point when he reaching into the safe with his entire body before the paper unsticks leaving him trapped in the safe.
Practically speaking, its a fairly shut off narrative with one character and single macguffin. The film explores the fine line between curiosity and greed through the actions of the office worker; we see him become obsessed with the possibilities the paper holds. The character isn't presented as an unreliable narrator, but tension is still built up in the film as his greed is displayed more and more.
Similar to Black Hole, this film revolves around a character isolated from the rest of the world in order to satisfy an obsession of theirs. In this case, the character is a drummer who tries again and again to perfect a song. Around the midpoint of the film the drummer walks out, only to walk into an infinite loop as sound of drums swells. At the end the drummer is back with the drum set momentarily before stumbling to the ground in a coughing fit, eventually seeming to die.
This film breathes obsession with how it depicts taking over the life of an individual. The non-linear narrative presented to the viewer leads them to question the validity of the drummer as the main point of view for the film. These elements along with the sound design and editing come together to build up tension for the viewer.
These were two of the more interesting psychological thrillers I found and wanted to share. I knew I wanted to show the mind and desires of my main character, but after having done this research, I know I need to build tension on top of that. These examples also were practically simple with few locations and actors, so I can rest assured that I don't need big and elaborate set pieces to create an engaging story. Also doing this research early on in the process is really helpful for building up a story; last year for my film opening, I foolishly put off my genre research up until right before filming which lead to some last minute changes and decisions that were not fully thought out.
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