Creating Enigma

Creating Enigma

The creation of enigma within a film is a common convention found within the thriller genre. In my thriller opening, I want to create an atmosphere of mystery surrounding my antagonist. I want to cause the audience to ask themselves why this man is killing people whom, to them, will seem innocent. In order to ensure that this sense of enigma comes across in my opening, myself, Zoran and Joe created an enigma scene as a form of practice. The purpose being to experiment with  different camera techniques and the technical construction in order to achieve the required effect. 

The finished product, which is extremely short in length which creates an uncomfortableness in it’s own right, shows Zoran entering a building and opening an empty locker which he then slams. This creates a sense of mystery and enigma surrounding the character due to the audience not knowing who he is or what his intentions are, where he is or what he expected to find in the locker. This consequently entices them, as they wish to learn more about the character. 

Due to a limited period of time in which we had to complete this task, we only had an hour, we were unfortunately unable to edit the sound of the piece therefore the film does contain some noticeable background noise coming from other groups creating similar pieces. Time management was clearly key to this exercise because the sound of other groups filming detracts from the sense of enigma and mystery as it suggests this character is actually in a friendly environment and making the piece look unprofessional. Arguably however, it could be said that this makes the piece even further enigmatic due to the fact that the typical conventions of danger are manipulated through the juxtaposing friendly environment.

Although there are a number of things that I feel could have managed better whilst performing this task, one of the key things I believe this task has taught me is that I need to take more control over how I manage the time in which I have available throughout the production process. This is a concern as I plan to film two of the three scenes for Duality in a classroom therefore there will be time constrictions as to amount of time I will be permitted to use the room. In contrast to these issues, on the other hand I feel that there are also a number of successful aspects of the piece as I feel that I have successfully created an enigmatic atmosphere surrounding the character and I believe that the audience would be intrigued to see what he will do next in search for the missing object.

Here is my short enigma piece: