Planning characters - Miss Miller

The representation of a character is how someone is presented to an audience and how they judge this person by looking at their clothing, background and attitudes etc.

In my group narrative for my opening thriller clip, we have 3 main characters, but two of them could be played by the same person. The characters we are planning are described below;

The Little Sister - 
Name - Annie
Age - 10
Gender - Female

Race - Mixed race

Background - She is the little sister to the next character called Ayesha. They are very close which will be shown through the flashbacks in the clip. During the narrative, they go for a walk in the forest which is shown in the flashbacks. We also see 'Annie' walking through the forest by herself, trying to uncover the events which happened, which the viewers do not know about yet.

Purpose to narrative - She is the victim. She will be portrayed as being innocent through her body language and facial expressions making her look sad and lonely.

This character will appeal to the audience because of the way she is portrayed. She looks lonely and sad which will make the audience believe she is innocent and so may be the victim. This is made clear through the use of high angled shots when portraying the little girl. They will therefore sympathise with her, which will mean they are emotionally attached to her throughout the clip. In thrillers, the victim is stereo typically always a female, and so by using a female in our clip, makes it clearer to the audience that she is the victim.
By presenting her in everyday, young clothes such as the pink dress and the pretty pink scarf, it shows her youth, meaning anyone who is a parent or has young friends etc will be able to relate to the little girl, meaning they will feel even more sorry and nervous for her, and will be more shocked when they find out she is dead.


The Older Sister - 
Name - Ayesha
Age - 16
Gender - Female
Race - Mixed race

Background - She is the older sister to the previous character called Annie. They are very close which will be shown through the flashbacks in the clip. During the narrative, they go for a walk in the forest which is shown through the flashbacks. She is only seen in the flashbacks.

Purpose to narrative - This character will help to confuse the audience. They will begin liking her as she is close with her sister, but as the story develops and we discover that she may be the killer, the viewers may feel a sense of hatred or anger towards her due to the betrayal towards her sister. She is used to help create an enigma which is conventional to thrillers as it leaves the audience unsure of what has happened and so they question it and continue to watch to see what happens. Teenagers of a similar age will be able to relate to this character and how she feel, such as if they have a younger sister then they too may have experiences the arguments sibling share. They may also sympathise with her when we see her place the rose down as viewers will never want to lose their little brother or sister, no matter how much they argue, and so will connect very easily with this character.


Killer - 
Name - Unknown / Ayesha?
Age - Unknown / 16?
Gender - Unknown / Female?
Race - Unknown / Mixed Race?

Background - Unknown - The killer could possibly be the older sister which would mean she is close to the younger sister as stated above. Or, if it is not the older sister then the audience do not know who he/she is as his/her identity is kept hidden. This creates an enigma which is very conventional to the thriller genre as it makes them eager to know who the killer is which keeps them engaged with the clip.

Purpose to narrative - The audience should react to the killer in a negative way. He/she should make them feel uncomfortable and should be responsible for creating all of the bad emotions the audience feel. This creates a huge shock when we find out that the killer could possibly be the older sister. The viewers should struggle to accept this as they thought they were two different people, which creates a sense of confusion.