Genre Difference, Repetition and Similarity

There are several different thriller films that have key differences that make them unique for example The Silence of the Lambs is a horror thriller and includes a lot of gore and blood however Into the Storm is a disaster thriller which includes tornado seekers and creates a thrilling effect through the characters playing with life or death.Other thriller films that are very different would be Constantine, The Name of the Rose, The Exorcist because they have a religious aspect to them, making them unique and interesting for the audience.

The two different thriller films that I chose are The Cabin in the Woods and Insidious.

Cabin in the woods and insidious share the trait of the same genre however the characters differ very much. In cabin in the woods, by the end of the film we see the reason behind the chosen characters, being the athlete, the scholar, the virgin, the whore and the fool however in Insidious we are shown a typical family of 4 who then become introduced to several characters in the boys head.

Ghoul

Lipstick Face-Demon

The Virgin

The fool

The athlete

The scholar

The whore

Another aspect that differs in the two movies is mise en scene. In cabin in the woods we see a close to empty cabin, where there is very little mise en scene, however we do see a lot of props and things in the basement where the characters begin to see the creepy aspects of the house. They find a diary, toy chest, puzzle, amulet, tape recording, an old sword etc. The interesting aspect of mise en scene that is used in cabin in the woods is all the objects that they find are a subtle symbolic way in which they will die i.e the music box meant they would be killed by the sugar plumb fairy. In Insidious, however a main part of mise en scene that affects the narrative are the drawing that the young boy draws. They create a dark atmospheric tone to the film and give the audience a sense of being on the edge.

When comparing narratives you can see the difference as Cabin in the Woods almost has a comical aspect to it where as Insidious is more on the horror side of thriller. Both movies have gory moments however insidious is scarier where as the gore in Cabin in the woods is relatively comical. Cabin in the Woods also can be identified as a comical thriller due to the fact that there are two realities in the film, one relating to thriller and the unknown and the other is controlling the later.

The similarities however between the two films would be that at the beginning there is a sense of normality and calm and it slowly escalates into a greater, thrilling narrative. Both films are similar in the tone that they create in the creepy rooms, the boys room has dark lighting and it is hard to see which is also the kind of lighting used in the basement when the 5 characters in Cabin in the Woods are discovering the objects. From an audience's perspective we can see that both films have a normal beginning then a climactic build up to the tension filled climax. The Virgin in Cabin in the Woods fulfills the same function as the father in Insidious as both characters have to sacrifice themselves and are left alone to do so to resolve the issue in the narrative.