Conventions of the Mystery Genre

I followed some conventions of the mystery genre in my trailer in order to create suspense and tension. I followed a typical mystery film narrative as at the start the characters are going about their day to day life, then disequilibrium occurs causing their lives to be disrupted.

Another convention I employed was the use of fade to blacks to build up tension as these create a mysterious feel and connote eeriness. Using this convention allowed the audience to understand the diegesis of the film as they are familiar with this convention and therefore understand that it connotes danger.

 

I also included a recognisable (a detective) as most mystery trailers introduce a 'heroic' character (police officer, intelligent character, private detective) in order to demonstrate that the mystery is difficult to solve. 

The detective character I introduced wore a professional looking outfit, to portray that she is a serious character. I also used a police badge to act as anchoring, which demonstrates to the audience who she is.

Another convention I followed was in terms of lighting, as it was naturalistic when the characters were going about day to day life, but it becomes low-key and more threatening when the 'villain' appears.

Naturalistic Lighting

Low-Key Lighting