Subgenres

By Alyssa Grieveson

What is a subgenre?

A subgenre is a subcategory that is featured within films along with the main genre of the film. The director uses a subgenre to include certain traits from another genre within the film to make it more interesting and appeal to a specific target audience.

Mystery Thrillers:

Mystery film is a sub-genre which is similar to crime films and at times the thriller genre. Mystery thrillers focus on the effort of the detective or private investigator to solve the mystery circumstances of a crime by the clues, investigation and clear deduction.Examples of mystery thriller films:• Shutter Island• The Others• The Sixth Sense• Inception

Crime Thrillers:

Crime thrillers are very similar to mystery thrillers. Crime thrillers focuses on dark, quiet surroundings. They also include both fast paced and suspense action.Examples of crime thrillers:• Inception• Seven• Taken• The Departed

Action Thrillers:

Action thrillers are made to keep the audience on the edge of there seat and to keep them entertained.Action thrillers are sometimes based around some what of a true story, but just the use of weapons and the extent of the actions are over exaggerated. Examples of action thriller films:• Taken• Insidious• Heat

Supernatural thrillers:

Supernatural thrillers include strong characters often with a supernatural power. It also includes elements such as ghosts and vampires.Supernatural thrillers are typically filmed in a dark/night environment, because this creates more suspense and sets the atmosphere a lot better for the film.Examples of supernatural thriller films:• Paranormal activity• The Exorcist• Mama• The Women In Black

Conspiracy Thrillers:

Conspiracy thrillers, features protagonists which are often journalists or amateur investigators who find themselves (often inadvertently) pulling on a small thread which unravels a vast conspiracy that ultimately goes "all the way to the top.”Examples of conspiracy thriller films:• The Bourne Identity• All The President’s Men• Angels & Demons

Psychological Thrillers:

A psychological thriller is a fictional thriller story which emphasizes the psychology of its characters and their unstable emotional states. They have similarities to Gothic and detective fiction in the sense of sometimes having a "dissolving sense of reality“ with complex and tortured relationships between obsessive and pathological characters.Examples of psychological thriller films:• Memento• Saw• Identity

Political Thrillers:

A political thriller, is a thriller that is set against the backdrop of a political power struggle. They tend to involve extra-legal plots designed to give political power to someone, while his opponents try to stop them. Political thrillers can be based on true facts and can involve national or international political scenarios.Examples of political thriller films:• Argo• The Ghost writer• The Assignment