Conventions Of A Psychological Thriller

Psychological thrillers are slightly more challenging than most mainstream movies. This may be because they often reverse the traditional 'thriller' balance of plot and character. A standard thriller emphasises plot; psychlogical thrillers however, emphasise character equally or more. Also, they are often analysed from a pschological point of view.

The main theme of 'Identity' involves mistaken identity, stolen identity, dual identity, doppelgangers, confused identity and amnesia. The theme of 'Perception and Reality' can give us an insight of the narrative from the perspective of mor than one characters. A character having a different perspective of what is and what isn't real compared to the norm is often used to establish in the film. These are all sub conventions of a psychological thriller, some more are:

• Clever and unusual plots making the audience think in depth, often back to front by using flashbacks avoiding the typical structure of films. (Such as action) Twists used at the end to make the audience doubt themselves 
• often end on a cliffhanger , not always a resolution 
• question reality
• unusual heros, different from most films where hero is stereotypically big, strong, handsome etc..
• unusual dark themes
• focus on one psychological dimension
• typical narrative structure not used
• parallel edits, use of flashbacks
• characters in conflict with their own mind due to psychologically related problems/handicaps
• 2 characters preying on each others minds
• Danger is on a mental level rather than physical
• Mysterious

This particular sub-genre have emerged and evolved over the past years, in many different types of media including, film, literature, radio and books. Although these types of media are different, there has been a consistent trend of conventions used within them. For example:

• The Mind- Which is where you will discover a persons  personality, thought, reason, memory, intelligence and emotion. This is often used to help characters reach understandings about themselves that they must first battle with their own mind and create a narrative conflict to do so.
• Purpose or Existence- This is when a character/characters try to discover the reason for their existence, which is often shown and resolved through the narrative's conflict.
• Reality – The quality of being real. When the characters try to determine what is true and what isn't, within the narrative.
• Perception – An unreliable narrator is often used to alter the interpretation of the world around them through senses. They sometimes misperceive characters.
• Identity – This is when the characters are confused about who they are and try to discover their true identity.
• Death – Characters often either fear or have a fascination with death in this genre, however, it is less gorey and more psychological.