Independent genre research: Conventional storyline

Conventional storyline of thriller movies 

In 1920' Propp analysed multiple Russian folk tales and found that in all the stories the framework of the story is always the same. Propp broke down tales from both Russia and many other countries to smallest possible units and called them narratemes or narrative functions, these consist of things the story needs in order to flow and and move forwards. Not all functions appear in every story however they do go in the same order. Propp's narrative has 31 functions however they all fit into 6 smaller categories that  are: 

• Preparation
• Complication
• Transference
• Struggle
• Return
• Recognition

Thriller storylines are usually filled with suspense throughout. The story usually has one or two people who are the main focal points of the movie with three or four side characters.Thriller movie narrative is usually restricted as most of the time the audience is in the dark about whats going to happen within the movie. This is in order to create suspense and mystery in every sub-genre of thriller.  Often a thriller movie shows a normal life something then causes a disturbance in the normal this can be many different things depending on the sub-genre of the movie, the movie ends with a resolution to the problem and the return to often an new type of normal. Many thrillers play with the viewers emotions by using everyday places and things that then experience some form of disturbance form often a murder or supernatural force. 

Narrative of a thriller is affected by the theme of of thriller movie. Some of the themes a thriller movie may have are psychological, crime, supernatural (often horror) or mystery. 

A psychological thriller:

Taxi Driver (dir. Martin Scorses 2006)

Taxi driver is about an disturbed loner with insomnia who ends up taking a job as a New York taxi driver. Driving through the streets at night he starts to become detached from reality as he dreams of cleaning up the filthy streets. After meeting a pretty campaign worker he becomes obsessed with the idea of saving the world, first plotting to assassinate a presidential candidate, then directing his attention  towards rescuing a 12-year-old prostitute.