Intertexuality

Intertextuality is a term to describe the visual referencing between films. Quite literally, films 'borrow' from each other and aspects of certain camera angles, aspects of mise en scene, snippets of sound and editing methods the may be recognizable in some films that has been seen in others.

I will use the example of the synonymous shower scene from Psycho one of the most widely recognized thrillers and this scene has been used in countless amount of movies.
Below is the clip from Psycho and also, Fatal Attraction and What Lies beneath, who have used this scene in their movies also.

In this clip, we see a woman going into the bathroom for a shower, most of the things in the bathroom are white, for example, the batth and the tiles. Whilst she was in the shower you see a shadow of the killer through the translucent shower curtains. The curtains then get pulled back and the woman get stabbed multiple times, whilst struggling to fight off her attacker. We see cutaway shots of the blood dripping down and flowing with the water and then we see a shot of her hand on the white tiles, sliding slowly and then he body sliding down also. Then she grips onto the shower curtain pulling it off as she falls and (we see a close up), then the blood flowing in the bath with the water into the drain. Then a close up of her eye, the camera moves out to show her face then the shower head.

FATAL ATTRACTION

There are many similarities between this shower scene and Psycho one. Some include - the all white bathroom, women are wearing white and also the male. The multiple stabbing of one character, struggling to fight off the attacker. Although they changed it a little as the woman being attacked husband comes along and fights of the killer and drowns her, and there we see the close up of her face in the water supposedly dead (like in Psycho) until she pops back up and gets shot but the woman she tried to kill. Then there's her sliding down the white tiled bathroom war which was also in the Psycho scene

WHAT LIES BENEATH

This scene is a little bit different to the one in psycho but still includes some of its features. There's the same white bathroom and the running shower. The man is trying to kill her but instead of stabbing her to death and he has drugged her so she cannot move, and she'll eventually drown. Another similarity between this scene and Psycho is the close up of the characters face after they've been killed, although she isn't dead, even though she looks dead.


Using the features/elements from other thrillers in our thriller opening will help it to be recognizable as a thriller and it also show our understanding of a thriller and elements that make up a thriller.