My dream is to become a director. I want to direct a Hindi film. I have two scripts ready. One of them is a fantasy-adventure, while the other is a thriller. I’ve assisted my brother Selvaraghavan, who’s a well-known director in Tamil cinema. I’ve also made short films.
Well, if you’re writing a thriller, you have to have your character in mortal jeopardy on page 1 or it’s not a thriller.
I always say ‘thriller;’ if they see you’re a woman – and you’re a blond woman – people assume you’re writing about cats and romances where somebody has died.
On behalf of the entire cast, I urge the audience to please watch ‘Seven.’ It is a mass entertainer and thriller. You will see me in a new light in this one.
While thinking about ‘Freedom,’ I took ‘Hate Story’ as a challenge and did justice to it. We shot it like a beautiful international thriller.
I figured if I write a modern thriller but spliced in the DNA of a classic western – the drifter who comes into town with secrets – I could do something interesting with both genres. Westerns are also an incarnation of the classic knight errant tale, the lone warrior with a moral code, and I love those types of stories.
I’m extremely excited about working with Troika on ‘The Hive.’ This script has two elements I always look for in a thriller – strong, believable female characters and a smart, very dark and very creepy story that will definitely resonate with large audiences.
The thriller is the most popular literary genre of the 20th century.
‘Polisse’ is the sort of cop thriller where people do things like angrily bang on a desktop or sweep everything off it. If it happens once, it must happen six times. But every time it did, I wanted to stand up and cheer, which I’ve never wanted to do for any such thriller.
It is a political thriller. It’s very action packed and it’s very exciting, but at the same time it’s a very big soulful love story about longing and loss. They’re not separate, they’re completely dependent on one another.
I would love to do something in the thriller category. Not so much horror, but I would love to do a full-on psychological thriller. That would be really interesting. A period piece would also be fantastic.
The term ‘psychological thriller’ is an elastic one these days, tagged liberally on to any story of suspense that explores motivations while keeping blood and chainsaws to a minimum.
If you are writing a thriller with violence in it, the ending must be violent. You are delivering a promise to your reader.
There is a method to the madness of James Patterson’s success. Co-writing with him is a terrific learning experience, particularly in the art of crafting a perfect thriller. The collaboration also gives me an opportunity to access a wider global audience.
‘Line Of Duty’ is first and foremost a thriller. But I hope it will also be seen as a revisionist commentary on 21st century policing.
Here I was, having done a thriller and a horror movie – why did I have the audacity to make a romantic fantasy? How can I continue to make genre films? Well, maybe I don’t want to continue to make genre films.
‘Heavy Rain’ was really close to a dark thriller, like ‘Se7en.’ ‘Beyond’ is different in terms of tone.
The characters you refer to as predatory and unsavory are useful. They’re the ones who make a novel into a thriller. They’re active, and most of the common virtues, the signs of a good person, are not.
10 Endradhukulla’ is a thriller and the characters are all on the run. The film travels from South India traversing through the North, to the mountains where the climax takes place. Mine is a different kind of character; he is very suave and stylish and only later it is discovered that he is not what he looks like.
Sometimes it feels as if the artist hasn’t done the real work of engaging with the material. Film noir can’t just play off looks and attitudes. A thriller needs a dose of genuine suspense. It does not have to be literal, but it does have to feel genuine. Otherwise the artist is just leeching off the form.
I’d love to do a sci-fi movie, a western, or an espionage thriller. But I’m not going to limit myself. If a good script comes along, I’m not going to discount it because it doesn’t fit into one of these genres.
I am an avid reader of Sidney Sheldon thriller novels.
What was always interesting about Thomas Harris’ books is they were a wonderful hybridization of a crime thriller and a horror movie.
I saw the police thriller The Blue Lamp’ and remember realizing the power that Dirk Bogarde as the gangster exerted over the audience simply by his expressions in the close-ups. I could see how the people around me reacted to him and realized that I wanted to have the same effect.
Dhol’ is a light-hearted thriller revolving around four unemployed guys who are chasing money. It’s my first attempt at comedy.
Jack Kennedy very much enjoyed Fletcher Knebel’s thriller ‘Seven Days in May,’ later a film. The story: a jingo based on the real-life Admiral Arthur Radford plans a military coup to take over the White House.
The most distinguishing element of my novels is that I try as hard as I can – within the context of a popular commercial thriller – to make them feel authentic. Drawing on real locations and real events is part of that authenticity.
It’s not a monster movie. It’s a supernatural thriller.
In general, just as a framing, we always thought about ‘Winter Soldier’ very specifically as a political thriller.
The story of the Underground Railroad is a thriller. These are people who are basically in a heist movie, and it’s the most precious cargo ever, your life. You’re fighting for your freedom.
John le Carre’s ‘The Night Manager’ is a relentlessly exhilarating thriller with profound emotional depths.
‘Jack Ryan’ is a very fast-paced, very contemporary, very action-driven thriller.
I was very shocked to hear about Michael Jackson’s passing. He was a pioneer, and icon and a legend. I remember buying ‘Thriller’ when I was pretty young.
I’d been a thriller reader all my life.
‘Machine’ was one of the biggest decisions I have taken in my life – it was the best narration till date. It is a typical Abbas-Mustan thriller.
Most horror films fail to scare me. I think ‘The Ring’ plays more as a psychological thriller. It’s smarter, there’s more character development and some of the themes explored go a little deeper.
Thriller novelists get asked – berated, sometimes – about whether their work glorifies bad behavior, even, exploits human tragedy for entertainment.
I believe thrillers work if the story is good. It is not easy to make a thriller because the audience is making their own story in their minds as they watch the film. You have to break that expectation and still make them like the film.
I see ‘Jekyll’ as a very scary comedy thriller, partly because Hyde is violent and frightening as a character but at the same time he’s very funny – and that’s quite an achievement.
I went see the horror thriller, Hannibal. I am a massive fan of Anthony Hopkins. He is superb in the film.
In ‘Power Play’, Finder uses the thriller structure to make pointed observations about gender in the workplace, the corporate caste system, and the true nature of risk in the global business environment.
I don’t really look for a script and go, ‘I need to do a thriller, so I’m going to do this.’ I just read scripts and look for the best possible story.
To answer that I have to describe what I think is my responsibility as a thriller writer: To give my readers the most exciting roller coaster ride of a suspense story I can possibly think of.
When the militias came to Wau, they would blast out ‘Thriller’ as they moved down the dirt streets.
My background is more horror or thriller, and you can’t get better than horror fans, as far as I’m concerned.
I shot a pilot for ABC, which I’m a bit confused about what the actual title is – I heard it was called ‘Chosen.’ It’s directed by Roland Emmerich – the master of disaster himself – and it’s his idea and concept for the show that’s a supernatural thriller about good and evil set in contemporary modern day New York.
It’s a great thriller or mystery, but on another level it’s a film about the fact that, if you only look at a person through one lens, or only believe what you’re told, you can often miss the truth that is staring you in the face.
Right from childhood, I have enjoyed films which belong to the thriller genre. As a kid, I would read novels written by Agatha Christie and James Hadley Chase.
I was in a movie called ‘Vanishing on 7th Street,’ and that was my first leading role in a movie. It’s an apocalyptic thriller, and it’s really cool. It’s the first movie I ever shot.
It is unlike the quintessential thriller where someone is up to something and the audience is speculating. ‘Johnny Gaddaar’ is the opposite of a thriller. In this case, the audience knows right from the outset what transpires and who the likely culprit is. It is a suspense caper.
I like a good suspense thriller when it’s smart and well done like ‘Armed Response’ is.
With ‘House of Cards,’ you really get the heart and the meat of drama – and it’s a thriller!
The way to write a thriller is to ask a question at the beginning, and answer it at the end.
A thriller needs to hold the interest of the reader from the very beginning. It needs to engage with them, hold them in rapt attention, and prevent them from putting down the book.
