One prime example of a character showing their descent into madness is Nina Sayers from the psychological thriller entitled 'Black Swan' (dir. Darren Aronofsky, 2010, USA). Nina is an innocent and fragile ballerina, who strives for the lead role in Tchaikovsky's 'Swan Lake'. But in the process, Nina sheds her "sweet girl" persona to embrace her dark nature to fully embrace the role.

There are some films and institutions that challenge the stereotypes of women being a protagonist. Nowadays, the representation of women in psychological thrillers' have changed and have recently been portraying woman as stronger and self-reliant. One example of a film that challenges this typical representation is Gone Girl (dir. David Fincher, USA, 2014). Additionally, in Gone Girl, the male character, who seems to be the antagonist as he looks more dominant that the female, is actually portrayed to be the more vulnerable character - so this film does not conform with the conventional portrayals.


However, in most quintessential psychological thriller plotlines, women are still presented as more vulnerable than their male counterparts - especially once they begin to descent into madness. For my film opening, I plan to challenge this ongoing convention by conveying the female character as mentally disturbed and somewhat vulnerable in the beginning, but later shows signs strength. I have taken inspiration from Rosamund Pike's character in Gone Girl, where she is portrayed to be a weak character in the beginning and is viewed to be the protagonist, when she is really the antagonist.


I will convey this in my film by making the female character stand up (towards the end of the opening) after she has been crawling around the room. This will signify the beginning of the the film and will then take the audience back to the start of the story, and thus show how the female character falls into insanity.