Thriller (genre)

Thriller (genre)

Thriller is a broad genre of literature, film, and television programming that uses suspense, tension and excitement as the main elements. Thrillers heavily stimulate the viewer's moods giving them a high level of anticipation, ultra-heightened expectation, uncertainty, surprise, anxiety and/or terror. Thriller films tend to be adrenaline-rushing, gritty, rousing and fast-paced. Literary devices such as red herrings, plot twists and cliffhangers are used extensively. A thriller is a villain-driven plot, whereby he or she presents obstacles that the protagonist must overcome.

Common subgenres are psychological thrillers, crime thrillers and mystery thrillers. After the assassination of President Kennedy, the political thriller genre became very popular. Another common subgenre of thriller is the spy genre which deals with fictional espionage. Successful examples of thrillers are the films of Alfred Hitchcock. The horror and action genres often overlap with the thriller genre.

In 2001, the American Film Institute in Los Angeles made its definitive selection of the top 100 greatest American "heart-pounding" and "adrenaline-inducing" films of all time. To be eligible, the 400 nominated films had to be American-made films, whose thrills have "enlivened and enriched America's film heritage". AFI also asked jurors to consider "the total adrenaline-inducing impact of a film's artistry and craft".

Homer's Odyssey is one of the oldest stories in the Western world and is regarded as an early prototype of the thriller. One of the earliest thriller movies was Harold Lloyd's comic Safety Last! (1923), with a character performing a daredevil stunt on the side of a skyscraper. Alfred Hitchcock and Fritz Lang helped to shape the modern-day thriller genre beginning with The Lodger (1926) and M (1931), respectively.