Analyse your film opening with regards to genre.
For my film opening last year the genre that we chose to portray was horror. In our film opening we used a teenage female character as our main character and children characters as our object of fear and as the object that is haunting the nightmare of the main character.With regards to genre in our film opening we followed and challenged some of the common conventions from the horror film industry. With this industry it is easy to make a film that follows the conventions however it works well to challenge them so the film differs from the classic horror film. This genre also has sub-genres which allowed us to find specific conventions for each one. These sub-genres include Slasher, Paranormal and thriller.
Firstly we used the very common convention of fades to black as we felt this kept continuity throughout the scene and kept the audience wondering what would happen next. This also gave us the opportunity to put our titles in. We chose to have white flickering titles as this once again appeared in many of the films we researched and helped to establish the genre of our film. A challenge however was how large we had the titles, as usually they are small however in our film they were slightly larger.
Another common convention that we followed in our film was the fear of the unknown. We achieved this by showing parts of the story and characters at the beginning of the film allowing the rest of the film to explain the beginning. This also encouraged the audience to keep watching in order to find out the narrative of the film.
By using children as the object of fear in our film contrasted the typical innocent and harmless characters they usually play in other genres of film. They are often also used as the character in danger or that is effected in horror films.
The mise-en-scene and setting used in our film opening was stereotypical of a horror film as it was in a deserted area with dark lighting and in the main characters home at night. By using a lone female character most of the audience could relate to her and understand her vulnerability. The costumes and make up of the children and our main character in our film opening also met the convention as it is common to have some characters from the past as a scary feature in the film.
The length and composition of our shots were pretty common conventions of horror films however it was a challenge that we swapped between each shot at such a fast pace in the hope that this would keep the audience concentrating and intrigued.
Lastly our intended audience were also a common convention of horror films as from our research we found that the 18-25 age group were the most likely to watch a scary film. In order to meet this target audience we used a main character of this age and a household setting which would be easy to relate to.
Question 2 -
Discuss the way that women are represented in the media. Use work we have done so far to include a historical example and at least two contemporary ones to cover at least two different media types.
In the media women are portrayed in a generally stereotypical and negative way. Due to Gerbner's 'drip drip' theory this is a representation which continues to be shown to the public and therefore believed. Firstly they are portrayed as an object entirely for male pleasure. This theory follows the male gaze theory by Laura Mulvey which suggests that the media is created by middle aged men for middle aged men. In the explicit music video for blurred lines two men are seen performing the song with women dancing around them naked. This is a typical example of this common representation of women as the women are seen dancing around the fully clothed men naked for there pleasure and no other purpose.
Another example of this which did actually create more controversy is the 'Chandelier' video. In this video a little girl is shown dancing round provocatively in a costume that suggests she is naked and shows of every feature of her body. The reason for this being controversial is that instead of using and objectifying a women the main character is portrayed by a little girl wearing clothing that is skin tight and colour which gives the audience the appearance that she is entirely undressed, which is entirely inappropriate. The song is all about alcoholism and bad relationships which is another reason for the controversial views of this video. This fits Giroux's theory of youth being an 'empty category' which is relevant as it is clear that this video would have been created by adults and shows a child in an adult situation dancing to a song about adult problems.
Another representation of women which has been around since the olden days is that a women's purpose is to look after men and families and live out there lives at home as housewives. An example of this representation being used is in the film 'Brief encounter' where the women is seen constantly taking care and thinking of her husband while putting her own thoughts, feelings and opinions to the back of her mind so as not to offend or upset him. In this film the message is that even if women want and take the risk of trying to have a better more independent life, as shown by the main character, it will end up in tears and the only one who will get hurt is the women herself. This shows how women are represented to be entirely incapable of living without men.
In the film 'Sket' women are given an entirely different stereotype. The main characters in this film are all females who are shown to be aggressive, violent and bullies. This is a stereotypical representation of women that is becoming more and more common in current times due to the change in attitudes and role of women in society.
The majority of these representations and stereotypes are so often portrayed by the media that they have become dominant ideology and therefore its not often even noticed by everyday audiences, people just accept that this is the way it is.
Overall despite the slight changes and progress of the portrayal of the media generally the original stereotypes remain the same and continue to be just accepted by all audiences whether they are true or not.
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