I
Tuesday 14 October 2014
Monday 13 October 2014
Sophie Bishop - Pre reading audience theory
Julian McDougall
Say's that in the online age, it is getting harder to identify a stable audience.Mass, Niche, mainstream and alternative.
Stuart Hall
Encoding decoding text, preferred/negotiated, oppositional readings.
Denis McQuail
Uses and gratification theory (audiences consume media texts for surveillance, personal identity, personal relationships, escapism/diversion. definition of 'Popular culture' as 'low' culture, not for the elite, bur for 'common' people.
Len Ang
Detailed that media producers have an imaginary entity in mind before the construction of media product. ''Audiences only exist as an imaginary entity, an abstraction, constructed from the vantage point of the institution in the interest of the institution''
You must detail the social demographic of your target audience, gender, age, ethnicity and social class.
John Hartley
''Institutions are obliged not only to speak about an audience, but crucially, for them to talk to one as well; they need not only represent audiences but to enter into relation with them''
Institutions must produce
''Invisible fictions of the audience which allow the institutions to get a sense of who they must enter into relations with'' e.g they must know their audience so they can target them effectively.
Hypodermic
The Marxist theory, which was championed by theorists such as Adorno, assumes a direct stimulus-response relationship between audiences reactions and the consumption of media texts.
Criticisms:
Does not allow the resistance or rejection of media texts.
Elitist
Simplistic
Say's that in the online age, it is getting harder to identify a stable audience.Mass, Niche, mainstream and alternative.
Stuart Hall
Encoding decoding text, preferred/negotiated, oppositional readings.
Denis McQuail
Uses and gratification theory (audiences consume media texts for surveillance, personal identity, personal relationships, escapism/diversion. definition of 'Popular culture' as 'low' culture, not for the elite, bur for 'common' people.
Len Ang
Detailed that media producers have an imaginary entity in mind before the construction of media product. ''Audiences only exist as an imaginary entity, an abstraction, constructed from the vantage point of the institution in the interest of the institution''
You must detail the social demographic of your target audience, gender, age, ethnicity and social class.
John Hartley
''Institutions are obliged not only to speak about an audience, but crucially, for them to talk to one as well; they need not only represent audiences but to enter into relation with them''
Institutions must produce
''Invisible fictions of the audience which allow the institutions to get a sense of who they must enter into relations with'' e.g they must know their audience so they can target them effectively.
Hypodermic
The Marxist theory, which was championed by theorists such as Adorno, assumes a direct stimulus-response relationship between audiences reactions and the consumption of media texts.
Criticisms:
Does not allow the resistance or rejection of media texts.
Elitist
Simplistic
Friday 10 October 2014
theorist from the thriller last year
Claude Levi - Strauss, Brinary Oppositions
During our thriller we used Brinary opposites to show to opposites set off against each other.
Examples of Brinary Oppositions are:
These screenshots show two different characters, being against each other.
Reception Theory, Stuart Hall
During our thriller we used the Reception theory to show opposition. The reception theory is normally used within in literacy, but when used in filmed media (our sequence) it allows the audience to find their own meaning and interpretation.
Examples of the Reception Theory are:
The audience wouldn't know why this character is travelling on the train.
The audience could be thinking
Why is he on the train?
Where is he going?
Vladmir Propps, argues that narrative always have certain character types who perform certain actions. Characters are agents of actions.
We had a villain and a hero. But we didn't show the stereotype. For example our villain was a woman and our hero was a man, normally within films its the other way around.
Roland Barnes, Enigma code; Action code. Also open, and closed texts.
An enigma code creates mystery and question for the audience.
Who is she?
Why is she walking around London?
Why is she the only character in colour?
We didn't show/give the audience the idea of who the villain was until the end of the opening sequence. This created an enigma code.
Tim O'Sullivan (1998) - argues that all media texts tell us some kind of story
By showing our character doing different tasks around London it creates a story for the audience to think about.
By using different theorists in our thriller, this will help and gain us skill when creating our music video.
The Brinary opposition goes along with the idea for our music video as we are showing somebody fighting demons. The reception theory will allow the audience to get their own view of the character in our music video, so if he should be able to now life a happy life or if his demons should still follow him.
Genre
Daniel Chandler (2001)
Term is used in a literary theory, media theory to refer to a distinctive type of 'text'
Steve Neale (1995)
Genres are dynamic and envolve overtime.
Generic characteristics
- Typical Mise-en-scene/visual style
- Typical types of narratives
- Generic personnel
- Typical sound design
- Typical editing style
Jason Mittell (2001)
Argues that genres have different boundaries with differentp types of media texts. Operate within the industry and audience.
Rick Altman (1999)
Different genres offer different types of pleasure.
-Emotional pleasures
-Viscoral pleasures
-Intelleotional puzzles
Nicholas Abercrombie (1996)
'The boundaries between genres are shifting and becoming more permeable' 'A steady dismantling of genre'
David Buckingham (1993)
'Genre is not... Simply "given" by the culture: rather, it is a constant process of negotiation and change.
I think we have a majority of every genre charactisic in our thriller. I feel like we also used part of Mittell's theory as we slightly argued with the genre boundaries (again this being the changing of stereotypes). I felt we had used Steve Neale's theory within our thriller, for example using typical sound design - dark, tense and suspense soundtrack to go along with the thriller and loud foley. With using Altman's theory I felt we had used emotional pleasures - the audience feeling sadness and pity for the male main character. Intelleotional puzzles - suspense, enigma code. I didn't feel that we hadn't showed chandler and buckingham's theories within our thriller, because we didn't we show culture within the thriller.
Our thriller is both traditional and non traditional - Dismantled it slightly with the change of stereotypes, but yet kept it traditional with the suspense building, character chasing another character thriller type sequence. With costume, props and location also being traditional - costume being quite plain and dark (red, blacks and greys). Characters wearing quite smart/business wear costumes (Smart dress and coat, suit and briefcase) the location was rather traditional with the thriller being set in london (The capital - known landmarks being shown). The props we included were phones and sim cards, showing there was an effect of blackmail happening between the two main characters.
Our thriller is both traditional and non traditional - Dismantled it slightly with the change of stereotypes, but yet kept it traditional with the suspense building, character chasing another character thriller type sequence. With costume, props and location also being traditional - costume being quite plain and dark (red, blacks and greys). Characters wearing quite smart/business wear costumes (Smart dress and coat, suit and briefcase) the location was rather traditional with the thriller being set in london (The capital - known landmarks being shown). The props we included were phones and sim cards, showing there was an effect of blackmail happening between the two main characters.
Sophie Gordon Essay
Looking back at my thriller i'm trying to link different theorists with the work I had already created. I looked at the prositives and negatives within the sequence that Sophie and I had created and linked them to Tzetvan Todorov, Roland Barthes and Claude Levi.
The first theorists I decided to see if my work linked with their theory was Tzetvan Todorov, the theory he created was the argument of the structre of Equilibrium/Disequilibrium/New Equilibrium. I noticed that we did have an equilibrium/Disequilibrium Structure. Within our sequence we showed a female villain who was seen as a strong individual, powerful character. This character was blackmailing a business man, showing that are narrative did contain a structure.
Even though we did show a strong concept for the theory that Tzetvan Todorov created, in some areas and could of shown the theory in a stronger way. For example we did show a disequilibrium structure, this was highly visible. The way we could of pushed through a more obivious take on the theory would have been to show the male character (who was the hero) being phyiscally shaking with fear. I feel looking back even though we did show the actions of being scared, if we had showed it in a different way it would of not only made the sequecne slightly more intense, but also more interesting for the audience.
I also linked Roland Barthes with our sequence. Roland created the theory for the Enigma code, Action code and also opened and closed texts. We showed an enigma code very strongly throughout our sequence. We did this by creating an engima code within our thriller. We created suspence and mystery by showing our villain walking around London doing different tasks. We also only showed our villain as the only character in colour. This would of created questions and queries for the audience. These questions wouldn't be answered until the end of the sequence.
Claude Levi - Strauss created the theory of binary opposities. We showed this a huge amount within our thriller. We went aganist the stereotypical concept and had a female villain and male hero.
Did 'nt finish within the 30 minute time. Need to work on my time keeping and planning skills.
Genre Essay
To what extent does your thriller conform to traditional forms of structure?
Our thriller was very structured and had generic characteristics placed within the sequence. For example our Mise-en-scene was rather typical, giving the audience the visual style of a traditional thriller. We made sure we shot our thriller in London, we did this to show famous landmarks and show that the characters were in a modern and mature location. Our thriller was based upon a blackmailing between a male and female, so we wanted to show the blackmailer being done in a well known location, this would show the audience that the characters were adults as they worked in the capital of the country.
Our lighting was dark and we also added a black and white filter when editing in final cut pro to create more tension as the audience watched, we didn't want to distract with bright colours and we felt that would break away from the mood we was trying to create. The only colour we did show was red (this being shown on our main character and also props - red telephone boxes)
Again we kept with the typical sound design for a thriller. When creating our soundtrack and foley on garage band we decided to kept the beat of sound quite low and we wanted to create tension that would keep the audience of edge. Also our foley was rather loud, we did this to show importance, for example our main character was wearing high heels. We made this foley loud so the audience would know that she was the main focus and the actions she was doing in that scene would cause a consequence for either of the character by the end of the sequence.
Our thriller argued against different types of boundaries, this would of changed the views for our audience by the sequence not following the normal stereotype rule. In our thriller we decided that we wanted to show a woman blackmailer instead of a male, we did this to show how stereotypes can be broken and that either sex's can manipulate a situation to get what they want.
We showed different types of pleasures. I felt the main on we produced was emotional pleasure. Our main male character was being blackmailed, this would have an effect on him, causing the audience to hold sadness and pity for him. We showed him as the weaker character by him being shown with a high angle, almost as if the blackmailer was looking at him while he was travelling on a train to work after he had received a call from the female villain.
Also we showed intelleotional puzzles, by using an enigma code to create queries and questions for the audience. We didn't really show the character was being blackmailed until the near end. We also created suspension, tension and fear.
I think our thriller shows both traditional and non-traditional forms of structure. I felt it was shown as a traditional thriller by the way we used costume, props and location. For example our costume expressed that our thriller was traditional. Showing the female character wearing a dress and smart coat and also our male character wearing a suit and carrying a briefcase, in traditional thriller business/smart costume is shown, so we kept to the rule that applied with that. The main colours we used were red, blacks and greys, we used these colours to create a dark mood, this would have created suspense for the audience. Again we went along with the traditional concept by the location being set in central London. The we used were also again were traditional to form of thriller structure, we included phones and sim cards, showing there was an effect of black mail happening between the two main characters.
The only thing I felt that was an non-traditional form of structure was that we broke the rule of stereotypes, to which we dismantled it to produce a thriller that was our own. We decided to use a female villain instead of a male. In traditional thrillers it is the other way around.
Tuesday 7 October 2014
Sophie Bishop - Representation essay and planning
Planning:
Our music video is to a song called Steady Heart by the Archytypes, our music video is a concept/narrative music video, following a early 20 year old male, through his journey of getting out of a bad time in his life caused by his alcoholic mother. He copes with his problems by acting the same way as his mother. Our target audience are both genders in their 20's. I will write about how our music video is equally following modernism and post-modern theories/theorists, and is both traditional and breaking the mould.
Our music video does not conform to the traditional they of feminism and the male graze, but uses it to advance our music video technically. We have a set of shots, as our main character walks out of a cafe with his coffe, he bumps into a woman. After these shots showing this, closeups are used to section up her body, showing voyeurism this would agree to Mulvey's theory that woman are for male gaze. But the last closeup shoes what the woman is holding a ballon with 'Mum' on. We have used these shots in this order, to 'fool' the audience into thinking bad of the main character (woman), ut if we did this our female audience, within our target audience, would not appeal. This shows a deeper meaning, and makes a connection with the audience, creating an emotional image to the band.
Marxism is both shown and not shown, in different ways. It is shown because our main character, a man, drinks a lot of alcohol, 'which is common sense for a man to do', but this prop is used to show the link with his mother, also an alcoholic. The cool colour scheme, colour grading, and low key lighting are also masculin, because of the rough and cold mood created. But this is equally not applying to our music video, because he is so emotional, alone and vulnerable, again adding this depth and emotion to the image of our band, so there rough loud music is not all that represents them. The dominant ideology, does not exist in our music video, because he hasn't got power his 'demons' do.
We do have hyper reality as a big theme in our music video, in order to create a 'trippy', unrealistic atmosphere. In our music video we use green screen frequently, as our style, in order to metaphorically show his re-birth into excepting his mothers alcoholism and her abusing him mentally. Our rebirth will be shown by his staue/god like figure faling into a railway track, the train complements his mental journey throughout our music video,and then falling onto his white (pure) bed. As well as a good and bad version of him on his shoulders, to show his demons. We agree with Baudrillad's post-modernism theory, because our representation of reality is surreal, by using hyper realism, which adds to the image of our band.
Our music video, represents reality in a surreal way, but we have some realistic elements in order to relate to our target audience. Merrin states that we do not represent realty but produce it, which I agree with. We represent it in a surreal way, with green screen, but we produce a realistic element of emotion, regret, self loafing and isolation, by having lots of space in our shots and self abusing with alcohol. But also give a message that you can get over a bad time, as shown by our re-birth at the end.
In conclusion our music video is equally traditional and breaking the mould, as it is not following some traditional theories, but following others. Our music video must be traditional in order to relate to out target market, but also must not be in order to create that 'trippy' atmosphere, which is our style, and to be a concept/narrative video. If it was just traditional it may be too boring for our target audience, but with the hyper reality, marxism and representation of reality it is not.
Monday 6 October 2014
Representation essay plan - Sophie Bishop
Blue - Talking about my coursework in relation to the theorists theories.
Representation Definition - The description or portrayal of someone or something in a particular way (stereotypes). For representation to be meaningful to audiences there needs to be shared recognition of people, situations, ideas etc.
Our thriller had two characters, which are going against gender stereotypes. 'The Red Caller' was a strong, powerful woman, which is a binary opposite of a heroin character, which the business man was, also going against the stereotype.
Preferred representation - all representations have different ideologies, some are encoded into texts other are left out in order, to give a preferred representation - Levi Strauss 1958.
Richard Dyer:
Asked a few questions, when analysing media representations in general.
1. What sense of the world is it making?
It is following the modern ideology, than woman can be more powerful than a man, not following the weak female stereotype.
2. What does it imply? Is it typical of the world deviant?
It implies that our thriller wants to entice a larger audience, now this modern ideology is popular.
3. Who is it speaking to? For whom? To whom?
To the younger generation, born into his ideology, and to young men (provocative woman).
4. What does it represent to us and why? How do we respond to the representation?
The audience responds to this representation, in a positive way.
In our coursework we will be looking at representation in these following terms:
5. MARXISM
6.FEMINISM - support of woman's rights on the ground of equality oft he sex's.
7.POSTMODERNISM - After traditional. Present.
8.STEREOTYPES - The popular image of a group, before getting to know them.
1. Ideologies and representation - Marxism - A hegemonic view (masculine, powerful view) of society - inequalities in power between social groups, groups in power influence culturally rather than by force. Concept has origins in this theory, ruling capitalist class are able to protect their economic interests. Representations are encoded into mass media texts, to reinforce dominant ideologies in society.
Rosalind Brunt - Ideologies are not simple ideas in peoples heads bit are myths that we live by and which contribute to our self worth.
The ideology of out thriller was feminism, because our female character had the most power.
David Gauntlett 2002 - argues that ''identities are not 'given' but are constructed and negotiated.''
At the begging 'The Red Caller' did not have an identity, but it was built throughout the opening.
David Gauntlett 2007 - argues that ''Identity is complicated. Everybody thinks they've got one. Artists play with the idea of identity in modern society.'', The identity of 'The Red Caller'', is complicated, it is found out more towards the end, but the business man is known throughout, because of his stereotypical costume.
Michel Maffesoli - identifies the idea of the ''Urban tribe'' - members of these groups tend to have similar worldwide views/ideologies, dress styles and behaviours.Collective identity
We did not have a collective identity as such, but the business man is a stereotypical man who works in London.
2. Gender and ideology - Feminism - Masculinity and femininity are socially constructed. Ideas about gender are produced and reflected in language - O'Sullivan et al 1998 - No - we don't have much dialogue in our thriller.
Feminism is a label that refers to a broad range of views containing one shared assumption, that gender inequalities in society are exercised at right of woman's interest in rights. In relation to film, objectification of woman's bodies in the media has been a constant theme.
Laura Mulvey - Argues that the dominant point of view is masculine. The female body is displayed for male graze, therefore woman are objectified by the camera whatever the gender the audience is positioned to accept masculine point of view. We did not use male graze, in order to maybe entice a female audience.
John Berger - 'Ways of seeing', ''Men act and woman appear'' ''Men look at woman. Women watch themselves being looked at'' ''Woman are aware of being seen by a male spectator''
In our thriller Woman act and men appear.
3. Post modernism representations of reality -
Julian McDougall 2009 - 'In a media saturated world, the distinction between reality and media representations become blurred or invisible to us' The London relation makes our thriller blurred.
Example: Dominic Strinati 1995 - Modern period came before - people were concerned with representing reality, but now this gets mixed around and we end up with pastiche, parody and intertexuallity. ''Reality is now only definable in terms of the reflections of the mirror.''blurred
Merrin 2005 - Argues that ''the media do not reflect and represent reality but instead produce it, employing this simulation to justify their own continuing existence''.Ours wants to challenge stereotypes, perhaps alter peoples ideas about gender.
Walter Lippmann 1956 - The word stereotype wasn't meant to be negative and was simply meant as a shortcut or ordering process. In ideology terms, stereotyping is a means by which support is provided by one groups differential against another.No, gender stereotypes, we have challenged so we would not offend.
Orrin E. Klapps 1962 - Distinction between stereotypes and social types is helpful. Stereotypes are people who do not belong, and social types it those who do. Our stereotypes do and don't, the 'Red caller' does not a stereotype, bus the business man does more so is more of a social type.
Richard Dyer - Suggests Klapps distinction can be reworked in terms of the types produced by different social groups.
Baudrillard - Discussed the concept of hypereality - we inhabit a society that is not longer made up of any original thing for a sign to represent. He argued that we live in a society of simulacra - simulations of reality that replace the real. Our thriller was hyper real, because it is not very possible this person would exist, but it is not imposable.
Our thriller does not follow traditional representation theories, because we have gone against stereotypes/challenged them, to avoid offending.
matching video's with the theory/theorists:
Representaions of reality - Merrin, hyperreal Baudrillard
Gender and ideology - Feminism-Laura Mulvey - John Berger, Klapp social types
marxism-hyper real - Baudrillard
Baudrillard-Hyper real, Representaions of reality - Merrin
Representation Definition - The description or portrayal of someone or something in a particular way (stereotypes). For representation to be meaningful to audiences there needs to be shared recognition of people, situations, ideas etc.
Our thriller had two characters, which are going against gender stereotypes. 'The Red Caller' was a strong, powerful woman, which is a binary opposite of a heroin character, which the business man was, also going against the stereotype.
Preferred representation - all representations have different ideologies, some are encoded into texts other are left out in order, to give a preferred representation - Levi Strauss 1958.
Richard Dyer:
Asked a few questions, when analysing media representations in general.
1. What sense of the world is it making?
It is following the modern ideology, than woman can be more powerful than a man, not following the weak female stereotype.
2. What does it imply? Is it typical of the world deviant?
It implies that our thriller wants to entice a larger audience, now this modern ideology is popular.
3. Who is it speaking to? For whom? To whom?
To the younger generation, born into his ideology, and to young men (provocative woman).
4. What does it represent to us and why? How do we respond to the representation?
The audience responds to this representation, in a positive way.
In our coursework we will be looking at representation in these following terms:
5. MARXISM
6.FEMINISM - support of woman's rights on the ground of equality oft he sex's.
7.POSTMODERNISM - After traditional. Present.
8.STEREOTYPES - The popular image of a group, before getting to know them.
1. Ideologies and representation - Marxism - A hegemonic view (masculine, powerful view) of society - inequalities in power between social groups, groups in power influence culturally rather than by force. Concept has origins in this theory, ruling capitalist class are able to protect their economic interests. Representations are encoded into mass media texts, to reinforce dominant ideologies in society.
Rosalind Brunt - Ideologies are not simple ideas in peoples heads bit are myths that we live by and which contribute to our self worth.
The ideology of out thriller was feminism, because our female character had the most power.
David Gauntlett 2002 - argues that ''identities are not 'given' but are constructed and negotiated.''
At the begging 'The Red Caller' did not have an identity, but it was built throughout the opening.
David Gauntlett 2007 - argues that ''Identity is complicated. Everybody thinks they've got one. Artists play with the idea of identity in modern society.'', The identity of 'The Red Caller'', is complicated, it is found out more towards the end, but the business man is known throughout, because of his stereotypical costume.
Michel Maffesoli - identifies the idea of the ''Urban tribe'' - members of these groups tend to have similar worldwide views/ideologies, dress styles and behaviours.Collective identity
We did not have a collective identity as such, but the business man is a stereotypical man who works in London.
2. Gender and ideology - Feminism - Masculinity and femininity are socially constructed. Ideas about gender are produced and reflected in language - O'Sullivan et al 1998 - No - we don't have much dialogue in our thriller.
Feminism is a label that refers to a broad range of views containing one shared assumption, that gender inequalities in society are exercised at right of woman's interest in rights. In relation to film, objectification of woman's bodies in the media has been a constant theme.
Laura Mulvey - Argues that the dominant point of view is masculine. The female body is displayed for male graze, therefore woman are objectified by the camera whatever the gender the audience is positioned to accept masculine point of view. We did not use male graze, in order to maybe entice a female audience.
John Berger - 'Ways of seeing', ''Men act and woman appear'' ''Men look at woman. Women watch themselves being looked at'' ''Woman are aware of being seen by a male spectator''
In our thriller Woman act and men appear.
3. Post modernism representations of reality -
Julian McDougall 2009 - 'In a media saturated world, the distinction between reality and media representations become blurred or invisible to us' The London relation makes our thriller blurred.
Example: Dominic Strinati 1995 - Modern period came before - people were concerned with representing reality, but now this gets mixed around and we end up with pastiche, parody and intertexuallity. ''Reality is now only definable in terms of the reflections of the mirror.''blurred
Merrin 2005 - Argues that ''the media do not reflect and represent reality but instead produce it, employing this simulation to justify their own continuing existence''.Ours wants to challenge stereotypes, perhaps alter peoples ideas about gender.
Walter Lippmann 1956 - The word stereotype wasn't meant to be negative and was simply meant as a shortcut or ordering process. In ideology terms, stereotyping is a means by which support is provided by one groups differential against another.No, gender stereotypes, we have challenged so we would not offend.
Orrin E. Klapps 1962 - Distinction between stereotypes and social types is helpful. Stereotypes are people who do not belong, and social types it those who do. Our stereotypes do and don't, the 'Red caller' does not a stereotype, bus the business man does more so is more of a social type.
Richard Dyer - Suggests Klapps distinction can be reworked in terms of the types produced by different social groups.
Baudrillard - Discussed the concept of hypereality - we inhabit a society that is not longer made up of any original thing for a sign to represent. He argued that we live in a society of simulacra - simulations of reality that replace the real. Our thriller was hyper real, because it is not very possible this person would exist, but it is not imposable.
Our thriller does not follow traditional representation theories, because we have gone against stereotypes/challenged them, to avoid offending.
matching video's with the theory/theorists:
Representaions of reality - Merrin, hyperreal Baudrillard
Gender and ideology - Feminism-Laura Mulvey - John Berger, Klapp social types
marxism-hyper real - Baudrillard
Baudrillard-Hyper real, Representaions of reality - Merrin
Thursday 2 October 2014
Notes 12/09/14
Leighmediaa2section1b.blogspot.co.uk
3 questions
2 hours
Head - think - theory - hands - making things
Two videos:
What does this show about genre?
Dracula
Low key lighting, dark, characters villain,hyper real, vampire
Twilight
Modern, dramatic, soundtrack low key lighting, fictional, vampires modern, location
Conventions
Twilight
Romantic horror
Now normal - pale skin - jumps - vegetarian - changed conversions
Overtime a genre changes
Steve Neale - theory 1995 - wall
Genre Essay - Sophie Bishop
To what extent does your thriller conform to traditional structures of genre?
Our thriller was not a hybrid, but had multiple sub genres, phycological and mystery which follows Chandler's theory that all genres have sub genres. it also agrees with Chandler's description of genre, that all medias belong to one genre. If our thriller were to be a hybrid it would not target our target audience, but another age range/gender.
Our thriller doesn't have a clear structure, or it would not create structure and would not agree with Mittell's theory. Following Neal's theory it is a process as apposed to a structure. It also follows his theory that to have a genre, it must conform to those genre characteristics as it does. Our mise-en-scene followed the rules of a thriller inorder to appeal to a popular target audience of a thriller, males aged 18-29. Our mise-en-scene, included costumes (bold and promiscuous for our villain character, and a business suit for our businessman character which is relatable to this age group. The lighting was dull, and colour was dull and cool toned (colour grading editing) and our location was in London also relatable. our plot included blackmail, a common conflict created within a thriller, our characters were simply a villain and heroin, also common and stereotypical in behaviour and camera angles and shots. But the gender was not, the gender stereotypes swapped, but this was in a way to show voyeurism, attracting the male audience. The soundtrack created the correct atmosphere and mood, mystery and suspense, as well as the Foley. The editing style was fast paced to complement the soundtrack, adding tot e suspense built. Using editing I used an effect, excluding the red in the film, and making the rest black and white, but with a cool/blue undertone. This added to our mood, conforming to traditional conventions of a thriller, because cold and serious. Red can be seen as danger, the red was the colour fo the costume of 'The Red Caller', showing she is dangerous, this was the only technique as well as camera angles and shots, conforming to Altman's theory. The London buses and telephone boxes were also red, making London bold, and clear that it is a relatable city, and the telephone box was our main prob, causing conflict.
Mitchell believed that the audience of a genre created their own choices, this we followed, as our enigma code, build mystery and our other characteristics did too so. Allowing our audience to make their own mind up, on what will happen, showing our enigma code was successful. Mittell also believed that genres all belong to a culture category our genre of thriller it is common to see city's as it is relatable and well known, we chose London which follows his theory.
Our thriller also follows Altmans theory, that genre has pleasure outcomes, our did. Our emotional pleasure was the sympathy created for the businessman shown by high angles, the soundtrack, behaviour and dialogue. We showcased a lot of different emotions, caused by the mystery and fast pace, so we also included visceral pleasure. Also we included intellectual puzzel, because of our enigma code and mystery, allowing the audience to figure out what is going on.
Abercrombie, a modern theorist thinks that boundaries within genre are changing, our thriller disagrees this. Because of our thriller closely following traditional conventions, which is shown by all if the theories above that our thriller follows.
Buckingham believed that a genre was a constant negation and change, which is true to some extent in the production of our thriller, but not the end product. Throughout ur research and planning we explored new medias to inspire us, therefore changing our ideas as we went, to create a thriller which conforms to the other theories, we conformed to.
In conclusion my thriller closely conforms to traditional and post modernism theories, with only one not conforming, which would contrast too heavily if it did conform, and would not attract to our target audience. Our thriller conforms so heavily because it was our first production we had made, so we were new at using mise-en-scene, camera shots and angles, editing and sound to create a successful thriller. So in order for it to attract the correct target audience and be successful, it had to follow the rules of a thriller.
Genre Theorists - Sophie Bishop
Daniel Chandler:
Created the word genre, which means a style or category of media. All genres have sub genres.
YES A mystery and phycological thriller.
Steve Neale:
Say's that genres is not a structure but a process. Genre characteristics, including: Typical mise-en-scene/visual style, typical types of narrative (plots, historical setting and set pieces), generic types (i.e typical characters, do typical male/female roles exist), typical personnel (directors, producers, actors and stars), typical sound design(sound design, dialogue, sic and sound effects) and typical editing style
NO a structure.
YES The genre of our opening sequence was a thriller, because of mise-en-scene, plot, characters, stereotypes, sound, dialog, Foley and editing style.
Jason Mittell:
Genres are a cultural category and genre allows audience to make choices.
YES We had London as the location, which is a big part of Britain's culture. Our sequence is a thriller, and has a lot of mystery (enigma code), allowing the audience to make up there choices about our plot, outcome etc.
Rick Altman:
Emotional, visceral ('gut' response) and intellectual puzzle pleasures are what Altman believed are an outcome of genre.
YES
Emotional pleasure - sympathy for the businessman character.
Visceral pleasure - different emotions cased by mystery.
Intellectual puzzles - mystery
Nicholas Abercrombie:
Believes boundaries within genre are changing/shifting.
NO because it is very much following traditional conventions, and only had one genre. Not a hybrid.
David Buckingham:
negotiation and change YES
NO a structure.
In conclusion my thriller followed traditional conventions of genre mostly from the modernism era, including our location (London), which is common because it is so well known, the colour grading, very cool cold colours were used, we had a plot of blackmail and we had a villain and a heroin also used frequently. But following some post modernism theory's.
Why? - to appeal to a traditional thriller audience young adult male, who appreciate traditional techniques/conventions. It leans towards traditional modernism conventions more, only one it does not follow, because it was at the beginning of our year, as we were developing our skills, so we followed the rules.
Created the word genre, which means a style or category of media. All genres have sub genres.
YES A mystery and phycological thriller.
Steve Neale:
Say's that genres is not a structure but a process. Genre characteristics, including: Typical mise-en-scene/visual style, typical types of narrative (plots, historical setting and set pieces), generic types (i.e typical characters, do typical male/female roles exist), typical personnel (directors, producers, actors and stars), typical sound design(sound design, dialogue, sic and sound effects) and typical editing style
NO a structure.
YES The genre of our opening sequence was a thriller, because of mise-en-scene, plot, characters, stereotypes, sound, dialog, Foley and editing style.
Jason Mittell:
Genres are a cultural category and genre allows audience to make choices.
YES We had London as the location, which is a big part of Britain's culture. Our sequence is a thriller, and has a lot of mystery (enigma code), allowing the audience to make up there choices about our plot, outcome etc.
Rick Altman:
Emotional, visceral ('gut' response) and intellectual puzzle pleasures are what Altman believed are an outcome of genre.
YES
Emotional pleasure - sympathy for the businessman character.
Visceral pleasure - different emotions cased by mystery.
Intellectual puzzles - mystery
Nicholas Abercrombie:
Believes boundaries within genre are changing/shifting.
NO because it is very much following traditional conventions, and only had one genre. Not a hybrid.
David Buckingham:
NO a structure.
In conclusion my thriller followed traditional conventions of genre mostly from the modernism era, including our location (London), which is common because it is so well known, the colour grading, very cool cold colours were used, we had a plot of blackmail and we had a villain and a heroin also used frequently. But following some post modernism theory's.
Why? - to appeal to a traditional thriller audience young adult male, who appreciate traditional techniques/conventions. It leans towards traditional modernism conventions more, only one it does not follow, because it was at the beginning of our year, as we were developing our skills, so we followed the rules.
Narrative Exam - Sophie Bishop
Planning:
Pros and cons of the theories:
Levi-Strauss theory was also presented in our thriller, his concept was surrounded by contrasting oppositions, he called binary opposites. This was shown by our colour, lighting and characters. The colour was our black and white vs the red selective colouring effect. This binary opposite allowed the audience to boldly see 'The Red Caller'. The lighting was very shaded in areas and bright in others, another binary opposite, as well as the characters. 'The Red Caller' was our evil and villain character, while the business man was our good and heroin character, which is a traditional structure in narratives, modernism.
Propp's theory has a similar concept, keeping in with contrasting characters. Propp stated that in every narrative there are seven archetypes. Our thriller did not follow this strictly, but had two of these characters in Propp's theory. Our business man character was the princess (heroin), and 'The Red Caller' was our villain, as stated before. A male being the princess is not stereotypical in narratives so we have broken this boundary, exploring. For our thriller it is a positive aspect, that we did not include all seven character types, because this would ruin the suspense, by revealing everything in the opening before the film.
Barthe's theory was one that we included in our thriller, his theory was the enigma code (plus other codes too). We made a conscious effort to include this in order to help build mystery and suspense. We created many questions about 'The Red Caller', including Who is she?, Is she calling him? and Is she blackmailing him? These all helped tremendously with building mystery and suspense.
Pam Cook believed that all Hollywood/narratives had a cause and an effect. We had a cause and effect, but not as clear as Cook's theory suggests. Our cause was 'The Red Callers' blackmail, but this was not clear until the middle of the sequence. The effect was shown at the begging and the end, so this was not in the order that is traditionally.
In conclusion our thriller was equally keeping up with the traditional/modernism structure as well as breaking away from that mold/post-modernism. So our thriller used the familiar structure, but has broken away slightly in order to become a successful thriller, by building suspense and mystery.
Pros and cons of the theories:
30 minute exam:
My thriller The Red Caller, uses a few theories, but equally explores modernism and post modernism, so following traditional structure and theories as well as breaking that mould. I will write about Todorov's theory, exploring equilibrium, Levi-Strausse's theory of binary opposite, Propp's character type theory, Barthe's enigma code theory and Cook's cause and effect theory. Most of these theorists looked at these theories within narrative texts such as literature rather than film, because it was before film was created. So some are not included in my thriller from last year.
Our thriller included Todoro's theory of an equilibrium, disequilibrium and re-equilibrium included in a narrative. Our thriller did so, in the beginning of our thriller, it was calm, to build suspense. The shots showing our location and our businessman. The disequilibrium was shown in the middle at near the ending, as the audience were finding our 'The Red Caller' was blacking the business man (the conflict). Then again towards the end the equilibrium was shown, as the soundtrack softens slightly (re-equilibrium).
Levi-Strauss theory was also presented in our thriller, his concept was surrounded by contrasting oppositions, he called binary opposites. This was shown by our colour, lighting and characters. The colour was our black and white vs the red selective colouring effect. This binary opposite allowed the audience to boldly see 'The Red Caller'. The lighting was very shaded in areas and bright in others, another binary opposite, as well as the characters. 'The Red Caller' was our evil and villain character, while the business man was our good and heroin character, which is a traditional structure in narratives, modernism.
Propp's theory has a similar concept, keeping in with contrasting characters. Propp stated that in every narrative there are seven archetypes. Our thriller did not follow this strictly, but had two of these characters in Propp's theory. Our business man character was the princess (heroin), and 'The Red Caller' was our villain, as stated before. A male being the princess is not stereotypical in narratives so we have broken this boundary, exploring. For our thriller it is a positive aspect, that we did not include all seven character types, because this would ruin the suspense, by revealing everything in the opening before the film.
Barthe's theory was one that we included in our thriller, his theory was the enigma code (plus other codes too). We made a conscious effort to include this in order to help build mystery and suspense. We created many questions about 'The Red Caller', including Who is she?, Is she calling him? and Is she blackmailing him? These all helped tremendously with building mystery and suspense.
Pam Cook believed that all Hollywood/narratives had a cause and an effect. We had a cause and effect, but not as clear as Cook's theory suggests. Our cause was 'The Red Callers' blackmail, but this was not clear until the middle of the sequence. The effect was shown at the begging and the end, so this was not in the order that is traditionally.
In conclusion our thriller was equally keeping up with the traditional/modernism structure as well as breaking away from that mold/post-modernism. So our thriller used the familiar structure, but has broken away slightly in order to become a successful thriller, by building suspense and mystery.
5 narrative theorists - Sophie Bishop
Todorov's narrative theory:
Todorov had a theory that provided a structure for a narrative, our thriller follows this, the following shows this structure:
Claude Levi-Strauss:
Believes in binary opposites, in every narrative. A binary opposite is two contrasting oppositions, such as a villain and a hero.
So we had good v evil and villain v heroin.
Our Music video could follow some of theses theorists theories in order for it to be diverse, and reach a broad audience.
Pam Cook:
A hollywood narrative, include a cause and effect, our thriller did, because the cause of 'The Red Callers' actions (blackmailing)left the effect of the business man feeling alone and vulnerable.
Todorov had a theory that provided a structure for a narrative, our thriller follows this, the following shows this structure:
1 Equilibrium - our 'Red Caller' and the 'Business man', are shown along with the London scenes, so the audience are used to this.
2 Dis - Equilibrium - most shots show just the 'Red Caller' creating the suspense.
3 Realisation - That the 'Red Caller' is in fact the person harassing the 'Business man'.
4 Attempt to resolve - this is not shown in our thriller, because we wanted to build some mystery to the film.
5 Resolution - the film would shoe the resolution.
6 Re - Equilibrium - The 'Business man's' end of conversation.
Claude Levi-Strauss:
Believes in binary opposites, in every narrative. A binary opposite is two contrasting oppositions, such as a villain and a hero.
So we had good v evil and villain v heroin.
 |
| Good and heroin |
 |
| villain and evil |
Vladimir Propp:
Propp's theory consisted of the character in a narrative, stated what characters should be in a narrative, here are his character theories below, some that we did use:
The Hero
The Villain - The Red Caller
The Donor
The Dispatcher
The False Hero
The Helper
The Princess (the heroin) - The Business man, gender stereotypes not relevant in our thriller, making it somewhat more unique.
Roland Barthe's:
Barthe's theory was a way to see a narrative, through codes, they include:
Denote - What the audience see encoded by the director.
Connote - What the audience see it to mean.
Action - A narrative way/device, to show a resolution.
Enigma code - A puzzle/riddle for the audience to solve.
Our thriller, included a couple of these codes, to make our thriller diverse. We included an enigma code, showing the 'Red Caller' but not saying clearly who she was and what she was doing, allowing the audience to feel they had power because they could figure it out. We also has a connote, allowing the audience to depict their own diverse meaning, and create a narrative to collect the ending, making them want to see the film to find out if their theory is correct.
Our Music video could follow some of theses theorists theories in order for it to be diverse, and reach a broad audience.
Pam Cook:
A hollywood narrative, include a cause and effect, our thriller did, because the cause of 'The Red Callers' actions (blackmailing)left the effect of the business man feeling alone and vulnerable.
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