Media Evaluation Question 2

HOW DOES YOUR MEDIA PRODUCT REPRESENT PARTICULAR SOCIAL

GROUPS?

BY CHLOE CARMAN

LOCATIONS/ LIGHTING

We associated out OTS with various outside

locations:

- By the river

- Forest/ woods

- Field/ grass area

- Pathway

These locations are seen as mysterious places. The river and

forest locations are associated with a dark, murky atmosphere,

meaning that very few women would typically go there by

themselves, because of the dangers of being ‘raped’ or ‘murdered’

which is the typical story line to these locations. The darkness

represents solitude and isolation. But it’s the fear of being alone

and having someone creep up on you that you need to be scared

of. Darkness also is the sign of evil and villian’s (the dark side),

meaning that evil is everywhere. Our OTS breaks social grouping

as the femme fatale is walking round all these locations by herself,

proving that despite all the controversy, this female does not need

a male to look after her. All the outside locations represent

someone who travels around, and is fast paced and is no stranger

to danger.

The indoor locations (office/workplace) is seen as a place to retreat with

the plain white walls. The strong lighting, bounces off the objects, casting

a shadow on the wall. Shadows create a mysterious, forbidden ambiance;

not the retreat you were looking for and intrigues the audience. Lightness

represents the anti-hero, who (if sticking to normal film noir conventions)

concurs evil. We filmed all the outside locations during the day, using

nothing but natural light. This shows that our femme fatale isn’t afraid to

be seen, which shows she isn’t getting up to no good, unlike the

traditional film noirs. This neo noir twist appeals to more of a modern,

younger audience; not your typical audience associated with film noir.

SCHEDULING/EXHIBITION

The violence/death/crime within film noir means that our OTS would have to be

show to an older audience because of the adult themes. This means it would

probably be screened in cinema’s as a 12 because there isn’t too much

blood/gore, but there may be some violence and references to drugs and sex. If

our OTS was shown on TV, it would have to be a late night film, or at least after

watershed because of the content. The audience who watch it would have to be

quite intelligent and knowledgeable to be able to follow the story line, so this also

attracts the older generation to watch our film. This also targets our film at an

older audience. However the neo noir elements involved appeal to a younger

audience ( mid-teens/ late teens), so it appeals to both the traditional older

audiences as well as the younger action adventure seekers.

MISE-EN-SCENE/PROPS

The iconography within (alcohol, guns, matches) relate to the

time period our OTS was set in. Budweiser is normally associated

as being an ‘older mans’ choice of drink, and the other

iconography would attract the older generation as they can relate

to the props and can understand the time period, so would be

quite intelligent. The red elements on our femme fatale (lips,

heels, nails) are used for seduction to both the male characters

with in the film, but to also attract male audience members

because of the attractive young girl playing the femme fatale.

SEMIOTIC REPRESENTATION: SOUND/SYMBOLS/ICONS

For modern twist in the typical jazz music we stripped it back to the

keyboard. As the story builds up, the music does too. We done this by changing

the music this allowed the characters to grow. Traditional jazz musicians

would be interested to see how we have put a modern twist on jazz to bring in

a younger audience. Modern, contemporary music appeals to a modern

audience. The empty bottle in our OTS represents alcoholism and how it can

leave you feeling empty and make a character seem depressed and

unsatisfied, so goes searching for something more. At the end of our OTS the

music stops over the last frame. The silence leaves the audience wondering

what’s going to happen next. Adding a surprise shock there is a sudden crash,

which makes the audience jump, adding mischief to hook the harder to please

younger audience.

AUDIENCE THEORY

The audience must be educated enough to piece together a mystery

puzzle as there is no dialogue in the opening sequence and all is

revealed through iconography and camera work. The audience

follow where the camera takes them. They want to be taken on a

journey. We know at the beginning that the femme fatale ‘drowns’

but is not dead. This leaves the audience to wonder how it happened,

why it happened and who done it. This type of genre usually attracts

middle age males, however because of the female lead, more females

will be interested to see it.

CHARACTER REPRESENTATIONS

The modern twist of a female lead will attract females to

watch the film, but also the young men will be enticed by her

looks. The pretty femme fatale is a strong, seductive

character with manipulative charms to seduce the men. Her

job as a crime reporter shows us she is well educated for a

woman of her time period; almost a younger Miss Marple.

Her intellectuality tells us that she is middle - high class,

therefore (if following the traditional crime drama narrative)

will be involved with the crime, and her family may get

involved.

CAMERA TECHNIQUES

Framing is used to highlight the clues that are uneducated

so they can follow the story. This is also a way of controlling

the audience and making them see what you want them to

see; bringing the audiences focus onto something important,

allowing them to try and link things together. Pan’s of long

scenery shots are conventions of a traditional crime drama

like Miss Marple, so the older women who watched Miss

Marple would be interested in our film. The low angles

shows the femme fatales high status due to her educational

background .

NARRATIVE THEORYIn our OTS we have a plot of a fake death. This is a twist in the typical

traditional crime narratives. This means that the audience have to be

educated to understand the story. We have the traditional characters in the

film: femme fatale, villain etc.. But the twist with the fake death gives the

narrative a more interesting, adventure, mysterious like plot to the story

meaning it will interest the action adventure modern audiences are drawn to.

For our narrative we revealed that our femme fatale drowns, and the whole

film is a flash back telling the story about why it happened and why the

females eyes open at the end. This twist in the opening sequence hooks the

audience in and leaves them asking questions that they want to be answered.

TRANSITIONSThroughout our OTS we stuck to the same transitions. We

used cross-dissolve to link our frames together. This

transition slowly overlaps so as one from fades out, the

other starts to play over the top. The transition has quite an

old fashioned look and feel, and will attract an audience

who used to watch black and white films, with basic

transitions. We used a cross dissolve for linking two scenery

shots. This is what used to happen in old fashioned crime

drama’s, giving some audience members a sense of

nostalgia.