How does your media product represent particular social groups?
Our two minute film clearly defined a young teenage girl being vulnerable, innocent and naive. It also presents youths as the cheeky, careless and disrespectful. Gender, appearance and situations define these social groups.
The main character, Ivy, was played by our friend Molly. She has a particular wide-eyed look to her that makes her appear naive. Her age was perfect for the teenage role as she could then relate to the character and portray it with conviction; we played on this idea by using school uniform as the costume. The costume represents their age so therefore their vulnerability and innocence, suggesting that they are an easy target. It is also used as a way to relate to the audience; our two minute film was made for a younger audience that can therefore dentify and share the characters emotions. This character fits the stereotype of the protagonist and the victim. In the 2002 American psychological horror ‘The Ring’, the characters Katie and Becca are 16 and 17 years old. The film opened with them watching TV in their school uniform; this influenced our choice because this film was the most successful and believable out of the genre that I watched. We used this convention as a template to influence our character. Although in our filmed market research, many people thought that blonde girls suited being the victim, in the survey people announced they wanted actresses such as Kristin Stewart who played Bella in 'Twilight’. This is because she has a very unique, dainty yet defenceless appearance to her. The market research therefore encouraged us to contemplate using the convention of a blonde girl and decided that we wanted to use the costume as a convention but have our actress with darker hair and a weak appearance to her. Therefore, we used some conventions of psychological horror film characters but also applied a quirky and original essence to her. This would also fit the stereotype and influence the enigma of the film as her appearance is so natural.
The main character, Ivy, was played by our friend Molly. She has a particular wide-eyed look to her that makes her appear naive. Her age was perfect for the teenage role as she could then relate to the character and portray it with conviction; we played on this idea by using school uniform as the costume. The costume represents their age so therefore their vulnerability and innocence, suggesting that they are an easy target. It is also used as a way to relate to the audience; our two minute film was made for a younger audience that can therefore dentify and share the characters emotions. This character fits the stereotype of the protagonist and the victim. In the 2002 American psychological horror ‘The Ring’, the characters Katie and Becca are 16 and 17 years old. The film opened with them watching TV in their school uniform; this influenced our choice because this film was the most successful and believable out of the genre that I watched. We used this convention as a template to influence our character. Although in our filmed market research, many people thought that blonde girls suited being the victim, in the survey people announced they wanted actresses such as Kristin Stewart who played Bella in 'Twilight’. This is because she has a very unique, dainty yet defenceless appearance to her. The market research therefore encouraged us to contemplate using the convention of a blonde girl and decided that we wanted to use the costume as a convention but have our actress with darker hair and a weak appearance to her. Therefore, we used some conventions of psychological horror film characters but also applied a quirky and original essence to her. This would also fit the stereotype and influence the enigma of the film as her appearance is so natural.
'Twilight'
'The Ring'
Our Actress...
We intended the representation to influence the audience’s
emotions; through representing the victim as a defenceless teenage girl meant that the audience would empathize quicker. I consider this representation to have been read by the audience, due to the relatable feature to her portrayal. It was apparent that she was also the protagonist in the film because the cinematography followed her every move. We therefore accomplished our intended representation with our choice of character. Our character compares to many in other psychological horror films, such as ‘Time of the Wolf’, ‘Funny Games’ and ‘The Ring’ because they are all typical middle-class families. This representation addresses the audience in a way that lulls them into a false sense of security as they are ordinary people; however, that’s what makes the tension even stronger because the audience are familiar to the characters so feel more emotionally attached and real. Our character being a female victim doesn’t contrast to other films as this is a convention for psychological horror films. The social group that we represented were British, middle-class teenagers. We chose to use this social group as it not only related to our British audience, but it complimented psychological horror conventions. We didn't include... -Male gender for victim because a female can portray a vulnerable characteristic with more success. -Middle aged character as it wouldn't of related to our target audience with the same effect. -A character with a high authority/status because then they wouldn't be read as weak or vulnerable so wouldn't create the intended enigma. -A character with any religious quality, this was to widen the target audience so that anyone could relate to the character. We didn't use the social groups listed above so that we could represent and portray a particular social group that could captivate our modern and target audience. Through these choices we could create a social group (British, middle-class teenagers) that the audience could relate to; this made the film have more impact as it played on a fear and character that they could connect with. |
It is apparent that our film uses stereotypes, the girl as the victim and the youths creating trouble. I think it’s important to use stereotypes to make it easier for the audience to relate and respond to the film. If we used a middle-aged man as the victim, i wouldn’t have the same effect to our young audience as a teenage girl would. This is because the audience automatically understand a stereotype and use that to help influence their emotions. Stereotypes were used in a lot of the psychological horror films that I watched; I believe this was to enhance the enigma as they
can judge the characters features upon their appearance. It helps structure the storyline as the tension is already stimulated from the audience’s preconceived ideas. We chose to present the youths as males due to the cheeky, macho and less sensitive qualities that they display. With male youths it created more fear as they are strong, powerful and therefore more daunting instead of dainty females. For the protagonist and victim of our film, as mentioned above, we used a female to convey an innocent, naive and therefore vulnerable character that the audience fear for. A female would bring a weaker and defenceless side to the character than a male could; we wanted this vulnerable approach to our victim to stimulate more fear and therefore tension to the film. The more tension, the more successful the film will be for the psychological horror genre. These notions created and fitted with stereotypes and explored the importance of using particular genders for the roles. It also meant that I recognised how I stereotyped particular characters to have particular features just through the gender and how the audience would therefore reference the gender in the same way; creating a stereotype through doing so. 'Funny Games'
'Time of The Wolf'
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Here I have included a response to the stereotype of the 'youth' characters, however, in the final film we did not include these characters. This was due to the length of the film and through the editing process it became clear that it would make sense to take that scene out rather than any other, so that the enigma was not interrupted.