Character Representation

Here I have looked at four different short films from Virgin Media Shorts and have analysed how different characters are represented:

SALOON:

This film short is based around Indian barber shops whereby customers do not only get a hair cut. They represent this by showing the customers getting a massage, a shave, threading etc. The characters within this film short are all very similar, Indian men with mostly a comb over and a moustache and are very caring about their looks. However there is no dialogue within the clip.

 

 

 

 

 

 

THE GOOD SAMARITIAN:

A young man finds himself in trouble on the day of his wedding and looks for compassion from a passer-by.  The characters you find in this film short include a white English man who is in trouble as he has been tied up for some banter from the night before which presumably was his stag night as well as a black woman which we presume is African from her accent. Her character profile would include a loud character that is quite violent in order to support good deeds and has her accent. Whereas the male we expect to be in agony and anxiety to be let free and has a less aggressive tone of voice and a British accent.

 

 

 

 

 

2.20:

Two minutes and twenty seconds is thriller about a man who soon finds out at the end of the film that he only has two minutes and twenty seconds remaining of his life before he dies. As this is a thriller and we know the storyline, the characters profile would include a character that is agitated, in anxiety and frightened.  Whereas the other characters profile would include a character that is daunting and intimidating mainly dressed in dark colours as she is the antagonist.

 

 

 

 

 

 

FIRST PRESS:

A new recruit finds out if he’s got what it takes to join an elite gang, yet we find out at the end of the plot that they are no ordinary gang. The characters within this film short include tough, intimidating, bold characters which are dressed in black suits and long coats, like real gangsters or hitman. We also believe that the new recruit is going to be the same as he puts on his gloves when doing a job and given a parcel.

 

 

 

 

 

 

These character representations will help inspire me with my own film ideas as this task has enabled to me gain an understanding on how important characters are within a film and the way they are represented has a major impact on the audience and the film on a whole.

Representation- Applying it to Film

A stereotype can be defined as simplistic, fixed portrayal of a person, place, issue or event. They come from some elements of truth but are then exaggerated and enhanced. There is a distinct relationship between stereotypes and genre- one way of defining a genre is by looking at the stereotypes offered by the media texts. However comedy is used to break conventions between characters.

Representation of people in film:

• Characters are on of the most important elements of a film. If we don’t care about characters and what happens to them (love or hate) we won’t want to watch on.

• Film makers and photographers create characters through choice of actors, people, clothes, hair, make-up, expressions/ gestures, dialogue, camerawork, framework, focusing and positioning and use of colour.

• In creating a media representation a particular view of reality/ the world will be represented.

This can help me with our own film as it helps to realise the effectiveness of characters in a film and how the audience will interpret the storyline through the representation and stereotypical features through characters. The character profiles within our short film include an isolated/ lonely character who has lost their memory and another few character who look like investigators. These characters will be represented and portrayed through their costume, actions, personality and body language.

Short Film Planning- Shane Meadows Interview

In today’s lesson we watched this interview by Shane Meadows who gave us an insight into tips to consider when planning and producing film shorts. Shane Meadows is a British independent film short producer and has produced over 70 film shorts including ‘ This is England’ and ‘Somers Town’.

The advice that he gives to new film makers includes make films that realistic and storylines which occur in day to day life. In addition write about what you know for example content and people. Shane Meadows gets his inspiration initially from college whereby he used characters from his sketch book, however at present he gets his inspiration from normal people and makes a story from their personality.

From this interview I found out that no matter what the storyline, it has to be realistic and in order to make this happen try to use example from day to day life and when thinking of characters, think about their personality along with their actions and how this will influence your characters and how they will play a role in your film.

Film Idea Feedback

As a group we decided to develop the idea of the Lost Identity. I feel this is an interesting storyline as it has many twists within the plot which will keep the audience engaged and eager to find out what is going to happen next although some ideas will be used from the other initial ideas. I think this idea could link to the Hollywood blockbuster film Bourne Identity and the film short Inside as they both have a relevance of the main character who suffer from amnesia and memory-loss and as this secret of the character throughout is designed to shock the audience and to emphasis the persons mental state.

Here is the feedback which we received from our peers about our film idea:

• Good storyline, but needs to be perfect and believable.
• Realistic/ Feasible idea.
• Should aim the film at teenagers/ young adults.
• Stereotype/Attraction of mainly males and particular black males due to stereotype of black mugger.

We have decided to take this feedback on board and go through our storyline in more depth and thorough detail in order to make it a success and reach the genre and audience conventions.

Here is a video of the film short Inside. We have chosen to link our film idea with this short film as it involves the main themes of our idea which involves memory-loss/ amnesia/ schizophrenic.

Short Film Ideas…

As a group we had to come up with four initial ideas for a storyline and then choose the most appropriate one and elaborate on it in order to make a full short film. Here are our ideas:

First Idea: Lost Identity (Horror/ Thriller/ Adventure)

This idea is about a firstly a person who has been put into a scenario whereby they have done something terrible e.g. murder. The film continues to this person sitting in an interview room being interrogated by an investigator as the story is unravelled by a series of events where evidence is found and this is told through flashbacks. However the defendant has lost their memory and has no idea of what has happened, almost like amnesia. The story will be left on an unsolved mystery in order to carry on a sequel.  The main audience pleasure is the fact that they are eager to find out what the person has done as this is told at the end and also want to find out what is going to occur in the next film as it will be left as a cliff hanger. Although throughout the film the audience is led to believe that this person is innocent and vulnerable yet they actually end up being the villain all along.

This idea would work because it is not very hard to do as there are not many locations or characters involved. Also the storyline is not over complicated which would allow us to focus on certain aspects in more detail.

Second Idea: Kidnapped (Thriller/ Action/ Drama)

This story starts of with a mother who is sat in a room in distressed as her son who was much loved to her was kidnapped a few years ago and all she has left of him is a football medal as his memory and his passion for football. This story is told through a series of flashbacks whereby we see five years ago the family in a happy environment, leading to the son going missing and eventually a police investigation later finding out that in fact the boy had been kidnapped.

This idea would not really work as there are too many locations, characters and props involved along with you have to get the right characters and permission to use children. In addition the characters would have to look like parents and it would be hard to film the police.

Third Idea: Imaginary Friend (Thriller/ Drama)

Our third idea was about two friends are going through with their day as usual, weird things start to happen, where people don’t notice one of the two girls although they are together all day. They go into a coffee shop and one orders for two, the waiter finds this weird because he doesn’t notice the other friend. It ends with an argument in the park as the friend tells the other that her boyfriend is cheating on her, where one of the friends finds out that she has been seeing her friend all this time, and her friend doesn’t exist at all.

This idea would also work as again there are not too many locations or characters involved, however for this storyline to work there has to be perfect acting along with the different uses of camera shots and angles along with the major use of editing.

Fourth Idea: Mugging in the Park (Crime/ Thriller/ Drama)

This idea consists of a girl walking in a park with her iPod plugged in and then see’s a black boy stood there with his hood up. She then starts to get scared as he starts to follow her. As they are walking, someone else comes and attacks the girl, however the black boy helps the girl after the mugging. This plays with stereotypes as well as a twist at the end.

This idea would be an easy idea to work with as there is only one location, a few characters and a basic storyline. However you would have to make the storyline and stereotypes clear to the audience in order for them to understand. I believe this idea is the most feasible, however maybe not the most effective and interesting storyline out of the ideas.

Audience Theory

There are two main threads to think about when deciding your target audience. These include:

• The Effects Tradition– Suggest media are very powerful and audiences are very passive and the effects media have on people.
• Uses and Gratifications– Tries to look at what audiences actually do with media and the various uses and pleasures. It also sees audiences as active.

Uses and Gratifications:

1. Personal Identity- To help to establish our senses of identity and place in the world.
2. Escapism- Want to believe its reality because we like it e.g. films.
3. Surveillance- Finding out about the world.
4. Social Relationships- Talk about the media with people, leading to friendship e.g. Facebook.

Here is a spider diagram which explains our target audience and our target audience will read and use our short film by the use of the effects tradition as they will gain knowlegde and information about our film through the press kit, film poster and film reviews via the media.

Genre Theory

There are many different theory’s and view points when thinking about genre and its conventions. This is due to the major change in genres and the move towards hybrid genres in the last 20 years.

Firstly John Hartley a film theorist quotes that ‘the same text can belong to different genres in different countries or times’. He also argues the point that ‘genres are the agents of ideological closure- they limit the meanings- potential of a given text’. Although he is supporting the flux to hybrid genres he is also talking about how the conventions of genres provide limitations as to what can be achieved when working with genres, although we have also learnt that the conventions of genres only have limitations to a certain extent and can sometimes be reinforced.

Whereas, David Buckingham argues that ‘genre is not… simply ‘given’ by the culture: rather, it is in a constant process of negotiation and change’ meaning that although genres have boundaries, these can be challenged or negotiated to a certain extent and that genres are always changing and this also links to hybrid genres.

Furthermore Daniel Chandler– another theorist of theatre, film and television believed that film genres consist of a range of elements which are agreed and accepted to recognise a film being part of a genre allowing us to expect certain things to occur called conventions. This links back to John Hartley’s theory of typical conventions of a genre.

The ways in which we will reinforce/ challenge genre conventions would include by thinking outside of the box and try and link features which you would not expect within typical conventions and give it a twist although still keep a relation between the twist and the genre as we are trying to challenge the boundaries and not break them.

We will try to engage our target audience by playing with their fears and emotions and have a message or moral which will be constantly playing in their mind to engage them into using their imagination and creativity to figure out some aspects of the storyline although there will be a few triggers along the way. The pleasure this will offer our audience whilst watching our short film will include their involvement of making estimations and keeping them on the edge of their seats in anxiety.

Horror Conventions

The key conventions of horror films include:

Characters:

• Vulnerable, reserved, distraught characters which mainly consist of serial killers, murderers and rapists.

Locations/ Mise en Scene

• Set in a dark forest or isolated location mainly at night, lots of tall dark objects and black costume. The locations are mainly low key lit settings where everything is sinister and gloomy.

Verbal Signifiers

• Dialogue such as “I wanna kill you”.
• Vulgar language

Visual Signifiers

• Props such as blood and gloomy items e.g. skulls and skeletons
• Phallic iconography

Musical Signifiers

• Non diegetic music mainly consisting of bold, deep fast pace sounds.

These findings will help inform me about my final film as it will allow me to understand the conventions which need to be considered in regards to our final idea and the genre’s which are going to be undertaken. It will also enable me to put more detail into the details which need to be inputted in the different areas and segments when considering the conventions of genres and what elements will help to make the genres more effective.

 

Genre & Audience Pleasures

Genre is a way of categorising a particular media text according to its content and style. Genre is a French word that means ‘type’ or ‘kind’ and plays a major role in the way films are planned, produced and packaged by the studios and the way they are consumed and understood by audiences. This could either be in a form of hybrid genres or sub genres as well as a single genre although in this day and age single genres are slowly dying down and films are now in a state of flux in terms of genre for example Indie films are no longer very popular. Here is a table showing examples of hybrid and sub genre films:

Hybrid Genres:	Rom Com (Bridget Jones)	Action Thriller (Taken)	Horror Thriller (Sweeny Todd)	Action Comedy (Knight and Day)
Sub Genres:	Drama- Soaps (Eastenders)	Horror- Slasher (Scream)	Drama- Coming of age (Juno)	Supernatural (Twilight)

Audience Pleasures which are provided through Genres:

• Emotional Pleasures- Romantic Films/ Horror- Creates Anxiety
• Visceral Pleasures- Horror/ Thriller/ Action- e.g. SALT
• Intellectual Puzzles- unravelling a mystery or puzzle e.g. Adventure
• Counter-Culture Attraction- society’s moral and legal regulations being broken e.g. Crime Drama
• Genre Communities- Community of genre fans sharing an experience. Like Daniel Chandler said ‘pleasures can be derived through communities of a genre can share their experience of watching specific films which are targeted to them’
• Our identification with difference and repetition within a narrative- This would include superhero characteristics for example Kick Ass

Genre can be interpreted both physiologically and sociologically through the themes and stories which they present.

The key genre conventions include:

• Characters-  Their role in the film and representation
• Mise en Scene- Costume, props and settings
• Verbal signifiers- dialogue
• Visual signifiers- props
• Musical signifiers- diegetic and non-diegetic sounds

 

 

 

 

 

 

As hybrid genres are becoming more popular, producers are more focusing on them rather than single genres due to the flux in terms of genres which consumers prefer to go watch in the cinemas and on box office where most sales are made. One of the most popular hybrid genres include Action/Thriller as in modern day society people enjoy watching films which keep you entertained in anxiety and adrenaline rushes.

This links to my favourite film which is Taken as this too is a Action/Thriller. Although the reasons for why I adore this film include the thrilling storyline as well as they have undertaken all the conventions of this genre which keeps you wanting to watch more and almost like your on the edge of your seat trying to figure out what is going to happen next. Here is a trailer for the film Taken:

The T.E.M. Planning Process

When thinking about ideas for film shorts, you need to consider Themes, Emotions and Messages. This process will be used to plan our own short film through firstly thinking of themes which will match the genre and then to create a storyline which conveys the conventions of the theme within the genre and play with the emotions of the target audience of that specific genre or film. This will lead to the final stage yet the most important stage of thinking about a message or moral to the film to which the themes and emotions are linked to.

Themes:

A theme is a topic area for example school life or children. Themes help to eliminate other topic areas for example Kidulthood and Adulthood. This is based around a group of teenagers who start off quite young in Kidulthood where they are influenced by the youth life and crime in London and are out to enjoy themselves and cause mischief and trouble. As they grow older to Adulthood they realise the mature ways of life and how education is a major necessity in society although crime is still an issue as they are out to seek revenge.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Emotions:

Emotions is the next stage to consider and will indicate the mood/ atmosphere and film language. It may also help the production team shape the genre and target audience. This may affect the film style for example the pace of editing maybe influenced by the genre as if it is an Action film then the editing will be a lot quicker and will create an exhilarating and stimulating atmosphere within the film. For example Matrix Reloaded consists of fast pace editing to help the storyline be more interesting and relevant in sync with the  conventions of an Action film.

Messages:

This is the last element to be considered in the planning process of ideas stage. Messages embedded in the film help to shape the style of the film, as we all its intended purposes. This also links to target audience. Messages are considered last as it is the most important element and has to be thought about in great depth as it gives the overall significance of the film. An example of this could include the film short called ‘Strangers’ which portrays the message to overcome your racial prejudice and hatred when suddenly confronted by danger.