Summer Homework (Becky)

Homework Four- Textual Analysis 'Never Forget'(Becky)

Homework Three- Representation of age and class in 'About a Girl'. (Becky)

The film begins when our main character is showed through a low angle long shot as she stands in a destaurated field where she dances and sings to the song "I'm not that Innocent".

The character becomes a silhouette as the cloudy sky in the background is brighter and more saturated and brighter in comparison to the character creating a deeper contrast.

In the next scene, we the camera/spectator are placed alongside a canal and in the background we can see a derelict rural housing estate, which suggest that our character may come from an un- wealthy area. The grey and desaturated colour of the scenes add to the lack of wealth and increases our opinions of the girls 'working class' atmosphere.

The female character then begins to preach her life and goals to the spectator in a deep Mancunian accent. The audience is able to point out her class or status through the poor pronunciation of her words in her harsh accent. 

The character has a limited vocabulary suggesting that she has had poor education common of a working class citizen. We hear this when she shortens simple words such as 'thing' to 'thingy'.

This is me- genre- Megan

In the first couple of shots of 'this is me' we expect it to have a serious tone to it as we are shown a man in a hospital bed through the use of restricted narration to show his pump to help him breath and his foot covered by a hospital blanket.


Rick Altman's theory suggests that we can or we try to associate a particular object with a meaning and this meaning can then suggest to us a particular genre. In this case the first couple of shots may suggest to us that this some sort of drama.
However, when the voiceover begins we can automatically assume that this is a hybrid genre which is mixed with a comedy touch to it that makes his injury seem more like a joke than a serious matter.
Along with the colloquial voiceover, the woman's facial expression as she sits down next to her paralytic husband also suggests the idea of comedy. The timer in the corner suggests that she doesn't have much time for him. She seems very into her fashion and uptight which is a binary opposition to her husband- a rather large, jolly fellow- which shows comedy in their differences from each other.

Steve Neale proposed that each genre of film repeats the conventions of that particular genre of film while also making new variations to make the film individual. The conventions of a normal comedy genre film that are shown in this short film is the idea of binary oppositions, voiceovers to make it seem more funny and the accident that occurs to make him paralytic which is seen as funny because this is a thing that happens to barley anyone- rather than the usual convention of a comedy genre i.e. someone tripping over a banana as an accident.

Lovefield- Narrative- Megan

Restricted narration is used throughout the short film to keep the audience guessing about the story and the plot.

There are several action and enigma codes used throughout the film (as proposed by Roland Barthes) these are props that cause an active engagement in the audience to make them question what is happening and try and understand the plot and the genre of the film by these props and what they are being used for/in what context are they presented to us.


One of the enigma codes that appears repeatedly throughout the film in the shot of the black bird which presents the thoughts of darkness and mystery surrounding the story. An action shot that is used is the knife stabbing into the ground which could predict violence has or is about to happen which leads the audience to guess that the plot is horror/thriller as this is the sort of action code that would be used in that kind of genre. The bloody material seen on the floor as the camera pans over as well as the eerie non diegetic music makes us begin to believe this was a rape or something along those lines as we can hear a woman crying.

This film can be related to Todorov and his 5 stages of narrative:

Todorov 5 stages of narrative!

I would recognise the first stage (the equilibrium) as the first couple of pan shots across the fields where restricted narration is used to show the fields however at this point we have seen no people and no representation of anything bad happening.

The disruption of the equilibrium would be the pan over the mobile, material covered in blood and the screaming from a woman where we can only see her feet on the floor (yet again using restricted narration.) This is because the audience now know something has happened due to a tense atmosphere being created so there has now been a disruption to what was calm.

The recognition of the disruption occurs when we see a man running towards his car who we assume to be the antagonist of the film who has caused the woman to be in pain. The male character starts rummaging through the boot of the car trying to find something to aid the woman which is the recognition that this may be a protagonist of the story.

Stage 4 the attempt to repair the disruption occurs when the man passes the woman a blanket to aid her in her struggles and the problem is therefore resolved.

The new equilibrium is a new life being born and our views from the beginning of the film have completely changed. The pan over the fields show peace and security, the lighting has got brighter to show happiness and the non diegetic music has now changed from an eerie sound to a softer tone of music to show closure.

Mixtape- Audience- Megan

The short film mixtape won the best short film award at the Virgin Media awards ceremony. As well as this it won Best Film at both the Lancrab and Purbeck film festivals, and was even nominated for best short film at the BAFTA's in 2010.

 

I think the short film- Mixtape- appeals to many different audiences for different reasons. To begin with, this short film is only accessible by the use of YouTube and different websites online, which nowadays is seen as the main platform use of choice for teenagers/young adults who grow up around the technology of the internet and use it the most in this day of age.

main character and the girl next door
 

The film can be aimed mostly at the male population due to the film showing a boys love for the girl next door which is seen by the nervous way he is talking to her mum. It targets the age audience of around 20-40 year olds due to the outdated use of 'tapes' which aren't use in modern day anymore, it also targets the audience of when this music was released in 1925 as an up-beat pop music of that day in age, therefore targeting an older age population.

I wonder where my baby is tonight song

Lastly, this film could also target any teenager going through or falling in love as young love is the underlying theme of this short film.

Representation of Class and Age in 'About a Girl'

Camera Work
Mise-en-Scene
Sound

The films main character seen as a
silhouette against the bright sky
behind her.

Editing
Representation

The spectator is first introduced to the films main character through a low angle long shot of her standing in a field against a brightly lit background. The blue and white colours of the sky behind her cause her to become a silhouette in the frame, and she can be seen singing and performing a dance routine to the song 'I'm not that innocent.' The setting then cuts to a walkway alongside a canal where derelict and boarded up houses can be seen at the edge of the water. This suggests very little wealth in the area that our protagonist lives when partnered with the dull greys and browns of the buildings. She begins talking, and a harsh Manchester accent can be heard. The spectator is unable to assume her class and status simply from the way that she talks, but the harshness of her accent, the fact that she doesn't pronounce her 'T's' and 'Th's' and her limited vocabulary, substituting words she does not know for 'thingy' make is easier to guess that she is perhaps working class. However, she later on talks about how her father doesn't have time for her because he is 'looking for work' and how her mum lives off 'Dodgy burgers and knock off Larger' which suggests that actually her parents do not work at all, and could arguably be categorised as underclass as opposed to working.

Medium shot of protagonist
walking along the canal path.

During the shots by the canal path, a handheld camera is used and mostly a low angle medium shot. This gives the impression that she is talking to someone, perhaps a friend, and the position of the camera being next to her but slightly in front results in the spectator feeling as though she is directly addressing them, and therefore feel more involved in the shot. The film mainly consists of the girl talking about various events that have happened in her life involving her friends and family. When a memory is referred to, the scene cuts and a flashback of the event follows.

The spectator is first introduced to her mum and her little sister in a memory of the three out shopping on the street. She is in the foreground of the shot, while the other two are in the background in a deeper depth of field. Her mum can be seen scratching at a scratch card, which emphasises the family's lack of money and arguably their desperation. However, the little girl can be seen jumping up and trying to get her mothers attention, which paired with the fact that the main character is separated from the two could be a representation of the relationship between the three. The mum says 'hold on a minute' to the youngest daughter when she attempts to get her attention, which suggests that she perhaps doesn't have the time for her, and possibly see's her as a nuisance. The fact that the main character has distanced herself from her mum suggests that this is something she already knows, and has come to terms with. The first reference the spectator has of her father is her mum referring to him as a 'bastard,' which reinforces the idea of the protagonists unstable home life. Disputing parents is common throughout all classes, and separated families just as much, but with both sides struggling to find work and money, the main character being part of the underclass is enhanced.