Essay plan

To what extent did you aim to meet target audiences expectations?




Plan:


Introduction


I aimed to meet target audience expectations by....
describe product and desired target audience


1st paragraph


how we tried to meet expectation (camerawork, mise en scene)


2nd paragraph


Did we accomplish what we tried to do?


3rd paragraph


make reference to a theory, and apply it to our work


4th paragraph/conclusion


decide on personal viewpoint, make own thesis and answer the initial question.

Representation and Audience - Section A 1B

Representation

We have tried to represent freedom and ways of life in our music video. We displayed the contrast in different types of lifestyles through the use of jump cuts, which showed how different the types of people are. The mise-en-scene, such as costume also indicated the types of people, with lots of everyday, business-type people wearing suits and basic clothing, and out main character Porridge wearing jeans.

The use of colour in our music video also represents rebellion.

Our music video goes against Laura Mulvey's theory as we do not use objectification of women and we do not conform to the usual hip hop conventions of lots of girls on screen being shown purely for male's entertainment.

Audience

Our target audience is teenage males. It is also aimed at people interested in skateboarding, bmxing etc.

Our certificate would be 12 as there is no violence, strong language or sexual content. The only aspect of

our music video that would need some parental guidance or restriction is the lyrics.

We are attempting to generate a preferred response as are music video is purely for entertainment.

Our target group would expect to see a typical skating atmosphere, we have have embraced this stereotypical view of skating by the mise-en-scene and surrounding backgrounds. The audience we aimed the video at will be happy with our video because we followed the stereotype.

Analysis of theories and theorists

LAURA MULVEY

"In a world ordered by sexual imbalance, pleasure in looking has been split between active/male and passive/female. The determining male gaze projects its phantasy on to the female figure which is styled accordingly. In their traditional exhibitionist role women are simultaneously looked at and displayed, with their appearance coded for strong visual and erotic impact so that they can be said to connote to-be-looked-at-ness."

Biography:

• Born in Oxford on 15 August 1941
• studied history at Oxford University
• she came to prominence in the early 1970s as a film theorist
• much of her early work investigated questions of spectatorial identification and its relationship to male gaze
• the 1975 essay Visual pleasure and Narrative Cinema helped establish feminist film theory as a legitimate field of study
• the most influential of Mulvey and Wollen collaborative films, Riddle of the Sphinx (1977), presented avant-garde film as a space in which female experience could be expressed
• She is now a Professor of Film and Media studies at Birkbeck college, University of London

Theories:

• Mulvey argues that in classic hollywood films in particular, women are merely represented to provide visual pleasure to men
• Her theory of the Male gaze was influenced by the works of Freud
• the audience is constructed in a manner where they are all expected to be men
• This male gaze is both voyeuristic and fetishish
• Her concept of "to-be-looked-at-ness" exemplifies that women were merely shown on screen in classic hollywood in order to provide men with visual pleasure and have erotic impact
• Mulvey argued that the typical key protagonist within a classic hollywood film was male and the audience members where similarly typically expected to be men
• the typical male audience are alligned by the film's protagonist by identifcation, admiration and aspiration
• In a lot of Hollywood movies in which the target audience is male, events which occur to women are presented largely in the context of a male's reaction to the events and she also believes that female viewer's must experience the narrative secondarily, by identification of a male.

A film that somewhat challenges the male gaze theory is 'Top Gun'. There is a scene in this film in which several male characters are seen playing volleyball on the beach. This scene does not serve any purpose in progressing the narrative further or provide anything useful for the audience. It is there simply for voyeuristic reasons to appeal to a female audience. In particular the camera shots have intentionally focused on the character's body's.

A film that represents Mulvey's theory is 'Fast and Furious' as the main aim of the women featuring in the movie is too simply look good and attract the male audience. The camerawork has intentionally allowed a firm focus on the women, which is an example of objectification. The film clearly has been constructed to be visually interesting for a male audience and the women are there to merely look attractive to the men.

Analysis of Dog Soldiers

1) What key features of editing, mise-en-scene, sound and cinematography can you identify? What meanings do these elements generate?


Mise-en-scene
fire light - made a gloomy/dangerous environment - especially around Ryan
soldiers appeared tired/sweaty - showing how hard the fight is - can they win?
moon - hints that there is more fighting to come.
lighting is nature therefore creating authenticity

Camerawork
medium shots - shows them preparing to fight/tie up Ryan
close ups  used in shot-reverse-shot of conversation of Ryan and Cooper
close ups also showed on the car wheels, gear stick etc, showing the problem with the vehicle
handheld camera - creates confusion and franticness to the situation
over the shoulder - appears as if someone is backing him up/watching
pan of men around the table - shows their emotion - sense of loss and inevitable defeat.


Editing
accelerated hot reverse shot - shows energy of conversation and can see the characters emotions/reactions
zoom - into window towards woman
slow motion - fire chasing the car and explosion
match on action

Sound
diegetic sound - guns loading, footsteps, heavy breathing, heartbeat of ware-wolf (no soundtrack - emphasizes solitude)
non-diegetic - soundtrack is fast paced and emphasises the upbeat movement of the situation
heroic sound at times
abrupt changes from diegetic to non-diegetic - creates dramatic emphasis
Piano sound - in the disequilibrium stage

2) How do the technical elements you have identified help indicate the genre of the film? What other conventions do you think are evident in Dog Soldiers?


We would say 'Dog Soldiers' is an action/horror genre. Elements such as the fast paced energetic soundtrack support the genre we have given it. Mise-en-scene features a lot of gore and fictional monsters to emphasize the horror side of the genre whilst the action shown through the soldiers show the action side of the genre. Perhaps there is a comedic element to 'Dog Soldiers', little things such as shooting the hand through the letter box were laughed at throughout our viewing.


3) Are there three clear stages to the film's narrative? Does it have an equilibrium, disequilibrium and new equilibrium structure?
yes, Piano sound - in the disequilibrium stage. And the new equilibrium when the man walks out of the front door alone in day light.

4) How do you think gender is represented in the film?
Masculinity is shown throughout the film through the soldiers and how they battle through it, the female gender is also represented to be a twisted and plotting - as she pretends to be nice and helpful before she turns into a wolf and wants to kill all of them - this suggests the film makers are male/ or people with bad views of women.

5) How does Dog Soldiers represent the armed forces?
The armed forces are represented to be slightly corrupt, they were internally set up by Ryan, someone of a higher rank, however the corporal ranks are represented as genuine people who work together and care about each other. It also displays the armed forces as being quite humorous and perhaps less powerful and dominant as you would wish them to be.

6) Who do you think the film is aimed at?
Aimed at men and people who like ironic humour shown through a very small budget with Wolf costumes bought from tesco. lol
Aimed at people who are interested in soldiers, the army, werewolves etc.


7) What certificate do you think the film would get and why?
I think this film's certificate would be a '15' because of the gore, violence and strong language. It shouldn't be an 18 certificate because there aren't elements that strong in the film.g