Evaluation Activity 2

How does your media product represent particular social groups?

In our film we decided to stick to the stereotypes as we know that they have previously been successful. Taken was a film which had a significant influence on our production and so we decided to use a main character which was similar to the protagonist of Taken because it had similar genres and so in turn, a similar target audience. Kim – the protagonist in Taken is a 17 year old girl, portrayed to be overly vulnerable through the use of her over protective Father who retired from the CIA to be closer to his daughter. This almost over exaggerates the helplessness of the protagonist as it suggests she is incapable of looking after herself as her Father has had to leave his seemingly important job to be nearer to her. We referred back to Taken, in particular the character of Kim, many times throughout our planning process, both to gain inspiration from her, or to make sure our protagonist wasn't too similar to her due to the slightly different plot.

In terms of appearance, there are many similarities between Kim and Christie, our protagonist of 'Intrusion'. It appears that Taken had also chosen to follow the stereotypes as typically, a young, blonde, attractive female character is chosen to play the vulnerable character as this is what is expected in society. As the target audience consists of the general public, it makes sense to use a character in which they will expect to be the ‘vulnerable’ one in order to help involve the audience with the plot, and in our case make it more relatable as the target audience will be of a similar age. For this reason, we made sure to chose a protagonist which would easily be recognised by the audience as the victim. Like Kim, Christie is young, blonde and attractive which helps to provide reasoning behind the plot, making it more realistic as it could be understood why she would be a point of interest. Similarly, Christie is quite small, again reinforcing her helplessness but has a slim figure which helps to fit with the plot as she is introduced whilst running. In comparison to Kim, Christie is a lot smaller which fits more with the stereotypical conventions of the female victim than Kim's character as it could suggest she would be older and/or too strong to be taken advantage of, however they are both fit and slim. This reinforces their youth, but also gives a slight feel of hope or even independence as it suggests they look after themselves, and fits well with the genres as it implies they have a chance of surviving/escaping. Both characters are also white which again is stereotypical and conforms to the conventions of the genre as it is usually thought that young white females are more spoilt and rely on their parents whereas other races often seem exotic or invincible, therefore in the eyes of society, making them less susceptible to danger. For this reason, we decided that a white victim would fit better with our plot due to the audience's expectations. 

It is difficult to compare our protagonist's costume to what is stereotypically expected of the female victim because there are no clear guidelines as to what they are expected to wear. To an extent, it is suggested that they are not usually dressed conservatively which plays a part in why they are maybe more noticeable than other members of the public, however there is no dress code so to speak, like the very clearly defined 'James Bond' suit or the dark and mysterious spy attire. For that reason we decided to dress Christie suitably for her purpose as she was going on a run, but we also wanted to represent her wealthy background which is also something expected from a young white female victim. To do this, we dressed Christie all in black with recognisably branded trainers, and a simple stripe of pink down her sides. We also kitted her out with the full running gear such as a headband and ipod holder which is not necessarily necessary, however we thought this would help to represent her affluence. There are both similarities and differences between the protagonist's clothing in Taken and 'Intrusion'. They are both dressed appropriately for their situation - Kim is dressed less conservatively due to the holiday feel the plot represents however this could make her seem more vulnerable than Christie as she would stand out more against a crowd. Similarly, Kim is dressed more colourfully which illustrates her youth but makes her seem less sophisticated in comparison to Christie. It could be argued that this was done purposely in order to emphasise the vulnerability of Kim's situation but I don't believe that Christie's lack of colour undermines the effectiveness of her costume. It is more classy which is something we were aiming for, and makes her look professional which helps to enforce our plot as it allows the audience to believe that the crime may have been premeditated, adding to the suspense and creating enigmas. The pink stripes down her side are minimal but add a sense of youth to her character allowing them to remember that she may be more vulnerable than she portrays, and also help to make her seem more approachable which would help appeal to a wider audience. Due to the differences in each film which would have an impact on the costumes such as the location and the plot, I believe that the protagonist's costumes are as similar as they could be. They both represent youth, (although one is more obvious than the other) they both fit their purpose and they are both relateable to their target audience, successfully helping to suggest they are a victim.

Again it is difficult to compare the similarities of the characters' role in the play as they are different films with different plots and characters. On a basic level, both characters are cast as the 'targeted vulnerable teen' however this is as far as the similarities extend due to the differences in plot. As it is only an opening scene, little is given away about the character's background in our film meaning it is difficult to determine what the protagonist's role in the play is, however it is not suggested that the character is as helpless as Kim's character is in Taken. Christie is portrayed as mature through her body language and activities and maybe slightly naive due to her obliviousness through the use of headphones, nevertheless this probably goes unnoticed as it is something expected of a modern day runner. In comparison, it is implied that Kim is helpless due to the need for her Father to give up his job and move closer and for his over protectiveness, which may be considered over the top even for an ex Central Intelligence Agent. Similarly, her lack of clothing and bright colours despite the touristy location also suggest she is oblivious to the dangers around her, implying that her kidnap is her own fault. I do not believe that Christie's character/role in the film suggests this about her, however I am unsure whether this is due to her costume and demeanor, or just simply because there is not enough time for her character to be introduced completely. 

Evaluation Activity 1

 In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

It is important for an audience to be able to identify the genre of a film within its opening minutes. In our case, the opening to ‘Intrusion’ is characteristically that of a thriller film, sharing many of the conventions that are conformed to in a variety of popular films of the same genre. Despite the basis for our film existing around three main genres, crime, action and thriller, I feel like our film is most stereotypical to that of the thriller genre. This is because thrillers typically employ the use of a number of enigmas which immediately help to establish the genre, as well as ensure the audience’s attention is grasped so that they are paying attention to every detail. This, in turn helps with the establishment of the enigmas as it causes the audience to become intrigued, and want to know the answers to the questions which are being produced. Despite this, I do not feel that our other two genres are completely ignored and I believe that they still have a significant role in our film. Enigmas are also a popular convention within these genres meaning that the DNA of our plot works well with the conventions of all three of these genres. We focused on using enigmas to stimulate the audience’s attention and enjoyment because as the popular director Alfred Hitchcock once said "an audience would rather be confused than bored". This is something we took into a lot of consideration in the planning stages of our film, crafting a storyline for the opening that would be interesting and work as a prologue to events that could potentially follow.

The use of the extreme long shot which portrays Adam as he has entered the house aides his creepy demeanour as it suggests that he is being watched. The slow paced editing allows the audience to see that he is looking around, helping to unravel the plot. The slow paced scenes also aid to the stereotypes of the thriller genre in particular as it drags out the tension within the audience. The long distance shot helps to make Christie’s house look big, representing her affluence, but also emphasises her helplessness, making her seem vulnerable as it implies she will be unable to escape. We thought that this type of shot would be effective when introducing the genre as it would make the audience feel uncomfortable as Adam’s presence clearly doesn’t belong there, which hopefully would cause a build-up of suspense within the audience. We also thought that showing Christie leaving the house would influence Adam’s representation of the genre as it would help to provide a sense of urgency within the audience because they would expect her to be returning, which could be effective as it uses the feel of ‘time running out’ which is a conventional aspect in our chosen genres.

Thinking about it, our film does not conform to the action genre in the way we had first intended. Due to a considerable amount of plot changes due to practicality, lack of planning or just unfortunate circumstances, the finished product is completely different from our initial ideas. During the changes in plot we probably should have re-evaluated the need for three genres as now they could be considered to appear slightly unnecessary, and have prevented us from completely succeeding in following our aims. Due to it only being an opening scene, the next scenes had no relevance to us at all when filming, however to the audience the creation of enigmas may stimulate them to come up with an imaginative, elaborate plot, increasing their sense of enjoyment.

The use of enigmas which helped to establish our genre, also helped with the introduction of our characters. Due to the opening mainly conforming to the thriller genre, in order to help build a sense of suspense and intrigue, little was given away about both of the main characters. In order to follow the conventions of all opening scenes, we chose to introduce the main characters quickly so that we could show their significance, and to attract the audience’s attention from the outset, however we purposely chose to keep their background information to a minimal. Saying this, we decided to reveal slightly more about our protagonist’s background than our antagonist, such as her home and therefore her affluence in order to allow a character-audience relationship to be formed. This played a significant role in helping the audience to engage with the character as they were able to feel like they were getting to know Christie, and so could successfully form emotions, such as empathy with her, when necessary. We found that this was a successful, stereotypical tactic used in many opening scenes to help emotions to be established, allowing the audience to engage more with the film. In a similar way, we tried to reveal as little as possible about our antagonist to make the audience feel uncomfortable as his intentions were kept hidden. In this sense, I believe our opening scene follows the conventions of opening scenes, in particular the thriller genre’s conventions, and I think that the establishment of the genre plays an important role in how the characters are both introduced and interpreted by the audience. We chose to introduce Adam at the moment where he was coming out of the trees. We thought that this would successfully imply to the audience that this was not his house as it was not the normal entrance, and therefore, suggest he didn't belong there. This meant that from the start, the audience was wary of Adam's character which added to their sense of disgust around his character, helping the audience to engage and become involved in the film.

Evaluation Activity 1

In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

As research for our film, we looked at a number of different style fonts, in the hope to give us inspiration for our own. After looking through hundreds of different types of typography, we came to the conclusion we wanted to narrow our searches to a more simplistic, classy but not unnoticeable type of font. We decided with our film having elements of the crime, action and thriller genre, it would be best to gage both information and inspiration from titles of these genres. From our research, we learnt that titles do not need to be overly showy or flamboyant to stand out and look effective. Similarly, we wanted our film to be as realistic and believable as possible, so from our research we came to the conclusion that different cases were something to avoid, and stuck with all upper case as lower case would make it childish and easily dismissed.   

This is a shot of our final title. Although it is very plain, we believe it is still effective and stands out against the background well, focusing the audience’s attention. It gives the film a sophisticated and classy look, fitting well with both the genre and the plot, as well as attracting its target audience who we believe would find mature titles appealing. We opted for a simple font as we wanted it to act as juxtaposition between the tensions within the film.  Initially, Taken was the film we were basing our plot around as it was such a successful film and a similar genre to ours, so we wanted to produce similar titles. The titling used in Taken is very iconic to both the film and the action genre, which is something we wanted to avoid as our film is was not solely action so we didn’t want to advertise it misleadingly. Despite this, I believe that we created an ideal title which fitted well with our three genres. Although the monochrome titles are more conventional to the crime and thriller genres, they do not look out of place with the plot. We found it very difficult coming up with a name for our film, and I believe we settled on ‘Intrusion’ more for simplicity rather than because we really liked it. Saying that, we do not dislike it we are just unsure as to whether it fits completely with our genres as we believe its connotations have a slight sense of mystery to it that would make it more ideal for a different genre. Despite this, the word ‘intrusion’ successfully raises an enigma, hopefully causing our audience to ask questions such as “Who is the intruder? Why are they so important?” Obviously including the title of the film is something stereotypical to an opening scene, and so in that sense, I believe we successfully followed the conventions of an opening scene, succeeding in our aim.  

Evaluation Activity 1

In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

In our chosen genres, crime action and thriller, special effects is often a key component used to heighten the particular emotions wished to be evoked within the audience. It is difficult to compare the use of special effects within the genres together as there is such a large contrast, so I will discuss them separately before comparing them to our film 'Intrusion' in order to make it more accurate.

Even within the action genre there is such a variety of action it is difficult to accurately sum up the use of special effects as a whole. I suppose it depends on the amount and type of action used in each particular film as one on one fight scenes in an everyday situation would use much less, if any, and a different type of special effect than a full on gun fight battle in a war zone. Special effects are typically used where appropriate in moderation (if wanting to be realistic) in order to enhance or intensify the plot. In the action genre alone, special effects are used often to allow the producer to create any story they like (even the impossible) without endangering the actors. This is also the case within the crime and thriller genre, however typically special effects are used to a higher extent in action films. In the same way, there is also such a variety of special effects it is difficult to compare the use of them in the same way because they are used so differently. For example, special effects can be used to create the unreal, such as dramatic and gruesome battles which cannot physically be acted, as well as just to enhance the realism of certain lighting. Special effects are used in so many different ways it is hard to determine what is typical to what is atypical in my chosen genres.

As a whole, it is almost impossible to compare the use of special effects to the conventions of our chosen genres as there is such a vast choice. The use of special effects depends entirely on the plot (be it linear or non linear), and within each of these genres and sub-genres there are many different opening scenes which still classify as one of these genre types. In our film, partly due to practicality and partly due to the plot, there are little special effects used. The only feature we used which is relatively 'special' was our use of transitions. Although the picture is uninformative and boring, it illustrates our use of fades between different scenes. We used black fades to demonstrate a change in location, change in scene or change in time to the audience. This was helpful in making our opening more understandable, as well as realistic as it showed the passing of time which is something that would have been expected within the audience. When doing our research into our chosen genres, we found that transitions in-between scenes or to show the passing of time was a simple yet conventional way of unravelling the plot at quite a fast pace whilst it still being understandable. The only downfall in using these fades for so many reasons is that they needed to be used throughout in order to demonstrate continuity, however it meant it seemed like there were fades all the time which essentially made it even less realistic than it would have without them. This is something we have learnt and will take into consideration next time.

Even though transitions were the closest thing we used to special effects, we did not feel it was necessary to have included any more. This was because although special effects conform to the genres for the majority, realistically it lies down to the plot, and we did not feel that special effects would have aided our film in any way. I believe that by putting special effects in when it was not necessary would have made 'Intrusion' look childish and unbelievable which is something we were not aiming for. By not following the stereotypes of the genres as a whole, it could be said that our opening two minutes does not conform to the conventions, which is something we wanted, however I believe that to an extent it does adhere to what is expected as with special effects it would not have worked as successfully, and because there is such a large contrast of films within each genre, it would be unfair to judge it on the expectations as a whole.