Richard Dyer Theory

Icons and celebrities are manufactured by organisations for financial gain only.

His theory is broken down into three main sections.

1. Audiences and institutions- Celebrities/ stars are made purposely to appeal to their audience in order to make revenue for the globe companies. These companies will shape the image in which the audience sees.  
2. Constitutions- This is closely linked to Audiences and institutions.
3. Hegemony- mostly known as culture. The audience is able to relate to the star in some way as they admire them and look up to them. Audiences have been found to copy the stars behaviour or looks. For example a person may copy a stars hair style as they like the star for their appearance.

Narrative Theory by Todorov

­Todorov found that all plot lines all follow the same 5 steps.

1. Equilibrium- the beginning of the story will appear to be normal and everyone acting as they should be.
2. Disruption of the equilibrium- A problem will happen which will disrupt the peace.
3. Recognition of the disruption- All the characters realise that there is a problem.
4. Attempt to repair the damage- All the main characters try to fix the problem and restore the order.
5. New equilibrium- The problem is resolved and everything goes back to normal.

My film plot follows this theory:

1. Equilibrium- The opening scene shows Harriet sitting at home and everything is fine.
2. Disruption of the equilibrium- Harriet gets taken by Philip.
3. Recognition of the disruption- James, Laura. Matt, Alice all realise that Harriet is missing.
4. Attempt to repair the damage- Matt tries to find Harriet.
5. New equilibrium- They find Harriet and Philip goes to jail, happiness is repaired. 

Film Poster- low key lighting

Here are some images that I have found online while looking into different styles of lighting. This style is called low key lighting. I wanted to use this style as I found it fit best with the horror genre. I have decided that I will have the model looking away from the camera too. In most posters I have found that the model will be making direct eye contact, however I want to break away from this norm as I want the model to connote vulnerability and inform the reader that she is scared just with her body language.

Here is a horror poster that I have found which uses low key lighting. I like how they have placed the model in the middle of the poster. I aim on doing the same, however I will have the model angled and looking slightly to the left hand side. This model is making direct eye contact to engage with the audience. I also like how they have included dark colours. On my own poster I will include the colour red as it connotes violence and death. I will also make the writing into a bold serif font so the font is eye catching.

Theories

Stereotype theory 

The stereotype theory was created by Tessa Perkins. Stereotypes are usually created by the media. A stereotype is an assumption made based on a person or group of people. often a stereotype falls within these aspects.

personality

behaviour
appearance
sexual orientation

Perkins argues that if creating a stereotype was easy and straightforward then the audience would simply grow tired and the stereotypes would no longer work and the audience would not accept any form of stereotype.

Perkins view comes from the idea that it’s not as simple as placing a person/persons into a category. She states that their are 5 assumptions:-

1. Stereotypes are not always negative
2. They are not always about minority groups or the less powerful
3. They can be held about one's own group
4. They are not rigid or unchanging
5. They are not always false

Perkins also states that all stereotypes have some form of truth behind them, otherwise they wouldn't be as influential on the audience viewing the stereotype.

Here is a short scene taken from the film Cabin in the Woods. In this scene they have created a stereotype. This scene connotes to the viewer that this group of teenagers misbehave and are careless with no respect for society. As one of the teenagers is smoking an illegal substance we are able to see that they do not care for rules. In this scene these teenagers are shown in a negative light. Within less than a minute they have been able to create a stereotype for teenagers.

Feminism theory

The feminism theory is a set of beliefs made about women. Feminism is about the fact that women should have the same equal rights as men. They believe that in the film industry women are mostly shown in a negative way and that they are often shown to be an objective for men to use and take advantage of. They also feel that women are oppressed by man. They believe the media portrays this and keeps the subjective view going.

Laura Mulvey argues that the women are only shown in  the media due to their sexuality and physical appearance. She argues that there are three common traits in the film industry. These include:

• The males are the main characters who control the action and movement of the film
• Women are often shown to be passive and lead by the male. They are passive due to the male Gaze. This is when the camera is made out to be the eye of a real man and that we only see women in the media how ever the male wants to show the female.
• We watch these representations as we gain pleasure from them.

This scene is taken from “It Follows." It portrays the girl to be vulnerable and powerless to the men. The girl is wearing very little clothing which follows on from what Laura says about the way women are treated. The girl in the film is also shown to be passive. We see two men in this short clip. The first man is protecting the girl by holding up a weapon when they sense danger, the second man is shown to be the villain and powerful. We as the viewers see this, as the girl is crying and trying to escape as she does not want to be around him. The clip shows the key points made by Laura Mulvey.

Question 4

Question 1

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

When planning for my film I decided that it would be better to follow the conventions that are in the horror genre then it is to break away from them. While researching into other films I found that the most successful films follow the typical conventions for example, cabin in the woods, they made a large profit and their overall score on IMDB is 7/10. For a horror film this score is very good. Cabin in the woods was one of the films which inspired me to create mine. Cabin in the woods follows most conventions which I will go into detail later on.

I decided to call my film “lost In The Wild” as that normal conventions means that the title indicates to the audience what the film is about. As the first word is lost it connotes across to the audience that someone within the film is lost, this add vulnerability to the film which often is linked to the horror genre itself. A main part to the horror genre is to set the scene in an isolated area often forest/woods. In my title I have included the word wild; this is basically the same and therefore follows the conventions of the horror genre perfectly.

Most horror trailers open with a scene which is a peaceful home environment, for example cabin in the woods starts with a normal bright happy introduction with nothing wrong. I have done the same, I have started with my trailer showing Harriet in a safe environment (her home), and most horror trailers start with tricking the audience into a false security. This is what I have done with my audience. I have began my trailer with Harriet sitting at home reading a book, In this opening scene I have used a book as a prop, the book itself is from the horror genre. From this the audience is now able to see that something bad may happen when the character within the film doesn’t know anything yet, this affect is called dramatic irony. I feel I have done so in the correct manner. Dramatic irony is mostly used within written language and I haven’t seen this yet used in many horror trailers. I feel that by using dramatic irony has challenged this convention of not informing the audience anything. Most trailers leave the audience in the dark about the plot.

To add tension to the trailer and build up a mysterious atmosphere I decided to play around with using unusual camera angles. In one scene I have the camera facing downward onto a large puddle; in this shot we are only able to see two set of legs walk past. This low angled style camera movement connotes that there is strange mystery to the trailer. Also this angle allows me to show the villain and still hide their identity.

Another large part to the horror genre is the location. A key part to building suspense is the choice of location. Typically used within this genre is an isolated area. Mostly in Cabin in the woods the area is set in the woods and this is the same for my film. While researching into cabin in the woods and other films from the horror genre I found that most of them at some point in their film or trailer featured an isolated area. Most of my trailer features an isolated area, I have followed the convention as that I felt it would be best to do so as it connotes across to the audience a sense of vulnerability. 

I have used multiple type of sounds within my trailer. I have tried to use a mixture of both diegetic and non-diegetic sounds. One of the most common affects done for horror trailers is to have voice over. However to break this normal convention I have not used a voice over as I found it will take away the mysterious affect I planned to create.

One of the major theories that I researched into when planning my horror trailer was Propps theory, this theory came from the idea that there is 7 different character profiles that are featured in films, these profiles are; the hero, the villain, the donor, the princess, the princess’ father, the dispatcher, the false hero. Typically two profiles can be one person. Often this 7 character profile is found in horror films, for example cabin in the woods has several main characters and they all fit into all several profile. When researching this perspective I decided that it would fit perfectly with my plot idea and I would be following this convention.

When first creating my poster I looked into posters that are already published, my main influence came from the posters, Final Destination and Drag me to hell. I found that these two posters followed the normal conventions. For example they both feature a main image, Tag Line, masthead, realise date. However they both did not feature the actors name on the poster which was something that I wanted to do so to make my poster stand out against the others I decided to do so. I have found that most new films not to this and it were something that was done in the past. I decided that I wanted to bring back this old tradition. Part of the horror genre is to use low key lighting within the trailer. However I wanted to carry this on into the poster as well. By using this style of lighting I have been able to give my film poster a dark scary look.

In addition I have followed the same conventions for my magazine front cover. My main objective was to follow the conventions as I felt that it would be able to attract my audience better as I all ready knew what they wanted from my extensive amount of research. Within the horror genre, the colour red is featured a lot as it often connotes blood or danger. I have also featured this colour as I knew the colour would be easily recognised with the genre of horror. On my magazine front cover I have included a masthead, Tag lines, main image, bar-code and anchorage text. I have done so as I was able to find all things components on other magazine covers.  

In conclusion I believe that I have followed most conventions that are within the film industry, I have also followed the conventions that are for a poster and magazine cover. However there are a few areas which I have challenged conventions in order to make my film unique against films already published.

Question 3

What have you learned from your audience feedback?

When I first started to research into the horror genre I decided that I would have to use both primary and secondary research in order to get a non bias view that would also be able to reflect society.

My primary research consisted of  a questionnaire made on Google Docs, I then asked my friends and family to fill out my questionnaire, however I was aware that by just using people I knew may of made the results bias however to stop this from happening I published links to my questionnaire on different social media platforms like Twitter and Facebook. This then allowed me to get responses from all over the world

For my questionnaire I devised 8 questions that would help me gain an extra understanding of my audience and the things they enjoy watching. One of the first things I found was that the majority of the people that answered my questionnaire were females. To be able to keep my audience engaged with the film I made my main character a female so that the audience was able to connect emotionally with the film as they are the same gender. Following on from that I was able to find out that most of these females that are between the age of 15-20. I then developed the idea that I would use a young adult case for my film as I will be able to link parts of the film to events and sub cultures that are formed in today’s society. My questionnaire actually helped decide the name of my film. Before my questionnaire results I wasn't sure which name to call it but after finding out that the title “lost in the wild” was the most popular I decided to use this name. Another key part to my film is the area in which I will base my film. From my questionnaire I was able to see that my audience wanted my characters to be in an isolated area.

Leading onto my secondary research I looked at many online websites and books to give myself the information that I needed to be able to follow the conventions. For most of my secondary research I used a website called Slideshare, this website allows anyone to create a free account where they upload any presentation that they want. I also have my own account where I have uploaded presentations from both AS and A2 work.