Media Evaluation

Media Evaluation

1. Our film is a conventional thriller, we use non-diegetic music to build up tension while my character is following Matt, and as I appear from the bushes the music gets more edgy and it is a stronger tone of music as if a fight is about to happen. While I am running away from Adam there is a fast-paced drum and bass electronic beat to connote fast-paced action. There is a negative representation of youth culture in our film, my character is dressed in a tracksuit, hoodie, bandana and white trainers. The bandana is the main use of iconography; a bandana is usually a representation of gang culture. Matt’s character is carrying a shoulder strap bag with money inside, this indicates he is quite well paid, his suit and tie also show that he is either older or from a better background than my character. In most thriller films you will see non-diegetic music build up tension and if there is a chase or a character is being followed the way the camera shot is set up will show the spatial area around the characters and where they are going to go. There are also narrative enigmas involved which are a common convention of thriller films, e.g. who is my character, why is he following Matt, why has Matt got all the money out and why is my character beating up Matt and taking his money. The setting is counter-typical of a thriller film, instead of being in a more urban surrounding, or at night, it is set in a town centre and then moves over to a public park.

2. There is a negative representation of youth culture in our film. My character is shown to have a bandana – usually linked with gang culture, and when my character gets to Matt he beats him up ruthlessly showing he has no mercy, then when chased by Adam he shows more ruthlessness by beating him up and just walking off once he has finished. Matt and Adam are positive representations, Matt is shown to be an innocent victim and Adam tries being a hero but in the end he catches up to me and my character beats him up.

3. Either a small media institution would distribute our film, or

A large one like Pathe would, a company to handle production would probably be a large thriller institution e.g. Lionsgate, the reason a larger company would handle distribution and production would be because of the large male target audience, and if the main parts were played by Hollywood stars then that might attract a fair amount of female viewers as well.

4. The target audience for our film would be 15 – 30 year old

Males who are of lower social class because the violence and edginess of the film would appeal to the younger, lower social class. We made questionnaires to help us get a rough idea of who our target audience would be. The psychograph of our target audience would either be mainstream or struggler or a YAK lifestyle.

5. We decided the thriller genre would be the best genre of film to make because of the range of sub-genres and films we could use as examples. In the opening two minutes we see my character stalk Matt and create tension to the audience, then we see that Matt has money for someone by the phone call, then we are briefly introduced to Adam’s character who at this moment is an extra or innocent bystander. Matt goes into the toilets to check everything is in place and my character re-appears wearing a bandana and hood up and the audience knows that he is about to do something troublesome because of the clothes he is wearing, he sneaks to the toilet and sees Matt and ruthlessly attacks him and robs him for his bag and money, Adam’s character comes to check Matt is O.K after the brutal beating and pursues my character, he catches up to me and my character beats him up as well and walks off and music fades in and the film title is flashing on the screen. It would have a certificate of 15 because of the violence; the casting was easy because I was the only one who had stereotypical urban youth clothing so I was the one to play the robber and Matt and Adam were the others in my group and were easy to cast. The location’s were in Windsor town centre and Bachelors Acre, Windsor Town because of the hustle and bustle and false sense of security that Matt is safe, we then used Bachelors Acre because it is an open space and was handy for filming because of the amount of shots we could use. Costume wasn’t a hard decision to make, the bandana and hoodie I wear were to connote the urban youth culture and to show secrecy of my character’s identity, Matt and Adam needed to wear smart clothes to show the difference in class between my character and theirs. We used a few innovative shots, the point of view shot from Adam when I am punching him, and the shot in the alley when the camera flips 180 degrees to follow Matt’s movement which we saw in Kidulthood and thought would be quite good to use. We used fast paced music for when Adam was pursuing me and during the fight to connote the fast-paced action that was happening and we used hard rock guitar when I was running towards the toilet to create tension to the audience, and the stalking music was also to create tension and make the audience ask questions of what was happening and why Matt was being followed and creating Narrative enigmas.

6. The equipment we used was really helpful to creating the final product, the Macbook was the most helpful because of the software all inter-linked and you could import and export anything you did to Finalcut express to add to your film, you could make a soundtrack on Garageband and Send it to Itunes and then import it into Finalcut express to add to the film. We also used Livetype which we created our credits and film title on. The cameras we used were really simple to use and this was helpful because we could get to our location and get into filming straight away. We also had vast options of what we wanted to do on Finalcut express and Livetype and Garageband to alter what we wanted in order to make the final product how we wanted it to.

7. We have progressed excellently from the preliminary task because we were allowed much more time to shoot and edit the final footage, we used a lot more shots and were allowed to be more creative with the shots we used and music we added. We were also given more time to plan what we were going to shoot and what locations that we were going to use. We could have much more storyboards and our film was allowed to be longer, we were also allowed to use Livetype and put in credits and our understanding of the Macbook and its software became better. Our costume and mise-en-scene had a much wider variety as well, instead of all of us using school uniform we could go home and get other costume but chose not to because of the social class barrier shown in our film.