This document discusses influences for a social realism genre film. It outlines conventions of social realism like exploring social issues through character stories and regional identities. Directors Shane Meadows and Tony Richardson are discussed who made films set in working class communities in England. Actors Andrew Shim and Vicky McClure are mentioned who are known for their roles in Meadows' social realism films. Their use of method acting techniques could influence the film. Production companies Film 4 and the BBC film network are cited as influences because they have produced diverse narratives and documentaries.
2. What’s the genre?
For our media production, we decided to make a film based
around the genre of social realism. With this in mind, we
want to possibly include conventions such as wider and
social issues explored through the use of emotional and
dramatic character stories and the erosion of regional
identities.
This genre is not necessarily as well known and recognised
as other genres such as Action and horror and therefore we
wanted to make our film more unique and influential to our
target/secondary audience.
3. Relevant Directors...
Shane Meadows • Shane was born on 26th December 1972, in
Staffordshire, England.
•He has been a British director, screenwriter and
actor since 1995.
•The majority of Meadows’ films were based in the
Midlands area of England and were often
associated with what is known as ‘Kitchen Sink
Realism’. This refers to the cultural movement of
the 1950’s, whereby theatres and film companies
evolved into producing media products which
focused more on social realism and domestic
situations involving ‘working class’ people.
•Some of Meadows’ productions/films include:
‘Small Time’ (1996) and ‘The Stone Roses: Made of
stone’ (2013)
• The majority of the content of his films was semi-autobiographical
and was based on his experiences
in Uttoxeter (where he lived as a child).
4. Continued...
Tony Richardson • Tony was born on 5 June 1928 in Yorkshire
•The most famous film of Richard’s work is
‘The Loneliness of the Long Distance
Runner ’ which was released in (1962), and
was adapted by Alan Sillitoe in the later
years. The film is about, what was known as a
‘working-class rebel’ and how he gets himself
well known with the wrong crowd of people
and the character ends up in prison.
Therefore the only way he can escape from
the trauma of being in prison is by long
distance running, hence the title. This film is
more organic, and forces/ delineates
dominant ideologies, accompanied by its
realist observation, which is displayed well to
its target audience.
5. How have they influenced us?
As Meadows’ film were based
‘Kitchen sink’ realism as mentioned
before, we wanted to try and
replicate this kind of narrative and
include social and organic scenarios.
In addition ‘Small Time’ (see left) is
based around a small gang of
criminals and how they live their
lives in a suburb of Nottingham. As
this is kind of similar to our
narrative, we are going to possibly
incorporate storylines inspired by
this film, but obviously without
copying it!
Shane
Meadows’/Tony
Richardson
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6. Key/ reoccurring actors of the social realism
genre...
Andrew Shim
Vicky McClure
•Andrew was born 18th August 1983 in
Miami, Florida.
•He has been an English actor and MMA
fighter since 1999 to present.
•Shim is most famous for his appearance in
Shane Meadows’ film ‘This is England’
(2006) and played the part of Milky.
•
•Vicky was born 8th May 1983 in Nottingham, England.
•She is an actress and model and has been since 1999.
•Vicky is best known for her roles on Shane Meadows’ films, such
as her role as Ladine in ‘A Room For Romeo’s Brass’ (1999).
•Vicky has won a variety of awards over the years, such as the
RTS best actress of 2011 and the 2011 BAFTA award for best
Television actress.
7. How have these actors influenced us?
Many Social realism actors (in particular, the
ones mentioned on the previous slide) would
have used a well known technique to get into
character, which is known as method/organic
acting.
This was primarily introduced through
playwrights, such as Henrik Ibsen and
Constantine Stanislavski, which was then
adapted to modern film products.
This technique may involve the occasional use of
‘What if...?’ where the actor has to imagine that
they are actually in a certain situation and ‘act’
accordingly, or use emotional recall, whereby the
actor uses emotions felt from past experiences to
convey ideologies within a narrative. These
techniques may be the only way that an actor can
portray a particular emotion.
8. Relevant Institutions...
Film 4 productions
•Film 4 Productions is a British, independent film production
company that sometimes works with other subsidiary companies
such as ‘Pathé’ in order to produce various films such as ‘Slumdog
millionaire’ and ‘Shaun of the dead’.
•The reason why we feel this horizontally integrated and not
necessarily vertically integrated company is relevant to our media
production, is that this production company has involved itself in
a variety of different narratives and documentary themes.
BBC (Their Film Network)
•The BBC was founded on October 18th, 1922.
•This independent broadcasting and film company is vertically and
horizontally integrated and often does not involve any parent
companies.
•This company also, like Film 4 has done a wide variety of media
products and subsequently have involved themselves in numerous
narrative storylines, hence why they have influenced us.
