1. Representation: a portrayal of a person, according to
age, ethnicity, gender, class and status, sexuality etc.
‘Extort’ begins with the protagonist, a working class white
male, coming home from work. The mise en scene, the
suit, briefcase and smart phone, conveys to the
audience about the actors class and status.
I have also represented the hijacker as working class,
through what he is wearing and his threat to the leading
role, because he is asking for a large sum of money.
However, the kidnapper and the lead actor differ,
though their class seem similar. The central character is
conveyed as being on the high end of working class,
whereas the kidnapper is at the bottom of working class.
I have represented working class both positively
(protagonist) and negatively (kidnapper). This relates to
life because not everything is black and white. I
represented both sides so as to convey that every story
has two sides. If I presented the film through the eyes of
the kidnapper, the audience may see the reason behind
him being an extortionist.
However, I wanted the thriller to stick
to conventional action thrillers. The
plot of our film is common in the
media world. For example,
Breakdown (1997), the plot of this film
resembles ‘Extort’.