i am not sure where i have acquired this so if you are the audience i apologise for not citing your creative and intellectual rights. I suspect I found it somewhere on here or on an OCR training day -

2. An Introduction to Film

3. Points to Consider;
• The study of any film concentrates on genre,
narrative and representation – the major textual
features of any media product.
• However, you will also be asking questions about
- what those films reveal about audiences (e.g. how
they are targeted and how different audiences
respond to films).
- the industry which produces and distributes them.

4. Genre – balance between industry and
audience needs?
There are two important areas to explore when
studying genre:
• How does the film industry use genre?
• What does genre offer audiences?

5. Genre – balance between industry and
audience needs?
• The film industry generally uses genre fairly simply – as a means of
minimising the risk of failure. Genre allows the film industry to
produce the kinds of film it thinks audiences will like, predicting
future successes based on what has already been commercially
successful.
• Genre follows the principle of repeating and varying conventions –
the elements which audience like and therefore want to see again.
• This tendency to repeat based on a particular commercial success
often results in the emergence of a trend for a particular genre.
e.g. Gladiator (Ridley Scott, UK/USA, 2000) spawned a
succession of similar ‘sword and sandal’ films, such as Troy (2004)
and Alexander (2004).

6. Genre – balance between industry and
audience needs?
• Genre can also be used creatively by screenwriters and directors
who can extend and vary genre conventions as well as subvert or
even parody them, as Wes Craven’s Scream series did with the
horror genre.
• The way the film industry uses genres could suggest audiences are
exploited and turned into passive consumers.
• However, it can be equally argued that audiences actively choose
the films they watch and that whilst many genres offer audiences
something that is familiar, they gain pleasure from having their
expectations fulfilled.
• What audiences seem to like most, is the familiar with slight
variations. If a genre becomes too formulaic, audiences tend to
loose interest…

7. Genre – balance between industry and
audience needs?
• …It follows the need to be reassured by the expected and yet
challenged by the unexpected.
• You could say, therefore, that genre is the balance between the
industry’s financial need for profit and audiences’ needs for
entertainment and pleasure.

8. Genre – balance between industry and
audience needs?
• …It follows the need to be reassured by the expected and yet
challenged by the unexpected.
• You could say, therefore, that genre is the a balance between the
industry’s financial need for profit and audiences’ needs for
entertainment and pleasure.

9. The Bourne Ultimatum and the Bourne trilogy:
Genre – repetition, variation and hybridity.

10. Key Vocabulary
Hybrid: a cross between one film genre and
another.

11. The Bourne Ultimatum and the Bourne trilogy: Genre –
repetition, variation and hybridity.
• The Bourne trilogy of films provides an interesting example of this
balance between industry and audience needs. Even though some of
the standard conventions of the action genre are still present for
audiences to enjoy, the Bourne films demonstrate several
departures from mainstream Hollywood action movie conventions.
• For example;
- The films appear far more aware of international politics than
many traditional action films.
- They appear to integrate action into the narrative in a plausible
way without the overuse of computer generated imagery which has
become a recognised signifier of so many action films.

12. The Bourne Ultimatum and the Bourne trilogy: Genre –
repetition, variation and hybridity.
• Clearly, the Bourne trilogy represents a hybrid version of the
action genre, an increasingly common approach in many
contemporary Hollywood genre films.
• Marketed as a ‘Bond for a new generation’, the Bourne trilogy
combines elements from the action / spectacle / adventure and
thriller genres, with elements from the political / conspiracy and
espionage thriller.
• These various elements are densely packed into the Bourne films
to produce a multi-layered style of film-making, which is somewhat
different from a conventional Hollywood action film like Die Hard.

13. The Bourne Ultimatum Genre Conventions
• Characters – a hero, a villain, the villain’s accomplice and a
victim.
• Narrative – a plot involving political intrigue, a mystery to
uncover, an international dimension, usually based in the
recognisable present.
• Mise-en-scene – a location which offers ample possibilities for
putting the hero at risk.
• Camerawork – varied camerawork featuring spectacular action,
usually involving weapons and death – defying stunts.
• Editing – rapid inter-cutting between key locations and people,
to increase audience tension and suspense.

14. Group Work

15. Task: In groups, choose a film belonging to a genre of
your choice. Analyse the film focusing on the following
conventions:
• Characters
• Narrative
• Mise-en-scene
• Camerawork
In doing so, try to make
applicable narrative theory that
has been covered in previous
lessons.
• Editing
• Sound design
Present your findings – making use of you-tube, powerpoint etc, to deliver your chosen film to the group.