2. Genre means type
Horror
Sci fi
Romance
Drama
Comedy
Action
Fantasy
etc
3. Generic Conventions
“Die Hard is a generic action film because it
uses action props such as guns and the
narrative contains many fight scenes between
hero and villain”
When you see things you expect to see in any
type of film, lets say a horror, you seeing
theGENERIC CONVENTIONS
You recognise that a film is GENERIC
because of the sheer number of times you
have seen this genre of film use these
CONVENTIONS
4. How to identify generic
conventions
You are looking for:
Typical narratives (storylines): structure of the
story/character types
Typical Micro elements:
lighting/costume/font/colour/props etc
Typical themes: good vs. evil/crime and
punishment/ achieving goals etc
5. Task
Lets use the horror genre
Make a mental list of al the things you expect to
see in this genre
You have just listed the GENERIC
CONVENTIONS of the Horror Genre
6. Hybrid
Some films are not simply a HORROR or a
COMEDY
They seem to use generic conventions from a
number of different genres
These are called HYBRIDS
Shaun of the Dead: Romantic, Zombie, Comedy
Can you think of others?
7. Typical or Challenging
conventions
You can normally prove that a film is GENERIC
by giving Micro element examples
But sometimes, films do these you don‟t expect
that genre to do
This is called challenging conventions
It is good for films to do things that audiences
don‟t expect, it stops the films from becoming
repetitive and boring
It is important that you can find things that a film
does that you didn‟t expect. Don‟t just ignore
these examples, tell us about them.
8. Audience
select texts on basis of genre, often because texts
are arranged at retail outlets by genre (just look at
how dvds are categorised on amazon). Also, certain
genres are considered appropriate to certain
ages/genders in society, and choices are made
accordingly eg teen movie, 'chick flicks'
9. Producers
Market and publicise films according to genre
because they know they will reach genre fans
Will see what genres have done well at the
cinema and try to repeat that success by making
films of the same genre
11. Negative thing?
On one hand, conforming to generic conventions
and giving the audience what they want, can
actually lead to the "they're all the same"
judgement
This is what happened to the traditional
Hollywood Western and Musical – because some
films were success, other studios started to churn
out lots and lots of them, the audience got bored
and stopped watching.
It is now only when a „new‟ Musical that
challenges the typical generic conventions
(Moulin Rouge or Sweeney Todd) comes out, that
audiences are willing to watch.
12. Positive thing?
On the other hand, genre provides structure
which can allow a great deal of creativity,
especially when a genuine reworking of generic
conventions comes along
Genre provides key elements for an audience to
recognise, so that they may enjoy the film and be
fully involved
Genre allows for expectations to be met, resulting
in a more fulfilled audience.