Media Evaluation

1. By Kate Harrold
HOW DOES YOUR MEDIA
PRODUCT REPRESENT
PARTICULAR SOCIAL GROUPS?

2. A Social Group is a group of people who interact with each other
because they have something in common. For example, social
groups can be determined by: race, gender, age, religion,
sexuality or moral beliefs.
WHAT IS A SOCIAL GROUP?

3. FEMALE VICTIM
INNOCENT, HELPLESS, VULNERABLE, INTUITIVE
The character of the female victim in the opening of our thriller is very similar to the
character of ‘Kim’ from the thriller ‘Taken’. We took inspiration from this character and
incorporated it into our narrative. In ‘Taken’, Kim commits an act of heroism before she falls
victim to the villain. She does this by describing the identity of the villain to her dad on the
phone before she is kidnapped. Similarly, the character of Jen in our thriller begins to film
the gang’s conversation on her phone before she is discovered and killed. This is her act of
heroism. The heroic actions of both characters are vital to the rest of the narrative as they
act as a catalyst and fuel the rest of the film’s events.
The character of Kim wears bright child like clothes with minimal make-up. We used this
look on our own character of Jen to show her innocence. We achieved this by having her
wear a coloured scarf and a white top. The association of the colour white with the hero is a
code and convention of the thriller genre as it represents good in the fight of good vs evil. By
having Jen wear ordinary clothes, it shows that she is a normal girl who is thrust into an
extraordinary situation. This gives the audience the impression that she is helpless which,
again is an idea we took from the character of Kim. This is because it makes the audience
more engaged as they fear for the character as they are unsure as to whether she stands a
chance. Jen also wears very little make-up which also shows her vulnerability.
We also took inspiration from the props used. As I earlier said,
both characters use a mobile phone in their act of heroism. We
really liked this idea as the phone is the only weapon these
victims have. This allowed us to capture the bravery of the
character as it shows that even in desperate situations, they
managed to find a way to be a heroine.
The vulnerability of the female victim is also shown through the
camera angles we chose. We included high angled shots as
these made our character seem small and helpless which are
traits we definitely wanted to include to ensure we had created
a convincing and accurate character. Although the lighting of
our thriller overall is low key, the shots of the female victim are
slightly lighter to again, associate her with the side of good.
Finally, we represented this social group by taking inspiration
from the body language and facial expressions of the character
Kim. In Taken, she uses terrified expressions and her body
language is very nervous and shaky to show how scared she is.
We used this with our character by showing the terror on her
face when she tries to escape the gang members. We also
made Jen’s body language frantic when she momentarily
thinks she has got away by having her constantly look around
whilst her hands are quite shaky as she tries to remove the SD
card.

4. GANG MEMBERS
THREATENING, MENACING, EVIL, SERIOUS
We have also used the social group of gang members in our opening. For this group, we
took inspiration from the thriller ‘Sin City’ and the group of gang members led by ‘Jackie
Boy’.
The gang members in Sin City all wear dark coloured clothing as it is a code and
convention of the thriller genre for the villain to wear the colour black. We used this in
our opening as black shows that the gang members are on the side of evil and it
contrasts the innocence of the hero. We also used low key lighting in the shots of the
gang members as this creates shadows which are also a code and convention of the
thriller genre. It makes them appear more mysterious and menacing.
We also took inspiration from the setting used in the scenes of the gang members in Sin
City. As seen in the picture, they are standing in a narrow dark corridor. Our thriller
opening takes place outside so, we decided to set it in a narrow alley. We thought this
helped represent them as a social group as shows the threat of the gang due to their
secrecy. It also gives the audience the sense of feeling trapped which puts them in the
female victim’s position. The body language of the gang in Sin City is very laid back and
slouched which emphasizes how menacing they are as they don’t seem to care about
the bad things that they are doing. We incorporated this into our characters by having
them stand quite relaxed and nonchalant to show their casual look. A similar approach
was taken with facial expressions as the gang members in Sin City once again, do not
seem phased by what they are doing so we did this on our own characters. We also
made sure their facial expression was fairly serious as we wanted to show how violent
and reckless they were.
The voices of gang members are often very steely as we researched in Sin City. This
shows their focus and therefore threat so we made sure the actors playing our gang
members spoke in a way which made them seem a convincing threat to the victim. The
music also emulated their presence as it becomes were tense and driven by a drum beat
when the gang members enter to show their omnipotent presence.
Finally, our gang mirrors the gang in Sin City narratively as they both pose a threat to a
female victim by wreaking havoc. This was useful in representing them as a social group
as it shows the audience that they are on the side of evil.