1. How does your media product
represent particular social
groups?
2. What is a Social Group?
A group of people who interact with each other, conscious of the fact that
they share a quality in common. How social groups can be determined can
be perhaps through their age group, gender, race, sexuality, religion or moral
beliefs. They may share a common goal which unites them.
3. Social Group One:
FEMALE VICTIM
Both our character ‘Jennifer’
and Kim use mobile phones
as a source of aid and then
consequently as a weapon.
Initially, both girls use the
phone to capture information:
Jennifer the plans of a
dangerous terrorist gang, Kim
of the plans of a sex
trafficking gang.. Upon being
discovered, both then use the
phone to aid them – Kim to
phone for help, Jennifer to
capture top secret information
and to hopefully foil the plans
of the gang. The phone prop
is what consequently foils the
plans of both gangs in the
films.
For our Thriller opening, we based
our female victim character on the
character of Kim, from
mainstream Thriller film ‘Taken’.
We selected this character as she
possessed the characteristics we
wanted our female to have, such
as: vulnerability, intuition,
helplessness, the desire to survive
despite all odds and to be
perused, therefore putting her in
fatal danger.
Vulnerability is a quality we
modelled our character of
Jennifer around. Kim’s character
shows her childlike innocence and
vulnerability by dressing in young,
childlike clothes with bright
colours, by wearing minimal
makeup to give the impression
she is younger, and by having a
terrified expression on her face
throughout her scenes. We
incorporated these qualities into
our own film, by applying the
methods of childlike clothing of
bright colours, minimal make-up
and scared facial expressions and
mannerisms. The light colours
both characters wear symbolise
goodness and our desired quality
of innocence, which is a Thriller
genre code and convection for
the ‘good’ character’s to have.
‘Taken’ also taught us to show
our vulnerable character of the
female victim through high
angles, showing her to be smaller
and therefore more easily
overwhelmed by the threatening
characters both films share – this
is a Thriller genre code and
convention.
Both Kim and Jennifer also share narrative similarities. Kim utilises her skills in ‘Taken’ as a heroine, before falling victim to the gang, by
acquiring her Father the information he needs to track down the gang and foil their plans. Jennifer also does this by recording the gangs plans
on her mobile, then removing the SD card containing the footage and salvaging it, which enables the police to watch the video and then act
upon the information she has gained them by foiling the plans of the gang also. Despite both characters being put in fatal, life-threatening
danger, both play a key part in the narrative by keeping their cool and aiding the authorities in the film. Kim’s actions hugely inspired us when
creating our character of Jennifer, as she showed us how to present a character as helpless, while also showing them as heroines. The clothes
the characters wear show they’re just ordinary girls but in extraordinary situations, another genre code and convention. A final similarity in the
narrative the girls share is that they both momentarily think they have escaped the hands of the merciless gangs, both to be proven wrong when
confronted in the climax of the scene. We have mirrored our scene with the one from ‘Taken’, as this moment of realisation of the inevitable
danger of the girl being confronted by the gang is height of action in both films.
4. Social Group Two:
GANG MEMBERS
For our Thriller opening, we based
our Gang Member characters on
the gang from the mainstream
Thriller film, ‘Sin City’. This was our
choice as the gang members in
the film were shown to be truly
intimidating, omnipotent,
threatening, mysterious and
capable of committing horrendous
crimes with a heartless approach.
The way in which we positioned
our gang members was hugely
inspired by the gang in ‘Sin City’
.We placed our own characters in
the similarly confined,
corridor/alleyway setting, which
has the effect on audience of
feeling trapped with the gang,
increasing their menacing,
oppressive presence. Their
casual, slouched body language,
which is shown through a
midshot, shows how both gangs
are very relaxed and
unconcerned about the heartless
crimes both are about to
commit. This quality both gangs
share shows them to be a
serious gang as opposed to
armatures, which is the quality
we strived to incorporate into our
work after being inspired by the
gang from ‘ Sin City’.
Regarding Mise-en-scene, in our
project we also got inspiration from the
costumes the gang from ‘Sin City’
wear. It is conventional in the Thriller
genre that the ‘bad’ characters wear
black, signifying evil. Our project was
no exception. Our gang members, just
like the ones in ‘Sin City’, are dressed
from head to foot in dark clothes,
mostly black, clearly showing the
audience who the ‘bad’ characters in
our film are. Also, like in ‘Sin City’ our
gang members are partly concealed
from the audience in shadow. Low key
lighting is a key technique that
increases the mystery of a character,
therefore making them seem more
menacing and unpredictable. The
secretiveness that surrounds the gang
members implies what they’re up to is
so horrible it needs to be hidden from
view. The fear of the unknown is a
aspect we play up in our project, to
match ‘Sin City’.
The two gangs also share narrative similarities.
The gang in both films are the antagonist, who
peruse a female victim who acts as the
protagonist. The manor in which our actors
acted was influenced by the arrogant,
egotistical manor or the gang who offered us a
clear blueprint to follow to achieve a
successfully intimidating, realistic group. We
learnt from watching ‘Sin City’, our gang should
contain at least one male character, as men
are stereotypically more likely to be a member
of a gang. We achieved this by selecting a
male friend our ours to take up the part of gang
member two. The deep, husky voice of a man
is much more suitable for a gang member as
the harsh tones influence the audience into
feeling more threatened and in anticipation for
danger. As men are typically seen as the more
physically overpowering sex, a male actor was
ideal.
Both gangs earn their bad reputation by reeking havoc in the storyline of the film they star in.
The idea of the gang overpowering and harming a female victim was a key plot idea we
incorporated into our work after watching ‘Sin City’. Harming another person proves to be the
quickest way of establishing the dangerous, criminal facet to the gangs character’s. In the
same way the gang from ‘Sin City’ harm Shellie, our gang harms our character of Jennifer,
which sets up the narrative for the rest of the film that this is a notorious gang who need to be
stopped, as opposed to teenagers on a street corner. Their crime pays a key point in the plot.
