Post 15: Reflecting on theory

From previous post I have looked at three different theory and how they have effected on the media world, these three theories where Genre, Narrative and Audience. Each theory holds different views and opinions on the effects of media, which I both agree and disagree with. In this post I am going to be looking at how these theories can either be applied or not applied to our short film scripts and plans that we are making for production.

Genre Theory

If we look back to Post 4 that I completed looking at Genre theory as a media concept, we can see that I looked at theorist such as Chandler, Robert Symth, and McDougall and their varying ideas of what Genre theory is. To sum up quickly what genre theory actually is, is virtually impossible as everyone has their own ideas, opinions and interpretations that are debated widely by critics and audience. However, genre theory is looking at how texts are placed into different categories or lists, which is then used as a way of analyzing the text hopefully making it easier to differentiate between different genres.

Within each genre there are many conventions that are used by producers, which are used to help the audience establish what genre they are watching. These conventions should then become markers that are identifiable to the audience such as, narrative structure, themes, location, lighting, music and language. 

When looking at our short film that we will be producing we’ve had to look into different conventions that the audience would except or associate with the genre of Drama. The Genre Drama looks at real life situations and in our short film it is focusing on teenage life. An example of a convention that we have used is in our short film would be the dominant theme of bullying. This theme is something that nearly everyone can relate to in one way or another; within our society it’s a common topic, which is often reported about. This means the audience will be able to relate to the theme easily as they will already have a good understanding. 

 

Another example would be our location we have chosen to film in many locations such as outside a house, Alleyway and school. All these location reflect a real life day-to-day routine, which again reflects our genre as drama as its realistic. When filming we have chosen not to add any additional filters such as an 85 lens which would brighten the location as we are trying to create a location and atmosphere which reflect the girls life and the sadness she is feeling. We have chosen to use all of these conventions because as a group we feel these will have the biggest impact on the audience, we feel they will be able to easily detect the conventions within our short film and will appeal to our target audience.

Previously I have mentioned that producers need to be creative making sure they aren’t just copying another film with the same conventions. This means that they have to think of new and exciting ways to put the traditional conventions across to the audience but in a new and exciting way. As a group we have looked at examples of films that share the same conventions we are trying to create. One example is Harry Potter, here we looked at how though different conventions such as lighting, sound, camera they had create an intense action scene in an Alleyway. After looking how they had created this scene we then had to be creative ourselves making sure we weren’t copying the Harry Potter scene but using the conventions in our own thoughts and ideas.  

Below is a link to Post 4 on Genre Theory as a media concept which looks at media concept in a lot more detail. http://carolynthornton-a2-ms.blogspot.com/2010/09/post-4-genre-as-media-concept.html.

Narrative theory

When we are regarding at Narrative theory we are looking at the way in way in which the story is told either fictional or non-fictional. There are three very important theorists that are associated with Narrative theory and these are Propp, Todorus and Strauss. They each had their own ideas and explanations of what narrative theory is.

If we first look at Propp he was a Russian critic from the 1920s who analyses fairy tails. He claimed it was possible to clarify characters and their actions into clearly defined roles and actions.  He believed that there is only 8 possible characters in a story and there is only 31 different functions or situations that can take place within a story. The link will take you to all character and functions proposed by Propp.http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vladimir_Propp. In reference to our own short film I can say that we have used his character and functions that he proposed. When looking at the characters we have used, we can say we used the Villain played as our main character LucyAnn, the princess or the pries would be the younger students that gets bullied or the hoodies that bully Villain (LucyAnn). When looking at the functions we have used absentation, villaniny or lack, mediation and punishment. By using these conventions supports Propp’s ideas that all stories have some form of Characters and Functions that he suggested.

Another theory to look at is Todorvo who was a Bulgarian theorist. He suggested that most narrative start with an equilibrium in which life is normal and happy. This is then disrupted by and outside force and Disequilibrium takes place, this is then resolved and a new equilibrium takes place. When looking at our own short film I don’t think we can apply this theory. I believe we could apply the start of the theory such as Equilibrium where LucyAnn lives her life as normal which is represented, then moving onto disequilibrium we could apply this to when the audience realize that LucyAnn is actually being bullied herself as well as being a bully to others. However we cant apply the new equilibrium as I don’t believe our short film has one, I think if there was to be a new equilibrium it would be LucyAnn stops bullying other people and she is not bullied herself by others.   

The final theorist to look at is Strauss; he was an anthropologist who looked at how stories unconsciously reflect their values and beliefs on their audience, which are expressed in the form of binary opposites. Examples of binary opposites are Good vs. Evil, Rich vs. Poor, Hero vs. Villain. In our short film I think we have represented a few Binary opposites such as when LucyAnn pushes over a younger students here we could say the opposite was Good vs. Evil. However I think this is the only example where binary opposites apply. This is communicated through the mise-en scene and the clothing and props used by other characters. For the younger student her clothing with represent a stereotypical ‘geek’ like student and for props she will be carrying books representing to the audience that she is a hard working student. This will be the opposite to LucyAnn by which time the audience will know that she doesn’t follow rules and doesn’t does any interest in her education. 

Audience Theory 

When we look at Audience theory we are looking ta many different models that have developed from different time periods such as the Hyperdermic model, Two step flow, Uses and Gratifications and Reception Theory. When we first looked at Audience theory as a class we divided into groups and each looked at a different model. These presentation can be found on the link, these shows in depth research into each model. http://klsmediadepartment.blogspot.com/2010/09/audience-theory-student-powerpoints.html

The first model is the Hyperdermic model, which was produced in the 1920s, it proposes that the audience receives information passively as it is transmitted via the media texts, without any attempt to process the data. The audience’s experiences, intelligence and opinion are irrelevant to the reception of the text. It also states that behavior and thinking is easily changed by different media texts.  When looking at our short film Emily the producer by passively want to transmit the message and effects bullying can have on others as well as on an individual level.

 

The next model is the Uses and gratification model that came in the 60s, this model proposes that the audience is far from passive and that audiences consume text for different reasons and ways such as, a Diversion and a way to escape problems. Personal relationship for emotional interaction, Personal identity for learning behaviors and Surveillance to gain useful life information.  In terms of our short film I hope that audience will activity take away Surveillance, I hope they will have a better understanding of what its like to be bullied and the many possible reasons behind what makes a person a bully in the first place. This is shown at the start of the film when we hear an abusive father shouting at LucyAnn, later we see herself as a bully to younger students and class mates and finally the audience will see that she herself is a victim of being bullied.

The third and final theory is the Reception theory, which proposed that individual circumstances would affect the reading and interpretation of the texts such as age, gender, class, and race. Its also believes that text are encoded by the producer and later decoded by the audience. For example Emily is the producer in our group and her individual ideas and believes will be encoded in the script however, audiences will later decoded and take away their own meaning of the script. This could either be the same ideas as Emily had or they could have interoperated the ideas differently.