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Identity Theories

Sheldon Stryker - Identity Negotiation

Sheldon Stryker has a theory that people 'negotiate' with others to create their identities. People may negotiate their favourite fashion, films, bands and many other things, and with many people participating in similar activities. This creates the concept of a 'subculture' with people in one group who participate in similar actions and share experiences. 

Here are some example subcultures including:

• Football Fans
• Punks
• Metal-heads
• Goths/ Emos
• Hippies
• Nerds/ Geeks
• Bodybuilders/ Fitness Fans
• Cos-players 
• Hipsters
• Super fans
• Collectors 
• Hackers
• Gamers
• Adult fans of Lego
• Bronies
• Horror fans

Francesca Poletta & James M Jasper

They believe that identity is constructed by people outiside of the group. From birth people are designated gender roles, are made to watch certain children's shows and many things like that, British young people's identity is constructed by the media, which is mainly run by older people outside of their social group. As adults are the main group that run the media, British young people are seen through the view of adults, which sometimes leads to them being demonised. Young people can either go against how they are portrayed, or follow that example.

David Snow

David Snow believes that there is no actual definition of a 'collective identity'. He believed people felt a sense of individuality "one-ness" or individuals grouped together "we-ness". 

He believed there was no actual identity as an individuals identity could be similar to others, for example fans of rock music are all similar. 

Collective identity includes shared attributes and experiences, a main example of this is football fans can see themselves as 'better' than fans of other teams.

Tafjal & Turner

Tafjal and Turner theorised that there is no such thing as personal self, there is a collection of selves within one person. A person will have different interests and conversations depending on who they are with. One of the reasons for this is because there are ever expanding groups. A school student will act differently with their teacher, their parents and their friends. Social contexts are supposed to trigger different identities. 

Mikhail Bakhtin

Bakhtin believed that people cannot be labeled by an identity, as an identity is something which is ever changing and can never fully be revealed. The easiest way to consider this concept is that people change over time and that they do not like being labelled. Discovering the identity is a life long project. 

A huge time for people to experiment with identity is when they are young, this is the time they experiment with different activities, subcultures and music, and a lot of the time 'grow out' of their identity. Many people associate with the 'emo' subculture within their younger years 

David Gauntlett

His first theory is that people are expected to have an identity. He believes that modern western society puts pressure on on individuals to make choices about their identity and lifestyle. Society expects people to have certain interests and behave in a certain way. He also believes that identity is limited due to finite resources. People may not be able to afford to pay  for the fashion or lifestyle they want. 

This links to Ulrich Beck who noted everyone wants to "live their life" but it is "not a very experimental life". 

Gauntlett's second theory is that everyone wants to find themselves and find their identity, so they experiment with different lifestyles, hobbies, films, music, food and many other things to see what fits and what they like. Similar to the point I have made before, when someone is young they are likely to be experimenting with many different identities to see what they like, someone may try for example a football club, despise it and then move on to trying something else. He believes finding an identity is problematic and roles are uncertain. 

Audience Theories

Audience Theory

Utopia - Richard Dyer

The media theorist Richard Dyer has noted the audience look for 'utopian solutions' to the World's problems within film. The concept of a 'Utopia' is a perfect society with no flaws, which is present in many films, such as 'Back to the Future: Part II', which envisages a beautiful future with major technology and lower crime.

Hypodermic Needle Theory - The Frankfurt School

The Frankfurt school theorised that when an audience watches a film, they are passive meaning that they are told how to think.  They believe that characters can be 'demonised', values can be presented and many other things could be present through the media. The audience are supposed to be told how to think, as there is no other form of information. This is where the 'needle' image comes from, as if people have views 'injected' into them.

Users and Gratifications - Blulmer and Katz

The Blulmer and Katz media theory of 'users and gratifications' is the theory that audience members know what they want from a media text. They will consume different texts differently and this can be seperated into four categories: Information (find out about relevant events, seeking advice, education, gaining a sense of security through knowledge), Personal Identity (find out models for behaviour, identifying with another, re-enforcing their values and gaining insight into themselves) Intergration (gaining insight into others lives, identifying with others for belonging, finding a basis for conversation, carrying out social roles, enabling them to connect with friends, family and society) and finally entertainment (escapism, relaxing, cultural or aesthetic enjoyment, filling time, emotional reasons, arousal).

'Wallpaper' - David Buckingham 

David Buckingham believes that young people see the media as a 'wallpaper' in their daily lives, using it to make sense of their life and experiences around them to develop their taste. A strong example of this would be what many newspapers have described as the 'Skins' generation, basing their musical tastes and lifestyles around the Channel 4 drama show 'Skins'.

Production Company Logos

Effective Posters

Key Scenes

Scene Outline: 

Jennifer is walking towards the cinema through the streets, where she is kidnapped and a jacket is placed over her head.

Shots:

Establishing shot of the street itself.

Long shot of her walking through the street.

Medium close up of her walking.

Extreme close up of her eyes looking shocked at the kidnapper.

Over the shoulder shot of the kidnapper looking at her.

Close up of jacket over head. 

Blackout. 

Scene Outline:

Terry desperately  tries to call Jennifer, reads frantically through her diaries to discover her location. 

Shots: 

Establishing shot of him in her room. 

Close up to his stressed out face. 

Point of view shot towards her diary.

Close up of his phone.

Point of view shot of his phone.

Medium close up of him pulling his hair rather stressed.

Scene Outline:

Terry watching television where he discovers that Jennifer has gone missing.

Shots:

Long shot of him sitting down watching television.

Point of view shot of the phone ringing.

Close up of his facial expression reacting to the phone call.
Close up of the phone.
Medium close up of him looking upset with head in hands. 

Representation Task

Trailer Vocabulary

• The turn line - usually in film trailers there is some form of soundtrack that suits the mood, for example here is the trailer for the family film 'The Lego Movie', which is mainly aimed at young children with it's bright colour scheme and choice of third party characters such as Batman. The trailer uses the song 'Everything is Awesome' by Tegan & Sara feat. The Lonely Island, it is an extremely childish pop song and suits the upbeat mood of the trailer. However the trailer's turn line is at 1:01, where the main character falls into a ditch, creating a dramatic tone by stopping the music. A trailers turn line is where the soundtrack stops to leave time for a dramatic moment, shock dialogue or a comedic line, as it brings clarity and emphasis to that moment.

• Hits - hits also form part of the trailers soundtrack, creating a sense of action and tension, hits are usually features of action film trailers. This is especially true for the film 'Guardians of the Galaxy' as the trailer features the seventies song 'Blue Swede - Hooked on a Feeling', creating vocal beats and a sense of rhythm. 

• The button  - the button is a line of dialogue which is edited after the title card which reveals the name of the film. The button is used to leave the audience with a strong positive viewpoint on the humour of the film. It is present in the classic 1980's film trailer 'Groundhog Day' with Bill Murray's character repeating the same day of his life multiple times, the trailer ends with the humours dialogue "So what did you do today?" "Oh you know, same old, same old".

• The rise - the dramatic climax for the trailer, usually before the films button and title reveal. The 90's action film 'Fight Club' utilises this really well as there are several conclusions made with in it's trailer such as romance, gun violence and explosions, which will hugely interest the audience.

This information, along with a lot more can be found in this resource: http://www.npr.org/blogs/monkeysee/2012/01/15/145227280/the-art-of-the-modern-movie-trailer

Production Company Titles

Treatment

Production Company Name:
Voice

Production Team Members:
James Wale (8191) Eden Parke (8133)

Genre:
Teen Drama / Thriller (Social Realism)

Title of Production: 
'A short term effect'

Synopsis: 
The film begins with a young boy named Terry, who falls in love with a girl named Jennifer. She helps him over come his social problems ever in the most confused aspects of their relationship. One day, Jennifer stands up Terry at the cinema, she goes missing and it turns Terry's life upside down.

Detailed Narrative Outline:

The film begins with the lead character Terry, narrating the events of his life. He explains that he has done a lot in his life, and he would like to share with the audience. He explains that the film is a love story, describing his love for Jennifer, which sets up the romantic tone of the trailer and film. The first dramatic element of the theme (although a slight one) is the fact Terry is due to go to the cinema with Jennifer, he describes how everything in his life was looking up for him, until she doesn’t arrive. For a while, Terry is upset but thinks little of it until a few days later when he watches the news and finds out that she has been missing since the time they were due to date. Terry receives pleas from her parents asking if he knows anything, until one point where the police enter his house informing him that he is a suspect. He sees video footage of a man that looks mildly like him, but slightly different. At some point late one night, Terry meets someone who tells him that they are in fact the kidnapper, he attempts to get violent with them but to no avail. As the film progresses, Terry argues with the kidnapper, calls the police and then he gets arrested. The kidnapper Damian is present at the court; Terry notices that there are a lot of physical similarities between him and Damian. In the court room, there is the revelation that there was no such person as ‘Damian’. It ends with him in a psychiatric hospital, finding out that Damian was actually himself, and he had no recollection of kidnapping Jennifer. 

Intended Target Audience: 
Our target audience is teenagers and young people between 16 to 24 of both genders. We will not target our film at a specific gender, representing both genders in a positive way. 

Key Characters:
Lead Male: Terry Lewis
Lead Female: Jennifer Ida

Example of a Photo Animatic

The Development of a Genre - Superhero Films

Superhero Films - The Development of the Genre

Example Storyboards

This storyboard for the 2004 horror romantic-comedy 'Shaun of the Dead' features the scene title 'SCENE 2/3' the editing techniques that will be used. Here they have shown that a 'frame wipe' will be present, and arrows are used to illustrate camera movements such as panning shots. The mood of the scene is wrote here, which is rather unusual describing it as 'bored'.

This storyboard for the 2010 comedy 'Scott Pilgrim' is very action packed, bust is not as illustrative as the Shaun of the Dead Storyboard. Here this is not as effective, as there are no editing effects or emotions, instead there is just a description for the actors actions ('The twins mood deepens' and so forth). I do not think I will take influence from this. 

Conventions of Social Realism

• Cast of unknowns 
• British alternative/ hip-hop soundtrack
• Multiple sub-plots
• A mixture of humour and drama
• Location Shooting 
• Settings of estates and streets
• Identifiable regional identity 
• Exploring Social Issues

Conventions of Teenage Drama

• Usually feature a mainly teenage cast in a group.
• Features many elements of romance, be it heterosexual or otherwise. 
• One of the characters is an 'underdog' who meets some success at the end.
• An exaggerated version of teenage issues, such as drug use, pregnancy and many other issues.
• Empathy is usually created for the character or characters.
• Features a modern or alternative soundtrack.
• Usually a school setting.
• Characters houses are another common setting.
• Low-key lighting to show naturalistic surroundings.
• Costumes are usually fairly simple, casual teenage fashion.

Storyboard for Preliminary

Strengths and Weaknesses of an Existing Product

Secondary Research Into my Target Audience

The target audience for my film is young people, between 15 to around 25. This is also the target audience of the radio stations 'BBC Radio 1' and '1Xtra', in 2011 these radio stations ran a poll for all of their listeners. 
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/legacy/radio1movies/2011/03/your_favourite_movies.shtml

The list of the top 20 films are: 

20. Scarface
19. This Is England
18. Clueless
17. The Silence Of The Lambs
16. City of God
15. E.T.
14. Slumdog Millionaire
13. The Big Lebowski
12. Die Hard
11. Fight Club
10. The Godfather
9. Inception
8. The Dark Knight
7. Anchorman
6. Forrest Gump
5. Pulp Fiction
4. Back To The Future
3. Toy Story
2. Shaun Of The Dead
1. The Shawshank Redemption

This shows me that members of my target audience like a variety of films, including some contemporary (including 'Inception' and 'This is England' amongst others). But also many acclaimed and classic films ('The Shawshank Redemption', 'Scarface', 'Pulp Fiction' amongst others) and it also shows a variety of genres, including main ones (drama, comedy, thriller) but also niche genres (animation, gangster and sci-fi).

As social realism is one of the genres I am working in, and it is hugely British, my target audience is going to be British youth interested in film. This is also the target audience for the film magazine 'Empire' who earlier this year released their greatest films of all time list. This also shows variety in genre, with 'Star Wars - Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back' taking the top spot. The films that take the top 50 spots widely change in style and genre, but most films in the top 50 sharing the same binary opposition of 'good versus evil'. 

http://www.empireonline.com/301/list.asp?page=38

There is a film festival targeted towards my target audience of young people, titled the 'YoungCuts Film Festival' where I can see which styles and genres are popular amongst a young audience.
http://www.youngcuts.com/homepage