Media Theory

Conventions of form: Short Film

What makes a good media product.

Bad examples of media products:

CAGED: Film Trailer
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8ZY3PfZyH04#t=85

This A2 media product isn't a good product due to the unclear, hard to follow narrative, the bad camera work, in which shots are poorly done which don’t look right, bad acting and terrible editing. This makes the product look very unrealistic and not successful as a media product.

Mise-en-scene	Cinematography	Editing	Sound
Bad use of location, un-realistic to trailer genre No effort put into thought of costume So basic, lack of everything within the macro feature of mise-en-scene Bad use of lighting Bad acting – not able to understand which character is which and who the bad and good characters are.	Incorrect camera shots used. Badly framed shots Shots too dark, so unable to see the action	Basic fade editing which is over used Badly done with ‘quotes’ and information of films, not convention and very cliché	Music doesn't fit the trailer, should be faced paced music. Unable to hear speech at some points, music too loud.

Good examples of media products:

Strangers: Film Trailerhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TNpB0eG5ekc

This is a very successful A2 media product because it is well planned, editing, clear and concise as a trailer. It gives the audience a clear perspective of the narrative in a matter of shots, it is well shot with good camera shots and correct angles.

Mise-en-scene	Cinematography	Editing	Sound
Good use of mise-en-scene for the kitchen: realistic Good use of mise-en-scene to show after math of earth-quake Good use of filming within the trailer with another camera. Good use of costume to demonstrate the difference in characters and importance of them	Good use of pans as a location shot Good use of shots such as depth of field Good use of camera movement to demonstrate earth-quake Well shot, correct camera angles	Clear information with opening shot of the words ‘England 2015’ Clever use of cuts to title shots Good use of out of focus filming to make character and audience feel distraught. News report – good effect. Cut at right moments	Hard to understand V.O and what it is saying Good use of news V.O with realistic feel to trailer Good use of sound with the news reporter V.O Good use of V.O with the most important information louder

Screenplay codes and conventions

Above there is a section taken from the Superman film in which I have analysed to show what should be included in which is included in the slide below

This is showing the codes and conventions of a film script and where these are included, they should be included in each script for the following reasons:

• Page numbers -
  For reference in which page the actors/directors or need to be on. 

• Stage directions -
  For reference to know where, what and how the actors need to be doing
• Character names-
  To know who is speaking for the crew to know who to show in the shot
• Directors notes -
  For the crew, director and everyone else to be aware of what needs to be done for improvement.
• Way of speech -
  The way the character must speak the line to know the effect for the scene

This is a phony script I made copying the codes and conventions of a movie script.

My Initial Ideas

Initial idea 1:

Spoof horror film where the protagonist roles are switched in which males are seen as the scared, passive, crying stereotypical girl roles and the females are the strong, dominant, brave, take charge character in which the antagonist is also a female doing a complete role reversal of the narrative.

Initial idea 2:

Reverse story during a zombie apocalypse in which is starts at the end and finishes at the beginning with only two main characters, a few zombies and some extra non-crucial characters in which the tragedy is at the beginning, but at the end it is still a huge climax to be revealed about one of the main characters.  

Initial idea 3:

Recreation of Michael Jackson’s thriller music video as a short film, as a tribute to the late Michael Jackson which would have included iconic mise-en-scene such as the red jacket, the cinema and the glove used in his video. It would have been recreated as accurately as possible.

Genre - Themes

Generally within the horror genre the usual themes are:

• Good VS Evil -
  
  So the devil is usually included within the narrative, in which the devil is the antagonist and the protagonist must defeat/destroy the devil, which then leads to the resolution of the film in which the devil has been 'defeated' or 'destroyed' 

• Religion -
  
  Usually in horror films religion is a big part of it as is the devil, so both link in well with each other so stereotypically they will both be included together. 

• The |Family
  
  Usually issue arise in horror films around the family, where the family is part of the victim or the family is the cause of the problems for instance in 'The Conjuring' the whole family is effected by the devil (which links to the other two themes usually found in horror films.

• Insanity
  
  Insanity is usually a big part of horror films due to the fact of most horror film settings been done in mental asylums but also the antagonist are usually insane in which leads to them killing people.