It's a small world...

This is the video to Arctic Monkeys' song When The Sun Goes Down - and it is the nexus of many connections. Firstly, it stars Lauren Socha as the girl, who plays Kelly in Misfits. Lauren Socha's brother, Michael, plays Harvey the school bully in This Is England and reprises the role as part of the gang in This Is England '86. He stars in both of those Shane Meadows productions along with Stephen Graham, who plays the pimp in When The Sun Goes Down. Graham also features in the video to Arctic Monkeys' Fluorescent Adolescent, which was directed by Richard Ayoade from The IT Crowd and produced by Warp Films, which also released This Is England.

It is a small world, isn't it?

Shane Meadows

We will be using Shane Meadows' This is England 86 to explore the representation of people, places and period. I like alliteration, you see.

There is a wealth of material accompanying the series out there on the internet, and those helpful people at http://www.shanemeadows.co.uk/ have helpfully collected them all together. The posts for 18th October, 10th October, 7th and 3rd of September contain some excellent links to articles and interviews conducted to promote the Channel 4 premiere of the series. Please look through the collected articles and collect any statements or quotations that you think will help you to write about the representation of people, places and period in the series - because, eventually, that is what you are going to have to do! Remember, when you collect the articles either in a Word or PowerPoint document, to record the sources (you could do this as a hyperlink) - this is good practice for research and you will need to attribute the quotations in your final assessement.

Other than that, just enjoy - or marvel at, as parts of it are really not enjoyable - the brutality, sensitivity, the truth and emotional depth of the whole This Is England project. A modern masterpiece.

This made me laugh. And it's about I'm A Celebrity so therefore related to Media Studies. Probably.

Sherlock

Sherlock is billed by the BBC as "A New Sleuth for the 21st Century". It updates the traditional Sherlock Holmes and Watson roles into modern London, taking and adapting the characters to a modern world. But in what ways does the show also adapt the Detective Genre for the 21st Century? This week I would like you to look at Sherlock and answer the question:

In what ways does Sherlock use and adapt the codes and conventions of the Detective Genre?

I would like you to focus on Narrative, Representation of Character, and the media language used to present the show.
There is a PowerPoint for reference saved in Google Docs - follow this link to have a look.
You can also look at the BBC site which has clips and background on the series, including character profiles (very useful!) and some interesting links.
Enjoy and good luck!

Analysing Representation in Skins

What do we learn about the representation of the different ages or genders in the opening sequence of Skins?
How is this representation communicated using the technical codes/language of:

• Camera shots, angles, movement, composition
• Editing
• Sound
• Mis en scene

Skins

Our first TV Drama case study will be Skins, beginning with an analysis of representations found in Series 1, Episode 1. We will be looking at how the makers of Skins, Jamie Brittain and Brian Elsley, establish the characters and the world of the show, through the five key questions.

Representation in the Media Industry

Want to work in the media industry? Are you female? Well, between 2006 and 2009 the TV industry shrank by about five and a half thousand jobs. No surprise in these trying economic times. However, five thousand of those job losses were women as the female workforce shrank by 20%...

Who is making the representations we see every day? How are those representations constructed - and in whose image?

Read about the cutbacks in this Guardian article, and review the figures in the Skillset 2009 Census.

Sun Headline of Distinction?

They had two months to think of a headline - and this is what they came up with? Really?

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind

This film is great for looking at narrative and representation, although our primary focus is on applying Dyer's Star Theory here. Gondry subverts traditional typecasting in his presentation of Clementine and Joel, casting Kate Winslet and Jim Carrey against type in an audacious move - just one of many audacious things about this film!


More to follow...

Stars and Star Theory

Firstly, apologies for freaking everyone out with The Sandman.

Secondly, there is some really interesting stuff about Star Theory out there - some it quite advanced, some of it simpler.

This is a basic introduction to Star Theory: http://www.mediaknowall.com/Starsgcse/Starsmain.html. Use the links at the bottom of the page to find out more.

And here is an example of Dyer's star theory applied to pop music: http://www.mediaknowall.com/Popular%20Music/popstartheory.html

This is a Warwick University blog summarising the key elements of Star Theory and its history at a much higher level: http://blogs.warwick.ac.uk/michaelwalford/entry/stars_and_star/

Types of Types

There are three main types of types. These are:

ARCHETYPES
These are cultural character types handed down from generation to generation: the knight in shining armour, the damsel in distress, villain, the hero etc. Remember, though, these are not just fictional types: media texts can cast real people as archetypes too!

GENERIC TYPES
These are media generated character types that belong to particular genres. For example, you always get the same types of characters in Romantic Comedies: the ditzy girl who's never going to get a good boyfriend, but then ends up with the misunderstood hunk who is more than meets the eyes. In action movies there's the retired cop/soldier dragged out of retirement for one last case, the rookie officer whose enthusiasm and optimism gets him or her into trouble...and in horror there's the crazed killer who will stop at nothing to commit elaborate and gruesome murders, opposed by the Final Girl, often an isolated female who fights back with ferocity and cunning and usually escapes...
Remember here that, in this postmodern age of genre hybridity, generic types from one genre can all too easily appear in different genres. Voldemort, for example, fits a generic type from the horror genre, but appears in a children's action film.

STEREOTYPES
These are socially generated types that media texts use to enable audiences easily to identify certain features and behaviours in stock characters. For example, when a stereotyped teenager appears, audiences are comfortable with the hoodie-wearing, anti-social behaviour and defiance that this entails, even though this may not reflect the reality of what teenagers are actually like. Media texts can also play with this, however - after establishing a character as a stereotype, it is often interesting to develop them away from this idea. A good example of this is found in Misfits.

Representing Reality: The Five Modes

Transparent Representation of Reality

• This is the dominant Hollywood style
• The representation of reality does not draw attention to itself
• The camera, sound and editing allow the audience easy access to the story which unfolds in a logical order
• The world is recognisable, though people and events may be “larger than life” (more beautiful, more talented, more spectacular)
• Audiences must suspend disbelief and believe in the reality of the world if they are to enjoy the text

Social Realist Representation of Reality

• This style presents events drawn from “everyday” life – e.g. not “larger than life”
• Camera, sound and editing draw attention to the “authenticity” of the events – i.e. we would experience them like this in the real world
• Often called a naturalist or cinéma vérité documentary style

Fantasist Representation of Reality

• This is where the events depicted could not realistically be expected to take place in “real” life
• Camera work, sound and editing may be “expressionistic”
• Despite the fantasy, these representations will still have something to say about the real world

Anti-Realist Representation of Reality

• In this representation, attention is drawn to the process of making a film or constructing a story
• The actors may talk to camera, the camera may be in shot, events are out of sequence etc.
• These representations can also comment on the real world, even though they deny the possibility of a realist representation

Postmodern Representation of Reality

• Post-modern texts comment on other media texts rather than directly on the real world
• A central feature of “postmodernity” is that audiences make sense of the text, and derive pleasure from it, through their knowledge of other texts, rather than their knowledge of the real world
• Postmodernism is present in almost all contemporary media; we live in a post-modern world
• It is possible for a text’s representation of reality to be fantasist and post-modern, for example. Post-modern representation does not need to exist on its own.

Representation - Key Questions

When analysing representation, try to answer these five questions:

1.What sense of the world is this text making?
What kind of world does this text construct?
2.What does this text claim is typical of this world?
How are familiar types used as a form of shorthand to represent people?
3.Who is really speaking?
Who is in control of the representations in the text – whose values and ideologies are
expressed?
4.For whom?
Will different audiences make different readings?
5.What does it represent for us and why?
To what extent are the representations part of the struggle in the “real world” to either
maintain or change the power relationships between groups of people or sets of values
and ideologies?

Four Definitions of Representation

1.As re-presentation; i.e. presenting reality over again; reality is mediated through forms of representation available in culture.
2.As “being representative of” in the sense of being “typical”. This raises the question of what is “typical”.
3.In the sense of speaking for and on behalf of somebody or a group, i.e. representing them.
4.In recognising the existence of different audience responses to different kinds of representation

Richard Dyer (1985)

Children of Men

This week's lesson will begin to refine the focus of our textual analysis onto Representation. We will be looking at the ways Alfonso Cuaron establishes character, setting and location in the opening sequence of his suberb film Children of Men.

In addition we will be looking at his distinctive use of long, single take shots in the film as documented in the DVD extras, and exploring the contrast between the fast-cutting sequences in The Ring and the long single takes in Children of Men. You can watch the featurette on the making of Children of Men here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EjNk-nxHjfM

Don't forget your analysis of the opening sequence of The Ring which is due in on Friday.

Good Blogs to follow

This looks like a really interesting blog - weekly posts on interesting media stories, linked to the excellent Media Magazine. Take a look!
http://petesmediablog.blogspot.com/

The Ring analysis is due on Friday 17th September.
You can get the sequence on YouTube at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dYkw8PMyGAc

The key names are:
Director: Gore Verbinski
Katie: Amber Tamblyn
Becca: Rachael Bella

Any questions, come and find me!

Textual Analysis and J Horror

We began our exploration of textual analysis by looking at Simon Hynd's classic short Virus and exploring the use of the camera to create fear, tension and suspense. We couldn't, unfortunately, watch the equally chilling animation The Sandman although I will try and work around this for a future lesson.

Next time, we are looking at Gore Verbinski's remake of The Ring, exploring the following key areas:

• Use of the camera
• Soundtrack – diegetic and non-diegetic sound
• Representation and character
• Mise-en-scene and framing
• Special Effects
• Narrative structure

in order to answer the question: How does the director create fear and tension in The Ring?

Welcome to Media Studies

This blog will chart the Media Studies courses at Chew Valley, including class work, independent study, and relevant media stories and links from the press and web. Follow!