Monday 15 April 2013

Amani Choudhury - Question 1: In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

The opening of our thriller includes many conventional features and by our product research we have chosen specific aspects and have resembled this in our opening.

There are particular ways in which we have used conventions from real media products such as:

Lighting:

The use of dark lighting at the beginning of our opening suggests that the atmosphere of the school is quite nerving thus creating enigma amongst the audience. By presenting the school through low key lighting shows that there are dark and mysterious elements to a 'ordinary' school setting. This is also seen in the opening of Se7en as the antagonist is seen to be taking part in immoral activities however, their face is not revealed. This creates ambiguity as the audience are unaware of the character's identity as the lighting creates a sense of suspense because the audience are not fully informed of the antagonist but only of his corrupt behaviour. In our opening the central character is revealed and is shown towards the audience that she has committed a murder, however the use of natural bright lighting in the bathroom scene shows that she is 'covering' up her true self as we wanted the bright lighting to indicate her hiding her true self and putting on a facade of a 'normal' school girl. This is aslo shown in American Psycho as the main character is seen doing their morning routine however the voice over indicates that there is a mysterious and abnormal element to them.




Plot/Storyline:

The storyline of our opening is conventional as it is about a school girl with a 'split identity'. This is shown in many other films such as Jennifer's Body as a hidden aspect of a regular school girl seems to create interest amongst the audience.















Title and Typography:

The title of our opening has a double meaning which links to where the opening is set. 'Red Marks' can be associated with school and being a student as 'Marks' can refer to grades and tests however the red can be symbolic in terms of the storyline because the central character is a murderer so 'Red' therefore implicates blood.


The typography of our title is bold and has an eroded effect which is what we aimed for because it links to the thriller genre. My titles research post on the 'Art of the Title' video shows how the fonts and the typography link to the film's genre and plot so this helped us decided what fonts to choose from and what it suggests about the film. Our group used dafont.com to see what types of fonts we could use for our credits and titles and what were available and how it can be implemented in our opening. We decided to go for an eroded effect as the typography links with blood by the smears in the letters. The superimposition of the title over a clip of the drain highlights the use of blood because it is white font over a red background so this empathises the title and stands out against the blood. The contrast between red and white is used in many real media products such as 'Dexter' and 'Jennifer's Body' (shown above) as the white can symbolise purity of the character because of their age but the red also suggests a dark secretive side to them as she is also a killer.
 
 

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