How Does Your Media Product Represent Particular Social Groups? (Evaluation Task 2)

How Does Your Media Product Represent Particular Social Groups? 

In our 'Opening Sequence' there are numerous social groups that are well represented within our 'Thriller'  but out of them the two that I believe stand out the most are the representations of both Gender and Age, two major elements of determining someone's identity which is what our Opening Sequence is predominantly based around.

For the representation of Gender in our 'Thriller', mise-en-scene has often been well illustrated throughout out of all the 6 areas involved but especially through the good use of props which we provided for our 'Thriller'.   Make-up is a key prop as from its very first appearance to the audience, they automatically adhere to the stereotype of an ordinary Female performing her everyday routine, but with an obvious twist highlighted by the slow pace in time and the accentuated attempted care  which is going in every action. 

At the beginning the audience is made to believe that the 'Opening Sequence' is adhering to the stereotype of a Female putting on her make-up, but as more is revealed we come to realise that there is more going on. We are subverting the stereotype in disguise by showing only small clues throughout but her Gender still is able to connect to the stereotype of  how female victims are typically viewed.

Another one of our uses within the 6 areas of mise en scene was with our use of costumes for both the Male and Female roles, especially for the Female as she is more visible throughout. Her outfit was chosen to instantly represent her Gender as her coloured white gown represents her innocence which is often an image of young children and especially girls as they have been described as little angles and are protected by older siblings as their responsibility. Unlike the female's all white costume, the Male role, played by Mike, was dressed in an all black outfit, the complete opposite. Even though his role is only seen briefly, we are still able to clearly recognise his Gender through his costume with his fedora hat, leather gloves and heavy coat as it is a very stereotypical villains outfit, but this is such a massive contradiction to his true role.  

The facial expressions of the Male character are shown by the only full shot when he is silhouetted in front of the door.  The outline features of his face and his neutral facial expression, firstly looking back into the room before leaving, showing no recognisable emotion clearly reveals his gender to be male which is reinforced by his build with his broad shoulders and with his uptight body language. Mike's character positioned by the door also added a masculinity to the shot as he stands tall and looks out creating the tension formed from his angled outlined body.

We transformed and decorated our room location with the use of our props to create the atmosphere and change an originally quite plain room into quite a girly room by including the hair brush and candle; all the props equally added a sense of femininity to the existing atmosphere. Gender was represented by all these many elements connected to a girls room and not at all to a males room and so when he is revealed it suppresses all our previous ideas of the situation. 

When filming our 'Thriller', the majority of our shots were all either close ups of establishing shots or extreme close ups of our female actresses face or other areas of her body.  Every new shot focused on different feature elements such as her long, light brown hair, her long eyelashes being extended with mascara and her feminine lips.  All these elements combined help determine her gender without the need of a full face shot as the continuation of the close shots used throughout gradually reveal more and more with tension building about her identity.

When editing the shots in our production stages before completing our final product, everything was purposely quickly cut in single shots or short montages, as we wanted to begin revealing the Girl into the Opening Sequence after establishing shots of the room.  We aimed to raise the tension more and more until the girl eventually appears revealing her gender almost instantly but unlike her, our male character is only revealed towards the end of the Opening Sequence and in a way as to subvert any previous assumptions made by the audience to shock them into the reality of what was actually occurring.

The diegetic soundtrack which we used, as if it was coming out of the record player, was in the style of the 1920's era.  The quite romantic sounding soundtrack suggests it wouldn't be unusual for a girl to be listening to it. The words used in the song, which is also the title of the song ‘It Always Hurts to Say Goodbye’, connects to the reality of the situation as we know he is not able to let go of his younger sibling and so is trying to preserve her in her natural state in which he remembers. Other diegetic sound effects are included throughout, for example the sound of her long hair washed, blow-dried and brushed and also the sound of her long nails being firstly roughly clipped and then painted a light shade of pink, stereotypically a youthful colour used by young girls. Sound has not been used to completely reveal gender - but the combination of the 1920's music and the other sounds together with visual shots such as nail varnish gives an idea of gender.  

For my other chosen representation; Age -  the use of the props such as the record player and the antique style hairbrush made the atmosphere even more unusual as the props are not usually associated  with the stereotype of our Female's characters age.  Another Prop used was the record, where a 1920s style track was playing for a lot of the opening sequence which was quite unusual was for a girl her age to have owned, but not impossible and so the audience are able to potentially ignore this for the time being.  Also the chair, only partially visible, is a tired and possibly antique chair and so again is unusual and in contrast to for age.  The props create contrast between their age and our Female characters age.

Costume: the female character seems quite innocent due to the colour white worn and with the other added factors represents her as quite young but, for our male character we can identify his age through his smart clothes as they are more work like and so he would be older in age.

Looking at our lead Male, his facial expressions are more controlled.  In the single shot where they are visible, his expression represents the maturity of possibly an older man as he is straight faced and neutral for the entirety of the shot.

The camera shots either concentrate on her or are used as location establishing shots which include the clock and record player.  By revealing  her clear, un-squinting and youthful eyes and other features, including unwrinkled hands, it suggests that she is still quite young in age whereas the Male character,  the only camera shot visible showing his face shows his silhouette by the door and from the tuft of his hair and stubble of his beard demonstrates his manly and mature features which reveals his age as slightly older than our Female character.

The sound of the record player and the old styled soundtrack, slowed down with the added clicks and crackles of a real record player shows a juxtaposition to her age as she is youthful and the sounds are old fashioned.  The sound of the record player raises the tension throughout and also shows a massive  contrast to our chosen music which it is quite upbeat and light.