1. NarrativeApplying the concept of narrative to my teaser
trailer
2. Why it is useful to consider your work in relation to
narrative?It is useful to consider narrative in work because
forexample our trailer for our teen dramaYoung, Ruthless and
Useless follows an open linearnarrative structure and despite being
in a montageformat, the events that occur in the trailer are
inchronological order with a lot of information beingmissed out
(ellipsis) this helps to tie in with thepurpose of our trailer
because our trailer also ends ona cliff hanger; the last shot shown
is a close up of apregnancy test, so to find out the results of
thepregnancy test the audience must see the film. 3. The purpose of
our trailer is to entice the audience to want tosee the film so
they can find out what happens next, leavingthem asking questions
like.. Is she actually pregnant? Is there a love triangle going on?
Why is she crying? 4. Bordwell and Thompson Bordwell and Thompson
believe that the term plot is used to describe everything visibly
and audibly present in the film before us. and that The set of all
events in a narrative, both the ones explicitly presented and those
the viewer infers, composes the story The story of a film combines
those things explicitly shown and those that are inferred. 5.
Barthes theoryAction Codes Images or sequences which work as aform
of a visual shorthand making complex ideasimmediately apparent and
carrying the story forward forexample, from our trailer the
audience should get theidea that there is romantic relationship
going onbetween the two main characters, so we show a shortclip of
them kissing on the cheek to confirm this idea.Enigma Codes
Images/sequences which control howmuch we know in the story
engaging and holding theaudiences interest, they present puzzles
which demandto be solved. Enigma codes can generally be describedas
major or minor, so a major enigma code In our trailerwould be the
extreme close up of the pregnancy test atthe end leaving the
audience asking Is the protagonist 6. Our trailer shows the basic
plotline and key narrative/genre relatedthemes, the events unroll
as follows, close ups of protagonist waking upand putting on make
up, travelling to college with her friend, arrives atcollege, meets
boy, goes to the pub, gets drunk, boy offers the girldrugs, she
goes out more with the boy, experiences a drug trip, has
conflictwith friend, has a romantic relationship with the boy,
becomes violent anddepressed, pushes away those she cares about,
the final shot we see is ashot of a pregnancy test and then the
trailer ends. Most of the events thathappen are typical of that of
a teen life e.g. going to college, going to pubwith friends,
romantic relationships, experimenting with alcohol anddrugs, which
have to be inferred rather than explicitly shown due to the age12
certificate, within these conventional elements of a teen drama we
werehoping to attract a young audience aged 15-24 so that they can
relate tothe characters because its based on real life elements of
a teenager in thisgeneration.I think the use of narrative is very
effective in our trailer as it helps toachieve the purpose of
enticing our target audience by leaving themwanting to know what
happens next. Furthermore by using genre signifierssuch as young
characters aged 17-18, drugs/alcohol, college as a locationetc.
etc. and an open narrative I think we have successfully achieved
ourgoal.
