Mise on scene

0The positions of characters: Jocks, popular girls, nerds, the bullies, goth’s and outsiders.

0Hustle and bustle: stereotypical school atmosphere.

0 Set at the entrance to the school, corridors, lockers, lunch halls or simply the classrooms.

0 Lighting: For example, in ‘Dangerous Minds’ the lighting is dark and dull portrays the rough area the school is set in but then changes to lighter and more colourful shots. In contrast, ‘The School of Rock’ is instantly shown to be light yet monotone

Dangerous Minds – Opening scene

Mise on scene

School of Rock– School scene

Characters

0Rookie - Protagonist

0Popular/ Bully - Antagonist

0Teachers

Sounds and Music0Diegetic and foley

0 For a school drama it is important for the film to capture the carnage and different groups of people that are included in the shot: school bus screech/engine; whispering; shouting; chair screeches; school bells; intercoms; paper rustling and doors.

0Background music. This is harder to have a certain type of music to associate with a school, depends on the type of film. ‘Dangerous Minds’ cleverly uses the song ‘Welcome to the jungle’.

The rookie arrives at the new school

Meets an antagonist

Finds a love interest and often a friend

Begins to fit in and get accepted

The antagonist reveals some bad

information

It affects the protagonist

The love interest leaves and they lose their friend

Stands up for themself

Gets everyone back on their side and the enemy

gets punished.

The love interest returns and it ands

happily

Plot

Finally, a similaritybetween a majority ofschool base dramas isthe storyline. Here isa small diagram thatshows a quickoverview of theconventional schooldrama film plot:

In Summation