EvaluationIn what way does your media products use,

develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

What is genre?

• Genre is a style or category that is used in order to label media products and texts in order to give the audience an idea of what to expect with the media product they are watching. There is many different conventions associated with different genres, so when audiences see for example a horror they would automatically associate it with frightening.

Problems With Genre

• Neale “Its difficult to make clear cut distinctions between one genre and another: genres overlap, and there are ‘mixed genres’ such as comedy thrillers.”

• This basically means that there is no one set genre on some films, films contain hybrid genres which is a collection of different genre’s.

• My trailer represents two different genres which is a Thriller/Action, as this is the most common type of genre associated with a gangster film.

Conventions of a thriller film

The main characters found with in a thriller are people such as convicts, criminals, spies, police, heroes etc. There is usually some sort of binary opposition (Strauss) with in a thriller for example men vs women, good vs evil. The main themes associated with a thriller are things such as terrorism, suspense, thrills, chase, supernatural events, mind games. All these themes work well in making the audience on edge and giving them the thrill they expect. The sort of iconography seen with in thrillers consists of cars, weapons, urban settings, dark settings, dramatic music, low lighting, fast paced editing. These functions are all used in order to build up the tension of the audience. The intention of the thriller genre is to transmit certain feelings through to the audience, mains one being; excitement, anticipation, anxiety, uncertainty, suspense, tension. Todorov theory of narrative structure relates well to thrillers as most thrillers begin with a status quo, then the status quo is disrupted by some sort of event, which brings about a disequilibrium, the problems are then solved, then ends with an equilibrium. I have followed this theory with in my trailer and my film as this is the typical convention of a gangster narrative.

Conventions Of An Action Film

Action films usually include themes such as Big city’s, car chases, massive destruction, hi-tech, killings, cat and mouse chase. The props used with actions would consist of guns, fast cars, fire, smoke, blood, gore. Action genre is meant to inspire feelings of excitement, exhilaration, anticipation, interest. These conventions with in the action genre are the things that draw the audience in and keep them on edge during the film. My trailer consists of gun shots, and fighting which represents this genre well.

Use/Development Of A Convention

• My film follows the theme of a gangster film strongly as I have reviewed other gangster film trailers and tried to copy the conventions and incorporate them in to my trailer. For example with in the film Gangster Squad (2013) the gangsters look in a specific way for example smartly dressed with blazers, shirts, and use props such as guns and cigar’s. Watching these gangster films in ordered me to gain knowledge on the styles, themes, of what the audience will expect when watching my trailer.

Conventions of Film Magazine

• The position of mastheads with in normal film magazines is horizontally in the top left of the magazine or centred. This is because people usually read top left to bottom right so the top left is the most practical way of catching the viewers eye. An example of this would be Empire magazine.

• Magazines usually commit to between 1-3 fonts on the front cover as if there is too many it starts to look unprofessional and messy. Normally the colour of the font will contrast with the cover image in order to make it visible, for example black on white. The font sizes vary from a larger font for the title or mast head to smaller fonts for the sub stories etc.

• The cover image normally consists of one of the actors from which ever film is being reviewed. It is usually a mid/close-up shot of the actor, and he/she would normally be making eye contact with the camera in order to attract the audience to read. The clothing worn by the actor will match the themes of the film or it may be a freeze frame from the film.

• On the front of the magazine, you would normally see subtitles advertising what stories are going to be shown inside the magazine. These are placed on the front in order to convince the reader to read on into the magazine.

Conventions of Film Poster’s

• Film posters are usually bright intriguing and eye catching in order to draw the audiences eye to it and make them want to watch the film. The title of the film is usually displayed in a big font matching the themes of the film. Common conventions of film posters are, displaying the genre, displaying quotes from respectable magazines and news articles. Key information is usually placed around the poster for example, date of release, actors involved, production companies involved, directors etc. All the points above are key conventions of film posters.

Use/Development Of A Convention

• I wanted the genres of my trailer represented well through quick shots. After watching many action trailers such as Man of Steel, Expendables, I noticed that the use of whip pan is used quite a lot, in order to follow bullets from a gun and to keep the pace of the film/trailer fast. I decided to incorporate this into my trailer as I wanted it to be exciting and thrilling for the audience.

Use/Development Of A Convention

• At the end of my trailer I have used the title heading of ‘Gangster Squad’. The title slowly changes scale in order to give the illusion of it fading back, and then it fades to black. I have used this convention in order to give the audience time to think, consider what they watched and piece together what they think the film might be about. This is common with in many films, where the film ends with a title heading. For example with in the 2014 release trailer of Godzilla, at the end it fades into the emblem and title of Godzilla which matches the theme and sets the mood for the ending.

Challenge Of Conventions

• One convention that is usually seen with in gangster films is the typical Hero vs Villain, which are normally Gangsters vs Police (Strauss). With In my trailer there is no sense of good and bad as the story is two evil families who are fighting for respect and pride. I think this makes the trailer more interesting because there is no sense of good and bad, and this means that anything could go wrong for both families. This enables the audience to be further more drawn in to the narrative as it more interesting.

Challenge Of Conventions

• In most film trailers especially gangster ones, the audience usually experiences some kind of verbal exchange of communication between two characters or narrated over the top. I decided not to use this as I felt the dramatic music that I used over the top of the trailer, set the mood well and kept the audience on edge. I felt that if I incorporated speech then the mood would have been lost and the audience would lose interest.

Use/Development Of Conventions

• Another use of a popular convention with in gangster trailers is film noire and colour correction. Film noire basically beans the use of blacks and whites, and increase in contrast in order to make the film more dark and eerie. I used this with in my trailer because I wanted the characters to be represented as obscure and scary characters that the audience should be scared of. I also used colour corrections such as levels in order to change the different levels of lighting with in each clip and make it brighter on action scenes and darker on establishing scenes.

Use/Development Of Conventions

• Another convention of a real media trailer that I used with in my trailer is the use of non-diegetic music synchronised with the transitioning of the clips, for example, on the bass drum of a song the clips would either change brightness, scale, or transition. This effect is used to increase the dramatization of the trailer and make it more tense. It is used commonly with in most film trailers for example, with in Liam Neesons: Taken Trailer.

Poster – Use and Development Of Forms And Conventions

• I believe that I have used and developed conventions of a real media product for my film poster. The design of my poster was mostly based around The Godfather poster. I felt the poster was trying to attract the same type of target audience as me and it fits the gangster theme well. I used the same type of layout with in my poster, where the character is placed to the right and the text is placed to the left. The poster for the godfather uses similar colour schemes to me with the red/burgundies, black and whites. I felt these colours work well as the colours all contrast and the red represents danger and violence so it furthermore draws the audience in. However I have developed my poster to look more modernistic and have included more text in order to fill the blanks and make the poster look more full.

Magazine Cover – Use/Development Of a Convention

• On my magazine front cover I made sure the actor was looking straight at the front of the camera in order to catch the audiences eyes. I noticed this is a common convention with in pretty much all magazines. Also another common convention, is advertising other stories or films on the front cover. I have done this in order to make my magazine look more full and attract the audience to not only the main film but the other sub stories too. I think if the first front page is very interesting then it will incline the audience to read on. I have used big bold letters for my masthead as this is more appealing and outstanding to the audience and will draw their attention a lot easier.