POMO/NARRATIVE: HI v POP Cul: Austen v TOWIE!

Nice article here from someone who did an English degree and finds themselves distraught at becoming an avid follower of the horror that is TOWIE ... but then intelligently reflecting on the actual nature of the show and comparing to historical reaction to the Brontes work...
I've put this in as its a nice illustration of the high v popular culture binary opposition - music vids are seen as simple pop cul, tho are often vastly superior to productions by name-artists whose 'video art' will screen in art galleries (eg, Corbijn's work for DMode is generally stunning)
This debate is particularly relevant for analysis of Audience; if you do any wider reading on this you'll soon discover that academics in Media/Cultural Studies have long been debating the ideological issues around this (cf. Leavis, Williams, Hoggart, Arnold and more recently Sunderland Uni's John Storey)...
See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Popular_culture and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High_culture

The Only Way is Austen: In Defence of TOWIE and Co

By Kate Wellham on Mar 20, 2012 in Blogs, Film and TV

Share28

One of the things we decided to try and do at Louder Than War was to experiment with a debating club challenge; defending some seemingly indefensible guilty pleasures that even we’re not convinced about, and trying to find a bit of punk in the apparently punkless.
We’ve done Coronation Street and Leeds Festival so far, and they turned out to be pretty easy to defend.

So now I’m cracking the toughest, most nauseating nut I can think of: The Only Way Is Essex.

Make no mistake, this was not easy.

My dad was responsible for my first encounter with The Only Way Is Essex. I remember I was at my parents’ house one day, and in the minutes it took me to leave the room to make a cuppa, it seems he watched a bit of the first episode of TOWIE by accident.

By the time I re-entered the living room, he was livid with me and my entire generation for doing whatever it was we’d done that had convinced commissioning editors we were a potential audience for this show, thus leading to its existence.

Naturally, as a sensible adult, I decided that whatever my dad hated, I was going to love, and would watch later in secret.

At first, TOWIE disgusted and confused me, and I was convinced it had misfired. Was it real? Was it fake? Does anyone really live like this? And… can I actually SMELL Mark’s Eu de Smug Pour Homme through my screen as he casually buys a shiny three grand watch in which to see his own reflection when he’s on the go?

But, inevitably, by the end of the first episode I was hooked, and – worst of all – it was for all of the above reasons. You have no idea how much this upset me. Not least of all because I had to tell my dad when I next saw him that I had developed a TOWIE habit. I’d rather have told him I was partial to a bit of crack (make of that what you will).

I stopped watching it after the first series because I started to have regular fantasies about Mark Wright: Mark Wright suddenly realising he’s losing his hair and isn’t one of those guys who looks good bald; Mark Wright publicly finding out that one of his previous wank-puppets was a post-op transsexual; Mark Wright gambling away all of his mysteriously available cash and having to get a job as Arg’s cleaner. It was just distracting.

Having since cast a glance over Made In Chelsea and Desperate Scousewives, it seems the format, characters and appeal are the same dramality genre of The Hills. But there’s something else familiar about this…

I studied 19th Century literature at uni, love Jane Austen, and Thackeray’s Vanity Fair is probably my favourite novel of any century ever. I could watch the six-hour BBC adaptation once a week and not just because of the things their Rawden Crawley and his dashing ‘tash do to me.

The real appeal of the fiction of TOWIE, Made In Chelsea and Desperate Scousewives is that they push some of the same buttons, for better or for worse, as those classics. I know it sounds far-fetched, but consider criticisms of Jane Austen back in the day:

‘Why do you like Miss Austen so very much?… I got the book. And what did I find? An accurate daguerreotyped portrait of a commonplace (everyday) face; carefully fenced, highly cultivated garden, with neat borders and delicate flowers; but no glance of bright vivid physiognomy, no open country, no fresh air, no blue hill, no bonny beck. I should hardly like to live with her ladies and gentlemen, in their elegant but confined houses.’
Charlotte Bronte
‘I am at a loss to understand why people hold Miss Austen’s novels at so high a rate, which seem to me vulgar in tone, sterile in invention, imprisoned in the wretched conventions of English society, without genius, wit, or knowledge of the world. Never was life so pinched and narrow. The one problem in the mind of the writer in both the stories I have read, “Persuasion,” and “Pride & Prejudice,” is marriageableness. All that interests in any character introduced is still this one: has he or she money to marry with, and conditions conforming? ‘Tis “the nympholepsy of a fond despair”… Suicide is more respectable.’
Ralph Waldo Emerson

So even Austen was worthless trash to some at the time, and to others a guilty pleasure.

Q1b: Audience

Lets start with our exam board's chief examiner, and his guide:

[Some] questions which have been set in previous sessions:

1. Analyse media representation in one of your coursework productions.
2. Analyse one of your coursework productions in relation to genre
3. Apply theories of narrative to one of your coursework productions.

You will notice that each of these questions is quite short and fits a common formula. You can be assured that the same thing will apply this summer. You will be asked to apply ONE concept to one of your productions. This is a quite different task from question 1a, where you write about all of your work and your skills, as this one involves some reference to theory and only the one piece of work, as well as asking you to step back from it and think about it almost as if someone else had made it- what is known as ‘critical distance’.

So what do you do in the exam?
You need to state which project you are using and briefly describe it
You then need to analyse it using whichever concept appears in the question, making reference to relevant theory throughout
Keep being specific in your use of examples from the project
Here is a link to a good answer to q1a and 1b from the January session.

Audience
Every media product has to have an audience, otherwise in both a business sense and probably an artistic sense too it would be judged a failure. In your projects, you will undoubtedly have been looking at the idea of a target audience- who you are aiming it at and why; you should also have taken feedback from a real audience in some way at the end of the project for your digital evaluation, which involves finding out how the audience really ‘read’ what you had made. You were also asked at AS to consider how your product addressed your audience- what was it about it that particularly worked to ‘speak’ to them? All this is effectively linked to audience theory which you then need to reference and apply. Here are some links to some starting points for theories:
general intro
presentation on reception theory

Some further (DB) pointers:

• use the pack given out, and decide which theories you will use
• McQuail (1972): Uses and Gratifications theory is useful
• description of theories will get limited EAA marks; its all about applying these (to use the EAA terms: analysis and argument, not just explanation), well backed up with clear, specific examples
• precise, specific denotation is key to all Q1a/1b questions/topics
• has the answer you've prepared addressed the binary within audience theory (active v passive audience)?
• this is where your EAA can be boosted: you could point out that under the hypodermic syringe model [example of possible effect from viewing your text], but that this is too simplistic an approach

• have you addressed the role of audience feedback, and of new media technologies (web 2.0 etc) in getting this in the first place?
• is your text aimed at a narrow, niche audience, or a wider, mass audience? have you broken down the demographics? (it can always be helpful to consider: if this appeared on a TV channel/mag, which would it best suited to?) did feedback (or your own planning) indicate scope for secondary or cross-over audience appeal? any postmodern/intertextual references?
• do you represent your core audience in your text?
• did restrictions such as BBFC ratings or pre-watershed regulations (even the context of producing work that a school's image is indirectly linked to) have any influence on your work?

FURTHER RESOURCES (ALSO USE LINKS LISTS)

Audience theory 15th dec 2010

View more PowerPoint from kbamediastudies

...

Exam 1 b audience

View more PowerPoint from Charis Creber

...

Q1b: Posts on Representations

THIS POST LAST UPDATED JUNE 8TH 2012
All of the 'Posts on...' series primarily gather together existing posts from this blog relevant to the particular 1a/1b topic, BUT may also feature below this list further 'wider reading' links following these posts, and possibly copied-in links lists from this blog. In some cases I've added further links from further DB blogs too. Ultimately, these are 30min questions so the important thing is you pick out some ideas/theories/examples you're comfortable with and know you can apply specific examples from AS and/or A2 to. Some of the posts are brief, others much longer; its well worth skimming through as many as possible though and looking for ideas that click with you.


Representations is fairly tightly interlinked with Audience + Genre (tho Narrative conventions can also drive rep'ns too).

Her Body, Himself: Gender in the Slasher Film; feminist Carole 'final girl' Clover's 1987 journal article

Final Girl: Carole Clover and critiques; 

Representation theory; some of the links were for the previous A2 exam topic, but includes useful material on David Chandler in particular

Cultural Imperialism; this was tied to a previous exam topic but can still be used to explore how Britishness is subsumed by dominant American tropes - or even how S.Eng rep'ns overwhelmingly dominate UK media output; are your text/s normative or perhaps counter-hegemonic (challenging these normative representations, challenging whats seen as common sense and above questioning?)

Creativity + MANGeR: Everything is a Remix?; 

Creativity sans la femme + Bechdel Test; feminist Bechdel flags up the tawdry way women are used in film, but also consider the wider lack of women in prominent positions: were you influenced by any female directors, for example, of film/video? Feminism is a theory you should address for this topic.

The 'Britishness' of your work; rom-com eg but can be applied across the board
Hammer horror; any aspect of your work in this classic British tradition? (including the blatant sexism?!)
British horror + budgets; bright future?;

Being Human: Auds, Repns, Dig.Tech;

Inbred - Yorkshire mayor angry; Thirsk's mayor gets mad at movie set there carrying the title Inbred - how do your rep'ns of Ilkley compare? Should film/videomakers care about such issues?

Times Top 20 Villains; a poorly thought out list but nonetheless highlights the central narrative + marketing role of an identifiable killer, and the curious audience response (delighting in the killing and enjoying killers' quips [eg NoESt's Freddie Krueger]); did you attempt any intertextuality with existing killers? Did you employ any countertypes or stick to typical male killer with sexual issues?

Audience Expectations in the ‘Slasher’ Formula; did you venture outside the typical expectations in any way? 

 

 

Q1b: Posts on Genre

THIS POST LAST UPDATED JUNE 8TH 2012
All of the 'Posts on...' series primarily gather together existing posts from this blog relevant to the particular 1a/1b topic, BUT may also feature below this list further 'wider reading' links following these posts, and possibly copied-in links lists from this blog. In some cases I've added further links from further DB blogs too. Ultimately, these are 30min questions so the important thing is you pick out some ideas/theories/examples you're comfortable with and know you can apply specific examples from AS and/or A2 to. Some of the posts are brief, others much longer; its well worth skimming through as many as possible though and looking for ideas that click with you.


Characteristics of a Music Video; (bite-sized chunks of theory!)

POMO/CREATIVITY: Warhol's impact and vision; (not JUST about his visual style: his groundbreaking use of looooong takes; prediction of today's we-media [everyone will have their 15 mins of fame]; pertinent to working within a group, his concept of factory production by a team but bearing one artist's [auteur...] name: is a genre text little more than factory production?)

Creativity + MANGeR: Everything is a Remix?; 

CREATIVITY: Tyranny of Genre; (snippet: 'The phrase "tyranny of genre" comes from genre theorist Richard Coe, who wrote that "the 'tyranny of genre' is normally taken to signify how generic structures constrain individual creativity"')

Does slow pace = boring?; (pace was an issue for you all at AS and A2, linked to aud feedback + genre conventions: are you virtually forced to surrender to market/audience/genre demands for fast pace?)

Her Body, Himself: Gender in the Slasher Film; feminist Carole 'final girl' Clover's 1987 journal article

Final Girl: Carole Clover and critiques; 

Creativity sans la femme + Bechdel Test; feminist Bechdel flags up the tawdry way women are used in film, but also consider the wider lack of women in prominent positions: were you influenced by any female directors, for example, of film/video? Feminism is a theory you should address for this topic.

Cultural Imperialism; this was tied to a previous exam topic but can still be used to explore how Britishness is subsumed by dominant American tropes - or even how S.Eng rep'ns overwhelmingly dominate UK media output; are your text/s normative or perhaps counter-hegemonic (challenging these normative representations, challenging whats seen as common sense and above questioning?)

Micro-budget films +DCRUP;  espec relevant for vids + slasher/horror

The 'Britishness' of your work; rom-com eg but can be applied across the board. How distinct are UK genre egs from US? (Link to cultural imperialism, see above)
Hammer horror; any aspect of your work in this classic British tradition? Or more influenced by the US films that saw Hammer go from 50s/60s world-leader to bust in the 70s?
Horror Games: 13 most atmospheric; any intertextual influence from these (which also show wider appeal of genre to multiple audiences)?
British horror + budgets; bright future?;
The false scare; common slasher narrative device, links into concepts of audience pleasure + genre theories

Zombies for charity...; how horror memes have entered wider society

BBC snotty about horror/fantasy/sci-fi?; how a BBC book list seemed to reflect anti-popular culture bias or snobbery

Researching recent genre egs + presenting this in vid;

Being Human: Auds, Repns, Dig.Tech;

Scream 4 + genre/METZ; the classic pomo slasher franchise + Metz's theory of genre cycles
Peeping Tom 50yrs on; one of two British proto-slashers from 1960 that set out key aspects that Halloween would later reintroduce to a global audience, this one largely disappeared while Psycho was hailed as a huge influence, but today is rightly seen as a masterpiece, and has a sharp commentary on audience pleasures with the killing weapon actually mounted onto the camera itself, giving us an early example of the audience sharing the killer's POV
80s Madman Reborn on web; how an 80s 'video nasty' continues to make money [long tail theory...] through multiple digital platforms, raising its profile + creating talk of a remake
Colin, the £45 film; this made it to the cinema despite being really rather poor, not least the lack of shot variety and excessively long takes - clever exploitation of marketing, not least online, helped the case and it continues to make decent money from DVD sales

Box Office(Mojo) by Genre; this eg is for slasher but you can click through for others too. Persistently successful: tease out the factors behind this.

Times Top 20 Villains; a poorly thought out list but nonetheless highlights the central narrative + marketing role of an identifiable killer, and the curious audience response (delighting in the killing and enjoying killers' quips [eg NoESt's Freddie Krueger]); did you attempt any intertextuality with existing killers?

Audience Expectations in the ‘Slasher’ Formula; did you venture outside the typical expectations in any way?  

BellaOnlone on Popularity of Horror Films; analysis by a woman's website 

    

Q1b: Posts on Narrative

THIS POST LAST UPDATED JUNE 8TH 2012All of the 'Posts on...' series primarily gather together existing posts from this blog relevant to the particular 1a/1b topic, BUT may also feature below this list further 'wider reading' links following these posts, and possibly copied-in links lists from this blog. In some cases I've added further links from further DB blogs too. Ultimately, these are 30min questions so the important thing is you pick out some ideas/theories/examples you're comfortable with and know you can apply specific examples from AS and/or A2 to. Some of the posts are brief, others much longer; its well worth skimming through as many as possible though and looking for ideas that click with you.


This links well into audience (expectations, and concepts such as Uses + Gratifications) and genre. For the slasher genre, you can find fantastic analysis in the book Blood Money (don't have it on me at time of writing, but if you are prepping this one on AS ask me for a photocopy of the key section from it).

Her Body, Himself: Gender in the Slasher Film; feminist Carole 'final girl' Clover's 1987 journal article

Final Girl: Carole Clover and critiques; 

Creativity, Narrative: Coens;

Representation theory; some of the links were for the previous A2 exam topic, but includes useful material on David Chandler in particular + The Value of Narrativity in the Representation of Reality.

Cultural Imperialism; this was tied to a previous exam topic but can still be used to explore how Britishness is subsumed by dominant American tropes - or even how S.Eng rep'ns overwhelmingly dominate UK media output; are your text/s normative or perhaps counter-hegemonic (challenging these normative representations, challenging whats seen as common sense and above questioning?). By following narrative codes set down in Hollywood/US vids have you lost your UK voice?

Creativity + MANGeR: Everything is a Remix?;

Creativity sans la femme + Bechdel Test; feminist Bechdel flags up the tawdry way women are used in film, but also consider the wider lack of women in prominent positions: were you influenced by any female directors, for example, of film/video? Extend this and consider the Proppian roles in your work and how women fare.
The 'Britishness' of your work; rom-com eg but can be applied across the board. Are there recognisable 'national' traits within narrative conventions? (basically: yes - think of the US insistence on upbeat endings). You could link this to the cultural imperialism issue above

The false scare; common slasher narrative device, links into concepts of audience pleasure + genre theories

Times Top 20 Villains; a poorly thought out list but nonetheless highlights the central narrative + marketing role of an identifiable killer, and the curious audience response (delighting in the killing and enjoying killers' quips [eg NoESt's Freddie Krueger]); did you attempt any intertextuality with existing killers? Did you seek to confuse or mislead the audience over the killer's identity, exploiting common expectations?

Audience Expectations in the ‘Slasher’ Formula; did you venture outside the typical expectations in any way? 

Q1b: Posts on Audience

THIS POST LAST UPDATED JUNE 8TH 2012
All of the 'Posts on...' series primarily gather together existing posts from this blog relevant to the particular 1a/1b topic, BUT may also feature below this list further 'wider reading' links following these posts, and possibly copied-in links lists from this blog. In some cases I've added further links from further DB blogs too. Ultimately, these are 30min questions so the important thing is you pick out some ideas/theories/examples you're comfortable with and know you can apply specific examples from AS and/or A2 to. Some of the posts are brief, others much longer; its well worth skimming through as many as possible though and looking for ideas that click with you.


There is a subtext here, partially linking back to Q1a, of how digisation/web 2.0 has fostered convergence, and fractured the once seemingly clear lines between audience and producer.

Characteristics of a Music Video; (bite-sized chunks of theory!)

Web 2.0 + Fan-made vids: Applying YOUR work; (any Q1a answer should cite web 2.0)

DIGITISATION: self-published short film; (further eg on how web 2.0 functions + how YOUR work isn't mere abstract academic exercise)

DIGITISATION: book industry; (has web 2.0 made publishers obsolete?)

POMO/CREATIVITY: Warhol's impact and vision; (not JUST about his visual style: his groundbreaking use of looooong takes; prediction of today's we-media [everyone will have their 15 mins of fame] is where this becomes potentially useful on audience; pertinent to working within a group, his concept of factory production by a team but bearing one artist's [auteur...] name)

Creativity + MANGeR: Everything is a Remix?; 

Does slow pace = boring?; (pace was an issue for you all at AS and A2, linked to aud feedback + genre conventions: are you virtually forced to surrender to market/audience/genre demands for fast pace?)

Her Body, Himself: Gender in the Slasher Film; feminist Carole 'final girl' Clover's 1987 journal article

Final Girl: Carole Clover and critiques; if the scream queen (and attendant nudity) is a key element for male aud, then this is key for the female aud which the film biz goes all out to attract to this supposedly male-skewed genre - the book Blood Money is very good on this point

Creativity sans la femme + Bechdel Test; feminist Bechdel flags up the tawdry way women are used in film, but also consider the wider lack of women in prominent positions: were you influenced by any female directors, for example, of film/video? Feminism is a theory you should address for this topic.

Applying U+G theory; there's really no excuse for not applying this key active audience theory, which gives you plenty to write about!

Cultural Imperialism; this was tied to a previous exam topic but can still be used to explore how Britishness is subsumed by dominant American tropes - or even how S.Eng rep'ns overwhelmingly dominate UK media output; are your text/s normative or perhaps counter-hegemonic (challenging these normative representations, challenging whats seen as common sense and above questioning?)

Micro-budget films +DCRUP;  digitisation expanding access to wider aud for micro-budget productions?

Creativity: Gauntlett + Csikszentmihalyi; snippet: 'Some writers on creativity, such as Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, even suggest that creativity is a phenomenon which only occurs in a social context and cannot be understood, or even recognised, in isolation'

The 'Britishness' of your work; rom-com eg but can be applied across the board. Did you try to emphasize or disguise 'Britishness' for audience factors? (see cultural imperialism post) 
Horror Games: 13 most atmospheric; any intertextual influence from these (which also show wider appeal of genre to multiple audiences)?
The false scare; common slasher narrative device, links into concepts of audience pleasure + genre theories
Zombies for charity...; how horror memes have entered wider society  

Being Human: Auds, Repns, Dig.Tech;

Scream 4 + genre/METZ; the classic pomo slasher franchise + Metz's theory of genre cycles

Peeping Tom 50yrs on; one of two British proto-slashers from 1960 that set out key aspects that Halloween would later reintroduce to a global audience, this one largely disappeared while Psycho was hailed as a huge influence, but today is rightly seen as a masterpiece, and has a sharp commentary on audience pleasures with the killing weapon actually mounted onto the camera itself, giving us an early example of the audience sharing the killer's POV 

Box Office(Mojo) by Genre; this eg is for slasher but you can click through for others too. Persistently successful: tease out the factors behind this.

Times Top 20 Villains; a poorly thought out list but nonetheless highlights the central narrative + marketing role of an identifiable killer, and the curious audience response (delighting in the killing and enjoying killers' quips [eg NoESt's Freddie Krueger]); did you attempt any intertextuality with existing killers?

Audience Expectations in the ‘Slasher’ Formula; did you venture outside the typical expectations in any way? 

http://www.slideshare.net/classof09/choosing-audience: eg of prior aud research

BellaOnlone on Popularity of Horror Films; analysis by a woman's website

     

Q1b: Posts on Media Lang

All of the 'Posts on...' series primarily gather together existing posts from this blog relevant to the particular 1a/1b topic, BUT may also feature below this list further 'wider reading' links following these posts, and possibly copied-in links lists from this blog. In some cases I've added further links from further DB blogs too. Ultimately, these are 30min questions so the important thing is you pick out some ideas/theories/examples you're comfortable with and know you can apply specific examples from AS and/or A2 to. Some of the posts are brief, others much longer; its well worth skimming through as many as possible though and looking for ideas that click with you.


Every MANGeR topic is potentially linked into MLang; any work on Use of Conventions... from 1a could also be useful here.

Characteristics of a Music Video; (bite-sized chunks of theory!)

Web 2.0 + Fan-made vids: Applying YOUR work; (any Q1a answer should cite web 2.0)

PoMo by louderthanwar blog; (accessible guide to this very key concept)

POMO Slasher sitcom Holliston @ FearNet.com;

POMO/NARRATIVE: HI v POP Cul: Austen v TOWIE!; (neat comparison of TOWIE + Jane Austen)

POMO/CREATIVITY: Warhol's impact and vision; (not JUST about his visual style: his groundbreaking use of looooong takes; prediction of today's we-media [everyone will have their 15 mins of fame]; pertinent to working within a group, his concept of factory production by a team but bearing one artist's [auteur...] name)

Creativity + MANGeR: Everything is a Remix?; 

CREATIVITY: Tyranny of Genre; (snippet: 'The phrase "tyranny of genre" comes from genre theorist Richard Coe, who wrote that "the 'tyranny of genre' is normally taken to signify how generic structures constrain individual creativity"')

Does slow pace = boring?; (pace was an issue for you all at AS and A2, linked to aud feedback + genre conventions: are you virtually forced to surrender to market/audience/genre demands for fast pace?)

Her Body, Himself: Gender in the Slasher Film; feminist Carole 'final girl' Clover's 1987 journal article

Final Girl: Carole Clover and critiques; key point here is how you signify such archetypal characters through MLang/mise-en-scene

Creativity, Narrative: Coens;

Cultural Imperialism; this was tied to a previous exam topic but can still be used to explore how Britishness is subsumed by dominant American tropes - or even how S.Eng rep'ns overwhelmingly dominate UK media output; are your text/s normative or perhaps counter-hegemonic (challenging these normative representations, challenging whats seen as common sense and above questioning?)

Creativity sans la femme + Bechdel Test; feminist Bechdel flags up the tawdry way women are used in film, but also consider the wider lack of women in prominent positions: were you influenced by any female directors, for example, of film/video? Feminism is a theory you should address for this topic.

Slideshow on media terms;

The 'Britishness' of your work; rom-com eg but can be applied across the board. How does nationality impact on MLang?
Hammer horror; any aspect of your work in this classic British tradition? Note the slower-paced editing style for older horror, and use of stagey sets
Zombie flicks - low budget, inferior to your productions?;
Horror Games: 13 most atmospheric; any intertextual influence from these (which also show wider appeal of genre to multiple audiences)?
The false scare; common slasher narrative device, links into concepts of audience pleasure + genre theories
Fan trailers of movies they WANT made!; this isn't just fan-made material like the trailers cut to a favourite music track, but rather franchise fans trying to influence studio decisions about sequels/prequels/remakes
Scream 4 + genre/METZ; the classic pomo slasher franchise + Metz's theory of genre cycles  

Peeping Tom 50yrs on; one of two British proto-slashers from 1960 that set out key aspects that Halloween would later reintroduce to a global audience, this one largely disappeared while Psycho was hailed as a huge influence, but today is rightly seen as a masterpiece, and has a sharp commentary on audience pleasures with the killing weapon actually mounted onto the camera itself, giving us an early example of the audience sharing the killer's POV

Colin, the £45 film; this made it to the cinema despite being really rather poor, not least the lack of shot variety and excessively long takes - clever exploitation of marketing, not least online, helped the case and it continues to make decent money from DVD sales

Horror music copies animals?; use of music/soundtrack from AS is worth considering, and this helps

Times Top 20 Villains; a poorly thought out list but nonetheless highlights the central narrative + marketing role of an identifiable killer, and the curious audience response (delighting in the killing and enjoying killers' quips [eg NoESt's Freddie Krueger]); did you attempt any intertextuality with existing killers?

Audience Expectations in the ‘Slasher’ Formula; did you venture outside the typical expectations in any way? 

Q1a: Posts on Post-Production

THIS POST LAST UPDATED JUNE 8TH 2012
All of the 'Posts on...' series primarily gather together existing posts from this blog relevant to the particular 1a/1b topic, BUT may also feature below this list further 'wider reading' links following these posts, and possibly copied-in links lists from this blog. In some cases I've added further links from further DB blogs too. Ultimately, these are 30min questions so the important thing is you pick out some ideas/theories/examples you're comfortable with and know you can apply specific examples from AS and/or A2 to. Some of the posts are brief, others much longer; its well worth skimming through as many as possible though and looking for ideas that click with you.


The link to Digital technology is obvious, but also consider Creativity (how editing + gathering feedback on drafts using new media changed original ideas), and Use of Conventions/R+P (what observable editing conventions/FX were you seeking to employ?). 

Web 2.0 + Fan-made vids: Applying YOUR work; (any Q1a answer should cite web 2.0)

DIGITISATION: self-published short film; (further eg on how web 2.0 functions + how YOUR work isn't mere abstract academic exercise)

DIGITISATION: book industry; (has web 2.0 made publishers obsolete?)

Does slow pace = boring?; (pace was an issue for you all at AS and A2, linked to aud feedback + genre conventions)

TT3D as eg of A2-level filmmaking in real world; feature film made using same equipment as you guys

Creativity and R+P: Monsters; here's an $800k debut feature by a director who struggled to get financing because he didn't have a full script - like Loach. Leigh etc Gareth Edwards wanted to organically develop his script with his cast during the shoot. Indeed, he hired non-actors as he travelled (entire crew in ONE car!) on location... Editing was done as they went: digital tech means footage can be quickly + cheaply checked out (it doesn't need to expensively developed like 35mm film)

Micro-budget films +DCRUP; expanding opportunities for distribution of micro-/zero-budget productions? 

Coens on using Final Cut for Oscar-nommed True Grit; consider their editing style
British horror + budgets; bright future?;

Q1a: Posts on Use of Conventions

THIS POST LAST UPDATED JUNE 8TH 2012
All of the 'Posts on...' series primarily gather together existing posts from this blog relevant to the particular 1a/1b topic, BUT may also feature below this list further 'wider reading' links following these posts, and possibly copied-in links lists from this blog. In some cases I've added further links from further DB blogs too. Ultimately, these are 30min questions so the important thing is you pick out some ideas/theories/examples you're comfortable with and know you can apply specific examples from AS and/or A2 to. Some of the posts are brief, others much longer; its well worth skimming through as many as possible though and looking for ideas that click with you.


This topic is particularly tightly linked to the issues of creativity and R+P (in turn, R+P and Uses... are tied to digital technologies: how you uncovered/researched conventions).

Characteristics of a Music Video; (bite-sized chunks of theory!)

Web 2.0 + Fan-made vids: Applying YOUR work; (any Q1a answer should cite web 2.0)

PoMo by louderthanwar blog; (accessible guide to this very key concept)

POMO Slasher sitcom Holliston @ FearNet.com;

POMO/NARRATIVE: HI v POP Cul: Austen v TOWIE!; (neat comparison of TOWIE + Jane Austen)

Creativity + MANGeR: Everything is a Remix?; you can't avoid the issue of whether there's any possibility today of originality

POMO/CREATIVITY: Warhol's impact and vision; (not JUST about his visual style: his groundbreaking use of looooong takes; prediction of today's we-media [everyone will have their 15 mins of fame]; pertinent to working within a group, his concept of factory production by a team but bearing one artist's [auteur...] name)

CREATIVITY: Tyranny of Genre; (snippet: 'The phrase "tyranny of genre" comes from genre theorist Richard Coe, who wrote that "the 'tyranny of genre' is normally taken to signify how generic structures constrain individual creativity"')

Does slow pace = boring?; (pace was an issue for you all at AS and A2, linked to aud feedback + genre conventions: are you virtually forced to surrender to market/audience/genre demands for fast pace?)

Her Body, Himself: Gender in the Slasher Film; feminist Carole 'final girl' Clover's 1987 journal article

Final Girl: Carole Clover and critiques; 

Creativity sans la femme + Bechdel Test; feminist Bechdel flags up the tawdry way women are used in film, but also consider the wider lack of women in prominent positions: were you influenced by any female directors, for example, of film/video? Feminism is a theory you should address for this topic. To what extent are the conventions you've used sourced from male practitioners? Sexist? Or does post-feminist thinking end such debates?

Cultural Imperialism; this was tied to a previous exam topic but can still be used to explore how Britishness is subsumed by dominant American tropes - or even how S.Eng rep'ns overwhelmingly dominate UK media output; are your text/s normative or perhaps counter-hegemonic (challenging these normative representations, challenging whats seen as common sense and above questioning?). Have you managed a distinctive UK/Northern/Yorkshire/Ilkley 'voice' or have you overwhelmingly followed patterns laid down by US + London producers?

Coens on using Final Cut for Oscar-nommed True Grit; 

Slideshow on media terms;

The 'Britishness' of your work; rom-com eg but can be applied across the board. Are there distinctly UK conventions?
Hammer horror; any aspect of your work in this classic British tradition? 
British horror + budgets; bright future?;
The false scare; common slasher narrative device, links into concepts of audience pleasure + genre theories   

Researching recent genre egs + presenting this in vid;

Scream 4 + genre/METZ; the classic pomo slasher franchise + Metz's theory of genre cycles
Peeping Tom 50yrs on; one of two British proto-slashers from 1960 that set out key aspects that Halloween would later reintroduce to a global audience, this one largely disappeared while Psycho was hailed as a huge influence, but today is rightly seen as a masterpiece, and has a sharp commentary on audience pleasures with the killing weapon actually mounted onto the camera itself, giving us an early example of the audience sharing the killer's POV

Colin, the £45 film; this made it to the cinema despite being really rather poor, not least the lack of shot variety and excessively long takes - clever exploitation of marketing, not least online, helped the case and it continues to make decent money from DVD sales. Maybe worth contrasting your superior use of MLang

Times Top 20 Villains; a poorly thought out list but nonetheless highlights the central narrative + marketing role of an identifiable killer, and the curious audience response (delighting in the killing and enjoying killers' quips [eg NoESt's Freddie Krueger]); did you attempt any intertextuality with existing killers?

Audience Expectations in the ‘Slasher’ Formula; did you venture outside the typical expectations in any way? 

Horror music copies animals?; use of music/soundtrack from AS is worth considering, and this helps 

Q1a: Posts on Rsch + Planning

THIS POST LAST UPDATED JUNE 8TH 2012
All of the 'Posts on...' series primarily gather together existing posts from this blog relevant to the particular 1a/1b topic, BUT may also feature below this list further 'wider reading' links following these posts, and possibly copied-in links lists from this blog. In some cases I've added further links from further DB blogs too. Ultimately, these are 30min questions so the important thing is you pick out some ideas/theories/examples you're comfortable with and know you can apply specific examples from AS and/or A2 to. Some of the posts are brief, others much longer; its well worth skimming through as many as possible though and looking for ideas that click with you.


Characteristics of a Music Video; (bite-sized chunks of theory!)

Web 2.0 + Fan-made vids: Applying YOUR work; (any Q1a answer should cite web 2.0)

CREATIVITY: Tyranny of Genre; (snippet: 'The phrase "tyranny of genre" comes from genre theorist Richard Coe, who wrote that "the 'tyranny of genre' is normally taken to signify how generic structures constrain individual creativity"')

Her Body, Himself: Gender in the Slasher Film; feminist Carole 'final girl' Clover's 1987 journal article

Final Girl: Carole Clover and critiques; what such books/articles did YOU use?

Creativity sans la femme + Bechdel Test; feminist Bechdel flags up the tawdry way women are used in film, but also consider the wider lack of women in prominent positions: were you influenced by any female directors, for example, of film/video? Feminism is a theory you should address for this topic. To what extent are the conventions you've used sourced from male practitioners? Sexist? Or does post-feminist thinking end such debates?

Creativity and R+P: Monsters; here's an $800k debut feature by a director who struggled to get financing because he didn't have a full script - like Loach. Leigh etc Gareth Edwards wanted to organically develop his script with his cast during the shoot. Indeed, he hired non-actors as he travelled (entire crew in ONE car!) on location...

Micro-budget films +DCRUP;

Cultural Imperialism; this was tied to a previous exam topic but can still be used to explore how Britishness is subsumed by dominant American tropes - or even how S.Eng rep'ns overwhelmingly dominate UK media output; are your text/s normative or perhaps counter-hegemonic (challenging these normative representations, challenging whats seen as common sense and above questioning?). What proportion of the texts you examined were specifically British ... or even non-London-based for that matter?

The 'Britishness' of your work; rom-com eg but can be applied across the board. As above, how British-based was your research?

Coens on using Final Cut for Oscar-nommed True Grit;

Researching recent genre egs + presenting this in vid;
Box Office(Mojo) by Genre; this eg is for slasher but you can click through for others too. Persistently successful: tease out the factors behind this.

Times Top 20 Villains; a poorly thought out list but nonetheless highlights the central narrative + marketing role of an identifiable killer, and the curious audience response (delighting in the killing and enjoying killers' quips [eg NoESt's Freddie Krueger]); did you attempt any intertextuality with existing killers?

Audience Expectations in the ‘Slasher’ Formula; did you venture outside the typical expectations in any way? 

http://www.slideshare.net/classof09/choosing-audience: eg of prior aud research

 

Q1a: Posts on Creativity

THIS POST LAST UPDATED JUNE 8TH 2012
All of the 'Posts on...' series primarily gather together existing posts from this blog relevant to the particular 1a/1b topic, BUT may also feature below this list further 'wider reading' links following these posts, and possibly copied-in links lists from this blog. In some cases I've added further links from further DB blogs too. Ultimately, these are 30min questions so the important thing is you pick out some ideas/theories/examples you're comfortable with and know you can apply specific examples from AS and/or A2 to. Some of the posts are brief, others much longer; its well worth skimming through as many as possible though and looking for ideas that click with you.

The main post on Q1a Creativity stresses the overlap with all 4 other DCRUP areas, and the need to consider this one in relation to each of these in turn. Therefore several of the posts listed below may appear to be primarily centred on R+P etc, but I'm including them as a pointer to think of the interaction between this and Creativity.

Characteristics of a Music Video; (bite-sized chunks of theory!)

Web 2.0 + Fan-made vids: Applying YOUR work; (any Q1a answer should cite web 2.0)

PoMo by louderthanwar blog; (accessible guide to this very key concept)

POMO Slasher sitcom Holliston @ FearNet.com;

POMO/NARRATIVE: HI v POP Cul: Austen v TOWIE!; (neat comparison of TOWIE + Jane Austen)

POMO/CREATIVITY: Warhol's impact and vision; (not JUST about his visual style: his groundbreaking use of looooong takes; prediction of today's we-media [everyone will have their 15 mins of fame]; pertinent to working within a group, his concept of factory production by a team but bearing one artist's [auteur...] name)

Creativity + MANGeR: Everything is a Remix?;

CREATIVITY: Tyranny of Genre; (snippet: 'The phrase "tyranny of genre" comes from genre theorist Richard Coe, who wrote that "the 'tyranny of genre' is normally taken to signify how generic structures constrain individual creativity"')

Does slow pace = boring?; (pace was an issue for you all at AS and A2, linked to aud feedback + genre conventions: are you virtually forced to surrender to market/audience/genre demands for fast pace?)

Her Body, Himself: Gender in the Slasher Film; feminist Carole 'final girl' Clover's 1987 journal article

Final Girl: Carole Clover and critiques; can you be creative in recycling such archetypes yet again?

Creativity sans la femme + Bechdel Test; feminist Bechdel flags up the tawdry way women are used in film, but also consider the wider lack of women in prominent positions: were you influenced by any female directors, for example, of film/video? Feminism is a theory you should address for this topic. To what extent are the conventions you've used sourced from male practitioners? Sexist? Or does post-feminist thinking end such debates? Has gender effected your approach (useful also to consider if you worked within a mix gender group)?

Creativity, Narrative: Coens; 

Coens on using Final Cut for Oscar-nommed True Grit;

Creativity and R+P: Monsters; here's an $800k debut feature by a director who struggled to get financing because he didn't have a full script - like Loach. Leigh etc Gareth Edwards wanted to organically develop his script with his cast during the shoot. Indeed, he hired non-actors as he travelled (entire crew in ONE car!) on location...

Cultural Imperialism; this was tied to a previous exam topic but can still be used to explore how Britishness is subsumed by dominant American tropes - or even how S.Eng rep'ns overwhelmingly dominate UK media output; are your text/s normative or perhaps counter-hegemonic (challenging these normative representations, challenging whats seen as common sense and above questioning?). Have you managed a distinctive UK/Northern/Yorkshire/Ilkley 'voice' or have you overwhelmingly followed patterns laid down by US + London producers?

The 'Britishness' of your work; rom-com eg but can be applied across the board. How does your nationality come through in your work - or is it simply 'globalised' (perhaps even Americanised? see above post)
Hammer horror; any aspect of your work in this classic British tradition? 

Creativity: Gauntlett + Csikszentmihalyi; snippet: 'Some writers on creativity, such as Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, even suggest that creativity is a phenomenon which only occurs in a social context and cannot be understood, or even recognised, in isolation'
Horror Games: 13 most atmospheric; any intertextual influence from these (which also show wider appeal of genre to multiple audiences)?
British horror + budgets; bright future?;
The false scare; common slasher narrative device, links into concepts of audience pleasure + genre theories

Scream 4 + genre/METZ; the classic pomo slasher franchise + Metz's theory of genre cycles

Audience Expectations in the ‘Slasher’ Formula; did you venture outside the typical expectations in any way?

Q1a: Posts on Digital technology

THIS POST LAST UPDATED JUNE 8TH 2012
All of the 'Posts on...' series primarily gather together existing posts from this blog relevant to the particular 1a/1b topic, BUT may also feature below this list further 'wider reading' links following these posts, and possibly copied-in links lists from this blog. In some cases I've added further links from further DB blogs too. Ultimately, these are 30min questions so the important thing is you pick out some ideas/theories/examples you're comfortable with and know you can apply specific examples from AS and/or A2 to. Some of the posts are brief, others much longer; its well worth skimming through as many as possible though and looking for ideas that click with you.

Web 2.0 + Fan-made vids: Applying YOUR work; (any Q1a answer should cite web 2.0)

DIGITISATION: self-published short film; (further eg on how web 2.0 functions + how YOUR work isn't mere abstract academic exercise)

DIGITISATION: book industry; (has web 2.0 made publishers obsolete?)

Newspaper asks for applications via tweets; (eg of how far convergence has gone: social media being used to get work in 'old media')

TT3D as eg of A2-level filmmaking in real world; feature film made using same equipment as you guys

Creativity and R+P: Monsters; here's an $800k debut feature by a director who struggled to get financing because he didn't have a full script - like Loach. Leigh etc Gareth Edwards wanted to organically develop his script with his cast during the shoot. Indeed, he hired non-actors as he travelled (entire crew in ONE car!) on location... Editing was done as they went: digital tech means footage can be quickly + cheaply checked out (it doesn't need to expensively developed like 35mm film)  

Coens on using Final Cut for Oscar-nommed True Grit; 

Micro-budget films +DCRUP; 
Zombie flicks - low budget, inferior to your productions?;

Rotting Hill - 4min zombie short; another eg of we-media/UGC

British horror + budgets; bright future?;

Using YouTube video to pitch for $45k horror; 

Fan trailers of movies they WANT made!; this isn't just fan-made material like the trailers cut to a favourite music track, but rather franchise fans trying to influence studio decisions about sequels/prequels/remakes

Researching recent genre egs + presenting this in vid;

Being Human: Auds, Repns, Dig.Tech;

80s Madman Reborn on web; how an 80s 'video nasty' continues to make money [long tail theory...] through multiple digital platforms, raising its profile + creating talk of a remake

Colin, the £45 film; this made it to the cinema despite being really rather poor, not least the lack of shot variety and excessively long takes - clever exploitation of marketing, not least online, helped the case and it continues to make decent money from DVD sales

 

 

DIGITISATION: self-published short film

Across these blogs I'll keep returning to the concept of digitisation, the ongoing process of change and transformation of our media, a key element of which is the opening up of opportunities for micro-budget media producers to (occasionally!) attract large audiences and even make some money...
We mustn't forget that giant global conglomerates remain utterly dominant, but the possibilities for someone with a digital camera and a Mac are infinitely higher now than 10, 20 years ago. There have always been amateur/debut film-makers somehow bringing together feature films on infinitesimally small budgets, from Wes Craven's Last House on the Left and John Carpenter's Halloween, through Alex Cox's Repo Man (see his superb book X Films: True Confessions of a Radical Filmmaker, there's a copy in Lib/F6), Kevin Smith's Clerks and closer to home the rather more dubious Colin!
Here's an interesting example of a horror buff with her own successful blog, Final Girl, who made a short film ... and monetised it through this blog, charging $5 for a DVD of the 10min short film! The short is a postmodern lesbian vampire skit using knock-off Barbie dolls, reflecting the filmmaker's feminist sensibilities. If you do watch it, remember its NOT a feature film - shorts can be rather quirkier. It is, whatever you make of the film itself (the sound is nicely done and the mise-en-scene well handled given the size of the characters!), a great example of how digitisation has expanded the possibilities for enthusiastic amateur filmmakers and media producers generally to go ahead and create, distribute and exhibit work without having to sign deals with larger media firms.

Taste of Flesh, Taste of Fear - watch more funny videos     

'Final Girl' runs a monthly slasher film club; check it out and if you blog on it she may add a link to your blog on hers!

There is of course another example of a self-publishing filmmaker closer to home, and we will be looking at a trailer for his latest production in Friday's lessons, and with a bit of luck hearing a little from the filmmaker himself on how he went about it, and his plans for this new opus...
We'll also have a look at the film Monsters, a good example of how digitisation has opened up possibilities for filmmakers to produce slick work on very limited money and with a crew barely bigger than a Media coursework group; I have previously blogged on this and various other examples of digitisation, plus analyses, in a wide range of posts you should be looking over whether for AS/A2 exam or AS/A2 coursework (especially Evaluation)... 

DIGITISATION: book industry

I'll cross-post this on MusiVidz/BritCinema/ProdEval; relevant to all
Digitisation is perhaps the single most important concept you'll look at in AS/A2 Media. Its influence spans every industry, and renders what you're doing as A-Level students in producing practical work as industry-level, not simply an academic learning exercise. If you don't get this, you don't get Media Studies.
So here's another example: the book industry.
Big-name author Anthony Horowitz writes with some disdain about the all-powerful book publishers ... and how digitisation (he doesn't use the term; he doesn't need to) has opened up all sorts of self-publishing and online tie-ins (with the likes of Amazon). Writers just don't need the publishers anymore, he argues. Their response? You do need us, especially for promotion.
He dismisses that ... but they're right, at this point anyway. There is scope for self-promotion of course, and you've all being doing this with blogs, twitter, facebook ... But, that isn't always as effective as buying ads on TV/press/online/billboards/radio/cinema, a similar argument that can be rightly made with the film and music industries (look at Avatar and the huge promo campaign that underpinned it, partially reliant on the vertical and horizontal integration of News Corp, and the cross-promotion/synergies that enabled).


See http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/booksblog/2012/feb/27/anthony-horowitz-do-we-still-need-publishers

Anthony Horowitz: Do we still need publishers?

At an event hosted by children's booksellers The Book People last week, the author gave a talk questioning the role of the publisher in today's literary world. This is an edited version

Anthony Horowitz. Photograph: Andy Paradise / Rex Features

The title of this talk is, "Do We Need Publishers Any More?". I was going to call it "Thank Christ We Don't Need Bloody Publishers Any More" – but I felt that sounded too partisan.
Relationships between writers and publishers are of course very strange and change all the time, rather like a see-saw.
I remember my first meeting at Walker Books. The first question they asked me – and I swear this is true – was what mug would I like my tea in: the one with the teddy bear, the tennis racket or the pink one with the flower? And when I left the building, they asked me if I'd be OK taking the tube on my own. I was 33. I was married with a child. But they clearly saw me as some sort of demented child myself.
Cut forward 20 years: I've grown up, and they're nervous of me. There's Alex Rider. I've created a brand. Walker also resent me ever so slightly because now I'm the one with the SMA powder and the changing table. To a certain extent, they need me and that's probably tricky for a publisher who might find life so much easier without writers.
Meanwhile, across the river, I have my adult publisher, Orion – and they also have problems with me. Relations between us have been strained ever since they published my Sherlock Holmes novel, The Mouse of Slick, with no fewer than 35 proof-reading errors. Their proof-reader tried to kill herself. She shot herself with a gnu. Even so, we're doing another book together … a story of murder, suspicion and revenge.
But the truth is, I have other options.