Evaluation 2

Evaluation 2: How does your media product represent particular social groups?

Representation refers to the way groups are presented in the media and popular culture, often the images that affect our views of gender, age, class, race and ability. Representation is the term also used to describe aspects that have been created by the directors point of view which is usually based around a specific theme or topic focusing on the four main technical areas which include; mise en scene, editing, sound, lightening and camera 

A social group is defined where two or more people are joined together by some shared bond or similarity. There were two main social groups, which were used in the opening of our thriller, the first group which is represented is a disturbed mental girl who believes and hears the ghost and the second is the innocent passer who walks by which is then killed by the disturbed girl who has been tormented by the ghost named Culpepper.

The first social group to be represented in our thriller film is a disturbed mental girl that believes and hears the ghost. In the beginning of the film opening we see this being shown as the main character Ethel is on her own in an isolated park that looks around and seem confused about her whereabouts. The lightening in this small scene is bright showing parts of normality however by adding filters gave great effect to the main character allowing her to stand out and showing some of the characters feelings and emotions as well.  We see many aspects of mise en scene used to show this social group effectively. The mise en scene in this scene is simple but to an extent is seen to be extreme; the clothing of the character at this stage is normal as she is wearing a long black dress, to the extreme level we then see her wearing a hat but is based in a normal suburban area / park. Although the character is shown to be dressed to the extreme level, the location being based in a park adds to the extreme level as we see that people in society do not dress like this. There are quiet a lot of close ups and extreme long shots (establishing shots) to let the audience see how normal and conventional the character really is in some aspects. The colour of the costume Ethel was shown to wear was very dark; using dark colours gave the connotation of a shadowed isolated, troubled girl who is shown to be disturbed.

The character overall has been represented in a positive way and not to negative as we could relate this to media films such as Orphanage and the Woman In Black. Both these media films fetcher and imagined person. Orphanage is based on a woman who brings her family back to her childhood home, where she opens an orphanage for handicapped children. Later on her son starts to communicate with an invisible new friend. The woman and black illustrates a young lawyer who travels to a remote village where he discovers a vengeful ghost of a scorned woman is terrorising its locals. Both these films relate to our thriller opening ‘the voice behind’ as we see that aspects such as ghosts are used throughout to create suspense. We see these relate to media films in particular the woman in black and the orphanage. The characters that have been represented in these two films have similar aspects to the way they have been represented in the voice behind. The clothing of the characters in the voice behind is simple but gives the aspects that give away what a thriller is about. 

The second type of social group that is being represented is the ‘innocent passer who walks through the park’. Once being introduced to Ethel the character who is possessed by the dead Tudor Thomas Culpepper, who appears in the new era to seek revenge on those who trespass in his park, we then see the innocent girl walks through the park. Once we see the victim walking through the park the lightening is shown to have aspects of normal lightning to show her living a normal day however is blurred in Ethels eyes this could convey the confusion and mixed emotions Ethel is feeling. Once Ethel has been introduced, we then go on to see the innocent victim walking by in the park where the lightening is normal to see the victim living a normal day until Ethel comes across the character in which Culpepper told her to target.


Overall the representation of the social groups in our thriller opening were presented positively as we linked it with recent media films creating intertexualtiy of both the 'woman in black' and 'orphan' 

Below i have shown to use 'i movie' to represent all the softwares i had used when creating and researching conventions for film openings.