AUDIENCE THEORY #1 - Stuart Hall's Reception Theory

Stuart Hall developed three readings when talking about how meaning is encoded in a media text by the producers and decoded by an audience.

1. Preferred Reading
2. Negotiated Reading
3. Oppositional Reading

EXAMPLES:

In a scene from Repo Man, a character says the word: "Gringo"

I don't speak Spanish, but I do know that gringo is a Spanish slang (insult) term for Caucasians (due to a Mexican character using it in an audio series I listened to as a child). 

So while I can't follow the preferred reading like someone who can speak Spanish fluently, and might detect signifiers of regional identity, I still understand some of what is being said here. Someone who does not know this term or any Spanish at all will have an oppositional reading towards this line, where as I have a form of negotiated reading.

These two YouTubers show the two alternatives, different readings on the content, in this case verisimilitude of the text, on the other moral issues



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The Opening Shot - Shaun Of The Dead

Shaun Of The Dead

Edgar Wright, 2004

LEAD ACTORS: Simon Pegg, Nick Frost, Kate Ashfield

GENRE: Zombie romantic comedy

PRODUCTION COMPANIES: WT2 (Working Title)

DISTRIBUTORS: Universal Pictures 
BBFC: 15             MPAA: R

BUDGET: $6.1m 

BOX OFFICE: $30m (worldwide)

REVIEWS, wiki:

Shaun of the Dead received critical acclaim. On Rotten Tomatoes, the film has a score of 92%, based on 201 reviews, with an average rating of 7.8/10. The site's critical consensus reads, "Shaun of the Dead cleverly balances scares and witty satire, making for a bloody good zombie movie with loads of wit".^[14] On Metacritic, the film has a score of 76 out of 100, based on 34 critics, indicating "generally favorable reviews".^[15] Nev Pierce, reviewing the film for the BBC, called it a "side-splitting, head-smashing, gloriously gory horror comedy" that will "amuse casual viewers and delight genre fans."^[16] Peter Bradshaw gave it four stars out of five, saying it "boasts a script crammed with real gags" and is "pacily directed [and] nicely acted."^[17] The film was placed sixth in Empire's top one hundred British films list.^[18]

TRAILER:



International trailer, with the classic booming American narrator



Minus the Universal ident, the opening sequence

THE SHOT

TEXTUAL ANALYSIS 

There is no Working Title ident, only the Universal ident. There is an audio bridge transition between the ident and the opening Shot.

The camera zooms out. So already in the first Shot there is camera movement, the camera isn't static. 

The unsettling sound on the indents, and suddenly the soft, upbeat sound signifies the hybridity of the horror comedy. His serious look can also be seen as a juxtaposition with the positive music.

This character is signified as important, protagonist, we are meant to sympathy with him.

• Background is in shallow focus and he is deep focus
• Rule Of Thirds applied
• Looking at the camera
• Alienated, the "Other"

Alcohol and cigarettes, negative connotations, signifies his precarious situation throughout the film.

Regional Identity: UK stereotype, "Last orders"

I myself know how non-British people perceive this as a stereotype, my German father once joked how I should say "Last orders" when we soon going to leave a restaurant.

Narrative enigma, female protagonist the conflict of romance set up. Common trope of issues in relationships, one doesn't listen to one's partner, often a female complaint? 

REPRESENTATION

Countertypical representation of the male gender, confused, bewildered, not the strong macho male protagonist leading the story, not the typical Proppian hero?

DISTRIBUTION/AUDIENCE - Age Ratings

From the BBFC website:

The Motion Picture Association of America, from the MPAA website:

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Prelim1 - The Brief

Continuity task involving filming and editing a character opening a door, crossing a room and sitting or standing opposite another character, with whom she/he then exchanges a couple of lines of dialogue. This task should demonstrate match on action, shot/reverse shot and the 180-degree rule.

What is continuity editing?
Continuity editing is the process of editing footage so that the narrative flows naturally and doesn't appear disjointed to the audience. This can take away realism from the text.

Media language: Angles & shot types

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AS Media - Camera Shots & Angles from Richard Dannenberg

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Box Office, The Gant Rule, Big 6

*Between The Film Cycle and Working Title A Short History*

Box office revenue comes from cinema chains.

The 20 highest grossing films, nearly all A-List stars or intellectual property, linking in to an existing audience that can be marketed to.

Charles Gant, box office analyst writing for The Guardian, set up The Gant Rule. 

Big hit films (a film is considered to be a hit when it makes at least 3 times its budget at the box office) will make ten times as much in dollars in US cinemas than it will in stirling.

The Big Six take this into account, so they will want to market towards that audience. This has utter dominance over the content of the films, including representation of social groups and issues, and the originality of its narrative.

As my main case study to show how companies owned by the Big 6 stick to this narrow representation I will use Working Title, a subsidiary of Universal, owned by conglomerate NBC-Universal which in turn is owned by Comcast.

DISTRIBUTION - Studio Subsidiary Vs Indie

WHAT I ENDED UP APPLYING:

• I created a fictional record company, Cosmic Heat Records, making the origin of my film company just like the origin of Warp, and creating a fictional indepedent artist who was contracted that record having created the OST 

In order to understand how the my film would achieve distribution, I have to understand the consequences of being an independent film company in contrast to a studio-subsidiary.

I am going to focus on two main case studies, Warp and Working Title, both British, one an independent company formed out of Warp Records, an indie  record company; and the other starting out as an indie but in the 90s merged with PolyGram and is now owned by one of the Big Six, Universal Studios (which is owned by multimedia conglemerate NBC-Universal).

I will create a timeline for both companies, then summarize what implication this has for my film opening.

INDUSTRY The Film Cycle

To know how my text would be distributed I need to understand how the film industry and media industries in general work.

The Media Students Book lists these six stages for any media production:

• development or negotiating a brief 30
• pre-production 31 
• production 32
• post-production 33 
• distribution 34 
• exhibition. 

The Film Cycle:

1. Production
2. Distribution
3. Exhibition
4. Consumption

SAMSUNG1/BLOGGER4 - The BLOGGER App

I've downloaded the free version of the Blogger mobile app onto my Samsung S3 from Google Play. This is a form of convergence, the technologies of computers and smartphones coming together so that I can work. 
However, the smartphone has several limitations due to the smaller screen, I can only edit drafts on this free version, I can't publish posts.

TECHS: Website Sources

I have added to this list throughout the year:

CIE Website

GENERAL RESEARCH:

• Google
• Wikipedia
• Db3igs

Sometimes I would just type something into Google and find the answer.

FOR TECHNOLOGY:

• AppleSupport
• Premium Beat
• No Film School

FOR INDUSTRY:

• BoxOfficeMojo
• Rotten Tomatoes
• IDMb
• The Numbers
• BBFC
• Amazon
• Netflix
• Working Title
• Warp
• StudioCanalUK
• IFC Films
• BBC Films

ONLINE BOOKS:

• Media Students Book.

My favourite film

WHAT I ENDED UP APPLYING

• I learned that this is an example of convergence, with TV and film going off into spin-offs, sequels and TV series, and it also showed a trend in audience behaviour that my favourite film is the spin-off of  a TV series, I prefer TV a lot to film
• In the distribution I said there was a minor chance that my film could spin-off a TV series, like had happened with 10 Things I Hate About You
• The fact that BBC Films, a subsidiary of a broadcasting corporation, is behind this film, further shows the convergence, and I speculated that Film4, the equivalent film subsidiary of Channel 4, might distribute my film, like they have done for my indie film company case study, Warp.
• What the ScreenDaily review says about the lack of demand for satire due to Obama's presidency being a negative factor to the film can also be reflected in my genre, is the demand/audience appeal for rom-com/teen films as high as it used to be? I concluded that while there is still some interest, it has wained, and teens, my primary audience, are more interested in big blockbuster, fantasy and futuristic teen fiction franchises like Harry Potter, Twilight, The Hunger Games, The Maze Runner etc.

POSSIBLE POINTS OF INFLUENCE

• Maybe it would be possible to do a film spin-off of a TV series for my coursework
• Political satire also as a possible genre. It will most likely either be a drama or a comedy.

IN THE LOOP

Armando Iannucci, 2009

PRODUCTION COMPANIES: BBC Films, 
                                                 Aramid Entertainment

DISTRIBUTOR: IFC Films (US)
                          Optimum Releasing (UK)

GENRE: Political satire 
               (subgenre of comedy)

LEAD ACTORS: Peter Capaldi

                            Tom Hollander

                            Chris Addison

                            Gina McKee

                            James Gandolfini

BBFC:  15                 MPAA: Not Rated

BUDGET: £612k       
BOX OFFICE: $3.5m (UK) $2.4m (US) $7.8m (worldwide)


CRITICAL KUDOS

ROTTING TOMATOES: 94%                     IDMb: 7.5/10

REVIEWS (from wiki)

The film was released to critical acclaim. Reception to the film's premiere at the Sundance Film Festival was particularly positive.^[2] Damon Wise, writing in The Times was particularly complimentary, giving the film five stars, stating "It's hard to settle on a standout element because it's all so outstanding, from the performances to the one-liners to the plot."^[19] Screen International's David D'Arcy was complimentary, but noted that the release of the film may be poorly timed, given the new presidency of Barack Obama, stating "its exuberant, boundless cynicism will test the demand for political satire in an Obama-infatuated America."^[20] Michael Phillips of the Chicago Tribune put the film as #9 on his top ten list of 2009.
The film review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes reports that 94% of the reviews they tallied for the film were positive, based on 166 reviews.^[21]In The Loop was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay in 2010.^[22]

A full list of reviews listed on IDMb here.

TRAILERS:

From the StudioCanal UK YouTube Channel, however then it was still called Optimum Releasing.

Longer trailer, however provides less exposition due to more non-linear and shorter takes.



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WHY THIS IS MY FAVOURITE FILM

• I am a huge admirer of Armando Iannuci's work
• I have always find his comedic writing superb 
• It takes quite a controversial issue and turns it into dark humour

BLOGGER 3: Gadgets

I added various gadgets to make my blog more user-friendly, detailed in a screen recording.



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Last 5 Films I Watched

WHAT I ENDED UP APPLYING:

• The knowledge/interest in Shakespeare ended up being useful for the signifiers of high art in a pop culture film, as well as the origins of the romantic comedy with Twelfth Night mentioned below, but also As You Like It, Midsummer Night's Dream, Much Ado About Nothing

POSSIBLE POINTS OF INFLUENCE

• Representation of LGBT+ like in The Imitation Game
• Some of these films narratives I aspire to create one day, but most of them are too complicated for a two-minute film opening

I had not watched any of the trailers before watching the film.

The Imitation Game

I had been wanting to watch this film for a while, primarily because of the lead actor, Benedict Cumberbatch. This demonstrates how the star system dominates the film industry. While I don't just watch films and other media in general, recognisable faces always give me a good feeling about the film, especially when I first heard of it two years, it excited me that Benedict Cumberbatch was in a leading role after seeing him in several TV roles leading up to internationally successful Sherlock and his role as a villain in Star Trek: Into Darkness.

Twelfth Night 

I have had an interest in Shakespeare for a while, and have been watching more and more screen adaptations.

The Tempest

The Reader

Watched it because I read the book, intellectual property.

The Age Of Stupid

A very relevant issue for our planet today, and the DVD had been lying around for a while.

MAC2/BLOGGER2 - Taking & Uploading a Screenshot

*Insert film recording of you taking a screenshot*

Insert the image on the toolbar

Click the choose file

 It goes straight to your Mac's Desktop where your screenshots end up.

 Multiple sizes

Left, centre or right? 

Click the screenshot(s) to insert and then "Add selected" below.

You need to be careful not to extend the width of the blog page, otherwise reaches over to the side bar.

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MAC1 - Keyboard Shortcuts

From Apple Support:

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Shortcut	Description
Command-X	Cut the selected item and copy it to the Clipboard.
Command-C	Copy the selected item to the Clipboard. This also works for files in the Finder.
Command-V	Paste the contents of the Clipboard into the current document or app. This also works for files in the Finder.
Command-Z	Undo the previous command. You can then press Command-Shift-Z to Redo, reversing the undo command. In some apps, you can undo and redo multiple commands.
Command-A	Select All items.
Command-F	Find items in a document or open a Find window.
Command-G	Find Again: Find the next occurrence of the item previously found. To find the previous occurrence, press Command-Shift-G.
Command-H	Hide the windows of the front app. To view the front app but hide all other apps, press Command-Option-H.
Command-M	Minimize the front window to the Dock. To minimize all windows of the front app, press Command-Option-M.
Command-N	New: Open an new document or window.
Command-O	Open the selected item, or open a dialog to select a file to open.
Command-P	Print the current document.
Command-S	Save the current document.
Command-W	Close the front window. To close all windows of the app, press Command-Option-W.
Command-Q	Quit the app.
Option-Command-Esc	Force Quit: Choose an app to force quit. Or press Command-Shift-Option-Esc and hold for 3 seconds to force just the front app to quit.
Command–Space bar	Spotlight: Show or hide the Spotlight search field. To perform a Spotlight search from a Finder window, press Command–Option–Space bar. If you use multiple input sources to type in different languages, these shortcuts change input sources instead of showing Spotlight.
Space bar	Quick Look: Use Quick Look to preview the selected item.
Command-Tab	Switch apps: Switch to the next most recently used app among your open apps.
Shift-Command-Tilde (~)	Switch windows: Switch to the next most recently used window of the front app.
Shift-Command-3	Screenshot: Take a screenshot of the entire screen. Learn more screenshot shortcuts.
Command-Comma (,)	Preferences: Open preferences for the front app.

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BLOGGER1: Initial Adjustments

TEMPLATE, NAME & URL:

Name: Clockwork Lemon and Cosmic Heat Productions

URL:  

BACKGROUND IMAGES:

Issue with copyrighted images. I am going to use the image of coffee and a camera.

WIDTH:

At the moment keeping it ag the same size as Evie because we might work together and share posts, so that makes copying and pasting easier.

FONT/SIZE/COLOUR:

For normal text I use normal size, for Main Titles Largest and Minor Titles Large.

Use Italic for fictional titles (This Is England)

I don't like the default font, I much prefer Arial.

Terminology I will mark in pink and bold.

Trebuchet I will use for quotes and make them purple.

EMBEDDING:

embedding image and using caption tool, embedding video (including where you get the embed code from), embedding links and anything else so far) 

Needed to change the settings from "Show HTML literally" to "Interpret typed HTML"

I got a lot of help from this post: DB Blog Post for setting up new posts.

My existing Media skills/experiences

In 2012 I was the boom operator in a short film, filming over a weekend in and around a housing estate. 
NOTE: It is in German, the narrative involves the protagonist trying to hide his mother's alcoholism (with the father having died recently) from his girlfriend who is at the door, who begins to think he is becoming an alcoholic.

In 2015/2016 in Art we had the choice to either do photography or a short film. I was in a group making a short film. However we didn't ac. As this wasn't Film or Media Studies, we weren't marked on our techniques, only on the film at face value. The editing was done mainly by the one person in the group who had a MacBook and thereby access to iMovieMaker, while the rest of us planned it logistically and wrote the script, as well being the main actors. This has given me experience of forming a narrative and also learning you might have to adapt to certain sudden circumstances like rain.

During the summer holidays I took an Acting For Screen course at the National Youth Theatre. While this was mainly focused on acting and not on the production level of filming, I still got a good insight into how the industry works when we looked at the scripts for Wolf Hall and This Is England, a series  by Warp, one of our two case studies companies. This was also when I was introduced to the different shot types. 

I have not had a directing role in filming, but have had experience in assistant directing both actors and logistics on stage in amateur theatre groups, also managing the whole rehearsal once

I have never written a script for screen, but indulge a lot in writing short stories, poems, song texts and I am also developing a play script at the moment. I have always wanted to write scripts for screen.

I have never worked with a recording camera in photography, only done amateur recording privately with small cameras, iPhone and Samsung in my social life like all adolescents. 

Assessment Criteria

FROM THE CIE SYLLABUS:

The Blog's The Thing!:

The Evaluation:

As summarised in this Media Studies blog post, and linking to the two screenshots before, these are the main themes of my AS coursework next to actual media product.

• AUDIENCE RESEARCH
• INDUSTRY RESEARCH
• TECHNOLOGY RESEARCH
• CONVENTIONS RESEARCH
• PRE-PRODUCTION/PLANNING

• REFLECTION OF THE PRODUCTION PROCESS - PRESENTED CREATIVELY USING TECHNOLOGY

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