Ideology

Ideology: this is often referred to as an unconscious set of ideas, values and beliefs that a group, society or an individual hold to be true or important, and provide a particular view of the world. This was developed my Karl Marx.

For example- A popular narrative is in Hollywood films such as the American dream. This is the belief that if you work hard there is no limit to your success. This can be read as a dominant ideology.

An example of ideology in films can be seen in Shawshank redemption-
Preferred/dominant readings-
The 'mainstream' ideology in Shawshank redemption would be that at the end when Morgan Freeman and Tim Robbins met each other again that they were so happy purely because they had seen each other again.
However the oppositional reading would be different.
The oppositional reading-
This is the 'alternative' reading which in Shawshank would be at the end when the two characters meet, that they were actually in a relationship together rather than just friends which is why they were so happy to see each other.

The dominant ideology of our film:
For our film, the dominant ideology would be in the Christian view, that Jake has bullied his brother however he is trying to make up for it, redeem himself, he is trying to be a better person and get justice for what happened to his brother. Also the fact he is a white male that comes from a middle class family causes him not to get in trouble, the common ideology that different classes and races are still treated differently. The audience would sympathise with him, realise that he is trying to redeem himself and change the person he is.

The oppositional reading of our film:
This would be that Jake is a violent, vile thug who deserves nothing but to be sent down or put into a youth offenders. The audience would have no sympathy for him and they would believe that it was his own actions that got him in that situation, it was his actions that drove his brother to suicide so therefore he is just as bad as his friends.

Storyboard

Here is a brief storyboard we did right at the beginning of planning to give us some direction for our trailer.

This part of the storyboard is a brief outline of the full film.

The script/voice-over

We decided to use a voice-over to direct the narrative, it just made it that bit clearer to the audience what direction the film was heading. It also creates tension as Jake it making a sort of confession, this is slightly risky as the audience do not know Jake as a character very well yet (seeing as they have only watched the trailer) so they could easily chose to go against him, but the voice-over allows Jake to explain himself and prove that he will fight back for redemption.

The voice-over read:
'He was my brother,
Bullied by me and my friends,
Driven to suicide,
This was never meant to happen,
We didn't know what the consequences would be,
I will avenge his death,
If it's the last thing I do,
So let me ask you this,
How far would you go for redemption?'

The rhetorical question at the end draws the audience in, it causes them to think about what they would do if they were in that type of situation and it also makes them want to know what Jake did, how far he went for his brother.

Location

 This is the house we used to film parts of our trailer, such as the death of Stuart. We chose to use a middle class house as it connotes normality, it highlights that Stuart was from a regular family, there was no specific factors that caused him to be bullied. We knew that social realism films were based around real life, so by keeping the house that the family lived in as normal as possible was essential.

This is a picture of the local train tracks which is situated close to the family home we used, we thought the train tracks would be a good location for the death of one character as train tracks connote danger and urgency. There is always that slight panic when you are crossing them which is what we wanted to represent when Jake's friend was about to cross them.

This image is of Attenborough Nature Reserve, we chose this location as it was quite a desolate place, places like these are usually where followings occur, we thought it would be a good place for Jake to watch his friend until he decided it was time to kill him. Again it is quite an everyday setting, many towns have nature reserves, we wanted to be consistent with keeping our locations as realistic as possible to follow our genre.

The music

This is the website that we got our music for our trailer from, we chose two tracks, 'breaking dawn' and 'dark night'. We found these tracks by using the 'feel' category where you can search a particular feeling and then all songs that are associated with that feeling come up. For example, 'breaking dawn' was associated with urgency and building tension.

 We then merged this track with 'dark night'. When the action in the trailer picked up we merged 'breaking dawn' into 'dark night' as 'dark night' fitted with the action of the trailer.

Representation theory

Representation can be defined in various different ways, such as:
a) the act of representing
b) action on behalf of a person
c) when something is re-presented in a different way

'Representation is the re-presentation of what originally had been presented. Representation means the way in which ideas, objects, people, groups and life forms are depicted by the mass media' - Stuart Price.

The media has a big hold on how someone or something is represented to the audience.

Two main theorists, the first one being Stuart Hall who argues...
'The media have the power to represent the world in certain ways. And because there are so many different ways in which meaning about the world can be constructed, it matters profoundly what and who gets left out, and how things, people, events and relationships are represented'






The other theorist, Richard Dyer argues...
'How social groups are treated in cultural representation is part and parcel of how they are treated in life, that poverty, harassment, self hate and discrimination (in housing, jobs, educational opportunity and so on) are shored up and instituted by representation.'


One of the biggest social groups that is represented by the media in the same way each and every day are young people, 'the youth of today'. Constantly in TV programmes, films and the press the same negative light is used usually associating them with drugs, alcohol, unemployment or violence. Our trailer is based on that 'youth' age category and does slightly follow that same representation of youth being involved with drugs (as Stuart overdoes on pills to kill himself) and violence (as Jake turns to killing his own friends in order to make up for his brother's death) however there is some positivity that comes from our trailer which is that Jake is trying to make a mends for all the hurt and pain he has caused. We do show the youth of today displaying remorse and emotion, taking consequences (despite being very severe) for their actions.

REDEMPTION- the trailer and analysis

We opened our trailer with out production logo 'THRILL'ER CLOCK PRODUCTIONS'- firstly this lets the audience know who the production company is, this would be a big selling factor if our production company became a successful film company. It also gives away part of the genre, 'THRILL'ER' is a subtle hint to the audience that part of this film will based around the thriller genre. Straight from this production logo we go into a medium shot of Jake and Stuart playing on the xbox, it establishes a relationship between the new and creates an equilibrium for the film and trailer. We then cut to a range of footage showing Stuart being bullied, this begins the narrative, it immediately creates a relationship between the audience and Stuart causing them to sympathise with him. From this footage we then used a 'cupboard shot'- where we placed the camera in the cupboard to film Stuart getting the pills, this then leads on to watching Stuart's suicide. From this we use a spiral type shot, where Stuart is sat on the floor and the camera is spinning around him causing a type of disturbed feel. It causes the audience to realise how disjointed Stuart is feeling, their automatic response would be that they do not want anything to happen to him, so when he does die it gives them a motive to want to know what Jake's going to do rather than automatically disliking him. This is slightly a convention of the thriller genre as it creates anxiety and anticipation, you wonder whether he is going to die or not. From this footage we then use a few fade transitions to connect Stuart to Jake as Jake becomes the main character. We use an enigma code of a knife, another convention of a thriller genre, this hints that violence is not far round the corner, it excites the audience. We then use a montage which is a typical convention of a thriller genre as we watch Jake on his journey to redemption. The montage builds suspense and tension, it is quite dramatic which would be a very appealing factor to our target audience.

We used a voice over which was Jake talking, it gives his narrative which forces the audience to have to follow Jake's perspective of the story, it would be likely that they would dislike him due to his actions but this way they are stuck with him and his perspective, therefore they would struggle to go against him and end up following his journey. Eventually this leads the audience to sympathise with Jake, they have a clearer understanding of what went on and they would more than likely support him on the road to redemption. As for the text we decided rather than having sentences and lots of words, which would take time to read and digest, that we would choose a few words which linked to the narrative really well, such as 'JUSTICE', 'SUICIDE' and 'AVENGE', this creates suspense, it builds the narrative. Lastly at the end we have the title of the film, 'REDEMPTION', followed by 'JUNE 2013', this leaves the audience with the title of the film in their minds, by telling them the month that it comes out it saves them having to look or wait, especially as our target audience are 15-24 being patient or doing their own research is not something that would appeal to them, therefore we made it easy.

Lastly the non diegetic music in our trailer is two different tracks, the first one 'breaking free' is a fast beat, its slowly building up the tension. It really draws in the viewer well as it keeps them engaged with what is going on in the trailer. Then as soon as Jake pulls out the knife the track changes to 'dark night' and the tone turns much more serious as the music is more dramatic. It runs parallel to what is happening in the trailer. We decided to keep the diegetic sounds in such as the dialogue from Stuart being bullied and the sound of the xbox so that it kept the trailer much more realistic, we especially want the film and trailer to seem realistic due to the social realist genre.