Genre- Generic Conventions
Thriller
Brief was to create a short opening to a thriller with soundtrack and titles.
Characters:
The Femme Fatale- a dangerous, seductive and manipulative women who advocates female independence excluding traditional female roles.
Monica- is our deviant femme fatale and is the protagonist of the narrative, which challenges the generic conventions of thrillers as the protagonists are usually male dominated, for example, Michael in the ‘The Godfather Trilogy‘, Samuel L.Jackson and Brad Pitt in ‘Seven’ and Holly Martins in ‘The Third Man’. Monica was influenced by Jackie Brown as she is independent and free from men which is unusual in female roles in the genre, however she doesn’t she is inadequate to the genre being middle aged, middle class and black. We gave Monica this power and independence over men along with seductive attributes like Mia from ‘Pulp Fiction’, and Barbara from ‘Double Indemnity’, who were our main influences for Monica. Monica’s costume was the same as Mia‘s generic costume of red lipstick, black heels and black hair in ‘Pulp Fiction’ conveying her as seductive, her character strongly inspired our femme fatale to smoke and abuse drugs, which is a recurring motif in modern thrillers such as Scarface and Jackie Brown. Monica‘s image was distinctly feminine unlike some modern feme fataales like, Tarention‘s Bride in kill Bill. Tarentino was a great inspiration for the basis of our femme fatale and he takes a post-modernist approach and challenges the generic conventions of the genre.
Sam- is a significant character in our narrative who sparingly gets killed off, inspired by Tarentino’s looser characters, like Melanie from ‘Jackie Brown’. His character was developed in order to connote Monica’s manipulative power and control over people, especially men.
Location:
Building Site- this location was significant in order to convey the mise en scene’s danger and generic conventions of thrillers. This location is extremely unglamorous and contrasts with the sophisticated Monica. This desolate location connoted an un-secure and corrupt atmosphere similar to the vast marshes in 'Essex Boys',and developed entrapment as the site was full of cargo crates surrounding, forming a claustrophobic space, like the murder of Beaumont inside a car boot in a desolate car park. Claustrophobia is key in thrillers as it connotes a sense of fear to the audience, building up to the climax, for instance in ‘Kill Bill Vol 2’ when the Bride gets buried alive.
Soundtrack:
Richard Straus ‘Last Song’- This soundtrack steadily builds up the tension and climax of the narrative leading to an ambiguous denouement. This song influenced the title for our thriller, ‘Monica’s Last Song’, as it foreshadows Monica’s possible fate/doom, this is using the genre as usually the femme fatal or passive female character is killed of, which is an act of misogyny.
Inter-textual references:
Plug Hole Scene- We manipulated the scene from Alfred Hitchcock’s, Psycho, where Marion Crane (the passive and submissive female character) gets murdered in a bathroom, this adds to the development of claustrophobia, however voyeurism is developed when the camera zooms into the plug hole. We referenced this scene by having Monica wash her hands from the blood of a murder, whilst slowly zooming closely into the plug hole of the sink. This developed the tension felt during Psycho and linked both Monica and Marion together, reinforcing Monica’s doom further in the narrative. This scene also possibly reflects Lady Macbeth’s insanity, paranoia and obsession with washing her hands from the guilt of murder.
Lighting: we couldn’t achieve chiaroscuro or noir lighting so we shot in broad daylight like Essex boys.
Shots:
Canted- conveying a giddy and corrupt atmosphere like, ‘The third Man’
Low Angles- established the superior characters to the inferior, Monica was shot from a low angle, and Sam from a high.
Music Video
-Brief was to create a music video to promote an unsigned band- ‘Smaller Than You’.
-Was more of a challenge as we had to connote the characters/band-members emotions and personalities through actions, instead of dialogue.
-Needed to follow the Goodwin Theory of having a relationship between the lyrics and the visuals.
-I progressed extremely in significantly utilising genre and making the product professional.
Genre is Ska-punk, a hybrid of Ska.
Challenge the Genre-
We took a post modernist approach to the genre by featuring female skateboarders in our video, challenging the genre by altering gender power relations. As the band consisted of 6 members, one being female, we decided to promote her strongly to advocate females in the Ska industry. Ska bands are extremely male dominated, for example Spunge, Reel Big Fish, Mad Caddies and the 2 tone renowned group, The Special’s, which are all bands Smaller Than You are influenced by. The exceptions to these male dominated ska acts are No Doubt and The Raincoats, which both have female lead singers.
Skate-punk-Although the genre was Ska-punk we infused skateboarding into our narrative to deveopl a subgenre of Ska called skate-punk,which is popular amongst bands who enjoy both music and skateboarding. We were influenced by bands such as Blink 182 and Offspring who advocated the genre of skate-punk. This subgenre was created in America and is associated with American Ska, where skateboarding was growing in popularity and was a form of rebellion. This is extremely fundamental to our video as we wanted to predominantly target Ska-punk as well as Skate-punk.
Costume- As our narrative was performance based integrated with a skateboarding slapstick comedy story, the costume needed to be generic for both the genre and the democratic sport. All the cast members wore generic Vans and Etnies clothing, which are both associated with Ska-punk and skateboarding. Shoes were a significant part of the bands video as most of them were skateboarding in the second narrative, the camera was focused primarily on the stunts and tricks they did in this part of the narrative, so there brand style and genre had to be connoted through this part of their costume significantly. We needed the cast members and band to look young to appeal to their youthful audience demographic of 16-25, which was significantly carried out by the costume. The bands attire was influenced by Sum 41‘s ‘In too Deep‘, and Less Than Jakes ‘Does This Lion City Still Roar?’ Music videos. ‘Smaller Than You’ all wore Vans, Etnies, and band merchandise, for example Iron Maiden t-shirts, as worn by the guitarist of 'Sum 41'. ‘Smaller Than You’ are extremely interested in the genre and appealing to their target audience and to convey this generic appearance Jasper, the bassist of the band wore an Aquabats t-shirt who are a renowned Ska-punk band, and one of the skateboarders wore a 'Rolling Stones' t-shirt and has tattoo's, adding to the sense of youth rebellion.
Location-
Urban Landscapes- These were core to using and developing the genre as these scenes are associated with underground music, which are the roots of Ska-punk. Urban landscapes were fundamental in our music video as our narrative was primarily filmed in this location, reinforcing the nature of the music. These urban scenes such as Norwich’s run down and unglamorous Anglia Square, is significant as the location is associated with rebellion and skateboarding, but also establishes the Britishniess of the band. The filming of urban landscapes in our video references the music video of Less Than Jakes- ‘Does This Lion City Still Roar?’ and Nike SB’s promotional video- ‘Today Was A Good Day’. Both these videos were significant in targeting their audience (and genre) through costume and location, focusing on urban landscapes, like the negative portrayal of La in Nike’s skateboarding video.
SoundClash- This is a music store in Norwich which is renowned for selling underground, urban, ska, and reggae music, appealing to our band and audience immediately. We filmed outside and inside this music store as it connoted independent new music and excludes the mainstream music industry.
Props-
Skateboard- This prop was fundamental to the genre and band, as it is a favourite hobby of theirs. This is significant as it provides escapism for the audience to experience their lifestyle and how important music and skateboarding are to them.
Drumsticks-This prop represented the bands passion for music and was the main focus of the music video. These drum sticks were used to entice the audience, keeping them engaged and active, this is also apparent in ‘Less Than Jakes- Does This Lion City Still Roar?’ where this ska band’s device is a pair of sunglasses which is central to the narrative throughout. These sticks formed the comedic narrative and were used as an object to pass and create a relay with the band and skateboarders, throughout Norwich’s city.
Lighting- in order to use the genre significantly we kept the grading and lighting Ambient, shooting on bright days to add to the optimism of the genre, this is also apparent in many Ska bands music video’s, for example the video of ‘Sum 41- In too Deep’ is extremely bright and vibrant. This use of bright lighting connoted a bright atmosphere and related to the ast pace melodies of the genre.
Shots-
I was inspired by Nike SB’s promotional video. This video was fundamental towards my research as the costume utilised was extremely generic to skateboarding which is extremely similar to the costume of the genre. As the video was promoting Nike shoes, the shots were extremely focused on the skateboard and influenced the variation of shots in our video. This video inspired our filming of urban scenes and how to keep the shots varied, for example we were influenced to film underneath the skateboard to show the trick above, increasing the professionalism and effectiveness of out music video. This video also influenced ours as they were a good example of filming the different skateboarders (band members in our video), and the product (in our case the skateboard and drumsticks), with the urban landscape.
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