Genre practice exam question

Genre helps the producers of films to create a template for what they are making. Genre also can also help the distributor and promoters to market the film to specific audiences. For example in ‘Neighbours’ (my film opening coursework for AS) my genre was teen thriller; which can also be classified as a hybrid genre. My film opening can be classified as teen thriller because the audience are able to connote the common conventions that they infer to be from a thriller genre. The teen genre also comes from the fact that there are teens in the film opening; therefore the audience can also relate to the characters in the film. My film was about a girl who was getting revenge on her previous friend; and she ends up killing the friendship group off one by one. The audience denotes the antagonist following the ‘popular girl group’ and killing them off one by one. Within the first two minutes the audience are able to connote. Neale (1990) says that genres are both important to be similar and different. For example films in specific genres have to have some of the typical conventions and then also have to be different to keep the audience interested. More repetition wouldn’t attract the audience. For example in thrillers like mine, they follow similar conventions in that most thrillers involve either a chase scene or some violence. Whereas comparing the film the film Heathers and abduction. Both are classified under the genre of thriller. However Heathers is also a teen thriller due to the fact there isn’t any guns or typical violence; but there is murders. Whereas in abduction there is guns and chase scenes. Both are thrillers but they are very different therefore they both attract similar but different audiences. Neale also stated that audiences bring their pre-determined knowledge to films and this helps them pre-determined what they are going to see. If audience members had previous knowledge of the film Heathers; they would have pre-determined knowledge and understand the film more. Having pre-determined knowledge enables audiences to understand the films more and they get what they are expecting from a teen thriller.

 In my film opening I made my semantics and syntactic elements specific to the teen the thriller genre enabling the audience to connote the teen thriller genre. For my semantic elements I gave the antagonist wear darker clothing and I specifically gave the role of the antagonist, to the female with darker hair. This will enable the audience to infer that she is the antagonist. I also used darker lighting and due to the fact that I was filming in the months of November and December I was able to take advantage of the dark night lighting. Also in the editing process I used split screen and I used fast pace editing; this follows the typical conventions of a thriller. The fast pace editing implies that there will be a lot going on in the film. I also used syntactic elements to enable the audience to define my film to one genre. Some syntactic elements such as; the antagonist following the protagonist in the opening and the narrative enigma throughout the opening. The narrative enigma being the fact that the audience know that the antagonist and the protagonist know each other but the audience are unaware of why. This follows how Rick Altman stated that genres are usually defined in terms of media language such as the synaptic and syntactic codes. Another theorist stated that ‘satisfaction comes with what is expected from genre’. Therefore using a sematic code of the location being set in a school for a teen thriller. The audience will get what they are expecting and will be able identify with the location and the characters in the film. I also used teens in the teen thriller; this also  

 John Fisk talks about sub-genre and genre being difficult to define. Due to the fact that my AS coursework was a maximum of two minutes long; it was difficult to apply the dark comedy to the film to the beginning when there was no dialect. However if the film were to continue the audience would be able to connote the dark comedy. However based on the opening to minutes I would classify my film to be a teen thriller. Making my film a genre hybrid film it will attract a wider audience. The mis-en-scene in the music video challenges the genre characteristics of a thriller. Typical mis-en-scene conventions of a thriller include a male protagonist and props such as; guns and bombs. Other typical mis-en-scene conventions would be that costume is generally dark clothing throughout and the male protagonist either wears a leather jacket or a suit. In ‘Neighbours’ (my AS film opening) the main protagonist is a female and the audience does not denote any guns or a male protagonist. However the audience does see a chase scene and this does follow the typical conventions of a thriller.

My film will appeal to audiences because if they do bring their pre-determined film knowledge they will know what to expect when they come to a teen thriller such as ‘Neighbours’. In the first few minutes of the opening the audience is able to denote that the film is set in a school and the characters are all teens. Therefore the audience will be able to identify and be able to understand the film that they are coming to see.  My film follows some but not all generic conventions of the thriller genre. This applies to the theorist Neale in which a film has to be the same but also different to be able to fit into a specific genre category.