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

This evaluation question will comment on how my media product represents particular social groups through the use of camera angles, Mise-en-scene, Editing and Sound. These four technical areas also begin to communicate how Gender and Class and status are portrayed to audience members.

Primarily, I feel the need to start with the area of Mise-en-Scene. Immediately from looking at the characters costume, we can tell costume plays a big role in the representation of who a character is. For example, it is clear to the audience that our protagonist has a maintained high income and notably notice which working class background he’s from as he presents himself in a formal, professional way. By the character wearing a suit it can connote the higher class he’s from and the superior status. From this technical area of Mise- en-Scene I understand the protagonist is trying to briefly represent the area of gender as well through the empowering position of a male in a typical suit. By our character wearing a white shirt it shows purity and innocence within himself to show he is a good person, highlighting he can be heroism as well with black trousers and smart shoes. As he is wearing a suit it shows an important role in society and this adheres to the stereotype that a middle class man usually wears smart, formal clothing to show the position of high class and status of responsibility in society.

In comparison to his shirt being of a crisp white, and in an ironed status, the shirt has bloodstains on it suggesting the protagonist has previously been beaten up. The character also has cuts and bruises on his face. This subverts from the usual stereotype of a man. This allows gender to been attended to as one normally sees a man with holding power and superior actions, however from the injuries and bloodstains it immediately makes him look more weak and inferior.

Also, I wanted to draw attention to our characters facial expressions as this can represent another section of Mise-en-scene. For instance, throughout the sequence the characters facial reactions and expressions are of confusion and fright. We see this as the protagonist wakes up with a slight concuss feeling making his expressions force this. This therefore allows audience members to sympathise with him as we realise he is in a vulnerable position and in danger. However, this then goes against a usual genders superior position, as we don’t normally empathise with men.

The last section of Mise-en-Scene that helps force the representation of class and status is the props used. For example, we see in the opening sequence there are a numerous number of keys and a one padlock. The protagonist quickly realises he needs to find the correct key to escape from this dangerous situation. Through the mechanism of props, it shows the character is well educated and intelligent as he rapidly works out the mission he has to complete; this therefore adheres to the stereotype of someone with high status and class as he’s typically gone through a journey of successful education.

I am also going to focus on the variety of camera angles and shots that we used to represent particular social groups. For instance, we primarily start with an extreme close up of the character’s face. We start with the camera being at the same level as the protagonist so the audience doesn’t suspect any representation immediately. However from this extreme close up and through close ups shots throughout the sequence, we see the confusion and fear spill out of the characters expressions shown on his face and through his body language; this allows us to automatically empathise with his position. . In comparison to this, it also adheres to the stereotype of a ‘white middle class’ person that is usually good and innocent, which forces us to sympathise. Although these shots help to subvert from the typical stereotype of a powerful, superior man through the representation of gender, we similarly see in our sequence, a point of view shot to allow the audience to see how many keys there were and how stressed he is. This adheres to the representation of class and status as we see in the next mid long shot he knows exactly what to do through his intelligency, as he’s been well educated.

I also looked at how my media product represents particular social groups of gender and class and status through sound. Our character is introduced with the sound of heavy breathing and scarcely panting when he is finding his conscious again when waking up. Through the use of heavy breathing and panting at the beginning and consistently throughout the sequence, it implies the character is frightened and lost for words. The use of repetitive diegetic dialogue is used to also force the vulnerable position the protagonist is in. He similarly crosses the mature language barrier by emphasising harsh, offensive language to highlight his stress. The use of non diegetic background sounds of guns and people suffering and also increasing footsteps coming closer towards the protagonist is used to help force the dangerous atmosphere and allow the audience to see how alarming peoples situations can be due to various social class positions.

The last way that representation can be showed in my product is through the use of sound to represent social groups. For instance, we focused on creating quick, sudden transitions from different shots and sped up parts of the sequence to show the struggle and the challenge our protagonist has to face. This adheres to the stereotype of a high class and status man as he is always ready for a challenge and can achieve most things.

In this evaluation, I want to briefly touch upon ethnicity as I feel through the use of our titles it has represented a particular social group. For instance, we named our opening sequence ‘The Salvatore’ and allowed ‘Biondani studios’ to present it. We have involved the Italian language into our thriller titles so the audience realises it is a worldwide sequence. However, present in society at this time, many people associate a foreign language to be unusual and unfamiliar to them. Some audience members can feel intimidated by words and language they don’t know and therefore can sometimes portray bad impressions; therefore it was a risk using a different language barrier as our title. This represents ethnicity forces a foreign social group to watch our thriller but we understand this puts of some people off.

To conclude, the character in our psychological thriller is challenged with many different social groups and shows complete signs of a protagonist working on his own and being a man who is well built and has experienced many things in his life.  Camera angles, Mise-en-Scene, editing and sound help to force representations of gender and class and status throughout.