Evaluation Question-2

How does your media product represent particular social groups?

As a group, we decided to try and cover a range of social groups accurately and thoroughly. We made sure that this was carried out using the extensive research we had conducted through the preproduction process of our thriller opening. We aimed to cover the following social groups within our opening: gender, class, sexuality, mental health and age.

Gender: Females in the thriller films, are very significant because they have no overall stereotypical role in the genre, this is because in some films, they play the cold-hearted and emotionless and in others they are portrayed as the damsel in distress, who needs saving by the protagonist, which is usually the male as he is portrayed as mentally and physically stronger than females in thriller films. Our narrative subverts this particular stereotype as Lucas as the male lead is shown as weak due to his mental illness and is unable to save Ellie the female lead from his physical strength as it is later revealed in the film that he has killed her. So in a sense the narrative both subverts and adheres to this stereotype as although Lucas retains his physical strength (shown particularly in a worm's eye view shot of him looking down at Ellie's grave) his mental illness restricts his mental strength as he is unable to control himself and experiences periods of memory loss. The men in thriller film are portrayed as both the protagonists and the antagonists; The males are often portrayed as the strong hero, who saves the day by figuring out the enigma which is usually given to the audience at the start or middle of the film. They are usually mentally and physically strong and shows their strength and independence during the disequilibrium, to obtain the new equilibrium. The narrative of our thriller opening subverts this stereotype as Lucas is seen to be the opposite of this and is shown to be the antagonists which are the villain of the narrative. It is quite common for the females to be the survivor in thriller films, our narrative, however, subverts to this stereotype as Ellie is shown to be inferior in comparison to Lucas as he is able to overpower and kills her. Females are also often portrayed as very charming and glamorous and sometimes over sexualised in thriller films due to mise-en-scene such as clothing and makeup, an example of this would be the use of red clothing and makeup which could be used in the thriller to represent evil, danger and blood but when linking this colour to a female it could be used to depict her as a sex symbol. Although Ellie is not depicted in any red clothes, the makeup in which she wears could show her as a sex symbol as her features are over such as her eyelashes and lips. This also shows that she takes pride in her appearance whereas Lucas is portrayed as doing the opposite wearing very casual clothes and messy hair. We have also used nordic noir, is a genre comprising crime fiction written in Scandinavia with certain common characteristics, typically in a realistic style with a dark and morally complex mood. This closely relates to our theme and links to the mental issues experienced by Lucas also the idea that we have used a strong female detective investigating a male lead.

Class: In multiple thrillers, money and social class play a part within the story. Often money is used for the breakdown of relationships which adds to the deterioration of a victim. A lot of issues in these films are sidetracked by money as a sub-narrative which underlie the main problems of the film. In our thriller opening we have used mise-en-scene to suggest links to class and social status of the two main character Lucas and Ellie, they are both seen to be wearing normal casual clothes and the house in which they lives seems extremely normal as well, this shows they are both of either working or lower class as the opening shows no sign of expense or upper-class activities or belongings. Social class is often used in the sense that a lot of high-class people are punished, usually due to being considered stuck up or not grateful for what they have. What is perceived to be a 'perfect' life i.e. big house, marriage and children, stable job is often quickly broken down in thrillers by a turn of extreme events, which proves none of these things counts for anything when it comes down to it, and aims to change a character. Our narrative relates to this stereotype to an extent as it shows Lucas being involved in the crime which is often thought to link more to lower class citizens than those of a higher class such as the detective shown in the final portion of the opening. She is depicted in higher quality clothes and brighter colours (a 'royal' blue top) this can also be linked to how she is on the other side of the spectrum in relation to crime as she is investigating and putting things right and the lower class citizens are the ones to be convicted and that suffer the effects of the crime as Ellie is killed.

Age: A stereotype typically associated with the Thriller genre is that victims/weak characters fall to teenagers and elderly people. This is usually because they can not handle the circumstances and are vulnerable to the situation, and audiences will straight away identify this. With this in mind by casting our lead character as teenagers it immediately identifies with our target audience as they can feel the danger of the character as they are of a similar age. For example, in the opening scene of Jaws, the audience instantly feel worried for the characters due to the carefree nature of the teenagers. Using this as a small token of inspiration our opening shows a teenager in a graveyard, a location often associated with the elderly. It is odd to associate such a young person with such a dark subject such as death. Our narrative may also be said to take a dark, twisted and unique turn in relation to such as the young person being killed, this alone brings an element of shock into the storyline. Although the age or identity of the person in the grave is not revealed within the two-minute opening it will be revealed through the duration of the film, this is intended as it leaves questions to be answered which build tension within the audience a key convention of thriller openings. 

Mental health: As a group we found that mental illness was not a common topic that past media groups had used as a foundation to thriller openings, with this in mind we decided that by perusing this topic we would have to take into consideration the effects of portraying mental illness' incorrectly, to prevent this we conducted vast amounts of research to ensure an accurate interpretation of mental illness was shown. Many people still wrongly believe, for instance, that all people with schizophrenia are violent. In fact, only a very small number of all people who are mentally ill are in any way violent towards other people. We have represented mental illness within our media product by depicting one of the main characters within our film with the mental illness schizophrenia, although Lucas portrays the small portion of people with schizophrenia who are violent, the opening itself does not portray him to be violent in any way, in infant shows his compassion for his victim visiting her grave and showing remorse. However throughout the duration of the film the different sides of the character would be shown in ways that show the reality of mental illness. The amazing thing about using mental illness as a foundation to any media platform is that it allows the people behind the film such as the producers and directors to educate the audience of the film about mental illness which is rarely touched upon in films. The mood set by this topic is ambient and increases to a high tension build up throughout the opening until the final cut to the title and eerie sound effect that opens the film keeping to the key conventions of thriller openings as the climax of the tension is as the title fades and the film begins. Lucas is portrayed in a relatively straightforward fashion, wearing casual clothing in a very non-casual situation (visiting his girlfriend's grave) this relates to his mental illness as he is shown to be a regular young man and in fact is suffering in a way in silence to the other character within the film, the audience however get a unique insight into how he is feeling from the distressing voiceover cast over the calm shots contrasts in a way that is in keeping with the conventions of the thriller genre as the voice over builds suspense and gives the effect that Lucas' character may snap at any second, the audience wait for this as they can see from his body language grabbing his hands infant of his body and walking with his head down showing guilt. He never snaps during the opening, this leaves the audience waiting for this highly anticipated moment within the film.