Evaluation of Finished Production - Question 2

How does your media product represent particular social groups?

Our thriller opening only contains a limited number of characters - three female and one male. As the male appears to dominate the three females, the females could be perceived as weak and vulnerable. Moreover, the male could be seen as strong and more powerful than the women. Feminists would believe that this is a negative view of women, as they are subsidiary to men.
This was a deliberate choice as we wanted to use three females who were vulnerable We felt that this would make the thriller appear more realistic and believable; thus bringing it closer to the the Hollywood standard. Furthermore, a strong and mentally unstable male would enhance the realism within the film. Due to last minute changes, however, our male character was played by a female. Plus, our original female cast was changed dramatically. As a result, our ideas had to be altered slightly, meaning that the characters would be perceived in a different way than we originally thought.

Original Cast

New Cast

Unfortunately, we did not use any ethnic minorities in our thriller. Three of characters were white, whilst the other was mixed race. We do not feel as though our cast is the most diverse we could have chosen, but due to the limited amount of people who wanted to take part, and the unreliability of the original cast, we settled on choosing our close friends, as we knew they would be comfortable around us. We would have liked to include some actors/actresses from a more ethnic background, and would certainly consider it if we were to do the project again.

Sexuality was not explored in our thriller, as we did not feels it was necessary. The antagonist's obsession was not supposed to be sexual in anyway; the obsession was based around the character of Jed Parry from the book 'Enduring Love'. Parry's obsession was about love, but not about the sexual side of the feeling. We wanted to take this aspect of the book, and instill it into our thriller. We feel this was effective, as the obsession seemed more of a darker topic. Also, the lack of a sexual element in the thriller thus far would allow the audience to feel comfortable with the subject matter.

The class structure is explored, but only on a really shallow level. We show the female characters as a higher class to the male character. The females are well-dressed, and equipped with the items they need for the camping trip. The male character is dressed shabbily, indicating a low income. Also, the room in which he is situated in the opening scenes highlights the poor living conditions the character has.

Overall, I think that young people are shown in both a positive and negative light. The contrast between the protagonist and antagonist highlights the innocence and the deeper side of teenage life. Both the extremities are shown in our thriller, so the audience can identify the good and bad points of young people.

We tried to avoid stereotypes in our thriller, as they can make the film seem rather amateurish. However, when creating the antagonist, we needed to use conventions of the stereotypical 'hoodie'. We decided to dress our character in a hooded sweater, as we wanted his identity to remain hidden. Our character differs from the stereotype through his obsession. A typical 'hoodie' would not have an obsession, and would most definitely not stalk someone to the extent that our character did. Also, a stereotypical 'hoodie' would carry a weapon such as a knife, or baseball bat. Our character's weapon is just a piece of rope.

By using the 'hoodie' stereotype, we are immediately classifying are character as negative. The lack of a weapon makes him appear less threatening, but the dramatic irony (the audience knows of the antagonist's obsession, and know that he is chasing the females, whilst the girls are unaware) reinforces the nasty and vindictive nature of the character.

Our 'hoodie'

A Stereotypical 'hoodie'