Genre case study 1- The Breakfast Club

‘The Breakfast Club’ is a teen movie where 5 teenagers get detention on a Saturday and are locked in the school library for 8 hours. From 8am until 4pm. You have each one of the stereo types of an American high school. You have, Claire, the spoilt-princess, Andrew, the school jock, john the badly behaved, rude boy who comes across at first as not having any feelings. Brian is the nerd, the brainy boy who is in the physics, maths and many more academic clubs and lastly Allison, who is a compulsive liar and doesn’t speak at all in the first half of the film. Throughout the movie you learn a lot about the characters. They all have something in common, at first they deny these factors but as the movie progresses they become much more open and tell each other about their home life and why it is so bad. It all comes down to the parents. The principal is a nasty, bully who takes his power of authority to another level. He threatens John secretly and tells him no one will believe him, hes alone and who would take his word over his. The principal’s nasty behavior brings the students together, they all become very interested in John and why his behavior is like it is.

Teen movies usually use problems that teenagers in the audience will face, this is to help them relate to the characters and become emotionally involved. Conflict with parents is a common factor in a teen film but instead of presenting it in a very serious way there is humor throughout the film but they still get their points across, which brings the audience emotionally attached. This is a very cliché teen movie although it was instrumental in setting the clichés. They include illegal substances, such as marijuana but there is no peer pressure in the characters taking part in it, they join in on their own. Although the idea of virginity was made very pressured. Claire the princess and prom queen was repeatedly taunted about whether she was or not.

This is John, the misunderstood teenager.

This is Claire the princess, sitting next to Andrew the school jock with Brian the brains sitting behind them.

And this is the nasty principal. This images shows his anger at the teenagers.

Latly this is an image of Allison, watching everyone else in the room, not saying a word.

Genre Intertextuality

Box office results for similar films

Drop Dead Gorgeous

'Drop Dead Gorgeous' is a mocumentary that has a box office viewing of $10,571,408.

American Teen

'Amercian Teen' is a documentray that has a box office viewing of $942,441

There is such a big gap in viewings between these two films, even though they are both american high school documentaries. The mocumentary is trying to be non fiction by making it seem as real as possible where as the documentary is completely non fiction. Poeple are clearly more attracted to 'Drop Dead Gorgeous', this could be for many reasons but it seems like it is because 'Drop Dead Gorgeous' has stars featuring in it, such as Kirsten Dunst.

Our chosen genre and its conventions; documentary

Voiceover is the first convention of a documentary. The voiceover encourages the audience to think that they know more about it then they do. It gives them the idea they have some kind of specialist knowledge. This is because the voiceover is authoritative.

The second convention is the ‘real’ footage of events. Documentaries will add in as much footage as they can, so that there documentary will seem as real as possible to the audience. Documentaries are seen as non-fiction by audiences. The footage is always made to look as real as possible to the audience by editing and having a voice over.

The third convention is the technicality of realism. This is natural lighting and sound to make the documentary seem as real as possible.

The fourth is archive footage and stills. This will create information that the film maker may be unable to use or find themselves. It all helps with making the documentary look more non-fiction.

The fifth convention is interviews with experts. This is used to help authenticate the views in the documentary.

The sixth convention is text. Text is always believed as being true as you see it, remember it and it’s there in bold. It is easy with labels, dates and names.

Sound is the seventh convention. Is id diegetic sound or non-diegetic sound? Ha it been added or was it on location? Is sound used as a transition between scenes?

 Set-up is the eighth convention. Even if something is true and did happen, the film crew will recreate the scene to make it look real but it isnt as it is being recreated.

Visual coding is the ninth and last convention. Visual coding are things like mise-en-scene and props. Soemthing that shows who someone is viually, weather it be a white coat for a doctor or a briefcase and tie for a business man.

Our chosen genre and its modes; documentaries

There are 5 different modes for documentaries.

              The first is Expository, this is the most traditional mode and it focuses on the voice over. The 'voice of God', you hear him or her but you never see them. There would be a lot of footage and archive material etc. to help back up the voice over and support the argument. Images are often used to illustrate or even counterpoint the voiceover.                                                                       

                The second mode is the observational mode. This mode consists of no interviews, no voiceover, but with lots of handheld footage and long takes. The sound is caught on location rather than added in during editing. The subjects also pretend that they are not being filmed.

           The third mode is participatory. This mode could be described as having a mix of observational mode and expository mode in it. There is a voiceover of the documentary maker talking, but there are also synchronous sound recordings. The documentary maker interacts with the subject. There are interviews and a lot of footage and archival material as well as newspaper heading and letters. The documentary maker is visible to the audience.

               The fourth mode is reflexive documentary. This mode tries to capture an emotional response from the audience by borrowing techniques from fiction films. They like dramatic lighting and dramatic music. The voiceover isn’t telling you things, they are questioning things so that the audience can come to their own conclusions but with suggestive factors.

             
The last mode is the performative mode. This mode is when the documentary maker interacts with the audience and will comment on the process of making the documentary. The documentary will address the audience in an emotional and direct way.  The documentary may be focused towards an investigation or a search, but this may not lead to any satisfactory conclusion.

Our chosen genre and its conventions; teen movies

Our film is going to be consist of two genres; teen and documentary. The reason that it is teen is because it is going to be set in a high school and focus on the pressures that teenagers face, we are going to document what we see and interview certain people which will create a documentary.

Teen films are films that contain mainly teenage characters with real life problems to face, ones that the audience can relate to. They attract a teenage audience and actively discourage adult viewers. They are usually rated as 15's for indecency and sexual themes as these are common in teen films. The main plot line that they can go for would be, first love, the coming of age, conflict with parents/family, teen angst and alienation. They can either be presentd in a serious way but this wouldnt be as fun for teenagers to watch as they enjoy watching the glossy and stereotypical way they are usually presented.
Teen documentary is not the only hybrid genre of the classic teen film. You can get:

• Teen sci-fi
• Teen drama
• Teen horror
• Teen comedy
• Teen musical

The codes and conventions of a teen film are;

• high school
• parties
• alocohol
• illegal substances
• relationships
• complications
• proms
• parties
• virginity

American teen films are much more popular and world wide watched then any other. This is because they focus on the conventions of sterotypes and social groups. They always contain cliques and bullies and the jocks..etc.

Target Audience Research

JUVENILE

Gender    Age
Female 13-17
Male 25-34
Male 45-54


This is a short film about a young girl bringign home her boyfriend to meet her father who does everything he can to put the boyfriend off. Ther reason i think that this film connects to our idea is because it is all about first impressions and how you coem across to people and in our mockumentary we see that people's impressions change when they find out one thing about that person.


Little Hands

Gender	Age
Male	18-24
Male	25-34
Male	35-44

After watching this documentary and looking at the statistics i was really shocked by the fact the main gender who had watched it were male. I thought that women would feel emotional and connected to this sort of short film but i was wrong. This documentary provides conventions such as lookin gin on the life of someone else, it will often use hand cameras, it uses real people and interviews. The story is about a group of young school children who are deaf and so therefore are forced to communicate through hand gestures. They are happy children and not aware of the difficulties that they face.