The Pluralistic concept has an active audience, where they interpret media texts for themselves and creates more than one meaning for that text. This creates a negotiated and optional reading for its audience which also link to the reception theory, the media in these texts have to be pluralistic and reflect society. The pluralistic way of looking at the media gives the audience a sense of freedom to view society as how they want.
I feel there is no convening concept as if there was no hegemony in this world then society may not be structure properly, but if there was no pluralism people would have any freedom of speech in how they think the media can manipulate people. There is no concept that is convincing for me, as I think that we need both hegemony and pluralism as with hegemony society is structured and with pluralism it let people speak out.
Hegemony is a concept by Gramsci, he show’s that everyday things that we do to create a complex system in society, can be feed to use through by a dominate group or class. It shows how we are feed by the media to believe what they tell us to do is correct. For example as Althusse explains in the “ideological state apparatus” that, religion, media, and family can feed us views that we believe in and these 3 things help us structure how we live. Another example is where school students are feed by teachers what they have to do in school, like coming to lessons and school in time. All these example I have given of how many things can brainwash peoples is given the term “indoctrinate and manipulate” by the theorist Marcuse. The hegemonic concept is for a passive audience.
Friday 21 November 2008
Essay summary key points
1. The overall essay is about men’s magazines such as Maxim, Loaded and FHM. Its about how women are objectified which states the theory of male gaze these images are very similar to the more explicit version the ‘Playboy’ magazine.
2. Secondly the essay talks about masculinity as the primary target audience for the magazines are males.
3. Magazines of this genre sell purely due to the promiscuous pictures of women on the front cover. If women where to be posted in the magazines as purely natural without make up and no enhanced cleavages, the magazine wouldn't sell, this shows that the women themselves are the unique selling point.
4. The essay also compares the profit per the number of copies sold between the magazines such as Maxim, Loaded, FHM and Playboy.
5. The essay also explores the theory of ‘Laddism’ and how a magazine can gain high readership.
2. Secondly the essay talks about masculinity as the primary target audience for the magazines are males.
3. Magazines of this genre sell purely due to the promiscuous pictures of women on the front cover. If women where to be posted in the magazines as purely natural without make up and no enhanced cleavages, the magazine wouldn't sell, this shows that the women themselves are the unique selling point.
4. The essay also compares the profit per the number of copies sold between the magazines such as Maxim, Loaded, FHM and Playboy.
5. The essay also explores the theory of ‘Laddism’ and how a magazine can gain high readership.
Monday 17 November 2008
Textual analysis on the final scene of TCM – the beginning
The scene that I have chosen to analyse is the last scene of the film which has Jordana Brewster and Andrew bryniarski (Leather face). Jordana Brewster is the most significant character through out the film she is the last one to survive out of the bunch and also try’s to get her friends out of that house of horrors.
At the start of this particular scene, Chrissie played by Jordana Brewster, gets in the car after escaping a close death encounter to try and get some help but as she finds herself getting closer to the sheriff standing on the road nearby she discovers that the villain Leather face is in the back seat and before she can claim any sort of help a chainsaw is put through her neck and she is the final character to be killed. This is one of the most significant scenes in the film as it proves the theory of final girl by Carol Clover wrong because she claims that there is always a final girl who survives in Slasher films and she kills the villain but in this particular film it was not the case. On the other hand her theory is partially correct as even in this film the final character to survive is a female.
The next part of this short scene is the ultimate punch to the storyline as it concludes with the car going out of control and running over the sheriff on the scene. This shows that the villain is out of danger as everyone around him is dead and he yet again survives as in the historical Texas chainsaw massacre. It is very important to understand the significance of the ending as in many Slasher movies the villain is killed at the end although in the case of both Texas chainsaw massacre texts the villain has survived.
There are extreme close up shots of Jordana Brewster’s face as the facial expressions are extremely important in the climax as she is on the verge of escaping this horrified experience, there is anxiety building up for the audience as they question themselves if she is going to be rescued or not and later its revealed that the villain kills her before she reaches to get any help.
The final part of the scene is when everyone around the villain is dead and there is a long shot of the villain walking into the dark as there is a voiceover which talks about the horrifying deaths in Texas over years and finally a dark screen appears and the film ends.
At the start of this particular scene, Chrissie played by Jordana Brewster, gets in the car after escaping a close death encounter to try and get some help but as she finds herself getting closer to the sheriff standing on the road nearby she discovers that the villain Leather face is in the back seat and before she can claim any sort of help a chainsaw is put through her neck and she is the final character to be killed. This is one of the most significant scenes in the film as it proves the theory of final girl by Carol Clover wrong because she claims that there is always a final girl who survives in Slasher films and she kills the villain but in this particular film it was not the case. On the other hand her theory is partially correct as even in this film the final character to survive is a female.
The next part of this short scene is the ultimate punch to the storyline as it concludes with the car going out of control and running over the sheriff on the scene. This shows that the villain is out of danger as everyone around him is dead and he yet again survives as in the historical Texas chainsaw massacre. It is very important to understand the significance of the ending as in many Slasher movies the villain is killed at the end although in the case of both Texas chainsaw massacre texts the villain has survived.
There are extreme close up shots of Jordana Brewster’s face as the facial expressions are extremely important in the climax as she is on the verge of escaping this horrified experience, there is anxiety building up for the audience as they question themselves if she is going to be rescued or not and later its revealed that the villain kills her before she reaches to get any help.
The final part of the scene is when everyone around the villain is dead and there is a long shot of the villain walking into the dark as there is a voiceover which talks about the horrifying deaths in Texas over years and finally a dark screen appears and the film ends.
Tuesday 4 November 2008
Monday 3 November 2008
Texas chainsaw massacre 1974
SHEP (Historical)
Director: Tobe Hooper
Writer: Tobe Hooper and Kim Henkel
Tagline: The idyllic summer's day that became a nightmare of fear and blood...
Plot: Five friends visiting their grandpa's old house are hunted down and terrorized by a chainsaw wielding killer and his family of grave-robbing cannibals.
Director: Tobe Hooper
Writer: Tobe Hooper and Kim Henkel
Tagline: The idyllic summer's day that became a nightmare of fear and blood...
Plot: Five friends visiting their grandpa's old house are hunted down and terrorized by a chainsaw wielding killer and his family of grave-robbing cannibals.
Key words from the media vocab pack
1) Male gaze - term used by Laura Mulvey in her essay "Visual Pleasures and Narrative Cinema" to describe what she saw as the male point of view adopted by the camera for the benefit of an assumed male audience.
The male gaze theory will be useful to my study because to this theory I can link the changing roles of women in slasher films.
2) Hybrid Genre - a cross between one film genre and another
Texas chainsaw massacre- the beginning can be classified as a hybrid genre film as it has elements of a thriller and also horror.
3) Binary opposition - a term used by Claude Levi-Strauss as part of his argument that narratives are structured around oppositional elements in human culture, for example good and evil, life and death, night and day, raw and cooked. Within many media narratives, common binary oppositions are cowboys and Indians and also gangsters and police.
This theory of Levi- Strauss is widely seen in all genres of movies every film within the horror genre has to be based upon a hero and a villain.
4) Feminism - political movement to advance the status of women by challenging values, social constructions and socioeconomic practices which disadvantage women and favour men.
Are women still being portrayed as they were earlier on in slasher films or have women taken up the male roles by proving the final girl theory?
5) New man -a term used to describe a new type of masculinity identified and developed by advertising media in the 1980's in line with lifestyle marketing strategies.
Are the roles of men also changing within the slasher genre as women are becoming more powerful and final characters to survive the horrific experiences?
6) Bridging Shot- A camera shot that shows a passage of time or change of location as a means of connecting one scene to another.
In TCM- the beginning the opening scene shows the birth of the villain and the next scene shows a total change of location and time span.
7) Uses and gratifications theory - an active audience theory, developed by Jay Blumer and Elihu Katz that focuses on 'what people do with the media' rather than what the media does to people, arguing that audiences are free to pick and choose from a range of media products to satisfy their own needs.
This theory will be useful to find out why people watch slasher films as it covers the different needs of the audience i.e. personal relationship, surveillance, personal identity etc.
8) Remake- A new version of a previously successful film that closely follows the original but adapts it in line with changing audience expectations.
The first TCM was released in 1974 and due to the success of that the next part was released in 2006 which could not live up to the expectations of the audience as the audience did not think as highly of this part then the historic one.
The male gaze theory will be useful to my study because to this theory I can link the changing roles of women in slasher films.
2) Hybrid Genre - a cross between one film genre and another
Texas chainsaw massacre- the beginning can be classified as a hybrid genre film as it has elements of a thriller and also horror.
3) Binary opposition - a term used by Claude Levi-Strauss as part of his argument that narratives are structured around oppositional elements in human culture, for example good and evil, life and death, night and day, raw and cooked. Within many media narratives, common binary oppositions are cowboys and Indians and also gangsters and police.
This theory of Levi- Strauss is widely seen in all genres of movies every film within the horror genre has to be based upon a hero and a villain.
4) Feminism - political movement to advance the status of women by challenging values, social constructions and socioeconomic practices which disadvantage women and favour men.
Are women still being portrayed as they were earlier on in slasher films or have women taken up the male roles by proving the final girl theory?
5) New man -a term used to describe a new type of masculinity identified and developed by advertising media in the 1980's in line with lifestyle marketing strategies.
Are the roles of men also changing within the slasher genre as women are becoming more powerful and final characters to survive the horrific experiences?
6) Bridging Shot- A camera shot that shows a passage of time or change of location as a means of connecting one scene to another.
In TCM- the beginning the opening scene shows the birth of the villain and the next scene shows a total change of location and time span.
7) Uses and gratifications theory - an active audience theory, developed by Jay Blumer and Elihu Katz that focuses on 'what people do with the media' rather than what the media does to people, arguing that audiences are free to pick and choose from a range of media products to satisfy their own needs.
This theory will be useful to find out why people watch slasher films as it covers the different needs of the audience i.e. personal relationship, surveillance, personal identity etc.
8) Remake- A new version of a previously successful film that closely follows the original but adapts it in line with changing audience expectations.
The first TCM was released in 1974 and due to the success of that the next part was released in 2006 which could not live up to the expectations of the audience as the audience did not think as highly of this part then the historic one.
Delicious Tags
http://www.horschamp.qc.ca/new_offscreen/final_girl.html
A page full of information on Carol Clover and her book on Men, women and chainsaw’s. She is the prime theorist I will be looking at in detail.
http://virtual.clemson.edu/caah/women/flc436/mulvey.html
Notes on Laura Mulvey and her theory of the Male Gaze.
http://www.aber.ac.uk/media/Documents/gaze/gaze09.html
More detail on the theory of Mulvey.
http://www.epinions.com/content_4546994308
This link states the top 10 Slasher films and I could use this to extend my knowledge of this genre and by watching these texts I could compare my primary text with these movies.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slasher_film
This website talks about the history of Slasher films and their revival into the mainstream in the mid 1990’s.
http://www.geocities.com/Hollywood/screen/3226/history.html
Another website which talks about how the Slasher films started out and I could use this in my study by referring to how far back these films go and how they have changed over time.
A page full of information on Carol Clover and her book on Men, women and chainsaw’s. She is the prime theorist I will be looking at in detail.
http://virtual.clemson.edu/caah/women/flc436/mulvey.html
Notes on Laura Mulvey and her theory of the Male Gaze.
http://www.aber.ac.uk/media/Documents/gaze/gaze09.html
More detail on the theory of Mulvey.
http://www.epinions.com/content_4546994308
This link states the top 10 Slasher films and I could use this to extend my knowledge of this genre and by watching these texts I could compare my primary text with these movies.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slasher_film
This website talks about the history of Slasher films and their revival into the mainstream in the mid 1990’s.
http://www.geocities.com/Hollywood/screen/3226/history.html
Another website which talks about how the Slasher films started out and I could use this in my study by referring to how far back these films go and how they have changed over time.
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