Content Analysis (4-8)

0 Content Analysis

CONTENT ANALYSIS Familial Analytics

Zack Reese COM 401 Professor Smith

Abstract A constitutive report analyzing quantitatively how a group of people can become a “family.”

Due Date: 4/13/15

0 Content Analysis

Table of Contents

Section Page #

Part I: Objectives, Methodology and Logistics……………………………………………………..1

Part II: Operationalizing………………………………………………………………………………3

Coding Pages…………………………………………………………………………………5

Part III: Findings………………………………………………………………………………………14

Appendix A: News Release……………………………………………………………………………16

Appendix B: Personal Evaluation……………………………………………………………………17

References………………………………………………………………………………………18

1

Content Analysis

Part I: Objectives, Methodology and Logistics

The entire purpose of this specific content analysis is to really decipher what makes a

family, just that, a family. This was done by watching and analyzing the six Fast and Furious

movies. This led to the question behind this analysis, the research question. This question is:

How has the series’ main characters grow to be the family they are currently. To a lesser degree,

the question could also be: how exactly is this group of people a family?

This of course led to the creation of a list of objectives having to do with this question.

1. To calculate how many occurrences of key themes appear in each of the movie and how

many times. This will give key insight in how the characters grow and change and grow

together throughout their character arcs.

2. Comparing where the franchise began to where it is currently. This would involve a deep

comparing and contrasting the similarities and differences in the six films.

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Content Analysis

3. After having all the statistics based on the chosen categories and themes, figure out how

that all plays out in the grand scheme of things. What exactly do my findings actually

mean?

4. The important part is to present all of these thoughts into a cohesive understanding.

5. What the main objective boils down to is to understand how the “family” depicted in the

Fast and Furious movies became a family. Coupled with that is a look at how the series

has evolved since its conception in 2001. Finally, the findings will be applied to the real

world and what the films’ views of family means in the vein of reality.

In order to conduct the research necessary for this content analysis, I watched the six Fast

and the Furious films over the course of four days. Within these four days all six films were

watched to completion. I own all six as downloads on my iPad as well as having a Blu-ray

copy of each.

The next thing I had to do was come up with a group of themes of which to analyze while

watching the films. This led me to a group of 20 themes. These 20 encapsulate many of the

key elements of the movies as well as how the group of people depicted in them became a

family. Everything compiled together will provide a great answer to the research questions

and fall in accordance with the objectives.

Logistics:

Time Period: 4 Days

Movie Duration:

“The Fast and the Furious:” 107 minutes

“2 Fast 2 Furious:” 108 minutes

“The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift:” 104 minutes

“Fast and Furious:” 107 minutes

“Fast Five:” 132 minutes

“Fast and Furious 6:” 131 minutes

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Content Analysis

Part II: Operationalizing

The following list of themes used for the purposes of this content analysis is presented in

alphabetical order.

1. Adding members to the family: This would be anytime someone joins the movie

group’s current roster. (i.e. helping with heists, “hanging out” with other

characters, heavy interaction)

2. Friendly Banter between characters: Anytime one member of the “family” has a

light, humorous conversation, or teases another family member.

3. Bonding over working on a car: Anytime two characters are working on a car and

grow closer by sharing stories, etc.

4. Cliché line about going/being fast: This series is known for its sometimes cliché

lines or lines that would make a critic slap their palm to their forehead.

5. Cliffhanger endings: Any ending that leads either to the next film or has the

viewer wanting more.

6. Different city: Any time the predominant location for the film series changes.

7. Family meals: Anytime the “family” is together and eating and bonding. (These

always result in one character saying grace. These have become a staple in the

series.)

8. “Family” member killed: Whenever somebody from the “family” dies. (All deaths

are murders)

9. “Family” rescue: A grandiose rescue scene for a family member in peril.

10. Fight scene: Any scene between two characters who both throw a punch. A two-

sided fight. (One character attacking another without retribution doesn’t count.

11. Flashbacks: Any time a previous scene from one of the earlier films is played.

12. Joining forces against a villain: Any time the family joins forces either within

their group or another group against a common enemy, usually the film’s

overarching villain.

13. Kidnappings: Any time someone close to the family or within the family are

kidnapped or taken against their will.

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Content Analysis

14. Old friends return: Whenever a previous character with ties to the main group

returns to the forefront.

15. New protagonist: Whenever one of the series staples isn’t the protagonist and new

one is in place.

16. Self-sacrifice: Any scene when a person from the main group does something

sacrificial and self-harming in order to rescue or protect another.

17. Sex Scenes: Any scene depicting sexual intercourse.

18. Street Race Scene: The street race scenes the series became iconic for. Any

official street race with a wager of some sort on the line.

19. Vin Diesel “badass” line: Any one-liner delivered by Vin Diesel’s character, Dom

that clearly has an impact on another character, either within the family or against

it.

20. The word family: Whenever this word comes up in any of the films. Even in

casual conversation.

I created all twenty of the themes within this coding list based on my own knowledge of

the movies and what happens to be in most of the movies. The ones I chose also help to

distinguish the similarities and differences between each of the films and how they grew and

change as time went on. The films themselves changed immensely from the beginning to now.

Thoroughly analyzing each of the films the statistics for each was placed into 1 of 6

different coding sheets. (One for each of the films) and then those results were taken and further

analyzed into my findings. These were then placed into pie charts to exemplify how much of

each movie a certain theme was in. This complete separation of results was applied to reduce

confusion between the 6 movies as well as in order to effectively compare all of the movies by

putting the sheets side by side and comparing the differences.

The twenty different list items were met with a varying degree of differences throughout

the tenure of the 6 movies. Watching the 6 in quick succession was the perfect way to show just

how deep the contrast is from “The Fast and the Furious” to “Fast and Furious 6.”

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Content Analysis

Coding Pages The Fast and the Furious (1)

Theme Occurrences

Adding a new member to the family | (Brian)

Friendly banter between main characters

||||

Bonding while working on a car ||

Cliché line about going/being fast

| (“I live my life a quarter mile at a time.”)

Cliffhanger endings

0

Different city | (Los Angeles)

“Family” meals |

“Family” member killed | (Jessie)

“Family” rescue mission | (Mia/Brian rescuing Vince during truck heist)

Fight Scene ||

Flashbacks 0

Joining forces against a villain | (VS Johnny Tran)

Kidnappings 0

Old friends return 0

New protagonist 0

Self-sacrifice | (Brian giving Dom his keys and letting him go)

Sex scenes | (Mild sex scene)

Street Race Scene ||||

Vin Diesel Badass Line ||||

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Content Analysis

The word “family” | (Said by police)

2 Fast 2 Furious (2)

Theme Occurrences

Adding a new member to the family | (Roman, and to a lesser degree Tej)


||||

Bonding while working on a car 0


0

Cliffhanger endings

0

Different city | (Miami)

“Family” meals 0

“Family” member killed 0

“Family” rescue mission | (Roman goes back to save Brian)

Fight Scene |||

Flashbacks 0

Joining forces against a villain | (VS Carter Verone)

Kidnappings | (Brian’s love interest, Agent Monica Fuentes)

Old friends return | (Roman)

New protagonist 0 (Technically Brian because this is his solo film)

Self-sacrifice 0

Sex scenes 0

Street Race Scene ||

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Content Analysis

Vin Diesel Badass Line 0

The word “family” 0

The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift (3)

Theme Occurrences

Adding a new member to the family ||| (Brand new group – Sean, Twinkie, and Han)


||

Bonding while working on a car | (Twinkie and Sean post-Han death)


0

Cliffhanger endings

0

Different city | (Tokyo)

“Family” meals 0

“Family” member killed | (Han)

“Family” rescue mission 0

Fight Scene ||||

Flashbacks 0

Joining forces against a villain 0

Kidnappings 0

Old friends return | (Dom, technically Han (chronologically))

New protagonist | (Sean)

Self-sacrifice 0

Sex scenes 0

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Content Analysis

Street Race Scene ||||

Vin Diesel Badass Line |

The word “family” |

Fast and Furious (4)

Theme Occurrences

Adding a new member to the family |||| (Han, Cara, Leo, and Santos)


||||

Bonding while working on a car |


|

Cliffhanger endings

| (Mia, Brian, Leo and Santos about to intercept Dom’s prison bus)

Different city | (Chicana, Mexico)


“Family” member killed | (Letty)

“Family” rescue mission | (Family going to save Dom)

Fight Scene |||

Flashbacks ||

Joining forces against a villain | (VS Braga and Phoenix)

Kidnappings 0

Old friends return |||| (Dom, Letty, Mia, Brian, Han)

New protagonist 0

Self-sacrifice ||| (Dom leaving Letty, Dom jumps in front of car for Giselle, Brian leaving police for Dom.)

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Content Analysis

Sex scenes 0

Street Race Scene |

Vin Diesel Badass Line |||| |||| |

The word “family” |

Fast Five (5)

Theme Occurrences

Adding a new member to the family | (Giselle, officially Tej and Roman; also joined forces with Hobbs and Elena)


|||| |||| |||



||

Cliffhanger endings

| (Letty is alive)

Different city I (Rio De Janeiro, Brazil)


“Family” member killed | (Vince)

“Family” rescue mission | (Dom’s rescue from the prison bus)

Fight Scene ||||

Flashbacks |

Joining forces against a villain || (Dom’s team vs Hobbs, and Hobbs and Dom’s teams VS Reyes)

Kidnappings 0

Old friends return | (Vince)

New protagonist 0

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Content Analysis

Self-sacrifice | (Dom telling Brian to go and taking on army of police officers)

Sex scenes 0

Street Race Scene |

Vin Diesel Badass Line |||| |||| ||

The word “family” ||||

Fast and Furious 6 (6)

Theme Occurrences

Adding a new member to the family ||| (Hobbs, Elena + Letty let back in)


|||| |||



|

Cliffhanger endings

| (Owen Shaw’s brother kills Han and comes for Dom and the “family.”)

Different city | (London, England)


“Family” member killed || (Giselle, Han)

“Family” rescue mission | (To rescue Mia from Shaw)

Fight Scene |||| ||||

Flashbacks |||

Joining forces against a villain | (Joined government VS Owen Shaw)

Kidnappings | (Mia)

Old friends return ||| (Letty, Hobbs, Elena)

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Content Analysis

New protagonist 0

Self-sacrifice || (Brian “checks” himself into prison; Dom jumps out of a moving vehicle to save Letty)

Sex scenes | (Mild)

Street Race Scene ||

Vin Diesel Badass Line |||| ||

The word “family” |||| ||

Results in percentage form:

4%

15%

7%

4%

4%

4%

4%4%

7%4%4%

4%

15%

19%

4%

The Fast and the FuriousAdding new members to the family


Bonding over working on a car

Cliché line about going fast

Cliffhanger endings

Different city

Family meals

"Family" member killed

"Family" rescue

Fight Scene

Flashbacks

Joining forces against a villain

Kidnappings

Old friends return

New protagonist

Self-sacrifice

Sex scenes

Street Race Scenes

Vin Diesel badass line

The word family

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Content Analysis

6%

31%

6%6%

19%

6%

6%

6%

13%

2 Fast 2 Furious Adding new members to the family




Cliffhanger endings

Different city

Family meals


"Family" rescue

Fight Scene

Flashbacks


Kidnappings

Old friends return

New protagonist

Self-sacrifice

Sex scenes

Street Race Scenes


The word family

14%

10%

5%

5%

5%

19%5%

5%

24%

5%5%

The Fast and the Furious:TDAdding new members to the family




Cliffhanger endings

Different city

Family meals


"Family" rescue

Fight Scene

Flashbacks


Kidnappings

Old friends return

New protagonist

Self-sacrifice

Sex scenes

Street Race Scenes


The word family

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Content Analysis

9%

12%

2%2%

2%

2%2%

2%2%

7%5%

2%

12%

7%

2%

26%

2%

Fast and Furious Adding new members to the family




Cliffhanger endings

Different city

Family meals


"Family" rescue

Fight Scene

Flashbacks


Kidnappings

Old friends return

New protagonist

Self-sacrifice

Sex scenes

Street Race Scenes


The word family

2%

27%

4%

2%2%

2%2%

2%8%2%4%

2%2%

2%

25%

10%

Fast Five Adding new members to the family




Cliffhanger endings

Different city

Family meals


"Family" rescue

Fight Scene

Flashbacks


Kidnappings

Old friends return

New protagonist

Self-sacrifice

Sex scenes

Street Race Scenes


The word family

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Content Analysis

Part III: Findings

As evidenced by the coding pages, the findings were pretty conclusive. As far as the

overarching direction of the films, they began as movies detailing the excitement of illegal street

racing, and the racers. This was the entire theme of the first and third movies with movie 2 being

more like the later movies, but with a lot more street racing. Starting with the fourth movie the

series went through a “soft reboot.” This means that without completely restarting the franchise,

the old way of the films was thrown out the window and the films became more about

international, high speed crime. It was also brought back after almost 6 years of no activity from

the franchise after the box office failure that was Tokyo Drift.

Curiously enough another thing that happened was that as the movies progressed, (Tokyo

Drift aside, as it was its own spinoff story with entirely different characters) the group grew and

expanded every movie and everybody involved grew close enough to refer to one another as a

family. The plot thickened with every movie and grew more and more grandiose to the point that

this ragtag group of people brought together and led by Dom Toretto (Vin Diesel) and Brian

O’Connor (Paul Walker) took on and destroyed a tank AND a plane with a fleet of cars.

5%

15%

2% 2%2%

2%

4%

2%

18%

5%

2%2%

5%

4%2%

4%

13%

13%

Fast and Furious 6 Adding new members to the family




Cliffhanger endings

Different city

Family meals


"Family" rescue

Fight Scene

Flashbacks


Kidnappings

Old friends return

New protagonist

Self-sacrifice

Sex scenes

Street Race Scenes


The word family

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Content Analysis

When “The Fast and the Furious,” began the family consisted of Dominic Toretto, his

sister Mia, his girlfriend Letty, Vince, Leon, and Jessie. They then welcomed in police officer

Brian O’Connor who would butt heads with Vince and end up falling for Mia. By “2 Fast 2

Furious,” Brian had parted ways from the others following Jessie’s murder and relocated to

Miami where he met his old friends Roman and another friend Tej. Tokyo Drift brought on Sean,

Twinkie, and Han. Unbeknownst to most, Tokyo Drift ended up being the sequel to 4, 5, and 6,

so despite being killed in Tokyo Drift, Han was in the three subsequent movies. “Fast and

Furious,” the fourth entry, set 5 years after the first movie, and bringing back the return of the

original cast, brought on Leo, Santos, and Cara who joined Dom’s crew. (Cara fell into the Fast

and Furious black hole along with Leon, Suki (a girl from 2 Fast), and Sean, (who is set to

appear in 7) and eventually Leo and Santos – none of them were ever heard from or seen again,

with little to no explanation.) “Fast Five” was the first film to call in the “family” to pull off

something big. Roman, Tej, Leo, Santos, and Giselle from “Fast and Furious” were all brought

into the family and together along the family stole $110 million dollars from the country of

Brazil. Due to their expertise, in “Fast and Furious 6” they were joined by Hobbs and Elena who

were enemies of theirs in the previous instalment in order to take down a fellow international

criminal and his fine-tuned team. The stark differences were apparent in the fact that the rival

group was not a family when compared to Dom’s.

Throughout the movies, specifically 5 and 6, with robbing the entire country of Brazil

and taking down an international criminal organization, the group became a true family. They

had family meals, the always had each other’s backs. Their undying loyalty was evident within

all of their self-sacrifice for the good of their friends. They fought together. They fought for each

other. Their motto is “ride or die.” The films became more about family in the later installments

and that can be seen wholly in the simplicity of how many times the word family is uttered in the

later films. It’s mentioned well over four times more in 5 AND 6 respectively.

Family is a lot more than blood. Family is exemplified entirely by the people in these

movies. The results presented in the coding sheets and resulting pie charts should be more than

enough to evidence this truth. Every family is unique and there’s a reason this family has

captured America’s hearts as surely as they have.

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Content Analysis

Zack Reese

Public Relations Director

(716) 345-0915

[email protected]

Reese Incorporated

1234 Hypothetical Avenue April 13, 2015

Buffalo, N.Y. 14222 FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Reese Inc. Releasing Research Analysis

Study Shows how the Fast and the Furious Movies Relate to Familial Traits

Buffalo, N.Y. ---Reese Inc., a local public relations firm will be releasing the results of its latest

research study based on the Fast and the Furious movies Thursday, April 30 at 12 p.m.

The study details a deep look at the first six films in the Fast and the Furious film series and

serves as a cohesive content analysis on what makes a family a family. Looking at different themes

enraptured within the six movies, the study compares and contrasts each film.

The study is described as follows by the corporation: “What constitutes a family exactly? Is it

blood or is it something more? This study will explore that very question by looking at the first six

Fast and Furious movies and breaking down how that “family” grew and what it truly means to be a

family.”

President of the firm, Zack Reese, commented on the study "these movies have become

something of a staple in the country and have seen so much commercial success. As a company we

are constantly thinking of ways to appeal to different publics for our clients and this study undeniably

carries with it knowledge on what a modern day family consists of and how we can appeal to that

demographic."

The study will go live at noon on April 30. The public is welcome and encouraged to read the

study and comment on it as well.

For more information contact Zack Reese at (716) 345-0915 or by email at

[email protected]. You can also visit www.reeseinc.com for news articles and blog posts

about the contents of the study.

#######

Appendix A: News Release Reese Inc.

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Content Analysis

Appendix B: Personal Evaluation

As was the case with many of the projects this semester for 401, this was my first time

writing/conducting a content analysis. I chose this series of movies because they are one of my

favorites and I thought that this idea that a family isn’t just tied together by blood but by a

mutual respect and admiration for one another. The idea that loyalty and the trials you go

through could be thicker than blood was extremely intriguing to me.

Of course, the series is generally about the “family” coming up and succeeding in their

endeavors despite being underdogs, and who doesn’t love a good underdog story? The struggles

they went through to get to where they are further prove my point.

I do believe that this analysis is pretty thorough without being overly so. The themes

weren’t too difficult to choose because I am an avid fan of the series so I knew what to look for,

for what I was researching. The only issue I ran into and I noticed this pretty early on was the

fact that I hadn’t seen movies 1-4 in a really long time so I had forgotten a lot of the things that

happened in these 4 films. I remembered the big events, but most of the smaller stuff was out of

my head. Fortunately this only effected maybe 2 or 3 of the themes out of the twenty. It’s pretty

obvious which one’s those were too. So I suppose if I had a “do-over” I would maybe think more

critically about which factors I chose to capitalize on even though for the most part what I chose

worked out in my favor and served its purpose of bringing the answer to my research question to

fruition.

One thing to note is that it is pretty evident that the people in the entertainment world

would be the most likely candidates to use a content analysis. This type of research is long and

tedious, but nonetheless it would be absolutely beneficial for marketing. This kind of research

would be viable to even analyze current audiences and markets and how they respond to certain

stimuli. It would just make sense to employ the use of something like this.

It was an enjoyable and enlightening experience. A lot of time and effort was put into

making this analysis clear and concise. Along with what was in my coding sheets, I took

additional notes to further solidify my ideas. My coding sheets are of my own creation. I actually

enjoyed that part quite a bit.

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Content Analysis

References

http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/r/richardbac134891.html?src=t_family

Content Analysis (4-8)

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