Evaluation Question 1

 The genre of our film is a mix of thrillers and a teen drama. Our film complies with the basic conventions of the thriller genre as we have an enigma in our film. And a character who seems unable to figure it out.However, unlike real media thrillers our enigma is not properly shown until the end of the film when we see Mullen's email, as well as the protagonist never actually finding out about it.

Genre

The Enigma shown by this is Mullen's reasons for Helping Hugh (the protagonist). the are hints to this throughout the film, the main hint is in the fourth scene during the first therapy session when Hugh tells Mullen about his World of Warcraft character and Mullen is shown to be more interested than before.Another hint is Mullen's unusual insistence that Hugh should destroy the game.

Genre

Our film is consistent with the 'teen drama' genre as the film deals with teenage issues and Focuses on youth Characters. Our film deals with Video game addiction which is seen as a teenage problem as well as relationship problems, which many real media teen dramas focus on.

Genre consistency

If we apply Rick Altman's 'pleasure of Genre theory to our film our film them the main pleasure id emotional pleasure, this is achieved with the reconciliation between Hugh and Gemma at the end of our film. our film also gives intellectual puzzles as there is an unexpected surprise at the end when it is revealed that Mullen is not only addicted to the game as well but is also the best player who's score Hugh was trying to beat.

Genre theory in our film

Although our film contradicts the normal view of gaming addiction as a teenage problem but our film shows Mullen being addicted to World of Warcraft, showing that adults can be addicted to games as well as teenagers, which is uncommon in real media films.

Inconsistencies with normal social views

Our film consists Exactly with Tzvetan Todorov's theory of narrative structure. Our film contains all five stages of the theory. In our film the original Equilibrium is shown in the first scene where Hugh is with his friend and is not yet addicted and happy. The significant event of the second stage is Hugh becoming addicted to the game and pushing Gemma. the third stage recognition happens after Hugh has hit Gemma. We see Hugh taking action when he goes to see Mullen for therapy in the fourth scene. the final stage is in the sixth scene when Hugh reconciles with Gemma, the Equilibrium is not the same as it is obvious that the relationship is not the same as it was before.

Applying narrative theory to our film:Tzevetan Todorov

Left to right: images from our film showing Todorov’s narrative theory from start to finish

Our film can be seen as postmodern in terms of Levi Strauss’s Theory of Binary opposites as there is no clear good vs. evil theme. Our film can also be considered postmodern as the ending is very ambiguous in whether or not Mullen is a complete villain or not, as we do not confirm if the only reason that Mullen helped Hugh was because he wanted retain his position as the best player in the game, or if he actually cared about helping Hugh. This means that our film further contradicts Strauss’s theory as Strauss stated that a film needs an unambiguous ending and must have a clear binary opposite, neither of which our film has.

Applying narrative theory to our film:Levi Strauss

We used similar technical methods to real life media products in our film:Like in real media texts we filmed on location to increase the verisimilitude of our movie. We also opened scenes with a long shot to set the scene and then change to shot reverse shot close-ups and medium shots for the dialogue. We also used hand held shots for the more dramatic scenes like the argument between Gemma and Hugh.

Technical Stuff